Reaction to Last Night’s Debate
Pandora will have a post up shortly on Romney’s stunning and revealing statements that revealed him to be a male chauvinist asshole, and I will have a detailed post up on Libya later this morning after the Polling Report (which we have a lot of, by the way), but here is what is being said across the mainstream and liberal and conservative media this morning. And I hear from Dana Garrett that Joe Scarborough has that sour puss on his face that reveals when his guy lost and Joe knows it.
Mark Halperin: “I don’t think anyone can say Governor Romney won this debate… His answer on Libya was the closest thing to a moment, a horribly weak moment, I think that the debate had.”
Neil Cavuto: “The President put in a better performance tonight.”
Mike Allen: “There were a number of painfully awkward moments for Governor Romney. This was one of them. American Bridge, one of the liberal groups, has already bought the website binderfullofwomen.com.”
John Kerry: “I’m telling you, in the next days, all of these inconsistencies and untruths we’ll see. Tonight the Mitt Romney campaign began to unravel formally and publicly and dramatically.”
John King: Romney on Libya: “That one moment, there, just a little bit of deer in the headlights.”
Jim VandeHei: “I’m getting an email from Lois Romano who’s on the floor in the spin room, and it says that Romney people are very defensive about the performance. She said that Ed Gillespie is red-faced and defending Mitt Romney’s performance.”
John Harris: “I sensed that this time Mitt Romney’s competitiveness sometimes made him seem a little peevish… I did feel that he was slightly annoying, frankly.”
Charles Krauthammer: “I think on points, if you’re scoring it on points, Obama wins on points.”
Ed Schultz: “I think the President had a stellar performance tonight … the dagger came out, the dagger of truth: Mitt Romney this is who you are behind closed doors, and the President hit him with the 47% comment in just the right tone, just the right way.”
Jim VandHei: “He seemed to get irked early on.”
Brit Hume: “[The President] will probably be declared the winner of this on most cards.”
David Brooks: “If we go by winners and losers, I guess I’d have to say Obama won this debate.”
Matt Dowd: “Yeah, very clear victor. President Obama gets the victory in this.”
Juan Williams: “I think Obama won the debate.”
ABC Fact Check: “Mitt Romney, when he says the President doubled the deficit – that’s just false.”
Lois Romano: “The sense of the room is that Obama knocked it out of the park.”
NYT’s Andrew Rosenthal: “When George H.W. Bush looked at his watch in a 1992 debate with Bill Clinton and Ross Perot and absolutely bungled a question about how the national debt had affected him personally, he cemented the impression that he was out of touch with real Americans’ lives. When Gerald Ford denied in 1976 that there was any “Soviet domination” of Eastern Europe, he cemented the impression that he was out of touch with pretty much everything. Tonight, Mitt Romney may have had a similar moment, during a back-and-forth about the attack on the Benghazi Consulate.”
Taegan Goddard: “Obama won the debate decisively. The president had a simple formula: Defend and explain his record while insisting that Romney wasn’t being truthful. He kept Romney on the defensive and came prepared with counter-punches to nearly every topic. It was devastatingly effective.”
Chris Cillizza: “In trying to catch the incumbent in what he thought was a clear mistake, Romney was hoisted with his own petard by Crowley in what will be the single most memorable (and replayed) interaction of the debate.”
New York Times: “The most devastating moment for Mr. Romney was self-inflicted. Continuing his irresponsible campaign to politicize the death of the American ambassador to Libya, he said it took two weeks for the president to acknowledge that it was the result of an act of terror. As the moderator, Candy Crowley of CNN, quickly pointed out, the president referred to it as an act of terror the next day, in the Rose Garden.”
I won $20.00 playing online poker last night. Glad our guy one. One more to go.
I will tell you that Candy Crowley surprised me. I didn’t expect much from her as a debate moderator since I see her as in the 1% of the Gang of 500. She worked hard at keeping time and order (and some focus), was gracious and unafraid in doing that, picked mostly good (as in not asked elsewhere) questions from the group, and got out of the way. The cherry on top was the live fact-check on the Libya moment.
