NBC News takes a deep dive into the statements made by President Barack Obama and Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney in their second debate of the 2012 election cycle. 

We take a look at two topics, the auto bailout and energy production, and put their comments to the test.

Oil and gas production on federal lands
Romney claimed that both oil and natural gas production on federal land has decreased, with Obama maintaining that the Republican’s assertions are “ just not true.”

Here’s their contentious exchange:

ROMNEY: As a matter of fact, oil production is down 14 percent each year on federal land and gas production is down 9 percent. Why?  because the president cut in half the number of licenses and permits for drilling on federal land and in federal water.
OBAMA: Here's what happened. You had a whole bunch of oil companies who had leases on public lands that they weren't using. So what we said was, you can't just sit on this for 10, 20, 30 years, decide when you want to drill, when you want to produce, when it's most profitable for you. These are public lands. So if you want to drill on public lands, you use it or you lose it.  
ROMNEY: OK –  (inaudible) –
OBAMA: And so what we did was take away – 
ROMNEY: That's –
OBAMA: –  those leases, and we are now re-letting them so that we can actually make a profit. 
ROMNEY: And  – and –  and production on private –  on government lands is down. 
OBAMA: And the production is up. No it isn't. 
ROMNEY: Production on government land of oil is down 14 percent. 
OBAMA: Governor –  
ROMNEY: And production of gas is down 9 percent.  
OBAMA: What you're saying is just not true. It's just not true.
ROMNEY: I  –  it's absolutely true. 

What’s the truth? Oil production did fall by 14 percent on federal lands - onshore and offshore -  but that was only in one year, from 2010 to 2011.

And it was mainly the result of fallout from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.

But Obama is correct, that since he took office, oil production on federal lands is up.

RELATED: Sharp exchanges at second debate

In both 2009 and 2010, oil production increased ... so even with the 14 percent drop last year, overall production on federal land is still up 10.6 percent since 2008. 

But natural gas production on federal lands is down, and has been declining since 2003, according to the Energy Information Administration, mainly because of a decline in offshore natural gas drilling. 

Charles Dharapak / AP

President Barack Obama and Republican presidential candidate and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney participate in the second presidential debate at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y.

Auto bailout
Obama called out Romney for not backing measures to save troubled car companies – the former Massachusetts governor opposed the federal bailout.

VOTE: Did the second presidential debate do anything to influence who you will support in the election?

"Now when Gov. Romney said we should let Detroit go bankrupt. I said we're going to bet on American workers and the American auto industry and it's come surging back."

The president was referring to a newspaper piece Romney wrote back in 2008, but the governor never actually said, “Let Detroit go bankrupt.”

The New York Times wrote that headline, not Gov. Romney. 

Romney did say the auto companies should go through what’s called a “managed bankruptcy,” where the companies would get help from private investors but not taxpayers’ money.

Slideshow: On the campaign trail

Reuters, Getty Images

In the final push in the 2012 presidential election, candidates Mitt Romney and Barack Obama make their last appeals to voters.

Launch slideshow

ABINGDON, VA -- Mitt Romney downplayed the importance of new, positive jobs data released Friday, telling a crowd of supporters here in rural Virginia the drop in the unemployment rate had more to do with workers dropping out of the labor force than with any real expansion of hiring.

"There were fewer new jobs created this month than last month," Romney said of today's report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics which showed 114,000 jobs created in September, and revised the August number up to 142,000 new jobs.

Steve Helber / AP

Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney gestures during a rally in Abingdon, Va., Friday, Oct. 5, 2012.

The Republican presidential nominee's tack broke from a now-monthly tradition of seizing on weak employment reports to portray President Barack Obama as ineffective in turning around a struggling US economy, Mitt Romney downplayed the importance of today's more positive labor data,

"The unemployment rate as you noted this year has come down very, very slowly, but it’s come down none the less.  The reason it’s come down this year is primarily due to the fact that more and more people have just stopped looking for work," Romney continued. "If the same share of people were participating in the workforce today as on the day the president got elected, our unemployment rate would be around 11 percent. That’s the real reality of what’s happening out there."

Recommended: Obama uses positive jobs report to make case against Romney

The report from the Bureau of Labor statistics shows workforce participation remained essentially flat in September, at around 64 percent, with an uptick in workers who took part time jobs for economic reasons, such as not being able to get full time employment. Updward-revised jobs numbers from July and August also contributed to the lower jobless rate.

