There have been a lot of Multiple Choice Mitt videos and jokes over the years (one from Jed Lewison is embedded above), but here’s the topper, RoboRomney. You pick what you want to hear, conservative, liberal or moderate, on a bunch of issues, and it assembles a video of Mitt saying it. This is Romney’s key problem, it’s why he’s so unlikeable, and it will be exploited by the Obama campaign in the next few days.
Like any tribal partisan who can’t think for himself and must stick slavishly to the party line, I have a hard time deciding what the mushy middle will think of a major political event like a debate. But I still stick by my prediction, which is that Romney can’t confabulate a whole new set of positions a month before the election, and that some of the positions he must stick to (Medicare, Big Bird) are poisonous.
I did a bad bad thing and looked at Sullivan today, since he’s the perfect leading indicator of Beltway media sentiment. He’s still wondering what happened to Daddy Obama, but it’s been clear since Thursday afternoon that Obama knows he fucked up and is even making fun of his crappy performance. The Obama campaign just raised a huge amount of money from supporters who can still donate. That money is going into ads talking about Romney’s lies, and I can’t see how that won’t matter.
Capt. Seaweed
I like what Mitt Romney has to say. Then I don’t!
Mark S.
Like any
tribal partisanManichean MonsterGet your terminology right.
BGinCHI
One thing the Democratic Party always has to be careful of at the presidential level is forgetting that being right isn’t always as important as being charismatic.
The allure of the debate is that you win by having the best and strongest argument (see The West Wing). But that’s only part of it, and sometimes almost none of it. You also have to have the spark that gets people feeling like they want you to be their leader. No, this isn’t always about brains or good faith, but it’s important.
Kerry lost an election over this and Bush won one and stole one. Reagan? Well, without this he wouldn’t have gotten past Life Guard.
El Cid
The two hugest vulnerabilities opened by Romney in his supposed victory (I listened / watched and thought he did well but I just didn’t see this Romneyromp but okay) were (1) abandoning *much* of everything he’d been claiming to the Teahadist neo-Confederate League, except for (2) him in person admitting to supporting ending Medicare. Not saying ‘that’s Congressman Ryan’s plan, not mine,’ but ‘yes, I support a private system for anyone who chooses it’ or whatever it was.
As each happened, I saw them as fatal errors, and I assume the Obama campaign noticed too.
I didn’t realize at the time that the ‘fuck you, moderator, I’ll fire you too’ would come out as “fire” and then (with able assistance) “kill and eat” Big Bird, but that works, too.
Joey Maloney
You wanna know why Mitt Romney isn’t polling in the single digits? This is from my facebook feed. I’m red. Note green’s response.
http://imgur.com/BXlEe
amk
from the trolls infested dead thread
Soledad O Brien takes it to the totally clueless mittbot spox woman on his Palestinian double talk.
Wish she is a debate moderator.
Higgs Boson's Mate
Mitt Romney is a moderate, damn it! That’s as of 7:31 AM, Pacific time. He’s waiting for the results of polling and focus groups to decide what he’ll be next. I’m confident that he’ll be whatever he is next with the same amount of conviction that he was whatever he was the time before that and the time before that.
BGinCHI
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: I don’t know how the guy chooses a Halloween costume.
Pirate. No, cowboy. No, Spider Man. No, Gumby. Wait. Pirate.
Ash Can
@BGinCHI: Or he can just not dress up at all, and go as everything.
Patricia Kayden
So have the polls turned upside down with Romneybot 2.0 leading President Obama in all national and swing state polls? Not sure why some on the Left are still bellyaching over President Obama’s debate performance.
The Bot cannot continue to speak out of two sides of his mouth. It will be interesting to see which Romney shows up to the next 2 debates. And yes, I’m sure by now President Obama knows that he has to go harder against Romney for the next two debates.
amk
@BGinCHI: A white sheet ? It speaks on many levels. And peeps like buzz can project on him whatever that gives them a hard-on.
mcmullje
A Conservative, a Tea Partier, and a Moderate walk into a bar…
The bartender says “what will it be, Mitt?”
Omnes Omnibus
@Ash Can: A quantum costume?
wrb
That’s a good video.
It is too bad they had to stick the KOS banner on it.
It would cause it to be dismissed by the waverers to whom I could show it.
Another Halocene Human
Mitt Romney is unlikeable because he’s a great heaving bag of dicks who only cares about himself and his immediate family, and even they have to ‘handle’ him. He lacks empathy for others which has the immediate result of him not being able to hold up his half of a conversation competently.
His flip-flops are the symptom, not the cause.
arguingwithsignposts
@BGinCHI: The West Wing is fiction. I’d say it’s good fiction, but it’s still fiction.
AliceBlue
@Patricia Kayden:
Swing states seem to have stayed more or less the same. Everyone is jumping up and down and pointing to the national trackers, where there has been some definite tightening.
Princeton Election Consortium is still showing Obama with 310 EVs.
FlipYrWhig
@amk: White sheet, nice call. Besides all the other ideas, he can be the Ghost of Mittmas Past.
FlipYrWhig
@AliceBlue: National “tightening” could easily be an uptick for Romney in states where he’ll either win or lose handily already. Increased enthusiasm from those who had been wavering, getting them back on the bandwagon, but not the kind that determines the outcome of the election. In close state, presumably everyone was already on the bandwagon.
I don’t know if this is _true_, mind you, but it would make some sense.
ericblair
The takeaway from the rest of the debates will be one random detail that was not intended to be the zinger or the kill or whatever anyone was talking about the night before. We got firing Big Bird out of this one; who the hell knows what’s next.
