Tonight’s second presidential candidate debate will be in the absurd “town hall” format. Consistent with the last two debates I do not plan to watch it. I do plan to comment on the commentary tomorrow as it emerges. There’s already some pre-commentary appearing and I think I see a common theme emerging: why the heck does Barack Obama want to be re-elected to the presidency?
Ezra Klein puts it pretty succinctly:
At this point, Romney and Obama are running almost perfectly opposite campaigns. Romney can tell you exactly what he wants to do, but barely a word about how he’ll do it. Obama can’t describe what he wants to achieve, but he can tell you everything about how he’ll get it done. It’s a campaign without real policies against a campaign lacking a clear vision.
also this:
Obama campaign officials insist that they have an agenda. They want to create a million new manufacturing jobs, hire 100,000 new math and science teachers, and require the rich to pay a bit more in taxes to protect our most important public investments.
Sorry, but I don’t buy it. The guy who ran in 2008 to change, well, almost everything, isn’t enduring the grind of another presidential campaign to give the manufacturing sector a modest push. Obama hasn’t forgotten his more ambitious goals on climate change or campaign finance reform or the American Jobs Act. He has just stopped mentioning them.
Elect me because I’m me. Or because I’m not the other guy.
Harold Meyerson, on the other hand, frames his column today rather poetically around Rabbi Hillel’s first and third question:
If I am not for myself, who will be for me?
But if I am only for myself, who am I?
If not now, when?
The most important of these in the present circumstances may be the second. Is Barack Obama only for himself? Who is he? Is Mitt Romney only for himself?
Mr. Meyerson goes on to propose his own agenda for a second Obama term:
A vote for Obama should mean more than consolidating the reforms of his first term and fending off the Republicans’ dismantling of the New Deal. In Tuesday night’s debate, why not unveil a plan to reinstate the Glass-Steagall barrier between investment banks and federally insured depositor banks? How about putting a ceiling on the level of assets a bank can have, as Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) has proposed? These ideas aren’t just prudential economics; they would also align the president with Main Street against Wall Street.
Such an alignment would work to the president’s advantage not only in itself but also because Romney remains a creature of Wall Street, a man comfortable in homes where he can casually slander half of the American people to the quiet approbation of his donors.
revealing that he has, apparenty, been living in a cave for the last four years. By what measurement is President Obama not “a creature of Wall Street”? Our alternatives are between Mitt Romney, a creature of Wall Street, and Barack Obama, a creature of Wall Street. Rejoice! If we pour enough credit into the banks, I’m sure the economy will recover some day.
I note that housing prices in Long Island, Connecticut, and Arlington, Va are rising nicely.
If we pour enough credit into the banks, I’m sure the economy will recover some day.
Just … a few … trillion … more … should do it….
-alternately-
Any trillion now….
Looks like the President managed to weasel his way out of the Benghazi thing with a dishonest assist from the moderator. I’m sure that will come up, and I’m sure all the O supporters will claim that the President never said that the Benghazi attack was anything other than an act of terror now. Weasel words from weaselly people, designed to obscure truth and meaning.
God how I miss mathematics at times….
Oh, and I decided to watch a few minutes with the sound turned off. My wife did, too. At least for those few minutes Romney seemed to be winning. He looked relaxed, confident, positive and energetic. During that period Obama looked very down in the mouth, kind of slouched (though not quite Nixonian!) and seemed rather angry.
The moderator did the whole debate process a disservice by coming in and validating something Obama said (the Benghazi Rose Garden comment), only later to admit that she didn’t really remember the incident enough to validate it — and her memory proved wrong. However, it was too late, and as other analysts have noted, the red flag had already been thrown down, a another lie was perpetrated and embossed on listeners brains.
A woman friend and I both watched the debate, but in different places — she with a male friend over at his condo, I viewed with my husband. She dropped by afterwards and we discussed it, pretty intensely. Her first reaction was that Obama had walked away with it. When I asked why, she said it was because he was so much ‘cooler’ that Romney and the there was the whole women’s rights thing. She had also been insulted by Romney’s comments dealing with hiring women for his MA staff, and feared the rights of women were in jeopardy should Romney be elected.
It’s interesting because she fits right into the Obama demographic for women — 31 years old, unmarried, professional and kind of restless in her life. After going through the debate together, though, and after I explained some of the ‘talking points’ on both sides, I think she was less sure about her vote for Obama. It’s more of an emotional impression that often decides votes, not a deeper discussion into the substance of the issues. In the latter, I think Romney has it hands down. In the former, Obama is able to successfully solicit votes from people.