While workforce participation has generally declined over the course of the past four years, workforce participation actually inched upward last month – meaning a drop in those seeking work wasn’t directly attributable to the lower unemployment rate last month.

But if the jobs report itself was a secondary focus in Romney's remarks today, the economy was once again front and center, with Romney telling some 3,300 supporters gathered here that he could grow the economy faster than Obama, and promising brighter economic days ahead.

"My priority is creating jobs," Romney said. "I’ll help small business do that, with everything I can do. Now we can do better. We don’t have to stay on the path we’ve been on. We can do better."

"When I’m president of the United States – that unemployment rate is going to come down not because people are giving up and dropping out of the workforce but because we’re creating more jobs," Romney said later. "I will create jobs and get America working again!" 

The Obama campaign challenged Romney economic plans in a statement released shortly after the event concluded.

"In fact, independent economists say his plans would not create jobs, could slow the recovery, and could actually cost us two million jobs over the next two years. The American people want to move forward, not back,” Obama campaign spokesperson Lis Smith wrote.

HOBBS, NM -- Mitt Romney returned to oil country this morning to sell his new energy plan, setting a goal of reaching North American energy independence by 2020 in large part by removing regulatory barriers to fossil fuel development in the United States, and increasing cooperation with fellow energy-producers Canada and Mexico.

"I will set a national goal of America and North America -- North American energy independence by 2020," Romney pledged. "That means we produce all the energy we use in North America. And there are a number of things I'm going to do to make that happen. It is achievable. This is not some pie in the sky kind of thing. This is a real, achievable objective."

Evan Vucci / AP

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney speaks during a campaign event at Watson Truck and Supply Aug. 23.

Romney's plan, laid out in a white paper and conference call with reporters last night, calls for streamlining the permit process for energy development on federal lands and offshore, for building infrastructure like the Keystone Pipeline, and supporting basic research on next-generation fuels like wind and solar, while abandoning subsidies and loan guarantees that, Romney argues, have tilted the marketplace in favor of those energy sources.

With the plan largely fleshed out before Romney's remarks, the candidate took on the role of chief salesman for his plan today, telling a crowd of a few hundred supporters here there would be ancillary benefits to boosting domestic energy production beyond lowering energy prices at home.

"Three million jobs come back to this country by taking advantage of something we have right underneath our feet, that’s oil and gas and coal, we’re going to make it happen we’re going to create those jobs," Romney said.

"Let me tell you what else it does," Romney continued "It adds $500 billion to the size of our economy. That’s more good wages, that’s an opportunity for more Americans to have a bright and prosperous future. It also means by the way tens of billions, potentially hundreds of billions of dollars of tax revenues going into states and the federal government, which can make sure we have a military second to none and schools that lead the world and care for our seniors, better roads and bridges."

Romney also argued that becoming less dependent on unstable or hostile regimes for energy increases America's national security.

"This is not just a matter of economy and jobs and rising incomes and the growing economy and more tax revenues. It’s also more security. It means we don’t have to rely on people who in some cases don’t like us very much," Romney said.

Democrats responded to Romney's remarks with a statement.

"He will embrace a backward, drilling-focused energy policy that prioritizes subsidies and tax breaks for the big oil and gas companies and leaves behind efforts to increase energy efficiency and develop homegrown alternative energy," Obama campaign spokesperson Lis Smith wrote in a statement to reporters. "This isn’t a recipe for energy independence; it’s just another irresponsible scheme to help line the pockets of big oil while allowing the U.S. to fall behind and cede the clean energy sector to China."

Romney's choice of venue for publicly unveiling his plan raises some questions about his campaign strategy. The presumptive GOP nominee had not previously campaigned or run television ads in New Mexico, and while the state ranks 6th in oil production, according to government assessments, it is not considered a swing state. President Obama carried the state in 2008, and NBC's current battleground map, debuted this morning, places it in squarely in the "Lean Democratic" category.

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – With just one week until Mitt Romney takes the stage at the GOP convention in Tampa, his campaign rolled out the candidate's energy policy -- one that they hope illustrates stark differences with President Obama, and which excites middle class voters looking for an economic boost.

The Romney policy, spelled out in a white paper and on a conference call with reporters on Wednesday, focuses on developing domestic fossil fuels like oil, gas and coal - in large part by shifting federal responsibilities to the states, and by expanding exploration and production nationwide. Romney will outline the policy in oil-rich New Mexico on Thursday.

Romney's plan would make states the custodian of energy production on federal lands within their borders and allow them to implement their own federally-approved leasing practices. Such a move would effectively shift responsibility for permitting, leasing and environmental regulation to states, with the hope of speeding energy development by cutting red tape.