Also, maybe Obama was playing down expectations before the debate with the intent of, well, playing down expectations. Instead, all the real smart people figured that Obama was playing the expectations game, so he was really going to beat Romney into his component ICs and piss on his broken primary processing unit.
I guess Obama should have told everyone he was going to seriously kick Rombot’s ass, so we know that he was actually going to totally tank, so we could all be excited and relieved when he didn’t vomit on the lectern. Or maybe we should all develop an immunity to iocaine powder.
wrb
@AliceBlue:
PPP is saying that Virginia is suddenly the tightest it has been the whole cycle.
Hopefully they just hit the post-debate peak.
AliceBlue
@FlipYrWhig:
True. I can’t help but think that some of the national tightening is due to the south finally getting on board with Willard. I’ve seen more Romney bumper stickers in the last week or so
(I live in Georgia). It’s like they finally bit the bullet and said “shee-it, we might as well.”
iLarynx
The reasoning and logic of this post works perfectly fine. Please stick to political subjects as this appears to be your stronger suit.
Much obliged.
BGinCHI
@arguingwithsignposts: That was what I was suggesting. You can’t believe that making perfectly smart arguments is the end state of the executive office. If this were true then no idiots would ever be elected President.
You also have to demonstrate leadership in a charismatic manner. I’m certainly not saying this says anything positive about human nature and/or the health of our representative democracy. It doesn’t. If we were Klingons it would just be down to logic.
A couple hundred million humans are just not going to be led that way.
Joel
The good news appears that (at 538 and PEC) the damage is done and Obama still has a decent lead. But sheeeiitt.. That was unnecessary. I hope the Obama campaign has learned some lessons here. Let’s try and build back that lead.
El Cid
I await more in-depth polls with crosstabs, because what I’ve seen so far includes Romney strengthening his support & favorables among Republicans while Obama maintaining and/or improving among “independents” — a category frequently constructed to include voters who do not list as Democrats but vote very liberally.
shortstop
@wrb: Wisconsin, too, according to PPP. I’m not worried about Wisconsin, idiotic though it can sometimes be. I guess I’d say I’m a little worried about Virginia, but only insofar as it affects Kaine’s race. Obama doesn’t need either WI or VA.
Cacti
Obama had built up enough of a cushion that he could afford to fuck up the first debate. I’m sure that wasn’t the plan, but it is what it is.
The fundamentals of the election are still in his favor, and the post-debate polling shows a tie at best for Romney.
POTUS shows up strong in the second debate and all will be well. Another sleep-walking performance by O would tilt the scales toward Romney.
owlbear1
@AliceBlue:
After the debate, it sure looks like many of them realized they’d found the man to sell them the rope they could hang themselves with.
Hill Dweller
I’ve seen multiple pollsters say that Obama’s numbers were not good Thursday and Friday, but Saturday and Sunday looked more like the pre-debate numbers. There is a good chance that Willard’s bump is temporary, and will fade after more of his patented campaign bumbling.
Regardless, Obama needs two good debate performances, and OFA has to continue hammering Willard for lying.
jwb
@wrb: Yes, but a lot of that tightening in PPP’s VA poll happened only in the Friday sample. Hard to know whether that was noise, transient or something real.
shortstop
@AliceBlue: This weekend I saw–for the first time–a Mitt bumper sticker in Chicago. People were pointing and laughing. Guy waiting for the light next to me observed that while he can understand why some assholes will secretly and shamefacedly vote for Romney, why anyone around here would want to brag about it is an enigma.
Trakker
I get annoyed by people who disdain anyone who is still upset about Obama’s dismal performance. I understand the importance of keeping a stiff upper lip and all, but in my opinion, Romney was allowed to get away with some of the most egregious lies ever told in a presidential debate, lies that any one of us could have easily destroyed, and yet Obama looked stunned and brain-locked. Obviously he was poorly coached and poorly prepared for the debate.
This is the kind of spineless responses we’ve seen from Obama and Democrats to GOP thuggery for a decade or more and I’m sick of it.
Phil_NC
Serious question: Why isn’t the Obama campaign *mercilessly* hitting Romney on being a flip-flopper? This seemed like the best attack against him from the very start, but for some reason they haven’t rolled it out. Are they worried it might blow back? Do they think it’s ineffective? I can’t imagine it being the latter, as it worked so effectively against Kerry. I’m genuinely confused by this.
Cacti
@Hill Dweller:
I wouldn’t even say two good debates. He needs a good second debate, and could get away with a draw after that.
Fortunately, the second debate is a town hall format, a forum where the POTUS shines and Romney struggles mightily.
Davis X. Machina
@Joel: It wasn’t unnecessary so much as inevitable. Reversion to the norm.
@AliceBlue: No white man will ever poll less than 47.5% against a black man in this country. Ever. Not Ted Bundy v. Cliff Huxtable. Not Ever.
In 2008, the country was falling down an elevator shaft, and McCain got 46.5% against an at-that-point-purely-theoretical Negro.
WereBear
Correction. If we were Vulcans it would be down to logic.
If we were Klingons it would be settled like a bar fight.
Hill Dweller
@Trakker: I can understand your frustration, but we have to move on. It’s over, and nothing can be done about it at this point.
Furthermore, media reports suggest Obama knows he f’d up, and will try to correct the problem. Even with the MSM blowing Willard for the last few days, the Obama campaign has been pretty good since the debates.
