NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Vice President Joe Biden tells a gathering of black journalists that Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney's economic platform shows he is out of touch with the nation's middle class.

Biden said during his speech Wednesday night at a National Association of Black Journalists convention in New Orleans that Romney wants to grow the nation's economy "from the top down" by deregulating Wall Street and cutting taxes for the wealthy.

The vice president calls Romney "an honorable man" with a "beautiful family" but says that the former venture capitalist doesn't understand what's happening to ordinary Americans.

Biden also touts the Obama administration's record on job growth, saying that he and the president believe the economy cannot be truly health until the "profound erosion" of middle-class jobs and income is reversed.

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(Photo: AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)