Second presidential debate

[drwex]

tl;dr version: Obama wins on points

The bar for Obama was both very low and very high, given the first debate. He had to show up and show up strong - that's easy. But he still has to be presidential. He can't go completely on the attack or appear to be taking cheap shots. At the same time, he had to stem Romney's Big Lies.

He mostly did that, appearing combative and willing to call out Romney by repeatedly saying "That's just not true." But he didn't deliver knock-out punches by framing the truth in clear concise facts. I'm STUNNED that he didn't point out that more Americans have jobs now than when he took office. That's a total gimme. He passed up other such easy items, possibly because he feared giving Romney concrete numbers would lead to detailed debates or perhaps it's just not his style. I think it's something people want to hear. Several of the questioners in the town hall format seemed desperate to hear SOME good news.

As I've said all along, Romney is great on the attack and awful on defense. When the moderator (dear gods thank you FINALLY) called him out on one of his "misstatements" he stumbled badly and seemed seriously put out. Also, he pretty much _handed_ Obama the 100%/47% opening at the end by bringing it up first, which let Obama call it to mind without appearing to be taking a cheap shot. I think it was a serious mistake for Romney to go after the Libya issue; it's an area where Obama can appear serious and Presidential (talking about greeting the coffins at Dover) and Romney looks like a flailing outsider.

Obama didn't score any knock-outs, nor did Romney go off-message - he continues to be a great debater. I believe that Obama will pick up a point or two in the polls, but that'll be from disaffected Dems returning to his side. This debate isn't going to shift anything.

Comments

[wotw]

It does seem to me that while they both stretched the truth, countenanced illogic, and pandered to idiots, Obama had the most WTF moment of the evening when he segued directly froim arguing that the govt shouldn't dictate the terms of insurance policies to boasting that ObamaCare dictates the terms of insurance policies. It's difficult for me to imagine the voter who's too dumb to feel insulted by that answer. (Romney insulted my intelligence plenty also, but never quite this blatantly.)

[drwex]

I am attempting to score the debates almost entirely on appearance and surface rather than substance. If I tried to think about the substantive errors I'm quite sure I would weep.

For example, I agree with your posting that Obama really should have said that it's not the government's business to control gas prices. This is one of the easy ones he missed, somehow. What I would have said:

"Well, I'm sure if I tried to control gas prices there'd be people in Congress howling to impeach me. Also, you know we tried some pretty aggressive price controls in this country in the past - under President Nixon - and that didn't go too well."

One sentence, clear statement, folksy appeal. That question was SUCH a gimme because he could have answered "correctly" while reminding people of past bad Republican policies. Then again, it's easy to armchair quarterback.

Your imaginary voter is MUCH more sophisticated than mine, as I didn't recognize that segue when it happened - though now that you point it out, I agree it did. In my mind, the imaginary voter remembers Romney as the person who misstated because the moderator actually called Romney on it, and because that caused Romney to break composure.

Appearances >> substance in these things, whether we like it or not.

[aelf.livejournal.com]

I think your (general you, not specific) view on the Libya is much like the empty chair issue. How you see it very much depends on which perspective you take. If you look at left leaning opinion pieces, they think Obama handled it well and the moderator rightly supported him. If you look at right leaning opinion pieces, they think Obama lied to cover himself, and the moderator helped him cover it up.

Both have evidence to back up their statements, so I'm betting each will continue pushing his shape of reality. For Romney, bringing up Libya can help him shore up his base - Obama made some serious missteps there. For Obama, bringing up Libya can help him shore up his base - he has the demeanor to help minimize any damage his initial reaction may have caused (which sells solidly "Presidential"), plus it brings back to mind his other foreign-involvement successes without him risking looking too pushy with an "I killed Osama bin Laden" shtick.

[ringrose.livejournal.com]

I would hazard that Obama did not make some of the obvious points because there are rebuttals Romney can make which (however wrong) are difficult to counter.

Obama says "More Americans have jobs now than when he took office," and Romney can reply with any number of canned statements, such as "14.7% of America is out of work. We need to do better than that, Mister President. _I_ will do better than that. My tax cut will bring 12 million jobs to Americans." At best this stretches the truth, but it isn't easy for Obama to counter in a debate.

14.7% comes from the Bureau of Labor Statistics: "the U-6 unemployment rate -- is sometimes offered as a more "complete" picture of joblessness. It doesn’t just include those who BLS officially considers "unemployed" but also those working part time for economic reasons as well as those who are "marginally attached" to the work force (meaning they want to work but have not looked for work recently enough to count as being actively in the labor force)". And heck, yes, tossing that figure in when everyone else is comparing different numbers is misleading but it'll take a paragraph for Obama to explain the difference.
12 million jobs from his tax cut plan includes all sorts of things which aren't directly related to his tax plan, and has been debunked on Politifact. But again, it'll take a paragraph or two for Obama to rebut.

So I can see why Obama didn't bring up jobs. It's too easy for Romney to misstate the results. I did it in 5-10 minutes with Google.

[unseelie.livejournal.com]

I only listened to part of the debate, and as I did; at the end of every sentence I muttered "signal" or "Noise".
"As my grand mother once told me.."
"When I signed the bill that.."

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I only listened to part of the debate, and as I did; at the end of every sentence I muttered "signal" or "Noise".
"As my grand mother once told me.."<noise>
"When I signed the bill that.." <signal!>

lots of noise from Romney, Lots of noise from Obama. More signal from Obama, in the time segment I listened to.