The second of three presidential debates between President Barack Obama and Republican nominee Mitt Romney is done, and I’d like to hear what you thought of the debate.
As down as I was on President Obama’s performance in the first debate, I think he was much-improved last night. He was far more assertive, calling Mitt Romney out on his lies, and I think President Obama absolutely eviscerated Mitt Romney when discussing Libya, equal pay for women, and in his closing statement, and in my opinion Mitt Romney came across frequently as boorish, overly aggressive, and disrespectful, both of President Obama and the moderator.
President Obama seemed to me to be the clear victor tonight, but I’d like to hear what you think.
Obama was the winner! Mitt romney got cut down to size and he’s a big liar.
Am I the first commenter? I don’t see any others. Okay, well, my observation is that Romney frequently looked chagrined, or even like he wanted to cry. Temperamental, truly. If I knew NOTHING about these two men, I’d choose Obama.
Plus it cracked me up when Candy Crowley corrected Romney. Yeah she’s supposed to be objective, but I guess she couldn’t stand that particular lie.
Crowley has since changed her stance and said that Romney was accurate in his attack on the president, as he was caught in a blatant lie.
The president had nowhere to go but up, after his first performance. And it’s a lot easier for Romney given that he has four years of this administration’s weak and poisonous policies to pick apart, whereas the president can only employ class warfare in his attacks against his opponent.
Try again, Moot Dorsi. Crowley did not change her stance. The Conservative propagandasphere has spent the day trying to spin that drivel, and she’s responded to that drivel by unequivocally maintaining her position. She walked back nothing.
She was correct in pointing out Romney’s error – intentional error – where she was incorrect was in attempting a false equivalency by affirming Romney’s position that the inciting video shouldn’t have been at issue. Conservatives don’t like the idea of a moderator arbitrating, but that’s precisely what a good moderator does. Bad moderation plays well for dirty Conservative tactics and obfuscating rhetoric, but good moderation creates the space for meaningful debate, an orderly discourse marked by civility. Crowley was an improvement but she could have done better at keeping Romney in line and within debate bounds. I’d recommend a silence button for the third debate. Times up – hit the mute.
At the same time Romney’s complete disregard for anything but his own opportunism is telling too. God forbid contemporary politicians like Romney exhibit some level of sophistication by engaging in rational discourse… or demonstrate diplomacy and refined manners in the process… or the hallmark of classical debate – honest cooperation and mutual respect.
Another thing Moot:
As to your class warfare meme – if you think taxing the wealthy disproportionately higher than anyone else is class warfare then perhaps you’d find more comfort in a republican system other than the American democratic structure because that principle of graduated taxation is precisely the one advocated by Adam Smith, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison… when it was implemented the levy was on the wealthy alone for the purpose of eliminating the national debt and building the national infrastructure.
Class warfare in this country is being waged and it is initiated by the new monied aristocracy – an aristocracy created by abandoning those founding principles that sought to intentionally limit wealth disparity.
I watched ten seconds of it with the volume muted and thought that Romney looked a little demented.
I don’t think the President was as forceful as he could/should have been. Several times when Mr. Romney talked about jobs…the President should have reminded him that his running mate Rep. Ryan helped defeat his most of jobs stimulus bills…same thing with the immigration issue and Dream Act. And I wasn’t paying attention during their summations…but did Mr. Romney take credit for 100% health care coverage in ‘his state’? Why didn’t he want to say Massachussetts?
And the President should have nailed him on the pipeline:
Using CANADIAN oil doesn’t decrease our dependence on FOREIGN oil.
And the reason the pipeline needs to run from Canada while bypassing dozens of middle America refineries to the Gulf coast refineries is because the resulting refined petroleum products are targetted for export
AND I believe Mr. Romney’s running mate voted against a law that would keep the resulting refined petroleum products in the USA.
@Ed- The president can’t really nail Romney about the pipeline other than to explain that it won’t create energy independence. It will create profit for TransCanada and put our interior waters at risk. The reason Obama let that one slide is that he had approved the lower portion of the pipeline to be built and it’s construction is well under way. Read more about it here: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/join_the_blockade_of_the_keystone_pipeline_20121015/
Will comment on debate later. Have to dash.
Well…yes he could…Mr. Romney’s acted like the President had banned the pipeline…the only reason the President wouldn’t want to expose that lie is the pipeline doesn’t play well with his constuency.
But he can hold Mr. Romney accountable for assuming we have rights to Canadian oil as if it were our own…and Mr. Romney’s claims that the pipeline oil would lower gas prices and improve availability in the US…it will do neither.
I have another blog on the current pipeline in the…ehr…pipeline. Maybe I’ll get it up tonight.
I continue to be completely underwhelmed by President Obama. I will say it was nice not watching him sleep through the mendacity of Willard last night but still nothing convinced me that our President has the interests of people like myself in mind. He just happens to be blessed with the most inept competition in living memory.