Romney's plan calls for reaching North American energy independence by 2020, primarily through expansion of traditional fossil fuels. The United States is currently the world's third largest oil producer, which Romney would hope to expand. The U.S. also currently imports more than half its oil from countries in the Western Hemisphere, with Canada making up a 29-percent share. Those imports could be increased through greater cooperation and by the immediate approval of the Keystone XL pipeline, and similar projects.

"The challenge in getting there is not about the resources we have, it’s not about the technology we have, it’s about the government that we have," said Oren Cass, Romney's domestic policy director. "And the real question is are we going to pursue the political reforms that will allow us to develop the resources to their fullest?"

Those reforms will also include greenlighting increased offshore drilling, slowed after 2009's BP oil spill disaster, particularly off the coasts of Virginia and North Carolina where Romney's advisers argue there is already widespread support for increased offshore drilling.

"One of the things that's detailed here in the policy under the offshore section is to establish the most aggressive leasing plan ever put forward, as compared to President Obama's, which was the least aggressive ever put forward," Cass told reporters.

The GOP challenger's plan pays little attention to renewable fuels like wind and solar power, long championed by Democrats, including Obama, who has touted green jobs creation as a major part of his own economic and energy plans.

Romney's plan, in contrast, includes continued research support for alternative fuels, but would have wind and solar generation succeed or fail on their own, without government subsidies or loan guarantees, a politically unpopular position in some wind and solar producing states like Iowa and Colorado, but one Romney's advisers said they believed could be overcome by the overall economic benefits of their plan.

President Obama makes a similar argument about continued oil industry tax subsidies, arguing that the highly profitable major oil companies don't need the tax breaks, the extension of which is supported by Romney.

Romney is expected to further outline his energy plan in remarks later today in New Mexico, the sixth largest oil producing state in the country, pumping roughly 3-percent of the nation's oil on an annual basis, according to the Energy Information Administration.

BEALLSVILLE, OH -- Mitt Romney accused President Obama of declaring a "war on coal" here in the heart of eastern Ohio's mining territory.

Flanked by an army of miners and their families near the border with West Virginia, the presumptive GOP nominee said Obama was being deceptive about his policies toward fossil fuel. In this energy-rich and politically important part of the state, Romney renewed his call for achieving energy independence by the end of his second term.

"This is a time for truth. If you don’t believe in coal, if you don’t believe in energy independence for America then say it," Romney said. "If you believe that the whole answer for our energy needs is wind and solar why say that.  Because I know he says that to some audiences out west. But it’s time to tell the people of America what you believe."

The Obama campaign pushed back against the charge from Romney, accusing him of ignoring his own record of pushing for tighter emissions regulations on coal power plants as Governor of Massachusetts.

“Only one candidate in this race actually has a record of finding a clean future for coal and that’s President Obama. President Obama has increased investments in the research and development of clean coal technology and employment in the mining industry hit a 15-year high in 2011," Obama spokesperson Lis Smith said in a statement. "This stands in stark contrast to Mitt Romney, who, as governor of Massachusetts, spoke out against coal jobs and said that a coal-fired plant 'kills people.' This is just another issue where Mitt Romney is not being honest with the American people”

Obama spoke simultaneously in Iowa about wind power, putting energy production in Tuesday's campaign spotlight.

Romney asked supporters to focus on the president's policies and ignore the rhetoric, even while ratcheting up his own words toward the president in an effort to win support from the mostly white, blue-collar community here -- a hotly contested demographic whose support could decide this critical swing state.

"He said if he’s elected president and his policies get put in place the cost of energy would skyrocket. That’s one [promise] he’s kept. He also said you can go out and build a new coal plant if you want but if you do you’ll go bankrupt. That’s another promise he’s intent on keeping," Romney said. "His vice president said coal is more dangerous than terrorists. Can you imagine that?" Romney asked the crowd, many of whom booed in response.

To that end, Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH), who until last week was considered by many political observers a favorite to be selected as Romney's vice president, introduced the GOP contender here in what he said looked like "Romney country" and played up the rural background of Romney's running mate Paul Ryan, a hunter and fisherman who he called "smart," "articulate," and "a Midwesterner who shares our values."

Romney concluded his remarks here with a rare call-to-action, urging the coal miners here in attendance to spark a conversation with their friends and colleagues and ask them to support the Republican ticket.

