Live blogging the Presidential debate will begin here

Posted By: Peter DavidPosted On:

My long-term prediction: Election day will launch a lengthy legal battle and on December 21 the Supreme Court decides in favor of Romney…thereby fulfilling the Mayan calendar end-of-the-world-date.

That said, I will endeavor to be even handed in my commenting on the debate. See you shortly.

PAD

9:01–Am I the only one who thinks this should kick off with an announcer saying, “Let’s get ready to rummmmmble!”
9:02–No cheering or booing? Let’s see how long that lasts.
9:03–Obama sat first. Fox immediately says that cost him the debate.
9:04–Mommy! Why is the scary man walking toward me?
9:05–Lack of specifics as to how he’ll create jobs. Again.
9:06–Obama launches the first blast directly at Romney. It’s a delicate needle to thread–answering the questions while jabbing at the other.
9:08–Ah, and Candy now does exactly what the candidates didn’t want: pushing the matter and trying to pin them down. Meanwhile Obama’s head is so up that he could be a head on Mt. Rushmore.
9:08–I have to admit, if anyone knows about taking companies bankrupt, it’s Romney. Way more experience in bankrupting companies.
9:11–Romney tries to steamroll over Candy and she won’t allow it.
9:12–Any answer that starts off with stump speech points without answering the question directly is a bad answer. Obama needed to say “yes” or “no” to the guy’s question about gas prices. Both Romney and Candy can jump on him for it.
9:14–Christ, now Romney isn’t making note of the fact that Obama dodged the question. An opportunity handed to him, and he bypasses it. Why? Probably because he’s not going to answer questions either and doesn’t want to be called on it.
9:15–Caroline says, “How can he (Romney) talk about the President controlling everything? We learned there’s three branches of government. He’s only one.”
9:17–BAM! Obama points out a Romney flip flip, this one on coal. First of many to come, I’d think.
9:19–Head to head. It’s heating up.
9:20–Bad body language. Obama let Romney physically back him into a corner.
9:20–WHAT? I live in Suffolk county and that’s bûllšhìŧ. Gas prices were NOT below $2 four years ago.
9:21–First audible reaction to the debate, and it’s solidly on Obama’s side.
9:22–Aaaaand as Romney runs over the moderator and interrupts…you know, like Fox said was inappropriate.
9:26–I wonder how many in the middle class have worries about capital gains?
9:27–Obama subtly shakes his head on the “study.”
9:27–Obama presents his side with less numbers and more lucidity. He’s connecting in a way that Romney simply can’t.
9:30–Romney wants to get the economy going again, using his vast experience of buying companies, destroying them, and lining his pockets.
9:31–Obama looks like his head’s ready to explode when Romney talks about his experience in the private sector.
9:32–Obama really needs to laugh at the notion that Romney the job destroyer is a friend of small business.
9:33–Look how Romney’s smile doesn’t touch his eyes.
9:34–Oh, man, check out Obama’s grin. Romney isn’t even allowing for the possibility that things won’t go wrong.
9:37–Ohhhh, this is the chance for Obama to recapture the sinking opinions of women (at least according to polls.)
9:38–See, these are the kinds of things that Obama has done that hasn’t gotten enough publicity.
9:39–We must not tolerate discrimination…except for when Obama tolerated discrimination against gay marriage until Biden called him out on it.
9:40–Romney says that businesses have to be more flexible. A solid point. As president, how’s he going to make that happen?
9:42–Caroline to her mother just now: “Mommy, why do you keep holding up your middle finger?”
9:42–Excellent. Obama takes a sideways swipe at Romney’s abortion stance and reminds women that Romney is basically anti-women’s health and reproductive rights.
9:44–Romney is now trying to claim that he’s all for women’s reproductive rights and access to birth control? Has he been talking to his VP candidate?
9:47–I understand how hard it is to start a small business and see Bain Capital come in and destroy it.
9:50–Love Obama’s list of differences between Romney and Bush.
9:52–First mention of bin Laden, but doesn’t seem forced. Organic response to the question that basically gives Obama a chance to list his accomplishments.
9:54–Watch Romney say “He went over, so I should be able to.”
9:56–As the fact checkers go into overdrive on all Romney’s assertions…
9:57–We could try looking at Romney’s record, but he’s already run away from it.
9:58–“Don’t go away?” Where’s he gonna go?
9:59–We welcome legal immigrants. Because we’ve already seen the damage that unwelcome foreigners can wreak on this country…like when they bring Smallpox with them and wind up wiping out the indigenous population.
10:00–Ohhh, Obama can’t wait to leap on this one.
10:02–If you’re doing a drinking game involving Obama saying “folks,” you’d be pretty hammered by now.
10:04–Yes, Obama DID answer the question on Univision. I SAW him answer it.
10:06–“I don’t look at my pension; it’s not as big as yours.” There’s the takeaway line.
10:07–Does anyone think that if Biden hadn’t kept interrupting, that Obama wouldn’t be doing it now.
10:08–Stop saying “Don’t go away!”
10:08–Oh, Romney’s been salivating for this one. This is dangerous. Fortunately, Obama should be prepped for this.
10:09–Obama HAS to talk about how the GOP slashed $300 million for security.
10:10–No, no he’s screwing this up. Romney is going to screw him on this, especially when he just said that it’s his responsibility and Hillary just said it was hers.
10:12–Yeah, Romney’s hurting Obama on this one. Bush already proved how seeming disconnected from a disaster can hurt him.
10:15–Okay, Obama’s getting ramped up. We need to see more of that.
10:16–Oh my God, Romney just got corrected by both the moderator and the President and he’s STILL insisting that he was right.
10:17–He’s pretty much done nothing to curtail guns. Which is why it’s hilarious that the ARA insists he’s coming for their guns.
10:19–Romney will have to tread carefully, though. He can’t come out in favor of curtailing guns because it’ll pìšš øff his constituency.
10:20–Yeah, see, that’s where Romney and Obama are more or less identical.
10:21–Wait. Romney is trying to turn gun control into a referendum on families? Seriously?
10:23–So there’s another difference between Romney and Bush: Romney doesn’t approve of Fast and Furious which was begun under the Bush administration.
10:25–At what point did Romney suddenly start saying “folks.”
10:26–“And reduce violence.” Yeah, that sure tied it together.
10:26–Please, please, Mr. President, PLEASE bring up the thousands upon thousands of jobs that Bain Capital has lost.
10:28–Has ANYONE given an answer under two minutes? We see it ticking down repeatedly.
10:33–Obama takes a broader view and makes a more effective memory. Oh my God, Romney, shut up.
10:34–Ooooo…good question.
10:34–Romney takes the opportunity to sideways address the 47% gaffe by talking about how he cares about 100% of the people.
10:35–He’s actually dumb enough to talk about health care for Massachusetts after he’s run away from it?
10:36–I wonder if Obama will make a joke about the biggest misconception is that he wasn’t born here.
10:37–Well, Romney had that coming: he’s the one who alluded to the 47% remark. That opened the door for Obama.
10:37–Obama slam dunked the ending.

