The Obama-Romney tussle on outsourcing in India, China

Washington: US President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden on Tuesday went full blast against Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, accusing him of outsourcing American jobs to countries like India and China.

"There was an article the other day in The Washington Post about how Romney's former firm -- you know, -- was a pioneer in offshoring jobs to China and India," Obama said at an election rally in Atlanta, Georgia.

The city, incidentally, is the headquarters of the soft-drink giant Coca Cola, which a day earlier had announced massive investment in India.

"When they were asked about it, some of his advisers explained... there's a difference between offshoring and outsourcing. I'm not kidding. That's what they said. Those workers who lost their jobs, they didn't understand the difference," Obama said.

Biden alleged that Massachusetts Governor Romney signed a USD 160,000 a month contract that paid people abroad to help poor people in Massachusetts get food stamps.

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"So give Mitt Romney credit: He is a job creator. In Singapore, China and India," Biden said during an election campaign remarks in Waterloo, Iowa.

"And when the Massachusetts legislature passed a bill saying you could not outsource state contracts overseas... he vetoed it," he said.

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Meanwhile, Romney too launched counter attack by alleging that the Obama administration has failed to create jobs in the country.

"This president is out of ideas, and he's out of excuses, and in November we're going to vote him out of office," he said during an election rally in Virginia.

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Romney alleged that the Obama Administration has not had any new agreements to open up markets for American goods.

"I will go to work to open up markets and make sure we trade with them on a fair and free basis. And by the way, when they cheat as China has cheated, stealing intellectual property, our patents, our designs, our know-how, our brand names, I will crack down on them. The president has said he would. He didn't. I will. We'll get good jobs by trading around the world fairly," he said amidst applause.

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"One thing that frightens people who are thinking of investing here with capital and building new businesses and start-ups of all kinds is they wonder whether the dollar is going to be worth anything down the road because of all these deficits we're running up, trillion-dollar deficits every year," he said.