Having a good first debate would have been ideal, but their reaction to a bad debate has been good, in my view.
jwb
@Hill Dweller: Actually, it seems to be Friday’s numbers that were particularly bad. I’ve been trying to decide whether it was water cooler conversations, Democratic-leaning voters growing despondent about having left political writers and TV personalities go apeshit insane about the world ending over a mediocre debate performance, or the dumb conspiracy meme over the unemployment figures. Maybe a bit of each.
1badbaba3
OT, Chris Kluwe was on the phone with Mama and the Mooks last hour, and he is spectacularly awesome. I’m still chuckling about the “lustful cockmonster” bit.
Also too Jim Ward saying “Reince Prebus” in the voice of Sgt. Schultz is wicked, just wrong. Especially if I’m drinking coffee. Can you say spit take?
MikeJ
For those of you who wet your pants about the CNN post debate poll and claimed the only people polled were old, white southerners, Ben Smith saw an opportunity to say “both sides do it!” and paint you to be exactly like the “unskewers”. Congratulations.
Ash Can
@ericblair:
He’s beginning his major foreign policy speech as I type this.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@iLarynx: Whatever. Stick to breathing. It seems to be your strong point and obviously requires a lot of attention.
Frankensteinbeck
@Trakker:
Destroyed how, exactly? ‘You’re lying through your teeth’ actually does not go over well on a national televised debate. You sound like the person who’s desperate, and anybody who doesn’t know the truth concludes there’s no way to know. Particularly when your opponent makes up bizarre shit like 50% of green energy programs failing. What are the odds you know the actual number is 6%? The Gish Gallop is used because it’s very hard to counter. Countering it usually requires a third party seen as impartial to recognize who’s lying. With a weak moderator, you can sound like an untouchable expert just by making up whatever the Hell number crosses your mind. I have to say, I expected lies, but not Mitt making up an entirely new platform and calmly discussing an absolute fantasy world where all the numbers go his way. Usually people froth and their eyes twitch when they do that.
And the debate STILL wasn’t that bad. The Village desperately, in the bottom of their souls burn for any excuse to plaud Romney as their new Daddy. Bloggers panic because the Bush years would make anyone gun shy. To the general public with whom I watched the debates, two boring guys talked past each other.
Hell, the numbers only bumped because the Republicans again found a new height of ratfuckery by skewing the overall polling with not one, but three fake polls of their own.
raven
Maybe it’s all fucking fixed just like the NBA. Keep the rubes on the line and the $$$ flowin. I’m not just talking about republicans.
Andrey
@BGinCHI: ITYM Vulcans. If we were Klingons there would just be some stabbing and the whole thing would be over much faster.
Ben Franklin
@Patricia Kayden:
It will be interesting to see which Romney shows up to the next 2 debates. And yes, I’m sure by now President Obama knows that he has to go harder against Romney for the next two debates.
Had a knock-down argument with step-daughter and boyfriend last night. Pointing out facts was beside the point. They are religious, and they self-identify with conservative because, I believe, they see conservatives representing their christian values, whereas Dems are godless and valueless. It is an emotional clusterfuck we are dealing with, not rational, thinking-oriented persons. They are composites of the larger problem.
It won’t matter to them who wins the next two debates, and they outnumber us 2 to 1.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/152021/conservatives-remain-largest-ideological-group.aspx
lacp
@iLarynx: You disapprove of the reasoning and logic in the animal-rescue posts?
HRA
Debate #1 is over and done with. I still contend the president did not do what so many are wishing he did by calling Romney a liar by hoping enough rope will hang the bastard. It’s no secret among those who know me of having seen me do the same. I pick my moment.
Yes, I know time is getting short. Yet, those interested in how our country will be managed know it won’t be very well under Romney/Ryan and why would we want to go back to GWB where it was a disaster we are still recovering from.
Added note: I am relying on you all to inform me about this foreign policy speech on air right now since it’s important for my future health not to watch it.
dww44
@Joel:I agree. After all, in our media obsessed world, perception is reality. Good ads or no, as someone somewhere posted the other day, a lot more people saw that debate than will see the Ads. And, I for one, don’t think Obama or his campaign planned his weak performance. Why would they?
As a liberal relative in Florida said the other day, one of her granddaughters, who’s not politically committed, watched the debate and told her grandmother that she liked neither of them and that Obama hem and hawed and rambled. The granddaughter is under a great deal of pressure from Fox watching friends and relatives. This relative, like me, is a life long committed Democrat.
WaterGirl
I try to read the comments before responding, but I just can’t help myself this morning.
When you see them side by side, even regular Romney makes last week’s debate-Romney look smarmy by comparison. He looks fake and he sounds fake, even worse than usual. I hate that soft I-am-managing-you voice gives me the creeps.
KG
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: you know, part of this reminds me of how a lot of my Republican friends viewed Clinton during his presidency. The line was basically “he doesn’t believe anything, he just looks at the polls and takes the popular position.”
I wonder if that’s what Romney thinks he has to do in order to win. Just look at polls and say whatever is popular to the group of people he’s talking to. I can’t imagine that actually working, especially in this day and age, which probably explains Romney’s wretched favorables. But still, it is absolutely amazing to me that he’s made it this far.
Higgs Boson's Mate
A serious question; how do Romney voters know which Mitt they’ll be getting?
Davis X. Machina
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: They’re getting the one with the -R after his name.
And that’s all that matters. Go Team Red.
BGinCHI
@WereBear: Star Trek fail.
owlbear1
@MikeJ:
When a poll questions so few that it can’t even post up percentages for anybody but elderly southerners it is garbage.