Okay, I openly admit I’m biased. But I think that Obama absolutely won. I saw real passion from Obama and real feigned passion from Romney. And Romney’s getting fact checked ON AIR blew up any advantage he gained on the question about the embassy.

There was one image where Romney and Obama are standing maybe two feet from each other, both of them with their hands raised palms at each other. And all I could think of was, “So! I see your Schwartz is as big as mine.” Meanwhile, Fox is complaining about the moderator correcting Romney on the terrorist thing.

What it comes down to is this: I think Obama reminded people why they like him.

181 comments on “Live blogging the Presidential debate will begin here”

  2. Really? Mr. go where you can afford it and ask your parents for a loan now wants to talk about keeping education costs low and handing out grants left and right?

    Flip… Flop… Flip… Flop… Flip… Flop… Flip… Flop…

  3. Apparently the Barack Obama LMD who showed up a couple weeks ago has been sent back into storage. This looks like the actual guy we saw four years ago.

    Unfortunately.

  4. Your 9:12 comment: agreed. A yes or no would’ve been nice, and I actually hope (even as a major Obama supporter) that Crowley pushes him on that.

  6. 9:12–Any answer that starts off with stump speech points without answering the question directly is a bad answer. Obama needed to say “yes” or “no” to the guy’s question about gas prices. Both Romney and Candy can ump on him forit.

    Yup, bad answer and bad form.

  7. Ðámņ; Obama just started with a good response to her followup, but now he’s back to talking points. Drat … though his answer isn’t bad.

  9. No, Governor, that’s not the sign that the strategy is working — there is no policy that will guarantee low prices other than, dare I say it, socialism.

  12. 9:20–WHAT? I live in Suffolk county and that’s bûllšhìŧ. Gas prices were NOT below $2 four years ago.

    There was a blip in the prices for about a cup of coffee due to the economic crash in Europe. Republicans and their supporters like to point to that and act as if that was the norm when bashing Obama.

  13. 9:26–I wonder how many in the middle class have worries about capital gains?

    Or mutual funds?

    1. Well, I certainly do! Or, at least I did before this administration and I had to liquidate all my stocks and mutuals from my 401K fund. This point just about got my wife to vote for Romney – she is tired about making almost nothing on our savings, and then getting taxed on top of that!

      What? You don’t have a 401K or IRA? You must be a democrat that believes that the government will just take care of you when you retire…

      1. Or, at least I did before this administration

        It sounds like you voted for John “The Economy is Sound” McCain.

        But yeah, it’s ALL Obama’s fault that the economy šhìŧ the bed (when it was already well on its way before the election).

  16. 9:27 Romney actually answered a question directly and coherently. He’s looking as petulant as Biden when he takes followups though. I’m not sure PAD is right about the bad body language earlier; it looked more like he was being rude to the President.

    1. 9:36 Now they’re both acting like children. “My turn” “No, my turn!” “You lie!” “No, you lie!” “Moooooom!”

  17. Yes, Governor, the top 5% will pay 60% of the income taxes … but if you’re lowering all income taxes, that means that the balance must be made up in other ways which will undoubtedly fall upon the 98%. Regressive much?

  18. Romney cites another bogus “study” as full of šhìŧ as the six “unbiased studies” he cited before.

    The alternate reality bubble grows a little bigger…

  19. BEAUTIFUL connection to Romney’s past, in the “you wouldn’t accept an offer like this coming to you, so why should we?”

    1. Says the man who basically says “Well, I haven’t been able to get much accomplished for four years, but give me another four, and you will see what I REALLY can accomplish!”

      Oh, how will you do that?

      Why, Just vote for me and you will find out!

      (and, congress should just vote in major healthcare legislation so you can find out what is really in it…)

      1. Obama’s accomplishments are numerous and a matter of record (the ACA, START ratification, DADT repeal, Dodd-Frank, the CPB, etc.). What is Romney’s response when asked for details and specifics, besides saying that he’d reveal all after he’s elected because revealing details would hurt him in the polls?

        (Also, Congress had well over the better part of a year to “find out” what was in the ACA. If your [almost certainly GOP] congresscritter couldn’t be bothered to and had to rely on dishonest sources spouting off about “death panels” and the like, s/he did you a disservice.)

      2. Sasha,
        That better part of a year was spent in adding, subtracting and modifying that bill so much that when it was being voted on, NO ONE knew what all was in it! The comment was based on a response of Nancy Pelosi when asked what was in the bill, “Pass it, and we will find out!”

      3. The comment was based on a response of Nancy Pelosi when asked what was in the bill, “Pass it, and we will find out!”</i.

        So Romney's plans as president are based entirely on the words of Nancy Pelosi?

        "Elect me, and we will find out!"

        😉

  21. 9:33–Look how Romney’s smile doesn’t touch his eyes.

    What, you expect fake smiles to spark real emotional displays? Never.

    1. Do you mean that we have a budget with a surplus this year? Or do you just mean that it isn’t going up as much as it has in past years?

      The first statement means that the deficit is going down. The second just means that it isn’t going up as fast as it was…

      2. OK, that was what I expected it to be. They haven’t actually begun paying down the debt, it just isn’t rising quite as fast as it has been. Typical political BS, where huge spending cuts means that they are only increasing spending by 5% when the department asked for a 10% increase…

        Now, if he had a balanced budget, especially if he had begun paying down the debt, not THAT would be something to trumpet!