"I want you to use your own words to convince one person," Romney asked. "If you could do that every day I would win, but if you could just do it once a month I'd probably win as well. This is a place where we can spread out the message that you're hearing today and say you know what? America is back."

OSKALOOSA, IA – President Obama seemed to reference the infamous tale of the Romney family dog riding on the roof of the presumptive GOP nominee's car for most of a road trip during an extended riff here on wind energy.

Criticizing Mitt Romney’s opposition to wind energy production tax credits, Obama also went personal, bringing up an anecdote about a Romney family vacation.

Obama mocked what he said was Romney’s wind energy policy, quoting him from a March 6 speech in Zanesville, Ohio when he said, “you can’t drive a car with a windmill on it.”

“That’s what he said about wind power,” Obama told about 850 supporters standing outside a classic, American flag-bedecked farmhouse at the Nelson Pioneer Farm Museum here.

“Now, I don’t know if he’s actually tried that. I know he’s had other things on his car,” Obama said as the crowd applauded, understanding the reference.

Liberal critics and Democratic groups supporting the president have pounced on the Seamus story to criticize Romney's character, suggesting Romney is insensitive, but this is the first time the president himself has referenced it himself. (Obama aides have previously invoked the story.)

But after the quick Seamus allusion, the president went right back to accusing Romney of not understanding the importance of wind energy in Iowa.

“If he wants to learn something about wind, all he’s got to do is pay attention to what you’ve been doing here in Iowa,” the president said, noting that the wind industry now supports 7,000 jobs in Iowa.

And new statistics from a Department of Energy report on wind power, which the president referred to Tuesday, also reflect the importance of wind as a policy and political issue: it’s one of the top two states when it comes to in-state wind energy generation, generating 18.8 percent in 2011, second only to South Dakota.

“If [Romney] knew what you’ve been doing, he’d know that 20 percent of Iowa’s electricity now runs on wind,” Obama said to applause. “Powering our homes and our factories, and our businesses in a way that is clean and renewable.”

In a statement the Romney campaign said Obama's Seamus reference showed that the president "will do anything to distract from his abysmal record."

"After sanctimoniously complaining about making a 'big election about small things,' President Obama continues to embarrass himself and diminish his office with un-presidential behavior," campaign spokesman Ryan Williams said in a statement. 

After a series of local interviews here, the president heads to campaign events in Marshalltown and Waterloo, continuing to wind his way east through the state.

Republicans have latched onto a new report about the defunct solar panel maker Solyndra, in an attempt to ding the Obama White House for embarking on a fool's errand with its green energy initiatives and engaging in cronyism when one of its biggest investments took a turn for the worse.

Solyndra has been on the tongues of conservatives -- including Mitt Romney, who staged a surprise press conference out of the company's former headquaters in May -- for months. And they feel that a new report released this week by Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee only strengthens their case against the incumbent administration.

Republicans' central narrative is this: the White House anxiously approved $535 million in loan guarantees for Solyndra -- a company with a principal investor who was a major fundraiser for President Barack Obama -- as part of its green energy program. And, the GOP contends, when Solyndra started to struggle, the Department of Energy restructured its loans despite misgivings from the Office of Management and Budget.

In a series of emails obtained and published by the committee and written during the initial approval process for the loans, one OMB staff member writes of the pressure to finish its review of the Solyndra loan.

"It's based on pressure from the VP's office," another OMB staffer wrote in response. "[The Department of Energy] would like to schedule the closing for tomorrow, and [Energy Secretary Steven] Chu will be in CA and [Vice President Biden] by video link for Friday announcement."

A Democratic report issued Thursday by the minority staff of the Energy and Commerce Committee acknowledged that the White House was certainly interested in an "expeditious decision" on the loans -- but mostly because Solyndra was the first major loan guarantee of the program.

But, Democrats contend, there is no evidence that this pressure influenced the ultimate decision to offer Solyndra a guarantee. Moreover, Democrats said in their dissenting report that White House officials told investigators that they weren't aware of any involvement in Solyndra by political fundraisers until it was first raised by Republicans.

The White House said Thursday, too, that the Republican-led inquiry was about little more than politics.

"I did see these reports, and what it points out is, yet again, proof positive that none of the accusations that the Republicans have made about this particular loan have turned out to be true -- that this was a merit-based decision," White House press secretary said in a gaggle Thursday aboard Air Force One. "What we knew then we still know, and this is a 18-month, costly investigation that only highlights the fact that Congress is not doing what it should do to help the American people."