Ben Franklin
@Davis X. Machina:
ABO…anybody but obama.
Spatula
I still don’t get how Obama “messed up.” How do you NOT prepare adequately for a freaking Presidential debate in why you are the, uh…president?!
And how do you just stand there and not point out the falsehoods that your opponent is spewing?
Weird is what it is.
Maude
@Ash Can:
Please listen or watch it, I have a delicate stomach.
How did Romney win the debate with so many lies?
shortstop
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: Does it matter? They’re all white, right?
Spatula
@BGinCHI:
So where the hell was that spark at the debate? He certainly had it in 2004? I’m beginning to wonder if there is some truth to the theory that without a teleprompter he is lost.
1badbaba3
@Trakker: When you use words like ‘dismal’, ‘brain-locked’, and ‘spineless’ to describe your “feelings” towards Obama, you probably shouldn’t be surprised if someone tells you to shove your annoyance sideways and take care not to disturb your hibernating brain down there.
Concern and annoyance both duly noted. Now fuck right the fuck off.
El Cid
@MikeJ: I had no pants-wetting reaction, but what I did see was a literal, factual claim that the (shitty online poll which I don’t understand why anyone pays attention to these things but whatever) follow-up CNN poll had zero people identifying themselves as being anything other than white and from a Southern state.
Now, putting aside the empirical claim (i.e., was that a true characterization of the poll results), if that were the case, would it be wrong to point that out?
Matt McIrvin
@AliceBlue: The important swing states have tightened, but the counts are dominated by the polls that Rasmussen, Gravis and WeAskAmerica released late last week, which were all snap robopolls taken in the hours immediately following the debate.
The numbers from the more conventional pollsters are just beginning to come out. PPP just released some showing Obama still leading in Ohio, Virginia and Wisconsin, though his margin is way down in Wisconsin and a little down in Virginia. I think Romney was probably legitimately leading the presidential race for maybe 24 or 48 hours late last week, and the Republican-leading pollsters were sure to poll in that window to take advantage, but the effect is already fading.
Amir Khalid
@Higgs Boson’s Mate:
Doesn’t matter. He’ll say, “You people will take whichever Mitt you’re getting and like it!” And they’ll have to, if they’re set on voting for a Republican.
Spatula
@Trakker:
You’re not allowed to say that here.
Davis X. Machina
@Maude:
People like lies. They tell them all the time. So it’s easy to identify with a liar. Unless you’re actually married to one, they’re more fun to be around.
In other words — the fundamental depravity of mankind. It doesn’t always win, but it always covers the point spread.
Betting against St. Augustine is a good way to go broke.
ericblair
@Spatula:
Yep, half black kid with a funny name from a one-parent family in Hawaii who knew nobody and nobody knew him, made it to US Senator and President of the United States, is just some dimwit who can’t put two words together and got everything handed to him out of pity.
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
@Spatula:
Oh god, fucking please.
Spatula
@Hill Dweller:
However, it is VERY important to get answers and an explanation as to why or how Obama acted as he did. It doesn’t compute. As a matter of patriotic and/or party loyalty it seems pretty basic to require rigorous accountability from one’s leaders.
“Nothing to see here, move on,” does not accomplish that.
lamh35
I’m over the Obama debate performance discussion of the last 4 days, but I gotta admit, I’m still focussed on the ensuing meltdown by MSNBC and liberal blogs and some Obama supporters. This article is a good read on the whole thing and is basically what I said earlier.
“Groupthink and the Great Debate”
The Dangerman
@Spatula:
Think of it like a football game; Obama was WAY ahead late in the game and went into a prevent defense. Yes, a prevent defense often leads to opponents scoring easily, which isn’t good when you want to cover the spread (or take back the House).
So, in the prevent mode, Obama said basically nothing that was a gaffe; consider that against Romney’s comments on Big Bird and Medicare (I can’t believe he owned Vouchers).
Obama is still well ahead and the game is nearing it’s end.
piratedan
@BGinCHI: the correct answer is always “Pirate”…. natch
Spatula
@raven:
Not that you care, but I am very impressed that you wrote this.
El Cid
@lamh35: I differ: I walked out of the Phantom Menace immediately feeling like it was an awful piece of crap I wish hadn’t been made. It didn’t take me time or groupthink at all. I almost walked out of the movie when I heard Jar-Jar Binks, but I didn’t out of politeness to the group I was with.
amk
@Spatula:
Idiotic contradictory statements.
But then trolls are gonna be trolls.
The morons who are seeking to dump Obama based on one debate were not gonna vote for him in the first place. We are wasting time trying to ‘reconvert’ them.
owlbear1
@Spatula: Obama threw the debate in order to give conservatives a bit of hope so their tears of anguish on November 7th will be that much sweeter.
Ash Can
@Maude: I ain’t watching that shit. Besides, what’s important isn’t the speech itself, because we know that it’ll all be bellicose manure. What’s important is how everyone else reacts to it — that’s what I’m going to be looking for in a while.
Chyron HR
@Spatula:
Obviously it was part of the conspiracy to take down Elizabeth Warren, by trimming his campaign’s coattails.
jwb
@Trakker: I don’t think Obama’s performance was because he was poorly coached, I think it was because no one anticipated that Romney would take the line of attack that he did. On many items, Romney lied himself far to the left of any position he had previously staked out, and Obama wasn’t certain what the best way to attack was and so simply played defense. There were certainly places Obama should have counterpunched better, but the basic problem was that the debate prep hadn’t gamed out that possibility. Now ask yourself if it was a reasonable assumption on the part of the Obama team not to have prepared for this particular Romney transformation. Given the way the campaign had gone up to the debate, I think it was a reasonable assumption.