      3. Check the CBO projections for the coming decade. It takes a pretty interesting person to boldly make the assertion that Obama is taking us anywhere except total bankruptcy. That’s one reason why this election is so critical. Can Romney get us back on track? I have no idea. I know Obama can’t or won’t. It’s his programs and policies that are driving us to the edge.

        Obama talks alot about what he inherited from the previous administration. He never mentions the stellar credit rating we had. Those days are gone. Just read an article this morning that we’re due for another downgrade. It’s inevitable and won’t be affected by who wins the election.

      4. The numbers are going down, Charlie, not up. That’s called “heading in the right direction” no matter how you wish to spin it.

        That’s also the opposite direction from where every Republican President in my lifetime has sent the deficit.

        Nixon? Up.

        Ford? Up.

        Reagan? Waaayyyyy up.

        H.W. Bush? Up?

        W. Bush? Waaaaayyyyy Up.

        Obama? Down.

        Obama also has the lowest rate of federal spending by far under his belt.

        But, please, tell me more about how a pathological liar like Romney with a plan that even his six “studies” don’t actually fully support the claims of and who, when on a flip rather than a flop, runs as your average Republican and is surrounding himself with W. Bush policy people is going to wave his magic wand and get a different result out of repeating the same old Bush era policies X10.

      5. Tim and Charlie are the perfect living examples of what Clinton joked about at the Convention.

        Obama hasn’t cleaned up the mess left by 8 years of W. Bush fast enough, so they advocate giving everything back to a guy who’ll do the mostly same things that W. did and create the same giant mess all over again.

      6. No Jerry,
        The problem is that Obama has only given lip service to the fact that there is a problem. On the one hand, he admits that the huge national debt is a problem, while on the other hand, he realizes that he can’t do what all he wants to do if he does anything about it, so he just ignores it. It is a hard problem, and any solutions are going to be unpopular, so it is easier to get elected if you just make vague promises about it…

      7. “It is a hard problem, and any solutions are going to be unpopular, so it is easier to get elected if you just make vague promises about it…”

        True, but the good news is that his vague promises combined with all of his many flip-flops might actually keep Romney from being elected. So there’s always that.

      8. Obama talks alot about what he inherited from the previous administration. He never mentions the stellar credit rating we had. Those days are gone. Just read an article this morning that we’re due for another downgrade. It’s inevitable and won’t be affected by who wins the election.

        And you do remember that the downgrade was directly due to the fact that the Republicans decided to hold the economy hostage, right? Or do you blame Obama anyway because he didn’t cave to the GOP?

      9. Or do you blame Obama anyway because he didn’t cave to the GOP?

        Of course they blame Obama anyway.

        And the GOP (and their less than rational supporters like Charlie) have demonstrated time and again that they don’t give a dámņ whether this country runs a deficit, or indeed of it gets run into the ground as a result of their meddling.

        Their only goal is to cut funding for everybody but the military, and then take all those cuts and put them into the military. Ðámņ everything and everybody else.

      10. Craig,
        I am less than rational? Surely You Jest! (and Yes, I did just call you Shirley… 😉 )

        That response is about as non-rational as any I have seen!

        I mean, let us look at your logic. I express support for a GOP candidate. In your fantasy world, all GOP candidates have certain beliefs, therefore, with no evidence about MY beliefs in where funding should go, I believe all funding should go to the military.

        If you can’t be logical, you could at least try and be funny. That’s funny Ha-Ha, not funny strange… 😎

  23. Not sure either of them gave a great initial answer to the “women’s pay inequality” question, but the president just moved over to health care. Imminent wham, I suspect…

  24. Caroline to her mother just now: “Mommy, why do you keep holding up your middle finger?”

    Ðámņ you. That stream of water JUST missed the laptop…

  25. “9:42–Caroline to her mother just now: “Mommy, why do you keep holding up your middle finger?””

    Because that’s the natural and only appropriate response to listening to a pathological liar like Romney.

    1. PAD, as Jerry mentioned in the other thread, it’s high time to add your own version of Likes to this site. 🙂

  26. Romney came up through small business? Bain Capital is small business? Since friggin’ when?

    1. A GOP faction started defining “small business” based on the number of owners and employees, instead of a combination of employees and gross income or size of market share, sometime in the last ten years or so. Since people don’t always know which definition is being used, the media can be manipulated by sound bites without having to actually lie.

      1. BZZZZ Nope, wrong answer.

        The definition of small business is made by the federal government (Small Business Administration.) Now, that definition is as convoluted as a government agency can make it, but that definition has been evolving for as long as I have seen it, much longer than the past ten years. There is money being made available for small businesses, so they keep modifying the definition to include more companies in the definition.

      2. Yes, Sasha, even with that much capitalization, it was still a small business. PAD could form a corporation composed of just him and Kath, and he could make a billion dollars a year from his writing, and it would still be a small business. The definitions of small business rely more on how many people, and what industry you are in, than on how much your sales or income are.

      3. Most nonmanufacturing businesses with less than $7M in annual receipts is considered a small business. Anyone know offhand what Bain’s income was?

        Small businesses traditionally don’t have the advantage of having over 5 times that limit in seed money (or if they do, the local small businesses I patronize have really been miserly about investing). If Bain actually qualified as a small business, I suspect it would be only by the most technical of definitions.

      4. Ok, from the SBA website:

        What is SBA’s definition of a small business concern?

        SBA defines a small business concern as one that is independently owned and operated, is organized for profit, and is not dominant in its field. Depending on the industry, size standard eligibility is based on the average number of employees for the preceding twelve months or on sales volume averaged over a three-year period. Examples of SBA general size standards include the following:

        Manufacturing: Maximum number of employees may range from 500 to 1500, depending on the type of product manufactured;
        Wholesaling: Maximum number of employees may range from 100 to 500 depending on the particular product being provided;
        Services: Annual receipts may not exceed $2.5 to $21.5 million, depending on the particular service being provided;
        Retailing: Annual receipts may not exceed $5.0 to $21.0 million, depending on the particular product being provided;
        General and Heavy Construction: General construction annual receipts may not exceed $13.5 to $17 million, depending on the type of construction;
        Special Trade Construction: Annual receipts may not exceed $7 million; and
        Agriculture: Annual receipts may not exceed $0.5 to $9.0 million, depending on the agricultural product.

