I think I’m finally starting to understand how this works: Anything that can or does go wrong, any continued bumps in the road, it’s a problem the Obama administration “inherited” from the “previous administration.” Anything that might go the tiniest bit right, it’s all to President Obama’s credit. Huh — quite the logical dichotomy they’ve got there, amiright? Click the image to watch, via RCP:

Stephanie Cutter: Well, if you looked what the Vice President said and what he’s been saying on the campaign trail is that the middle class has been buried by the exact same policies that Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan want to go back to. You shouldn’t be cutting taxes for those at the top and ask the middle class to pay for it. …

Joe Scarborough: I’ve been a little bit distracted with baseball over the past four years. Who’s been President since 2009? …I mean, you can’t blame the last four years on George W. Bush can you?

Cutter: We’re absolutely not doing that. In fact, we’re taking credit for the 5.1 million private sector jobs that have been created over the past four years despite being handed the worst economy since the Great Depression. We’re taking credit for the million jobs that were protected under the President’s efforts to save the auto industry or increasing manufacturing jobs for the first time in decades. So absolutely, we’re not blaming, you know, our predecessor by any means. But we don’t think we should return to the same policies that crash the economy.

But, but — that’s exactly what you just did! With unemployment still above 8 percent (and only because the labor force participation rate has dropped so precipitously) and practically stagnant economic growth, you’re still pinning it on “being handed the worst economy since the Great Depression.” And, really enough is enough with the damned lie that Romney/Ryan preventing tax hikes on the wealthy would somehow come on the backs of the middle class, and that across-the-board tax cuts were somehow the actual cause of the financial recession. How are they even able to peddle this brazen rubbish with a straight face?

I realize Team Obama doesn’t really have a choice other than trying to spin all these negatives into either positives or not-my-faults, but really, they should maybe try and keep their messaging straight.