The results of Romney’s stratagem are still not fully in. He had to walk back a number of positions he staked out in the debate immediately afterward. Gingrich is now hammering him on the shift on taxes. Questions about who is the real Romney are being asked with renewed vigor. Romney may have broken through the front lines in the debate only to find that the front has closed behind him and he is even more isolated.
On the other hand, I will give Romney credit for recognizing that he needed to make a bold move if he was going to make the race competitive, and I have long thought that the Obama campaign had set the board so that the President was really only vulnerable to an attack from the left. Romney is trying to exploit this weakness but it’s not clear that the GOP is at all willing to follow him there in sufficient numbers to make the attack successful. In fact, I’m not certain Romney himself is really willing to defend much of the ground he staked out in the debate, and I quite imagine that next week the race will be right back near where it was before the first debate.
1badbaba3
@Spatula: Sure you can. Just like anyone could try to drive on Bill Russell. And we’ll say just what he would say: get that weak shit out of here.
El Cid
@lamh35: Also, I thought Romney did well, but then I had heard him in several of the Republican primary debates perform in exactly the same manner and he did well there, too. He did not perform differently with Obama than he did against Newt Gingrich.
But because I am afflicted with a memory which endures over 24 hours, I recall that, and wasn’t shocked by Romney assertively throwing a bunch of bullshit at his opponents.
Romney shut down Newt Gingrich, who himself (i.e., the Lord Savior of All Galactic Civilization) thought he would tear Romney to shreds. And he did so playing the same bullshit games he did with Ted Kennedy, too.
I thought Romney did well, and did exactly as well as he did in the Republican primary debates, and so I wasn’t shocked, and I thought it was about even, and a really lame-ass format.
AliceBlue
@Spatula:
I dunno, maybe he had some important things on his mind? Like Turkey and Syria? He has an important and stressful day job, ya know.
Seriously, many of his debate prep sessions had to be cancelled or were cut short due to his schedule and outside events.
catclub
@lamh35: And if enough Obama ads come out of the debate, demonstrating clear lies. A pyrrhic victory at that.
Spatula
@1badbaba3:
THIS. THIS is the ignorant, belligerent tribalism that JC has allowed to become all to prominent on this blog. It’s also the fawning, yes-man mentality that has lead many a former leader to his or her demise.
Wake up. This isn’t about YOUR feelings either.
Cacti
@El Cid:
Speaking of Ted, when the topic of reproductive rights comes up, I’d love to see O resurrect “I’m pro-choice, my opponent is multiple choice.”
Maude
@Ash Can:
There was a great tweet, tweeter said is the speech to cadets a view of coming attractions?
Sounds like Iraq all over again. Romney is so stupid.
Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God
@WereBear:
And either method would be more honest and honorable than what we have now.
(Geek Mode On:)
IMO the contemporary US is basically DS9’s Cardassia.
Notice also how that Cardassia was the only fictional power that had something akin to our mass media (little screens in every dwelling, big screens looming over the cities).
(:Geek Mode… well, still on…)
wrb
Sure it does if you read what leaked out about the debate prep ahead of time.
They were coaching Obama to be less sharp and to not let his contempt for Romney show.
They saw his advantage in likability at risk if he was too aggressive and indulged in his tendency to make satirical replies.
I’d wager that his looking down was an attempt to hide the amazement and contempt with which he likely reacted to Romney’s incredible spew.
Spatula
@owlbear1:
OK, well that at least has the advantage of being a theory of sorts, that doesn’t just say “nothing happened, nothing was strange, please move on.”
And if it plays out this way I will be very pleased. Anguished conservative tears give me great pleasure.
ericblair
@El Cid:
That, and that Obama himself set expectations low for the debate. As usual, the people who are the most disappointed with Obama are the ones who don’t listen to a word he says.
1badbaba3
@Spatula: Perhaps it’s about yours?
El Cid
@Spatula:
What is Cole supposed to do about this? If there are a few blog commenters who tend to say certain things in certain ways, who cares?
This ain’t the political committee of some political party. It’s a fucking blog where various people show up and post comments after a blog post.
Some of them will continually say certain things in certain ways, some will do the same and differently, some are trolls, and so on and so forth.
Do like I do — unless it entertains you to respond, ignore the ones that annoy you.
Ben Cisco
@mcmullje: Shamelessly stolen.
Davis X. Machina
@wrb:
They saw this chart.
John PM
I looked at Sullivan this morning as well and after his latest bed-wetting I am done with him.
FlipYrWhig
@Trakker:
But this is a weird leap to make, IMHO. “Obama didn’t respond to Romney’s lies with enough mojo” is not actually the same kind of thing as “Democrats never know how to stand up for themselves politically.” What’s been happening in the liberal blogosphere is that people are activating dormant parts of their tactics-and-rhetoric critiques of Obama, like “compromises too much” and “makes nicey-nice with Republicans,” so that they can complain about those all over again.
There’s a world of difference between saying that Obama didn’t act aggressive or counterpunch in the moment, which seem true, and then going on to say that it’s a window onto his all-encompassing personal approach to politics. I know TV pundits do that — “Look, his shoe’s untied! If this were a novel it’d be a symbol of his ineptitude, so let’s treat it as one!” — but I don’t think we need to do it too.
FlipYrWhig
@El Cid: Spatula pretending to complain about “belligerence” is pretty rich too.
Spatula
@1badbaba3:
Bot much?
