Folks, We Have a Brand New Ballgame
Mitt Romney on Wednesday night turned in the finest debate performance of any candidate of either party in the 52 years since Richard Nixon faced John F. Kennedy, with the possible exception of Ronald Reagan's demolition of Jimmy Carter in 1980.
But where Reagan won with style and quips—"There you go again"—and his closing line, "Are you better off now than you were four years ago?" Romney crushed Obama on both substance and style.
Mitt was like a contender so keyed up by his title shot that, between rounds, he could not sit on his stool, but stood in his corner to rush out and re-engage the champ the instant the bell sounded for the next round.
Obama was mauled, with facts, figures, anecdotes, arguments, jokes, quips. A smiling Romney was on offense all night. And the president's performance seems inexplicable.
With the split screen showing his response to Romney's swarm attacks, he appeared diffident, sullen, pouting, flustered, petulant.
Obama made no serious blunder. Yet, on the split screen, as Romney lectured him with a stern smile, Obama seemed a chastened schoolboy, head down, being instructed by a professor that if he did not get his grades up he would not be back next semester.
The verdict on the Denver encounter—that Romney turned in the performance of his life and one of the most impressive in the history of presidential debates, and that the president underperformed, was outclassed and lost badly—was virtually unanimous.
Indeed, liberal columnists and commentators are among those most angered and appalled at Obama's performance.
Why did he not fight back, they ask, with all the ammunition at his disposal?
The defense being offered by the Obama spinners is that Mitt was brazenly changing positions right up there on stage, that he was not telling the truth about his positions, that he was misstating facts.
But that leaves a glaring question. Why, then, didn't the president call him out? To this they have no answer.
Where does the race stand, a month from Election Day?
Members of the Republican commentariat who were grousing that Mitt had blown it may now become enthusiastic again, as clearly this race is far from over. Folks in the grandstand who were heading for the exit ramps are heading back to their seats.
We have a brand new ballgame here.
But if the campaign of 2012 is not lost, not by a long shot, it is not won, either.
The first sign of how great a recovery Mitt made will come next week in the head-to-head polls, when the nation has absorbed the news that Obama not only got waxed, he came off as man exhausted, weary with the duties of office, who lacks the fire and energy to lead us out of the economic doldrums in which this country finds itself.
Yet even if the national polls find Mitt surging, the polls in the battleground states will have to turn dramatically, as early voting is already taking place in half of the country. And that voting began when it appeared that Obama was coasting to a second term.
Can Ohio, for example, where Mitt has been consistently down by high single digits, be retrieved?
Is Wisconsin just too far a reach?
Perhaps the greatest advance Mitt Romney made in that debate was that, for once, he came off not just as a tough businessman and resolute budget-cutter who can put the nation's fiscal house in order, but as something of a conservative of the heart.
This has always been the missing dimension.
The reaction of the Obamaites to the thrashing their man sustained is probably not going to be sportsmanlike. We will now hear more of the Gordon Gecko of Bain Capital writing off the 47 percent and more on the missing tax returns and Cayman Islands account.
But if we do, that will also tell the nation something.
It will testify to the truth that Barack Obama is not the nice guy he is portrayed as being. And if his campaign reverts to the low road, it will convey another unmistakable message: i.e., the president cannot win on his record; he cannot win in debates about the future. Where Reagan after his first term spoke of "Morning in America," the only way Obama can win a second term is to demonize his opponent.
Gov. Romney still has miles to go before he sleeps. But the president is today facing a dilemma, as well.
Given his performance, one of the worst in debate history, Obama cannot afford to lose a second or third debate like that. This crushing defeat has to be shown to be, and to be seen as, an aberration.
Otherwise, the country may conclude that no matter how much it likes him, Obama as a leader is burned out, a mechanic who has tried every tool in the toolbox but cannot get the machinery running again.
The first debate made the race a toss-up again. The second could decide it.
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Rather makes one wonder why they bother with all the rest--the primaries (ecrasez l'infame!), the ads, the conventions, voter registration, voter disqualification, campaigning, etc.
Fortunately, if one simply doesn't turn on the TV (except to watch DVDs--my only use of the thing), it's amazing how little of all the foofaraw and folderol one encounters.
"if one simply doesn't turn on the TV"
A hearty Amen to that, Mr. Olson. Also, thank you for introducing me to two wonderful new words.
Forgive me, Mr Olson, but I have sinned. I watched the debates, and by not avoiding this occassion of sin, I began to glory in other people's misfortunes. I laughed when I saw pee-pee run down Chris Mathew's leg instead of the normal inspiration he so often mentioned in the past when in the presence of his hero, President Obama. I also chuckled when Reverend Sharpton got mad as hell that somebody was telling lies on national television and getting away with it. I got a deep belly laugh when Ed Shultz sent his aid out for malox between commercials from the spin room.
I also want to apologise for my past jokes about Mr. Romney and Eddie Munster's father. For once when I was watching the man, he demonstrated a touch of class by at least aspiring to his best when his best was needed. I am still not convinced that Mr. Romney is anything but an oligarchic fool used as a useful tool, but he demonstrated he might be something more than that in his ability to win when he desperately needed a win. So Ray, for these and all my other past sins of blogging and blabbing, I am very sorry.
A great analysis of the debate from a man who knows more about American presidential debates than just about anyone else.
And I share many of Robert Reavis' feelings about the debate. You'd have to have a heart of stone not to laugh at the Obamaites' discomfort, even rage, following the debate. Sadly, I doubt this will be repeated, because in the remaining debates, Romney will need to go up against both Obama and his protectors in the media, You can be certain that future debate moderators will not be as polite and deferential as the gentlemanly Jum Lehrer was.