I too was pleasantly surprised. I wasn’t expecting her to be good.
Crowley was good. She made it appear that the candidates were screwing the audience when they put up a fuss over their ‘time’. And Romney couldn’t have been more of a jerk about it. I didn’t watch the first debate but clips show that he was probably a lot worse with Lehrer.
Also, Candy’s hair was the best I’ve ever seen it. Good on her stylist!
Crowley showed her bias which a moderator should not do. Obama was given over 3 minutes longer to speak than Romney so he has a right to complain. Crowley had no right as a moderator to fact check during the debate and in fact admitted Romney was correct after the debate. When Romney brought up fast and furious in response to a question about keeping assault rifles out of the hands of criminals ( Fast and Furious did just the opposite) Crowley cut him off and redirected the debate. The supposedly undecided voters questions were hand picked by Crowley when they should have been randomly selected. There was a written agreement between the parties that there would be no follow up questions which Crowley ignored. All in all a very biased set up debate. The american people deserve better. Ask the questions and remain neutral, give equal time and allow the viewers to get a fair picture not a setup biased one.
TV critic Tom Shales on the debate:
If the President got an extra 3 minutes this time, then he is still has a 22 minute deficit to make up from the first debate.
Maybe the next moderator can put this right? Or maybe Republicans can quit being such cry babies?
a few things I’ve noticed… It was the first time I’ve heard (maybe not the first time it has happened, but the first time i heard it…. I’m very sorry if i missed it) Obama refer to the GOP as holding us hostage… he used the word “hostage”. that was refreshing. Also, the “offensive” bit was great. President Obama didn’t say he was offended when major candidate for the GOP ticket were railing about where he was born or questioning his faith in the most offensive ways possible. Until now, I’ve wondered if he was capable of showing that he’d been offended. Im sure he’s the type of guy who rarely shows anger. It was an emotion I dont recall seeing before, and i think it really made an impression in a good way. Kind of the opposite of the boy who cried wolf.
Ray,
Are you seriously saying Mitt Romney should be allowed to lie at will and not be called out on it? Fuck you if that is what you are saying. You are what is wrong with America if that is what you are saying. We need more journalists doing what Ms. Crowley did last night, calling out lies for what they are.
“maybe Republicans can quit being such cry babies?”
Not in this lifetime.
Republicans are typical bullies. You punch them back and they cry like little children.
“I too was pleasantly surprised. I wasn’t expecting her to be good.”
I wasn’t surprised at all. She performed exactly as I thought she would, like a 300 lb. blocker protecting her quarterback.
classy
“Crowley had no right as a moderator to fact check during the debate and in fact admitted Romney was correct after the debate”
Wait what? there’s VIDEO of him in the Rose Garden saying “act of terror”
I for one would LOVE fact checking during the debate (ex. like the CNN lines, but a twitter like feed explaining the veracity of each candidate’s statements -Obama too). I think it’s totally possible to come off as looking capable in a debate while lying your ass off if the viewers at home don’t know your pants are on fire. Maybe if we aired debates like that they’d be less inclined to free-wheel with the truth so much.
And Governor “I support the Blunt Amendment” Romney free-wheeled his brand, spanking new contraception position.
“classy”
And yet still whiny.
And look for the next moderator to restore “balance” to the fact check, by working at trying to fact check Obama the next round.
I found Romney’s answer to the immigration question so caustic that I even stepped back from the television while he was giving his answer!!! When he said to Lorraine let me step back and answer your question and talks about his dad! WTF It is offensive when he says my dad was born in Mexico to Amercian parents wtf does that mean and why does he keep saying it? Does that somehow give him some special “snowflake” status as V refers too so eloquently, he could barely control his “loathing” not good Mr. Romney . . . not good!