Tonight was a tricky beast. I was watching the debate in a Portland Oregon bar which had a decidedly liberal bent to it. Obama got lots of applause, Romney got lots of boos. In some ways, it could have been like watching Independence Day from an alien bar.
In contrast, my friend was texting me from a bar in Tennessee, and sending messages to the effect of "Romney's cleaning up". These two very different settings cast two very different lights on the debate.
Now, with a couple hours behind the debate, and a couple of tequilas out of me, I am feeling nearly objective enough to make some kind of assessment of what really happened:
-Romney had a stronger debate, but gave up a lot of ground.
-Romney got in better points on the president's shortcomings
-Obama stayed on message and remained more composed
-Obama seemed muddle and reiterated lines on green energy and education that seemed hollow
-Romney genuinely lost control several times, showing cracks that made him seem like a sociopath and a wingnut
In contrast, my friend was texting me from a bar in Tennessee, and sending messages to the effect of "Romney's cleaning up". These two very different settings cast two very different lights on the debate.
Now, with a couple hours behind the debate, and a couple of tequilas out of me, I am feeling nearly objective enough to make some kind of assessment of what really happened:
-Romney had a stronger debate, but gave up a lot of ground.
-Romney got in better points on the president's shortcomings
-Obama stayed on message and remained more composed
-Obama seemed muddle and reiterated lines on green energy and education that seemed hollow
-Romney genuinely lost control several times, showing cracks that made him seem like a sociopath and a wingnut
More analysis tomorrow. The key take away from tonight was that there was most certainly not a game changing moment and both candidates lived to fight another day. If Romney can string more of these together, we may yet see a real race. For all Romney has been criticized for not laying out specifics, Obama was equally evasive tonight - but he survived the economics debate, which was his biggest weakness. The question now is can Romney string some good days together, and can stand out clearly in the National Policy and Town Hall debates and bring forward his message clearly.
Bonus mindless observations:
-Why pick on Big Bird?
-Jim Lehrer would make a very good owl
-Gotta love the anniversary shout out
Romney's Big Bird jab sounded more like 'You know how almost all of you watching grew up watching Big Bird? Well I want to cut him up into tiny pieces and eat him because China.'
ReplyDeletePBS gets about 1/100th of 1% of the congressional budget, and most of their support indeed truly comes from viewers like YOU, not the U.S. Government.
It's amazing the extent to which the Republican party is willing to distort facts to suit their needs.
DeleteGlad BB will be OK.