The Republican report produced no hard evidence of malfeasance in the Obama administration's management of Solyndra, but the mere appearance of impropriety has fed into a narrative about transparency and waste that the GOP has sought to advance.

"When President Obama claimed government helped build businesses, he must have been thinking about his failed attempt to prop up Solyndra," Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul said Friday in an email to reporters. "But after half a billion in wasted taxpayer dollars and nearly 2,000 unemployed workers, it’s clear the only people who lost on President Obama’s Solyndra gamble were American taxpayers."

In particular, Republicans have highlighted a portion of the emails contained within the same GOP report detailing the cost to taxpayers if the government restructured Solyndra's loans, or rather, let the company liquidate.

An energy official wrote in early January of 2011 that the expected loss under liquidation would be $141 million versus an expected loss of $385 million under a loan restructuring.

Democrats argue, though, that the Solyndra loan wasn't imprudent in the way Republicans would make it seem, and that the process to restructure the loan was the process of usual internal administration deliberation. Besides, Democrats contend, Solyndra might not have had to file for bankruptcy if it weren't for a sudden influx onto the market of cheaper Chinese alternatives.

But Republicans aren't likely to let go of Solyndra as an issue during this campaign. The June NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll found that Americans who were familiar with the company had a negative impression of it. Two percent of respondents in the June poll said they had a positive impression of Solyndra, versus 24 percent who said they had a negative opinion of the failed company. But 59 percent of respondents said in mid-June that they were unfamiliar with the company.

GOP officials also said that Solyndra tests particularly well in data they’ve collected, especially as individuals are exposed to more information about its difficulties and the government's support for the company.

The bet is that if Obama and Solyndra are tethered together in voters' minds, it will benefit Romney come election day.

"Let’s look at the results. Today, Staples employs roughly 90,000 people," the presumptive GOP presidential nominee said Friday in Nevada, referencing the office supplies company that Bain Capital helped support during his time in charge.

"And Solyndra, I think you know how many people it employs," Romney added.

Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney has laid out a first term agenda that is nothing short of ambitious, outlining a list of priorities that would require him to marshal a near-impossible amount of political capital to achieve.

"What the court did not do on its last day in session, I will do on my first day if elected president of the United States. And that is I will act to repeal ‘ObamaCare,’" Romney said Thursday in Washington, adding to his portfolio the politically thorny pledge to undo President Obama’s health reform law.

Jonathan Ernst / Reuters

Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney gives his reaction to the Supreme Court's upholding key parts of President Barack Obama's signature healthcare overhaul law in Washington June 28, 2012.

The list of promises Romney has made for his first term is extensive. His two “Day One” ads outline other policies the former Massachusetts governor would put in motion on his first day:

• Seeking tax cuts and deficit reduction,
• Approving the Keystone XL oil pipeline,
• Issuing more aggressive strictures for trade with China,
• And seeking the repeal of “job-killing regulations” (the financial regulatory reform bill, Dodd-Frank, is an example Romney mentions frequently on the campaign trail)

More substantially, Romney has promised to seek some type of comprehensive immigration reform – an accomplishment that has escaped both Obama and President George W. Bush – in his first year in office.

"In my first year I will make sure we actually do take on immigration, we secure our border, we make sure that we grow legal immigration in a way that provides people here with skill and expertise that we want," Romney said at a fundraiser earlier this week.

All this is on top of lofty expectations Romney’s set for himself on the economy; he said in May that an unemployment rate above 4 percent is “not cause for celebration.”

“It's going to be busy,” deadpanned a House Republican leadership aide, speaking of Romney’s agenda.

Presidential candidates are not typically modest in their election year promises.

Obama, as a candidate in 2008, made a number of promises that haven’t made their way to fulfillment. Romney has been eager to highlight, for instance, the president’s inability to accomplish comprehensive immigration reform.

And to Romney’s credit, despite the criticism the presumptive Republican nominee has weathered for offering few specifics about his first-term agenda, his first term proposals seem to outpace Obama’s ambitions for his second.

Romney, like Obama and any number of candidates entering their first term as president, might encounter a stark reality. Governing is about as easy as herding cats, and that process isn’t helped by the glacial pace on Capitol Hill.

First Thoughts: Ending the month on a high note

Presidents often enjoy a “honeymoon” in which they’re able to advance a major element of their platform. Bush got education reform and his signature tax cuts; Obama got his stimulus bill.

And that’s to assume, the Republicans maintain control of the House and take over the Senate – in which case, prospective Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) would be tasked with convincing a non-trivial number of Democrats to join the GOP in advancing Romney’s agenda.