Mr. Piatak,
I quite agree. I also would defend the moderator. He had hosted 11 different presidential debates before this one. He was considered good at his job which is why both sides allowed him back. This last debate was number 12. The liberals were mad because President Obama kept looking at Jim Lehre for help and received none. Yet, Mr. Lehrer is a seasoned moderator. He knew that when a man needed help he should get back in the arena and punch his way out of the clenches. Obama talked the most in terms of minutes and seconds but the least in terms of qualitative meaning. That was not Lehrer's fault. Also Jim Lehre as a seasoned moderator had the advantage of knowing that in these type of debates, it is not a matter of trying to prevent one side from telling lies about the other, but rather allowing the public to see that both sides are lying constantly. I thought he performed admirably and a great public service. .
Mr. Olsen,
Your words, "foofaraw and folderol" conjure up images stored in memory of Miss Lindsey, an English teacher of the old maid status as many a teacher of her day were, who with set jaw, stern face and piercing eyes would set upon one of us wayward teens with those words hissing between her lips and with the intent of her impending action evidenced by the machine-like swing of her right arm, itself armed with a hickory paddle. Few dared to challenge her authority on the grammar and syntax of English and fewer still were the times on which the few did challenge her; for when so challenged, she would say, with an authority seeming to come from God himself, "Have your the audacity to doubt my veracity!" This, finally, brings me to the point: I do have the audacity to challenge the veracity of Mr. Romney; however, even when one is compelled to watch a competition between two devils, one, as human nature dictates, will have a favorite devil and enjoy his victory, however meaningless it is in the long run or however dangerous to one it might be in the even longer run. I get a double enjoyment through your post on the issue: Romney skewering Obama and a fond memory of a teacher who would have had the audacity to doubt the veracity of the both of them and who would have, as you have already done, proclaimed the entire matter to be just so much foofaraw and folderol.
Mr. Reavis,
Mr. Lehrer has caught quite the flak from colleagues and the rest of the left of which he is a part; nevertheless, his professionalism trumped his ideology. He is to be commended for that. I imagine that the chair of the moderator will be occupied the next time by an ideologue, who, if he has professional instinct, will subdue them for the "cause."
Mr. Peters,
"I imagine that the chair of the moderator will be occupied the next time by an ideologue, who, if he has professional instinct, will subdue them for the "cause."
Yes, it is always much better for them if they can find one who will volunteer for the cause, but if all else fails, I suspect they will also pay up for such services. Witness the business they employed down South to obtain new registered voters for Florida and elsewhere. And of course this is only the RNC's repsonse to the other side using exactly the same or similar techniques in registering new voters for their side. Personally, I think the old fish has been rotting in the sun for so long that the continual arguments about from which end it started, (the head or the tail) is totally superfilous and irrelevant at this time.
Pat, I loves'ya but otherwise... zzzzzzzzzzzzzz (no TV so I can't believes'in it anymore.)
The Constitution bought into Hobbes 'all men are created selfish, egoists', so we need big central authority to keeps us all in line and the bigger (and more powerful the better). And abandoned the Aristotelian Articles of Confederation 'all men band together for mutual benefit and protection' (whose polis can't function as such unless first right sized.)
Everything else is history, but I'm with you Pat, good work. Loves'ya, for what it's worth. Even though you may not have consciously known you signed on with Hobbes. That's ok if so. Got to go with what you've got.
Thank you, Mr. Peters. I quite adore your recollection.
Except for DVDs, Mr. Cornell. I just watched a fine one, Frank Borzage's The Mortal Storm (1940), which may be the finest propaganda film ever made--anti-Nazi, without once saying either the N-word or the J-word. If I correctly recall, Borzage was a Catholic, and lord. does it matter. See lots of his films and those of Leo McCarey (Going My Way and The Bells of St. Mary are the most famous of his, but you must see My Son John and Make Way for Tomorrow).
Mr. Buchanan's description of a sullen, pouting Obama remiinds me of the Afriucan king portrayed in the fine film "Mountains of the Moon."
Mr. Olson, I concur on using the TV for DVDs. I actually bought one of the fairly big screens to put down in the basement so that the kids & I can enjoy the movie experience. We've even been watching old episodes of the Guy Williams Zorro and the Lone Ranger. Incidentally, with the wretched new movie trailer now out, the Lone Ranger is a great icon with which you can trace the rapid progression of our cultural rot. You can watch the Clayton Moore/Jay Silverheels shows and see these clean, stalwart, upstanding men fighting crime in the Old West. You can then watch the debacle of the Spilsbury movie from the 80's and see how thing became progressively edgier & bloodier. And now you can see the Arnie Hammer/Johnny Depp travesty where the Lone Ranger wears all black and Tonto looks like some sort of Goth freak. It says something that this new Disney movie is being marketed for kids - heck, if I showed my own children the trailer they would be mortified (as I think any healthy child should be).
But I digress. Thank you for the recommendations of The Mortal Storm, My Son John, & Make Way for Tomorrow - I've not heard of them and will add them to the Netflix list. I've seen Going My Way and the Bells of St. Mary. Sadly, we've come a long way from there, both in terms of our movies and of the Church.
It's Christian the Egyptian, well also Jewish and Greek and er, Roman. After all Moses and St. Augustine were Afriucan. We bought into it but a little of it is WRONG. Build on tradition, time for a tune-up? Humor: Socrates would say, 'I don't know, and I know I don't know.' Sophocles, a bit more confident (with all his artistic awards) would say: 'No! Leave religion [tradition] as is!' But he wasn't around for some of these hybrids. Aristophanes-?-hmm, my guess, he'd say 'let's tune this sucker up.' I don't know (back to good ol'Socrates), so I'll follow Wilson, C.N. Ain't easy, so also follow Dr. Fleming...