Like many others, I watched Wednesday night's debate between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. I agree with Obama. Who was that guy? He was a new person. I suppose someone had shaken the Etch-a-Sketch just before the debate, so that he could transform himself into a lover and liker of many things. We found out that he likes green jobs, but he would never fund them. We found out that he likes coal. And he really loves Medicare (i.e., senior citizens of the 47%).
The thing that caught a lot of people's attention was Romney's attack on PBS's Sesame Street. Mitt Romney likes Big Bird, but he isn't going to borrow any more money from those loan shark Chinese to keep him on the air. This caused a lot of uproar in the media.
What do I think?
I doubt that Big Bird and his pals are the main cause of America's economic woes. I find it incredulous of Romney to attack a children's show in the middle of a presidential debate. That doesn't seem very presidential to me.
Let's talk about what presidential means.
Did Mitt Romney win the debate?
He certainly came off stronger than I expected. Obama was more reserved in his debate style. Many people say that it means Romney was the over-all winner. The winner of a debate is circumspect at best. He may have won in the eyes of some, but I saw it as more of a strategy on the part of the Obama team.
The debate was a platform for Romney to hang himself politically. He had to make himself seem more human and likable from the standpoint of the 47% of independent voters, who he slashed in a private melee with his top 10% of political contributors. Now that Romney has laid it all out on the line before a nationally televised audience, he can't take back anything he has said. I believe the next debates will show a much more concise and ruthless Obama. Wednesday's debate was more about feeling out where Romney "really" stands on domestic issues.
Romney is running on his record as one-term governor of a liberal New England state, who created the very model of Obamacare, and the CEO of a slash-and-burn capital investment firm. (What happened to the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics?) Obama is running on his record as President of the United States, which is a much more visible platform. Romney has a lot of personal demons to exorcise, as well. He must figure out how Romneycare is different from Obamacare. Of course, I realize that it was on a state-level, but it worked. Why shouldn't it work for the entire nation? (I believe that Obamacare doesn't go far enough. But, that's for a Clinton presidency.)
As a final thought, I am reminded of a 1995 Michael Douglas movie, The American President. Douglas plays an incumbent president who is mired in a harmless personal scandal with a Washington lobbyist, which is lampooned by his rival for the presidency, played by Richard Dreyfuss. Dreyfuss' character always ends his speeches by declaring he is "running for president." I think we saw a little of that in Romney on Wednesday night; in that the only consistent issue we have seen from Romney is that he is "running for president." Everything else he has flip-flopped on like a big dead-eyed mackerel!
This message is Big Bird approved!