Romney could seek the repeal of health care as his first priority, something he might accomplish by using the process of budget reconciliation. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) suggested Friday on “Morning Joe” that Republicans could use this tactic, which allows the Senate to approve legislation with a simple majority of votes, to gut the heart of Obama’s law.

But even if this were to be achievable practically, it would be a bloody fight on which Romney would have to spend considerable political capital.

“He comes into office, and Day One is getting your secretary of State or secretary of Treasury confirmed!” said former Delaware Sen. Ted Kaufman (D), who long served as an aide in the chamber before succeeding Joe Biden in the chamber, of a new president’s traditional to-do list.

“You’re just going to declare war on the Democrats from the first day you get into office?” Kaufman said. “Obama didn’t do that, and he had 60 votes.”

There are always foreign policy crises and the unexpected issues – like 2010’s oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico – that can divert from the business of governing.

“If the Democratic leadership wants to criticize a President Romney for fulfilling his promises, it's not something that's going to play well with voters,” said the House Republican aide, evaluating the broad range of issues Romney has promised to advance.

On some of those issues, too, Romney is boxed in politically. Republicans in Congress have so frequently voted to repeal the president’s health care law – the next vote is set for July 11 – in part because they made it a cornerstone of their 2010 campaign.

“If Romney is to win, that's a major part of what he's run on,” the GOP aide said of Romney’s vow to repeal the law. “Despite protestations from Democrats, some of whom will vote for repeal, that A) depoliticizes it, but B) is also part of why he's running.”

But Romney will also have to reckon with the so-called “fiscal cliff” – the cocktail of expiring tax cuts, automated spending cuts and necessary extension of the nation’s debt ceiling – early in his term, unless Congress were to reach a deal in its lame-duck session, an unlikely prospect.

 “You may be critical of Obama – why’d he use up all of his mojo on health care reform?” Kaufman noted. “You’re going to need mojo just to get a debt limit vote and figure out what we’re doing on the Bush tax cut.”

Even after all of this has been addressed, even in the best case scenario for Romney, in which the GOP controls both chambers, he’ll be dealing with a Congress that prides itself on regular order. Romney has prepared few detailed plans or pieces of legislation to drop on Capitol Hill’s doorstep; in fact, when asked earlier this month on CBS about which tax exemptions he’d kill to finance tax reform, Romney said he’d “go through that process with Congress.”

That process can be lengthy, though, and force any president to prioritize agenda items. And congressional Republicans are cognizant of that.

“It's something that could be moved through a process,” the GOP aide said of Romney’s immigration reform plans. “Does it end up at a president's desk? That remains to be seen. Things that are comprehensive take a long time.”

FREMONT, CA -- Mitt Romney decried what he said was the Obama administration's economic failures and cronyism outside the headquarters of a defunct company that Republicans have upheld as the very symbol of those shortcomings.

The presumptive presidential nominee stood for an impromptu press conference outside the headquarters of Solyndra, the now-bankrupt solar energy company that had been the beneficiary of a federal loan, which, Republicans contend, was doled out as a political favor.

"It's a symbol not of success but of failure. It's also a symbol of a serious conflict of interest," Romney said outside the headquarters, a destination which wasn't made public until the last possible minute, even to the traveling press corps that cover the former Massachusetts governor.

"An independent inspector general looked at this investment and concluded that the administration had steered money to friends and family - to campaign contributors," Romney said, referring to a series of loans which backstopped the company and would have paid investors back before taxpayers. "This building, this half a billion dollar taxpayer investment, represents a serious conflict of interest on the part of the president and his team."

The bankrupt company's opulent headquarters, long a target of Romney's derision on the stump, made for a powerful visual backdrop as Romney lambasted what he said was the company -- and the president's -- failings.

"It's also a symbol of how the president thinks about free enterprise," Romney continued. "Free enterprise to the president means taking money from the taxpayers and giving it freely to his friends."

The appearance came amid a battle over optics between the Romney and Obama campaigns that literally stretched the continent.

In Boston this morning, the senior strategist for the president's re-election, David Axelrod, rallied other supporters of Obama's on the steps of the Massachusetts statehouse to decry Romney's lone term as governor. Axelrod had intended to highlight what he said were Romney's broken promises as governor, though that message was muddled as a Romney campaign aide gathered supporters to heckle Axelrod, drawing the Chicago Democrat into an exchange over their jeers.

"Romney economics didn't work then and it won't work now," Axelrod said over the boos of the pro-Romney crowd.