        So, Bain was probably a service company, so as long as its receipts were less than 20 million it was classified a small business.

      5. Yes, Sasha, even with that much capitalization, it was still a small business. PAD could form a corporation composed of just him and Kath, and he could make a billion dollars a year from his writing, and it would still be a small business. The definitions of small business rely more on how many people, and what industry you are in, than on how much your sales or income are.

        Even if we go by that yardstick, though, you have to very specifically and apply the definition.

        Let’s say Peter & Kath’s hypothetical two-person, billion dollar business then goes out and buys, say, McDonald’s. All of those McDonald’s employees now become employees of PeterKathCo. But, with McDonald’s still its own entity, owned by PeterKathCo, despite Peter & Kath having some 420,000 employees in 33,000+ locations worldwide, PeterKathCo is still just two people.

        At one time or another, Bain Capital has owned ClearChannel Communications, Toys R Us and (in what might be the most infamous example of their “buy, bleed, kill” practices) Kay-Bee Toys, none of which I think could be considered “small businesses.” Yet, somehow, a company that owns large businesses, thus making those businesses employees their own, is still a “small business.”

        I call shenanigans.

        –Daryl

      6. And also to the point, unless most American small businesses are ones that begin with millions in seed money, Romney’s suggestion that he was a typical small business owner is all kinds of disingenuous.

  27. 9:44–Romney is now trying to claim that he’s all for women’s reproductive rights and access to birth control? Has he been talking to his VP candidate?

    Because Romney is a pathological liar who will say anything and everything that he thinks he needs to say to the person in front of him at the moment no matter how much it is at odds with what he has said before.

    1. Congratulations! You have bucked the trend!

      I can’t tell how much mine has gone up. I have had to change my insurance plan three times in the last four years to keep it in my budget, but a quote for my old plan looks like it has only gone up maybe 60% in that time…

      Maybe you have had a high end plan all along so you weren’t getting ‘benefits’ added that you didn’t need?

  30. “A Democrat House, and a Democrat Senate?”

    God, I hope there’s an English teacher in the audience who rips his fûçkìņ’ head off for that abuse of language. “Democrat” is not an adjective, and that’s a particular rhetorical tactic I’ve loathed for a long time.

  31. 10:02 The flow of undocumented workers is lower than it’s been in 40 years. The economy has also been crappier than it’s been in 75 years.

  32. 10:02–If you’re doing a drinking game involving Obama saying “folks,” you’d be pretty hammered by now.

    “Osama bin Laden is dead, folks.” … and there goes the rest of the bottle.

    (And his moment just now with “if my daughter, or yours…” — beautiful.)

  34. 10:06–”I don’t look at my pension; it’s not as big as yours.” There’s the takeaway line.

    Particularly if I heard right with the followup “and that’s not a phrase I use often” or something like it.

  35. 10:04 Ooooh. Romney nailed Obama on a misrepresentation that he slid on in the first debate.
    10:06 Little kids again.
    10:07 If Obama’s right about having the author of the bill on Romney’s staff, that’s a pretty good counterpunch.

  36. As Romney has no beliefs and no actual policy plans, all he does is attack Obama with, uhm, lies. It’s stunning that people take him seriously. It’s like listening to a shadow.

  37. 10:21–Wait. Romney is trying to turn gun control into a referendum on families? Seriously?

    SO wish someone would ask him if he agrees that having a two-parent family is also preferable if both parents share the same “plumbing.”

    –Daryl

  38. Romney lies, my health insurance went up 26-38% under Bush but only 8-15% under Obama. And in what reality are automatic weapons banned???

    1. And in what reality are automatic weapons banned?

      Go to a gun store tomorrow and try to get an Uzi.

      1. Yes, because state-to-state restrictions on specific models of weapons for certain people after a background check equals a “ban.”

        I deliberately avoid throwing my hat into these little political spats you people have on this blog, but that’s probably the most egregiously wrong reply I’ve ever read. Just because a single model of gun is restricted in a single state does not mean it’s banned. And I emphasize STATE, because it’s THEIR rule. The Fed, and particularly the Pres, have NOTHING to do with it.

        TL;DR – actually, yes, I COULD walk into a gun store tomorrow and buy a full-auto Uzi. So . . . what’s your point?

      2. David,

        You can own a full auto in a number of states; most of them in fact. The trick is that it’s a pain in the ášš to get permission.

        Jay Field,

        “The Fed, and particularly the Pres, have NOTHING to do with it.”

        You are incorrect.

        “Firearm Owners’ Protection Act

        In 1986, this Act amended the NFA definition of “silencer” by adding combinations of parts for silencers and any part intended for use in the assembly or fabrication of a silencer. The Act also amended the GCA to prohibit the transfer or possession of machineguns. Exceptions were made for transfers of machineguns to, or possession of machineguns by, government agencies, and those lawfully possessed before the effective date of the prohibition, May 19, 1986.”

        http://www.atf.gov/firearms/nfa/

      3. @ Jerry: Ah, right, fair enough. Though again, I’ll reiterate, I was referring to any outright bans on the sale of ALL automatic weapons in general (which is, in most cases, a state by state thing) rather than any legislation that placed restrictions on only certain autos (in the cited case, weapons produced after 1986. But yes, you are correct, that is a rare instance of nationwide, Federal interference.

        The basic point still stands, you can still go out and buy an automatic weapon in numerous states.

    1. Given the alternatives, yeah we do. I don’t know why this is our choice– we have 100 times the population we did at the Revolution, which should be able to staff both houses of Congress and the administration with Hamiltons and Madisons. Somehow it doesn’t seem to be working out that way. But four years ago I thought that Sen. Obama was the best candidate the Democrats had put forward in my lifetime. I was dead wrong about that.

      5. No, I know what the word means. I have to deal with genuinely crazy people with mental disorders at work; and I don’t mean my coworkers.

        When Romney lies, you don’t see the signs that you see with people who lie to deceive and are worried about being caught. When he shifts on a dime and declares that the position that he’s just stated, even when that position is directly at odds with the position he’s staked out for himself for an entire month prior to that moment, he looks like a man who really believes what he’s just said. When he makes crap up about what he did in office, his father walking out of the 1964 RNC Convention in protest, or having actually seen his father marching with MLK, he looks like he absolutely believes every word of it.

