Immediate impressions post debate Oct 16

We will be waiting for a couple of days to get some solid poll data on the debate impact on the race  last night, but I was watching CNN to see if their poll taken immediately after the debate  showed anything.  46% thought the President won; 39%, Romney….a very different outcome than the first debate.

What the most likely outcome of this debate is that Obama was able to rally his base and make them happy he punched back.  Whether that is enough was the question asked by my late 40 something son. We will not know to what extent he was able to hold his troops together for a couple of days and stop the slide his poor performance caused in the first debate.

The most post-debate feedback I got was a call from my late 40’s something daughter, the teacher.  She and her colleagues were tweeting during  the entire debate and they all had the same reaction:  they were angry at Romney’s response on the question of birth control coverage as part of their employer provided health insurance, his sidestepping equal pay for women legislation, a perceived slam at single moms, and his irritating attempt at being understanding at what women go through.

 Particularly getting their dander up was the segment about gun violence where Romney appeared to launch into the praise of a family being comprised as one man and one woman as a way to curb youth violence. My daughter’s response (she is happily married, but some of her colleagues are single) “he just ticked off every   single parent listening”.  Also cited was the equal pay discussion, with Obama touting his support of equal pay for women…the Lilly Ledbetter Act…and Romney’s trying to show empathy.  What Romney said is he understood flex time.  Why, he even let his secretary have flexible hours so she could go home and cook dinner.  (I guess a woman’s work in the home is never done).  The GOP is on record for opposing equal pay laws.

 Did Roe v Wade even get a mention?  If so, it did not make much of an impression. That Romney is pledged to overturn it was never spotlighted by Obama.  Perhaps the birth control pills and ending Planned Parenthood (2 mentions of that) tested better in pre debate focus group.  Reproductive rights that include legal abortions as well as the pill are the main issue so far as women, suburban and single, are concerned. It was interesting that Obama used the question about what he would do to help working women as the opportunity to bring up the women’s health issue.  It is birth control that has made it possible for women to work and to develop their careers so it was appropriate.

The President was able to bring his position on immigration into the debate and I thought he did cite strongly what he had done and fired back at Romney for embracing the “show me your papers” law in Arizona. Romney tried to squirrel out of it, saying he only praised the e-verify part, but   Romney did little but repeats his anti-amnesty position(amnesty is a word that s poison to the Hispanic community) and self-deportation as a way to solve the problem with the undocumented already in the country.  He tried to chide the President for not passing a comprehensive immigration bill.  Hispanics are not naive. They, to the tune of 70% plus,  are supporting the President and know which party is friendly to Hispanic interests and who would support a path to citizenship as part of the law.  It is not the GOP or Romney.  Obama most likely helped himself with that base, as well, increasing probable Latino turnout at the polls.

CNN post-debate polls of only viewers of the debate still gave the points on handling the economy to Romney.  The President was able to call Romney out on the lack of details in a very direct confrontation, asking if Romney were asked to invest $8 trillion in a deal with no details of how it would be paid back, would that be  a good deal?  What Obama did not do was to explain how Romney’s plan did not add up to $5 trillion offsets to make it revenue neutral.  Obama did say what Romney wanted to do was to heap on another $2 trillion in defense spending and $1trillion in keeping Bush tax cuts, though the media post-debate did not pick up on the total of what Romney was proposing.  However, the CNN fact checker post-debate did conclude that neither Obama nor Romney would reduce the deficit with their plans. The Obama team and surrogates must do much more to shoot holes in the Romney plan and point out that Romney must offset with deductions and loophole closing  a total of $8 trillion, not just $5 trillion. 
 Obama began doing that in this debate.

Obama opened with his plan for the economy as an answer at the beginning of the debate. I could not repeat it by the end of the debate.. He needs to do better to make it memorable.  He still has work to do to lay out his plans for the future and Romney was able to get his 5 points in.  For once, Obama was able to enumerate his successes and the promises he kept.  He did that forcefully and he needs to do it again and again and again.

 However,  what Obama  did not do is to cite the improvements and show the trend in the economy that is upward..  Trend is the operative word, here.  He could have mentioned the market roared back and the housing market has worked it way through the foreclosure crisis, lending is up, and of course the unemployment percentage is the same as it was in January 2009.  He did talk about the creation of 5.3 million private sector jobs, and the increase in manufacturing,especially the Detroit auto revival,   but the job loss left by the Bush crash was 8.3 million.  We are on our way to solving the problem and it is getting better. He then could shift to the Romney job creation fantasy plan...Romney used to talk about trickle down and now he does not, but his tax cut without an adequate pay for would only drive up the debt or require the middle class to sacrifice.

What he did not do was to respond, though  and I saw his head shake negatively when Romney  repeated the GOP talking points that Obama did not live up to his promises.  What Obama  could have said is that those promises were made before he was sworn in and the depth of the recession was not known. The projections were made by economists and Obama, the president elect, did make an error in making promises based on them.  As we know now, there is about a three month lag time between the first reports and the final analysis.  It is at least an excuse that could put a dent in the GOP's main talking point argument that Obama failed by his own measure.  It would also have been an opportunity to remind us how bad the Bush policies were and that we should not repeat them.

Two highlights that benefited Obama:   Romney fumbled the Libya issue claiming Obama erred in not calling the attack on the consulate a terrorist attack when the moderator and Obama proved otherwise. (He must have been listening to the echo chamber of the right wing talkers). Also, he called Romney out on making it a political issue and was indignant about it.  The other was Romney mentioning  his portfolio and and Obama fired back that he had not followed his because it was smaller than Romney's.  Class warfare revived.