El Cid
@ericblair: Romney has no shame and no sense that there is a significant difference between fact and fraud.
His opponents are continually confused in debates when they make clear, supported points (even when as in Gingrich they make them in pointed, and even stinging fashion) and Romney just aggressively denies and recharacterizes everything.
Go back and watch Gingrich et al’s reactions: they go after Romney as hard as they can, and even when a challenge is a clear, sneering taunt based on absolutely obvious and utterly undeniable fact, Romney just doesn’t yield in the slightest.
Romney wouldn’t have acted any differently no matter what Obama said — until someone manages to get too much under his skin, in which case he gets weird and pissy: “10,000? Would you like to bet, $10,000?”
Rick Perry can say some of the meanest, most vituperative shit in politics, and he had no idea how to respond to this weird eruption by Romney. Even beyond all the drugs.
Yutsano
@El Cid: JC has said time and time again he wants this blog to be as open a forum as possible with only a few rules for outright bigotry or racism. We all say what we wish. Hell I still bitch about Big Ben and I’ve never been banned once.
@FlipYrWhig: Meh. It’s Special Timmeh. He’s special dontchaknow!
Ben Franklin
They were coaching Obama to be less sharp and to not let his contempt for Romney show
Romney, on the other hand, has condescension so ingrained in his DNA, he cannot mask it, but likeability also relates to competence..
amk
@Davis X. Machina:
Wow. Gore was the only one that
proved an exception tobroke that law? Who knew.Spatula
@John PM:
I dont’ know…if you’re still reading him at this point, it may be that you simply can’t quit him no matter what. :)
RaflW
@Spatula:
It was a fucking debate, Spatula. “I demand accountability for why he sucked eggs” over a TeeVee debate? Or you’re not patriotic?
Are you a parody troll?
handy
@John PM:
(Always) Shorter Andy: Hold me Daddy!
Matt McIrvin
@amk:
I’m a lifelong liberal Democrat, but after watching the debate, I swear on the Bible that Obumbum is a Kenyan usurper with a fake birth certificate who will feed our unborn babies to the Muslim Communist affirmative action moocher fluoridation gun grabber hippies at Chappaquiddick 9/11 FREEDOM ISN’T FREE.
Chinn Romney
RoboRomney is the neatest app to hit the Web since that thing that custom built your own Kenyan Birth Certificate.
Yutsano
@Matt McIrvin: Needs moar wingnut.
RaflW
@lamh35:
As far as the polling shifting as the media narrative marinated ~ that’s been key to the media’s need for horse race and for a ‘new’ narrative.
I’m a bit rushed today so can’t put fingers on links, but I think Jay Rosen at NYU and maybe James Fallows have both (among a few others) talked about how the media really needed Romney to ‘win’ so that they’d have something fresh to talk about.
Romney is tanking had played out. People were starting to tune out/not click. So they took a mild Romney win and a lacklust Obama evening and turned it into the debate equivalent of snowmageddon.
In fact, I think part of the reason snowmageddon stories sell so well is that they give climate-deniers and wanna-be head in the sand-ers a pause to say ‘ahh, different narrative than unending drought, crop failure and forest fire.’ So the Romeny TeeVee ‘win’ is like that.
Ben Cisco
@Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God: Good point.
Marc McKenzie
“That money is going into ads talking about Romney’s lies, and I can’t see how that won’t matter.”
Agreed. Just caught one of them on TV this morning.
amk
@Matt McIrvin: You left out ‘the most divisive prezinent evah’.
Spatula
@RaflW:
You don’t expect your president/presidential candidate to PREPARE and perform in nationally televised debates? You know, those insignificant televised events that no one watched the other night?
Bot much?
1badbaba3
@Spatula: Suckers walk. We’ll give you time to chase your shot and bring it back. But we’ll just smack it into the stands again and again.
Marc McKenzie
@Phil_NC: Uh, Phil? That’s exactly what the hell they have been doing since Thursday morning, several hours after the debate. Obama went after Romney in a speech on Thursday, and commercials pointing out Romney’s lies have been playing all over the place.
There have been days of fact-checking, and the conclusion is: Romney’s a bloody liar. That’s how he “won”.
Spatula
@1badbaba3:
Who’s “we,” Bot? Tribal much? :D
Raven
@Spatula: Go work on those stupid paintings.
elmo
Meh. People have bad days. Obama had a bad day, likely complicated by outrage at RMoney’s brazen contempt for truth, frustration with the moderator, and – I’ll say it – unhappiness at having to be there on his twentieth wedding anniversary. He wanted it to be over, and didn’t get in the groove.
Who among us hasn’t failed to bring our “A” game on occasion, or allowed petty frustrations and irritations to complicate our own poor showing? Dude’s a human being, and if he allowed himself to think that nailing RMoney’s jello to the wall was more than a little beneath him, I’m not going to argue with him about it.
Sam
@El Cid: So what’s the appropriate Obama response, to Romney denying everything? Call him a flat out liar? Obama basically did that with the 5 trillion in tax cuts and Romney denied the obvious citing some right-wing think tank’s study (I’m guessing he has these memorized). I have to think Romney has this down to a T now.
FWIW, I think forcefully bringing up the 47% in the next debate then having Romney deny it then bringing up Romney’s 3 weeks of defending it and calling him out as a flip-flopper would do wonders to get under Romney’s skin.
Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God
@Ben Cisco:
Romney even looks the part.
Enhanced Mooching Techniques
@Spatula:
I will type this very slowly since you are a special troll poster
Barrack Obama is the president of the United States. He is expected to be that first and foremost as long as he is in office.