        And I don’t think that Romney is that good of an actor. When he gets backed into having to confront reality VS his unreality, you see the conflict on his face before he gets comfortably back onto Planet Romney.

        The thing that scares me about Romney is that I believe that he really does believe everything that he’s saying when he says it. He really does believe the stuff coming out of his mouth. And that scares me because you can’t have someone with that defect as a world leader. You have no idea what he will say, disagree with or agree to in the moment, or maybe the wrong moment, as a world leader in order to fulfill whatever weird need he has to be seen as what he thinks the person or people he’s speaking to want him to be.

        IN the job I have right now, I’ve been around a lot of professional, career politicians, I’ve been around liars, I’ve been around actors and I’ve been around some people who don’t have the best grip on reality. Romney really is reminding me more and more of late of the people with the loose grip on reality more than he is the usual politicians, the liars and the actors.

  41. Romney wants to use his “experience in the private sector” to improve the country? So…we’re going to buy another country, use it to take out loans to line the government’s pockets, then shut that other country down and put its people out on the street?

    –Daryl

    1. No, we’re going to sell the country to China in a leveraged buyout and then go bankrupt.

      Romney will bank a couple billion in the Caymans.

    1. I thought he looked like The Captain from “How I Met Your Mother”–

      If you look at him only from the nose down, “He likes you!”

      If you look at him only from the nose up, “He wants to kill you!”

      –Daryl

  44. Okay, I openly admit I’m biased. But I think that Obama absolutely won.

    I’d put him ahead on points. Romney had a couple of bad moments, and a number of really good ones. The President did much better than in the first debate, and I think had more high points than Gov. Romney. Rubber match next time.

      1. I didn’t say you were deluded. I merely stated that, given the facts, the assertion that the Republicans were completely stonewalling Obama and the Democrats for the electorate’s own good was, at best, deluded.

  46. 9:15–Caroline says, “How can he (Romney) talk about the President controlling everything? We learned there’s three branches of government. He’s only one.”

    Caroline understands the Constitution better than Obama. When Obama can’t get the other two branches to go along, he just does what he wants anyway.

    Examples: Libya, the GM bailout, the DREAM Act, expansion of EPA powers in direct contravention of existing law, the moratorium on offshore drilling in direct contravention of a court order…

      1. So do you have any rhetorical skills other than attacking other bloggers? Way to build a sense of community.

      2. Well, if I did have to choose only one poster here as a perfect example of someone who has proven that he lives in an alternate reality, conservative bubble universe and is disconnected from the reality based community most of the time…

      3. My mission is calling out the deluded, and let people like Jerry and Peter give the details you’ll ignore. 🙂

      6. My mission is calling out the deluded, and let people like Jerry and Peter give the details you’ll ignore.

        So taking gratuitous shots at someone who wasn’t insulting you, or even necessarily addressing you, is now a calling? I didn’t know arrogant rudeness was a moral imperative.

        I’ll alert the pope.

      7. David,
        First of all, tea-for-brains, why do you need to defend a comment I made on Jay’s post? And second, sorry if it upsets you and hurts your world view. I’ve never seen you until this post, so you must be another political troll.

      8. First of all, tea-for-brains, why do you need to defend a comment I made on Jay’s post?

        Because most of us regulars can have more or less civilized discussions here. You, on the other hand, go for less-than-clever ad hominem (“tea for brains,” really?) attacks as your first option, rather than engaging in any kind of reasoned discussion. It’s bullying and it annoys me. Also, that’s kind of rich coming from someone who claims that he has a “mission” of “calling out the deluded.” My self-appointed mission of calling out the arrogant and obnoxious is every bit as important as your self-appointed mission.

        And second, sorry if it upsets you and hurts your world view. I’ve never seen you until this post, so you must be another political troll.

        Well, not that I have to justify myself to you, but I’ve been here 8+ years, off and on. I don’t really give a rat’s ášš what you may or may not have seen or remembered, but so there. Nyah.

  48. Once again, I listened to the debate on radio, getting a steady signal this time. I’m curious, anyone else just listening instead of watching, what did you think? It is a little harder without visual “cues.”

    Last debate is Monday, which is my day off, so I can see it on TV.

    Also, is anyone else old enough to remember a storyline that ran in Action Comics in 1968 or so, in which Superman forgot what his secret identity was? In the first part, he decided him must be the president. (Ignoring the rule that the Birthers have reminded us about so much the past few years, that a president has to have been born in the United States, which the 60s Superman definitely was not!) He used make-up to make himself look like The President, and an “Editor’s Note” (remember them?) stated something along the lines of not making him look like any current politician out of respect for the dignity of the office of President. Make your own joke here.

    The reason I bring this up is, if memory serves, President Superman in this story looked an awful lot like Romney. If anyone can dig out a copy of that and scan one of the panels, we can compare with something a little more solid than my memory.

  49. I’ll say this, this debate and the prior one should be a textbook warning to future incumbents. You don’t wait to get smacked and bloodied before deciding that you take things seriously. You don’t wait until you fumble and let the other team score before deciding that you’ll use both hands to catch the ball.

    If this Obama had come out for the first debate, we’d have been calling this election an almost guaranteed win. If this Obama had come out for two debates in a row, we’d be calling this a sealed deal and in the bag. As it stands now, we’re looking at a complete ášš kicking tonight that might stop the Romney momentum and swing the clear lead towards Obama.

    Basically, don’t half-ášš it.

    1. I’d like to think he may have been trying to look “Presidential”, but I also think The President kind of half-assed it for the first debate. I also think he didn’t expect Romney to explicitly lie and flip-flop like he did, and that put him off. Not making excuses for him at all, just speculating.
      I’m hoping President Obama will bring up Bain in the final debate, for cryin’ out loud.

      1. I’ve said something like that. It’s hard to prepare to debate a pathological liar. You can’t undercut the position of someone who changes the position to whatever he thinks he needs to say in the moment.

