Lima, Ohio (CNN) – David Axelrod described the message coming from President Barack Obama days before Election Day as "coming from his loins."
"I've never seen him more exhilarated than he is right now. He believes in what he's doing. He believes in what he's fighting for," Axelrod told reporters Friday after the president's event in Lima, Ohio. "You can see in the speech that he's delivering that this is coming from his loins."
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"I just wanted to say loins," the president's senior adviser added with a smirk. "I wanted to see if I can get loins in the story."
Axelrod's comments followed Obama's third campaign event of the day in Ohio, the latest example of the emphasis Team Obama is putting on the state.
The auto bailout is something the president cites as a major first term accomplishment. It has taken center stage here after TV and radio ads from Mitt Romney's campaign criticized the president over saving companies that are now expanding in China. Obama's campaign and auto CEOs have pushed back hard against the charge that Jeep (owned by Chrysler) and GM are now shipping jobs overseas, a message Axelrod perpetuated.
Axelrod said the ads were slipped on Ohio residents "like a thief in the night," and that Romney "got caught." He described the spot as a "risk" for the Romney campaign, necessary because of their precarious path to 270 electoral votes.
"It backfired horribly," Axelrod said.
"A few ads at the end of a campaign isn't a campaign," senior adviser David Plouffe, standing next to Axelrod, told reporters.
Plouffe, exuding electoral confidence, called recent efforts by the Romney campaign in Pennsylvania "fairytale" and said the auto ad will only serve as a reminder of the president's steps to rescue the industry, which provides a significant number of jobs in the Buckeye State.
An "utterly confident" Axelrod said come Tuesday, the Romney campaign "will be left to wonder why the mythical wave never came."