Romney tells Ohio crowd, "Don't be expecting a huge cut in taxes." Supporters okay paying more, and giving tax cut to wealthy.

To quote Ann Romney, “Stop it!”

That’s my message to the media. Stop handing well-crafted excuses to candidates for something they need to explain in their own words. The Huffington Post offered this excuse to Romney for something he said to a middle class audience regarding no real tax relief:

“The comments were either a flub on Romney's part…”

A "honesty" flub? Can you imagine what Romney is really saying behind the scenes? Here’s the comment Mitt’s made that should be hitting the fan today:

In a line that event attendees found a bit puzzling, Mitt Romney warned a crowd of mostly middle-class onlookers on Wednesday not to expect too much tax relief under his administration.

"We have got to reform our tax system," Romney said at a morning event here. "Small businesses most typically pay taxes at the individual tax rate. And so our individual income taxes are the ones I want to reform. Make them simpler. I want to bring the rates down. By the way, don't be expecting a huge cut in taxes because I'm also going to lower deductions and exemptions. But by bringing rates down we will be able to let small businesses keep more of their money so they can hire more people."

Sounds bad right? Believe it or not, Republicans in the crowd liked it. They’re willing to see their taxes go up, all the while cutting taxes for the elite wealthy:

In fact, none of the half-dozen attendees interviewed after the event expressed concern about the remarks, offering up lines of explanation that one wouldn't often expect at a Republican presidential candidate's rally.

"We need the taxes to stay the way they are because we have to get the debt down," said Margo Belkofer, of Powell, Ohio.

"He's not promoting a tax cut, he is preventing a tax increase," said Jim Bachelder, of Westerville.

Cynthia Beitman, of Westerville, said she was fine with Romney eliminating deductions and exemptions for people like her, so long as he lowered the rates overall for small businesses. "People run small businesses," she exclaimed.

Said Patty Karst of Gahanna, Ohio, "You have to realize as a society that we have to have the funds for infrastructure, the protection of the country and the social programs we support."

Are these conservatives absolutely insane?