        But Biden showed that you can shut that down if you just prep it better and Obama slapped the crap out of Romney this time whenever he tried to lie. If he had taken prep seriously and decided to deal with the lies as he did tonight, this would have been the final nail in the Romney campaign coffin rather than the hope of a second wind for the Obama campaign.

    2. I think part of the problem is that Obama treated Romney in the first debate the same way that he initially treated the GOP when his term began: in good faith. (The problem, of course, being that it wasn’t reciprocal.) Obama has clearly allowed the scales to fall from his eyes in this regard.

  50. Most polls I’ve seen so far are showing a victory for Obama, but the internals of the polls are fascinating. CNN’s poll, for example, said Obama won by a margin of 46% to 39% with a 4.5% margin of error. However the internals scored the following:

    Strong leader: Romney 49-46%.
    Economy: Romney 58-40%
    Health care: Romney 49-46%.
    Deficit: Romney 49-36%.
    Taxes: Romney 51-44%.

    Furthermore, 25% said they were more likely to vote Obama, and the same percentage broke for Romney. It would seem if these polls are correct, the debate changed nothing. Obama might have stopped the bleeding, that remains to be seen, but he didn’t gain any ground which is what I think he needed to do.

    As for the Crowley interjection on the Libya issue, she has now stated about Romney, “He was right in the main, but I think he picked the wrong word.” Mickey Kaus, a self-proclaimed “common sense Democrat,” makes a compelling argument about why that interjection was wrong here: http://dailycaller.com/2012/10/16/crowley-was-out-of-line/

    Now, before some idiot tells me to “shove it” again, please note I’m not actually trying to post my political leanings on this matter. Anyone who has read my previous posts know what they are, and I don’t feel the need to repeat them. I’m just trying to put some more information in the discussion.

      2. The problem with that is context. One could argue that he was not speaking of the Benghazi attacks in particular when he said that. He had just spoken of the embassy attacks, but also spoke of the 9/11/01 attacks in between. It was ambiguous enough (probably purposely) to leave room for belief that he meant terror attacks in general. The piece by Kaus highlighted just such a disagreement between WaPo fact checker Glenn Kessler and Josh Gerstein of the Politco over that very same speech.

        And while CNN may now say that Obama called it a terrorist attack on September 12th, on Friday September 21st, they declared, “The White House, for the first time Thursday, declared the attack that killed Stevens and three other people a terrorist attack.”

        http://www.cnn.com/2012/09/20/world/africa/libya-investigation/index.html

        So it wasn’t just rabid right-wingers who thought Obama failed to call the terrorist attacks as terrorist attacks in that speech.

        Again, I’m not trying to start an argument so much as show how people can reach different conclusions without being liars.

      3. Oh, so CNN also got it wrong. Considering that MSNBC reported that Felix Baumgartner broke the speed of light, it’s hard to conceive a TV news organization misreporting something.

        PAD

      4. Spin it any way you want to, Malcolm, but Romney got it wrong and there are two speeches in the following two days where Obama discusses the event as an act of terror.

        Romney got it wrong. He either spoke from ignorance, his second best trick, or he lied again, his first best trick,and got it wrong.

        But feel free to spin away anyhow.

    2. I’m still trying to figure out if Obama told the truth even once the entire night. If he did, I couldn’t find where. It was almost like he was trying to use Jedi mind tricks. “You are better off than you were 4 years ago.” “My policies do work.” “High gas prices mean the economy is strong.” And yes, Romney nailed him on the terrorism issue, as all the transcripts of his Rose Garden comments being posted online are proving. I’ll give him this – He had a good first half hour. Then he lost it and Romney took charge. By the end of the debate, Obama was gone. Struggling for words. Rambling answers. One time asking Crowley to move to another subject rather than respond to Romney. The Dems need to negotiate debates that only last a half hour. That seems to be the longest they can keep it together.

      Malcolm’s right. Crowley admitted she was wrong. Until that point, I thought she was being a good moderator. Wonder when the Repubs are going to wake up and decide that agreeing to rabid left wing “moderators” isn’t such a good idea. Crowley inappropriately injected herself into the debate and she was factually wrong. Very poor job on her part.

      Regardless of who won, here’s Obama’s real problem:

      http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/10/16/luntz_focus_group_of_mostly_former_obama_voters_switch_to_romney.html

      Obama needed a game changer. He didn’t get it. So, the momentum is still with Romney. In fact, Romney may have won the election last night. There was a lot of discussion in our house about who won the debate. We agreed that no one scored a knock out, and that no serious damage had been done. We were shocked… seriously shocked…. at the response from the Focus Group. These were independent, undecided voters who had mainly gone with Obama in 2008. Not only had they almost all broken for Romney as the result of this debate, their obvious distaste and disgust for Obama really caught us off guard. In short, they didn’t believe a word that Obama said and they are sick of his malarky. If their attitude is at all representative of independent voters in the country, Obama is done. Period.

      1. Tim, you really had the gall to post a link to a Luntz group “focus group” after that link I posted the other day relating to the NHL lockout?

        Using Luntz – a GOP strategist – means you’re not even attempting to hide your right-wing bias and desperation for any way to spin the debate last night in your favor.

        And congrats to you and Malcolm for both being User X.

      2. “I’m still trying to figure out if Obama told the truth even once the entire night. If he did, I couldn’t find where.”

        Well, leaving the alternate reality conservative bubble for a bit might help you see actually reality for a change.

      4. Ugh. Sorry. I meant another group swinging to Romney following the debate. Video included at the site.

      5. Craig, Obama’s problem is not that Luntz was a GOP strategist. His problem is that none of those people deciding to vote for Romney in those focus groups were GOP strategists. Most of them seem to have voted for him in 2008. According to their mood expressed last night, they are sick of Obama’s “bûllšhìŧ.” (Exact word used by a member of the focus group. Luntz immediately apologized. I think it was understandable.)

      6. Wow, Tim, the Weekly No-Standards edits video to make a false point.

        Right before that clip starts, the guy asked who was voting Obama. One person raised their hand. He asked who was voting Romney. One person raised their hand. He then started a conversation with them about the issues that night.

        So most of a group of undecided stayed undecided and one each went to each candidate.

        But don’t worry, the Weekly No-Standards is there to edit out that pesky bit of truth for you.