Spatula
@Raven:
Another angry day? Sorry.
P.S. Cole doesn’t think they’re so stupid.
Spatula
@Enhanced Mooching Techniques:
And you don’t believe that GETTING RE-ELECTED to a second term is an important part of his very important job? Right.
If at any point you become interested in self-reflection, consider how this comment board would have treated a debate performance from Romney featuring the same qualities as Obama’s.
Raven
@Spatula: You’re such an annoying little motherfucker but, angry, hell no. You are like a little gnat.
1badbaba3
@Spatula: I hear you, dude. Good sparring with you. Ta.
@Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God: Good gawd, that’s scary. I wonder if Limpballs will cry conspiracy about DS9 now as well.
Also too, this is the second thread today with a StarTrek shout-out. More geeks here than I feared. :D
McJulie
@Spatula: See, this pathetic narrative that Obama “didn’t prepare” is why nobody is listening to you. Of course he prepared. The question is why that preparation didn’t pay off in a better performance.
Spatula
@Raven:
BAZINGA! Just bit you under the left testicle.
Spatula
@McJulie:
You’re behind the curve here…today’s news contains multiple reports from advisors that his prep was half hearted, begrudging, and cut short by himself.
Note: ASKING questions is not the same as answering them. I did not say he didn’t prepare.
Note 2: If no one is listening to me, then how and why are you replying to my comment?
lamh35
Gallup Daily Tracking Poll has Obama back with a 5 point lead, 50-45%
http://www.gallup.com/poll/150743/Obama-Romney.aspx
blingee
“Obama knows he fucked up”? Really? And you are using a link to politico to prove it?
Dude, get your head our of your ass. He may be rusty at debating but they knew what they were doing and I’ve got a few Democrat and OFA videos exploiting Rmoneys lies in the debate to prove it.
Chyron HR
@Spatula:
Just out of morbid curiosity, if Obama wins the second debate are we allowed to “move on” and talk about something else, or does due diligence require us to continue rehashing the first one to the exclusion of all other topics regardless? How about if he walks away with the third one as well?
amk
@lamh35: The troll will walk away now. Everybody shush.
blingee
@Spatula: Care to provide links to these “multiple reports”. Not re-quotes from one politico or drudge bullshit factory story quoting “anonymous insiders” either.
shortstop
I find these pretensions of brave iconoclasm that much funnier since I found out that Spatula is a producer of dorm-room “art.” The banality of concept is only outstripped by the lameness of execution.
blingee
@shortstop: Dorm room art? WTF is that? I shudder to think.
LOL….yup….BJ attracts the cream of the crop!
Mnemosyne
@Spatula:
So Obama’s debate performance against Alan Keyes in 2004 was the high point of his political career, and it’s all just been downhill from there?
blingee
@Spatula: wtf do you think Cole would know about art? The guy eats Greenwald boogers for christs sakes. He actually believes all that stupid shit Greenwald spews daily and his obsession about dronezzzz is borderline clinical schizophrenia.
Mnemosyne
@Chyron HR:
Nope. The only conversation permitted is about how Obama Failed Us, and no other topic is allowed. SATSQ.
Spatula
@shortstop:
Awww…jealous?
ETA: Again, BJ bots reveal themselves. My comments about Obama’s debate performance are, quite naturally, disqualified by the alleged lameness of my artwork.
giggle
Spatula
@Mnemosyne:
Uhhh…yeah, because ONLY that conversation has prevailed here since the debate.
(eye roll)
Spatula
@blingee:
Wow. I don’t give a shit what you think of my artwork. I make pictures I like; a lot of people enjoy and buy them, some people hate them. I don’t care. It’s not a universal, overarching concern of the planet.
What does any of this have to do with Obama’s lame debate performance and prep?
blingee
@Spatula: Don’t you have better things to do? I hear FDL has lots of the same clowns as you.
shortstop
@blingee: Meh. I’m not joining you in any wholesale condemnation of Cole, whose humor and irascible outpourings here I like very much. He just hasn’t any taste in the visual arts.
Spatula
@blingee:
So stupid. Haven’t been to FDL in months. Boring. What else you got?
Spatula
@shortstop:
He just hasn’t any taste in the visual arts.
hahaha…how pathetic.
If I was a rambling BJ Kool Kid Obot, you’d be lining up to buy my scratchings. :D
OBAMA
scav
If there’s one fucking thing I blame JC for it’s bringing up spatula’s artwork because now everything always does seem to be about the spatz and his self-indulgent shit-throwing.
Spatula
@scav:
what the holy fuck?
You’re as bitter as you are silly.
Because, you know, I NEVER got hammered for my “self indulgent shit-throwing” ever before in the entire history of the seven years I’ve been posting here, until JUST LAST WEEK when Cole outed me and my artwork.
You are a maroon, my friend.
shortstop
@scav: Oh, well, it was before, too. Now it’s funny instead of sad since we found out Spatula has the artistic version of the Dunning-Kruger effect.
Yutsano
@1badbaba3:
Wait until the Whovian references get thrown around.
Mnemosyne
@Spatula:
That’s the only conversation you want to have, and if anyone dares to steer away from it, you start stamping your tiny feet and whining about how all of the Obots are so meeeannnn to you because we don’t talk about what you want to talk about.
So, yes, after the next debate I’m fully expecting you to come here with continued whining about how awful the first debate was and why are people talking about the second debate when we still haven’t finished excoriating Obama for his awful first debate performance. “Never look forward when you can look backward” is your favorite motto, after all.