Here in Fremont, a reporter asked Romney about the guerrilla tactics employed by his campaign.

"Many of the events I go to, there are large groups of, if you will, Obama supporters there heckling me. And at some point you say, you know what, sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. If they’re going to be heckling us, why we’re not going to sit back and play by very different rules," Romney said. "If the president is going to have his people coming to my rallies, and heckling, why, we’ll show them that, you know, we conservatives have the same kind of capacity he does."

But amid the campaign trail antics, Romney also took a moment to address the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Syria following a massacre this past weekend leading to the deaths of 100 civilians. Romney has repeatedly urged U.S. allies in the region, including Turkey and Saudi Arabia, to arm anti-government rebels and provide other aid necessary to remove the Assad regime from power.

Romney called the coordinated expulsion of Syrian diplomats by the United States and other allies "of course the right thing to do," but also a "very small matter in something as significant as the course of Syria."

"I hope we understand that Syria and what's going on there is a a ray of sunshine in the Middle East because you have a very dangerous tyrant, who has allied his country with Iran, which is seeking to become a dominant power in the middle east," Romney said.

"Syria is the headquarters of Hamas in the middle east. It is Iran's only Arab ally. Syria is the route for arming Hezbollah in Lebanon. It is important to see a change in leadership in Syria," Romney continued, adding that the peace plan implemented there by former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan was not"advancing in the way I think we could be advancing," and calling on President Obama to take a greater leadership role in resolving the crisis.

NBC's Garrett Haake

Mitt Romney (R) on the campaign press bus heading to the former site of the company Solyndra.

UPDATED AT 3 PM ET

FREMONT, CA -- When Mitt Romney arrived at the gates of the bankrupt solar energy company Solyndra this afternoon, he didn't do it before cheering supporters or backed by a large coterie of staff.

He pulled up on the press bus with the rest of his traveling media contingent.

Romney's staff, fearful, they said, of being blocked by the administration from holding an event here, kept the location of today's press conference secret, even from the press who cover the candidate.

On Wednesday, reporters who cover the candidate were told to get themselves from Las Vegas to San Francisco for an "event" in the bay area on Thursday. No other details were given, except to be ready at a hotel parking lot early this morning.

Professionally curious, the Romney press corps set about cracking the secret code of the event and breaking the story.

"I've got nothing for ya," one aide told NBC.

"Sorry, can't help you," replied another Romney staffer via email, complete with a frowny face emoticon.

And so it was this morning, when 31 members of the national and local press boarded a bus in the parking lot of the Holiday Inn Express, armed only with educated guesses – no reportable confirmation – that Romney was headed to Solyndra.

Message discipline, and an inner circle that sees leaks as treasonous, won this round.

The secrecy, one top aide explained, was to prevent the Obama administration blocking the event from taking place. The aide did not explain how that might happen.

The aide also said the campaign did not fear protesters disrupting the event, as pro-Romney protesters and staff did to Obama senior adviser David Axelrod this morning at an event on the steps of the statehouse in Boston.

Then, Romney boarded the bus.

Beyond a cursory wave and good morning, he didn't chat with the press, but rode in relative silence with a small group of aides and a few Secret Service agents surrounding him in the front of the bus.

Romney was asked why the event -- which ultimately lasted only about 10 minutes on a Nimitz Highway median -- was kept so secret. He offered a somewhat conspiratorial answer.

"I think there are people who don’t want to see this event occur, don’t want to have questions asked about this particular investment, don’t want to have people delve into the idea that the president took a half-a-billion dollars of taxpayer money and devoted it to an enterprise that was owned in large measure by his campaign contributors," Romney said.

This is the former Massachusetts governor's first trip to Solyndra, but he regularly highlights its failing, despite support from governmental loans, in his stump speeches and fundraisers.

Forget a president's first 100 days. Mitt Romney's first television ad of the general election, "Day One," comes as close as anything in describing the most urgent priorities of a President Romney upon taking office.

The ad is running in five swing states, and the presumptive GOP nominee's campaign is putting $1.3 million behind it; a Spanish-language analog is running in North Carolina, with a much smaller ad buy behind it.

Nonetheless, Romney's ad is meant to drive a three-point plan: 1. Approve the Keystone Pipeline, 2. Introduce tax reform, and 3. Begin dismantling and replacing President Obama's health care law.

In short, Romney's message is about jobs, taxes, energy and health care.

So what do we know about the specifics of Romney's three-point plan?