      7. Jerry, you always keep it classy. I didn’t see any obvious edits. If you have the “full” video, feel free to link to it. I’ll watch it. Not as drastic as Luntz’s group, but still moved in Romney’s direction. I do wish the video hadn’t cut off when it did. It sounded like (typically) Chris Matthews was about to make an ášš of himself.

      8. Tim, maybe you missed these important words –

        “Right before that clip starts…”

        And then an explanation of what anyone watching MSNBC last night saw.

        I know, reality… Whatcha gonna do other than keep denying it?

      10. Sorry Tim, a lot of us are better off than we were four years ago, and we didn;t have a president trampling all over the corpse of the Constituion to do it. (Maybe a little shuffling and a refusal to undo the damage done by his predecessor howver.)

    3. Most polls I’ve seen so far are showing a victory for Obama, but the internals of the polls are fascinating.

      How much time did you spend on the internals of the 1st Presidential debate and the VP debates while you were declaring the GOP the winners?

      Now, before some idiot tells me to “shove it” again, please note I’m not actually trying to post my political leanings on this matter.

      I’m the idiot when you’re the one picking every nit possible to make your side look better than it was last night? I call bûllšhìŧ, and yeah, again, you can shove it.

    4. So the fact that the president actually did say the words “act(s) of terror” 3 times after the fact is supposed to prove what?
      You dámņ well know what he was trying to say. That the president took two weeks to admit that it was a planned attack by terrorists and not by a group of protesters pìššëd øff about a movie some freak thought was a good idea to make. The fact that he went on and on about this movie being the cause or “we are still investigating what happened.”
      Your guy fûçkëd up yet again. No matter how you try to spin it, you are watching him crash and burn.
      I’m surprised someone here hasn’t blamed Bush yet.

      1. So, Pat, your own spin on Romney’s statement was that – as with his platform – he did not provide specifics on what he meant?

        Yeah…that’s a lot better than just plain being wrong and saying, “Fair enough…I forgot about that.”

        Make no mistake…Obama’s not “my guy.” In the 24 years I’ve been able to vote, I’ve never had a “my guy”…a candidate who made me sit up and say, “That’s the guy I want in office.” It’s always been a matter of, “I’ll take him over the other guy.” Same here. Romney’s given me no reason to say that about him. Between his views on social policy being further from my own than Obama’s (as a whole), his inability or just plain refusal to provide specifics to much of his platform, his apparent inability to grasp the nature of how those of us in the so-called middle class live, function, and are impacted by the economy (he’s going to help us by not taxing profits from mutual funds, for example? Great…once I’m able to stop living paycheck-to-paycheck, I’ll run right out and get one), his record of corporate piracy (hard to forget the last time a candidate said that his years in business meant he knew how to run the country…I’m looking at you, “Dubya”), and his outright distortion of fact, I’m not seeing where he’d be a better choice.

        –Daryl

      2. My guy “fûçkëd up yet again.”

        You got some balls, Pat.

        While my guy has been spending the last few weeks trying to determine what happened, your guy didn’t even wait for 9/11 to be over before trying to use four tragic deaths in order to score quick political points.

        My guy fulfilled his promise of getting bin Laden while your guys tried to credit Bush. Surprised no one here has blamed Bush? Your own party can’t get far enough away from the guy who embraced the policies that tanked the economy and your new guy wants to revive.

        Your guy’s main business experience is raiding other businesses and lining his pocket, win or lose. Your guy’s main claim to fame is lying. Your guy’s fortune is owed to the government bailout he himself received in the late 90s, before he came out against government bailouts.

        You want to see fûçkìņg up? Pray for a Romney presidency. Trust me, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

        PAD

      3. I’m surprised someone here hasn’t blamed Bush yet.

        It’s all Bush’s fault.

        There, hopefully you can now make it through the day.

        But hey, at least Obama and even Bush knew that ‘we the little people’ even existed. Romney, on the other hand, doesn’t consider life to start until you’ve got a healthy set of stock options going.

      4. Hey, Pat…

        ROMNEY: I — I think interesting the president just said something which — which is that on the day after the attack he went into the Rose Garden and said that this was an act of terror.

        ROMNEY: You said in the Rose Garden the day after the attack, it was an act of terror.

        ROMNEY: I want to make sure we get that for the record because it took the president 14 days before he called the attack in Benghazi an act of terror.

        The point he was making looks pretty clear right there. Your guy fûçkëd up yet again.

        Romney is a piece of trash. The day it happened, Romney couldn’t wait to go out and score cheap political points by standing on the bodies of the dead and use them as his soapbox to launch an attack. He attacked the President, because of Romney’s stupidity, he attacked the staff that was under siege, he got facts wrong and both he and Ryan have continued to lie about the nature of some things that had happened.

        And you would think that the dûmbášš, his campaign and their supporters would have learned from the first time he made this mistake this year. Oh, yes, this was the second screw up like this by Romney since he won the primaries.

        Romney, dûmbášš supreme, couldn’t wait to run to a microphone and a camera and crow about the Obama Administration’s failure to get Chen Guangcheng, the blind dissident Chinese civil rights activist who worked on human rights issues in rural areas of the People’s Republic of China, out of China. Romney, dûmbášš supreme, couldn’t wait to declare that our failure as a country to do this was a “dark day for freedom” and a “day of shame for the Obama administration.”

        Funny how mister “Can’t wait for facts before speaking” turned absolutely silent on the matter when Chen Guangcheng stepped foot on American soil shortly after Romney opened his mouth and made an ášš of himself.

        And yet he didn’t learn from that incident just a little earlier in the year and couldn’t stop himself from making an ášš of himself again. And then he tries to double down at the debate and says something both stupid and factually incorrect.

        And he got it wrong. Tough šhìŧ. Deal with it, Pat.

        It did show one important thing though. Peter and others have pointed out that Romney’s fake laugh and smile that he puts on in debates and interviews never seem to touch his eyes. When he tries to project joy or amusement, there’s a blank stare in his eyes that doesn’t match what he’s trying to convey. But when his petulance and anger at not having things go his way flairs up?