Amir Khalid
@Spatula:
Wrong. When John Cole mentioned your art last week, he began by conceding that you are widely despised here — and that he himself is not all that wild about you as a commenter, either. None of that began only last week. You do remember, don’t you, why you’re frequently referred to on these threads as someone who makes excuses for child rape? Why you’ve had to change your nym here again and again?
FlipYrWhig
@Spatula:
Then again, we’ve seen his shirts.
scav
It’s just pretty much the volume / frequency has increased since he got the mention. Dull before, Dull after, and really no more that a LCD “edgy” contrarianism so he get’s noticed for the most part. It’ll die down but it’s irksome and messy and dull.
shortstop
@scav: Okay. New topic. WHAT is a girl supposed to PUT ON in the MORNING with all this HIGHLY changeable WEATHER?!
Yutsano
@shortstop: Layers.
SiubhanDuinne
@Ben Franklin:
I sure as hell hope you meant that figuratively.
scav
@Yutsano: Yup, dance of the seven vestments (some of them have to involve down and possibly wool). It would certainly enliven walking about the loop if people just suddenly started to get their thing on and elaborately doffing one of the seven. On warm days, we could have impromptu pillow fights with the discarded downy veils. On cold days, anyone appearing to shimmy would instantly have an audience ready to grab whatever came off.
shortstop
@scav: Bring on the lavish production numbers.
@Yutsano: Oh, well, if you’re going to be practical, please hold this parka I wore out the door at 6:00 a.m., and also these gloves and this hat, and if you could just hang on to this little sweater, too. Many thanks!
blingee
@Spatula: Then how about some links to these “multiple reports” troll boy.
blingee
@shortstop: Yea, those stories of him getting drunk and stepping on his dog or whatever are real knee slappers. I just live for that stuff too. Or how he takes pictures of the inside of his motel 6 fridge. Yea, you just can’t find quality blogging like that anywhere.
Oh and the dronezzzzz. Always obsessing about the fucking dronezzzzzz whenever Greenwald starts flinging those boogers at him.
Amir Khalid
@shortstop:
This is one of those exotic temperate-zone issues, is it not? That is so cool. I have heard of such issues. As a tropical person, of course, I’ve never had to deal with them myself.
shortstop
@blingee: You sound sad and once again inappropriately angry. Maybe you just need a cup of coffee. Hold my scarf and snowboots and I’ll pour you one.
shortstop
@Amir Khalid: Keep it up, Khalid, keep it up. You won’t know how or when, but payback is coming, brother. ;)
Yutsano
@shortstop: Been there done that for my mom many a time. :) I went to college in a variable weather climate. Layers were survival tools.
@shortstop: It’s Durf. Durf has shown time and again he has zero life outside his need to kill that wretched John Cole and his evil blog once and for all!! Yet won’t start his own. Interesting, that.
shortstop
@Yutsano: I could never live in a climate where this stuff goes down every day. We love, love, love Yellowstone, for example, but early Wyoming summer mornings at 6,000-8,000 feet mean a lightweight base layer, a fleece and a lined windbreaker…then by 10:00 a.m. you’re in a short-sleeve t. Who has time or room in her pack for all these doodahs?!
shortstop
@Yutsano: Does Cole ever have to get meatspace restraining orders against these guys? Some of them seem like they’d be highly unbalanced in non-digital form aussi.
scav
@Amir Khalid: Yeah. Our sun does weird things too like setting earlier and rising later and and there’s a period where I swear office people do without weektime daylight for eons (they stay inside at lunch to avoid the plummeting icicles between them and the deli). Downy veils are fiercely protected at all times although thousands of mittens and gloves go walkabout and are often found impaled on spikes, looking for a home (Mittens can be distinguished from Mormons in that they’re usually found as singletons). Exotic indeed: I’m still taking notes.
Yutsano
@shortstop: That’s Wyoming fer ya. The cowboys just suck it up and sweat.
Spatula
@Amir Khalid:
Ummm, yes, you maroon, you just repeated the point I was making. You don’t understand sarcasm because you take yourself so seriously.
Turd.
shortstop
@scav:
Now that’s some fine work.
I’m debuting my line of adult mitten clips this winter. Not just for kindergarteners anymore…wink!
shortstop
@Yutsano: Get your mind off chaps, you dirty, dirty boy.
Spatula
@blingee:
google is your friend, lazy person.
Yutsano
@shortstop: I r irrepressible. :)
shortstop
@Yutsano: Yours ain’t the Mild West. Giddyap.
Amir Khalid
@scav:
(Wide eyes) Wow…
aimai
@El Cid:
Yeah, me too. As for the debate–I did walk out of it within the first six minutes. Not because I felt Obama was losing–that refers to an outsider perspective that I don’t have on the debates. If Obama wins the presidency again (god willing) then he will retroactively have won the first debate. But I couldn’t take watching him look so tired and sick of the whole business. I don’t hold it against him. Christ on a crutch I can’t imagine how that guy and Michelle get out of bed some days considering the work they do and the torrent of bile and shit they have to swim through just to get it done. But I couldn’t stand to have to watch my representative, my president, stand there and take Mitt Romney pissing all over us because he couldn’t afford to walk over and punch Romney in the nose. To the extent that one’s candidate represents, in an emotional sense, onself, I felt like I was having to stand there and take Romney’s shit without a rebuttal.
aimai
HobbesAI
@amk: Note: According to that chart Bush was +12, Gore was +10 in 2000.
Higher net favorable rating predicts the winner from 1980 to 2008.