Keystone -

Republicans, including Romney, have vocally criticized President Obama for rejecting an initial proposal by the TransCanada Corporation to build an oil pipeline through the central United States. The administration rejected the project out of environmental concerns and because it felt Republicans were rushing its approval of the project, at the expense of due diligence. (TransCanada has subsequently re-applied for a permit to build a pipeline along new routes.)

Romney invoking the example is meant to address the issues of jobs and energy.

TransCanada and supporters of the pipeline -- who range from Republicans in Congress to the organized labor community -- contend the project would create at least 20,000 jobs. The project's most ardent supporters claim these, in turn, would lead to additional job creation.

As for energy, it's much more difficult to say what the effect of building the Keystone Pipeline would have on the price of oil. Its mere approval could conceivably diminish speculation that drives up oil prices, but gauging the direct impact is difficult. Moreover, the pipeline would take years to become fully operational and deliver excess supply to gas stations in the U.S.

"Taking advantage of our energy resources is one of my priorities," Romney said Friday in a conference call with supporters. Among his other plans for his first day in office, Romney said he would also allow expanded permits for oil and gas exploration on federal lands. Romney said, for instance, he would authorize drilling on the East Coast's Outer Continental Shelf.

Tax reform -

The centerpiece of Romney's plan would include a permanent, across-the-board reduction of 20 percent for all income tax brackets.

He's also on the record supporting a number of other tax cuts, including maintaining current tax rates on investment income, eliminating the taxes on estates, cutting the corporate tax rate to 25 percent, and repealing the Alternative Minimum Tax, among other reforms.

The impact of these reforms on the rising national debt -- something Romney routinely decries -- is much more opaque, though.

Romney has said eliminating some tax deductions, combined with economic growth and cuts in spending would make the impact of his tax plan deficit-neutral at a minimum.

"One thing I'm also going to to do is work with Congress to limit the deductions and exemptions and special deals that are in our tax code," Romney said on the conference call.

But the former Massachusetts governor hasn't specified the exemptions or deductions he would eliminate beyond a select few (for instance, the mortgage deductions associated with a second home). Romney has previously said that the wealthy might shoulder a greater tax burden under his reforms, though he hasn't said how. (An analysis by the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center has suggested that might not be the case.) The Romney campaign also hasn't provided a detailed enough tax plan in order to subject it to static or dynamic scoring of its impact on the deficit and debt.

As for the spending side, Romney's website offers some additional details, but not enough to necessarily account for the total impact of his plan -- either on jobs, or the deficit.

The "issues" section of Romney's website includes an additional "Day One" promise: to send Congress a bill slashing non-defense discretionary spending by five percent across-the-board.

Other parts of Romney's site detail areas he would cut, and the savings associated with each of those cuts. Those savings include the elimination of subsidies to programs like the National Endowment for the Arts, and cuts in subsidies to Amtrak or the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

"There are items that I like that I will stop funding," Romney explained during the call.

Health reform -

Romney's new ad calls for not just the repeal of "ObamaCare," but its replacement, as well.

If part or all of the law were allowed to stand following the Supreme Court's ruling next month, Romney would have some options to undo the law on his first day in office, but they would be limited.

The former Massachusetts governor has said his ultimate goal is to return health care decisions to individual states, and create incentives for more efficient health care delivery.

Romney repeated his promise to issue a waiver to states, allowing them to duck some of the requirements of health care reform that conservatives find most onerous. But many other parts of the law would remain in effect, and would require legislative action to both enact a repeal of ObamaCare and a subsequent replacement. That could conceivably pass the House if it were to remain in Republican control, but unless Republicans were to somehow win a 60-seat majority in the Senate this fall, the GOP would need to attract Democratic support for Romney's alternative.

* * *

There are other things Romney said he would do on his first day, among them labeling China a currency manipulator and putting a hold on regulations enacted by the Obama administration.

Democrats have contested Romney's ad, with the Obama campaign labeling it as full of "empty promises."

"We know why Mitt Romney didn’t keep his promises- his business experience wasn’t in strengthening companies and creating jobs for long-term economic growth. It was in reaping quick profits for himself and his investors at the expense of workers and communities," said Lis Smith, a spokeswoman for the president's re-election. "These are the values that he wants to bring to the White House by giving more budget-busting tax cuts to the wealthy and letting Wall Street write its own rules—the same formula that benefited a few, but crashed our economy and punished the middle class."

A Democratic super PAC, American Bridge 21st Century, also produced a parody ad concluding of Romney's first-day plans: "We'll pass."