        That comes through in his eyes in spades.
        http://www.politicalruminations.com/images/1CAND-SURR/scary-romney_debate_angry.jpg

      5. Jerry, the other thing that gets me about Romney jumping out there and very quickly denouncing how foreign policy situations are handled…under “Dubya’s” watch, didn’t the Republican Party declare it tantimount to treason to say such things about the president while the situation was ongoing?

        –Daryl

      6. Nytwyng, that’s just typical right-wing “Do as I say, not as I do”.

        But then, it’s been like this since the day Bush left office. So, why expect them to care about their deplorable hypocrisy now?

      7. My guy “fûçkëd up yet again.”

        You got some balls, Pat.

        While my guy has been spending the last few weeks trying to determine what happened, your guy didn’t even wait for 9/11 to be over before trying to use four tragic deaths in order to score quick political points.

        Yep, I’ve got dirty big balls…

        Yes, he fûçkëd up again, the repeated request for more security denied? They knew exactly what happened over there but choose to go with the video excuse. Your guy was spending his time fund raising and trying to get re elected, going on the View.

        Oh and I don’t recall claiming Romney was “My Guy”

        My guy fulfilled his promise of getting bin Laden while your guys tried to credit Bush. Surprised no one here has blamed Bush? Your own party can’t get far enough away from the guy who embraced the policies that tanked the economy and your new guy wants to revive.

        Yes we know that he keeps telling us but no, your guy didn’t get Bin Laden, a group of guys called Navy Seals got Bin Laden and before you yell, the same would have been applied to Bush

        Your guy’s main business experience is raiding other businesses and lining his pocket, win or lose. Your guy’s main claim to fame is lying. Your guy’s fortune is owed to the government bailout he himself received in the late 90s, before he came out against government bailouts.

        You forgot the part about letting that woman die of cancer. I could give two šhìŧš and a holler about his “fortune”
        this class warfare bit is really old.

        You want to see fûçkìņg up? Pray for a Romney presidency. Trust me, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

      9. Hey, Pat, how about answering a question.

        “They knew exactly what happened over there but choose to go with the video excuse. “

        And what proof do you have of this? Let’s look at reality for a minute here.

        The Embassy of the United States in Cairo released the Twitter statement that Romney jumped on and declared came out after the attack and said was from the White House. Look at that one word in there. It came before the attack.

        Now why do you think they did that? Maybe it was because on September 9, 2012, an excerpt of the YouTube video was broadcast on Al-Nas TV, an Egyptian Islamist television station, and a number of the locals went batshit about it. The local media started pitching a fit and stirring up the locals.

        And then, right after that, the ship hit the sand.

        And why would we think that the film was the cause for some of what we first saw? Because many of the initial protesters said so and some spoke to the press about it.

        “Many Muslims consider any depiction of the Prophet to be offensive.

        “This movie must be banned immediately and an apology should be made,” said 19-year-old Ismail Mahmoud, a member of the so-called “ultras” soccer supporters who played a big role in the uprising that brought down Hosni Mubarak last year.

        He called on President Mohamed Mursi, Egypt’s first civilian president and an Islamist, to take action, without giving details of the film that angered him or other protesters.”

        “Rafik Farouk, 38, an Egyptian Christian, also took part. “I am here because I am Egyptian and reject anything that insults Islam or anything that sparks division in Egypt,” he said.”
        http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/11/us-egypt-usa-protest-idUSBRE88A11N20120911

        We then saw several smaller groups trying to claim involvement or take claim. This is important.

        See, the Obama administration isn’t like the W. Bush administration in one very important way. The Obama administration doesn’t doesn’t work under the idea of picking a desired finding and fixing the intelligence as they go to work towards that finding. They were working with what they had as they went. We knew the film created an issue. Citing that as a fact isn’t wrong.

        But no matter the finally settled on cause, it doesn’t change the fact that Obama went to the Rose Garden the very next day to discuss the attack and did indeed use the wording that Romney claimed he did not use.

        Oh, and that shot about The View? Obama’s segment aired on September 11. It was pre-recorded for that airing on September 10. So Obama wasn’t going on The View right after the major attacks or right after a man died or was actually being killed.

        Yeah, I know… Facts, what are you going to do?

      10. and before you yell, the same would have been applied to Bush

        Let the chants rain down:
        Bûllšhìŧ!
        Bûllšhìŧ!
        Bûllšhìŧ!

        At least “our guy” cared enough to get bin Laden.

        this class warfare bit is really old.

        Tell that to “your guy”, he who thinks the average American lives off of capital gains like he does, and “your party”, who are out to crush anybody who isn’t white, rich, and religious, then.

      11. They knew exactly what happened over there but choose to go with the video excuse.

        Somehow I doubt that. If they knew what was going on, they had to know it would eventually get out as well. I wouldn’t expect any administration to lie that transparently, knowing it would blow up in their faces, and do so sooner rather than later. It’d be like going to war for a reason you knew to be false and that your own inspectors would prove to be false as soon as you won.

        See, the Obama administration isn’t like the W. Bush administration in one very important way. The Obama administration doesn’t doesn’t work under the idea of picking a desired finding and fixing the intelligence as they go to work towards that finding. They were working with what they had as they went.

        Um, I think they’re exactly alike in that way. Being flat wrong is not the same thing as lying, even when people believe what they want to be true.

      12. Hey, Pat, how about answering a question.

        “They knew exactly what happened over there but choose to go with the video excuse. “

        And what proof do you have of this?

        http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/10/21/truth-behind-the-benghazi-attack.html

        Have fun.

        Oh, and that shot about The View? Obama’s segment aired on September 11. It was pre-recorded for that airing on September 10. So Obama wasn’t going on The View right after the major attacks or right after a man died or was actually being killed.

        So let me get this straight, If that show was taped on the 10th, why is it that Joy Behar was asking the president about the attack on the embassy? Now I know that woman thinks she is the šhìŧ and she’s right she is šhìŧ but to have that much vision is just plain amazing.

      13. “why is it that Joy Behar was asking the president about the attack on the embassy? Now I know that woman thinks she is the šhìŧ and she’s right she is šhìŧ but to have that much vision is just plain amazing.”

        Well, I’m glad you’re easily impressed by such a feat. Me? I’m not that impressed by someone’s ability to ask about an event that happened on September 11th fourteen days after the fact.

        You know, when he did a second sit-down with them on September 25th.

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