US Presidential Election 2012

[Count Bobulescu]

Tonight's the night for the first of three Presidential Debates. Tonight is domestic policy only. Oct. 16, is a mix of domestic and foreign, and Oct 22 is exclusively foreign policy. You can watch it livestream or recorded here 9.00PM Eastern.

http://www.2012presidentialelectionn...bate-schedule/


FORMAT FOR TONIGHT'S DEBATE (9 to 10:30 p.m. ET, at the University of Denver's Magness Arena, inside the Daniel L. Ritchie Center for Sports and Wellness), per a debate official: "It goes 90 min. straight-up -- no breaks. First three 15-min. segments are economy [Economy I, II, III], 4th segment health care, 5th is 'the role of government' and last is 'governing.' Then closing statements, so segments will be less than 15."

--AP's Nancy Benac and Kasie Hunt: "The moderator, PBS newsman Jim Lehrer, will open each 15-minute segment with a question, and then Obama and Romney will have two minutes apiece to answer. After that, it's up to Lehrer to keep the conversation going and to intervene if one candidate goes too long. ...

"Former President Bill Clinton will be in Boston on Wednesday night for Obama, with donors paying $20,000 a person. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is headlining a New York fundraiser. The Obama campaign plans more than 4,000 debate-watching events around the country. And Biden is scheduled to hold a live discussion with supporters that will be streamed online after the debate. The Romney camp planned 336 debate parties at restaurants, bars, grills, VFW halls and other sites concentrated in battleground states."

JIM LEHRER, in the 2012 paperback update to his memoir, "Tension City: Inside the Presidential Debates" (writing before he had been selected for tonight): "I strongly recommend that it be standard practice to advise debate hall audiences in advance that they are expected to remain absolutely silent during a debate. They are invited guests, not participants. The moderator should remind the would-be cheerleaders and boobirds of the rules and enforce them when necessary. That has been the long-established practice in the fall general election debates. ... There have been thirty-five nationally television presidential and vice presidential debates, counting [the] first one in 1960 [Kennedy-Nixon] and the last four in 2008.

"All the moderators have been broadcast journalists except one - Chicago Sun-Times editor James Hoge in 1976. There have been several repeaters: Howard K. Smith of CBS and ABC, Edwin Newman of NBC, Barbara Walters of ABC, Bernard Shaw of CNN, Bob Schieffer of CBS, my PBS colleague Gwen Ifill, and I account for twenty-one [now 22] of the thirty-five [now 36] moderating assignments. ... The first ... was for a 1988 debate between Vice President George H.W. Bush and Governor Michael Dukakis in Winston-Salem."

THE CANDIDATES AS BRANDS: a poll out today that used methods for measuring the effectiveness of corporate branding, applied to political candidates -- Mackenzie Weinger: "Pollsters from the Democratic firm of Penn Schoen Berland said ... Obama is successfully making the election a referendum on Republicans, while Romney's attempt to make the race a referendum on the last four years is falling flat with voters. And the Republican hopeful had only one theme that was breaking through with independent voters -- his attacks on Obama's handling of violence in the Middle East ... Of the 24 messages tested - 12 quotes by each candidate from their convention addresses and subsequent stump speeches - the top eight were all from Obama. Obama's highest scoring message was his line at the Democratic Convention: ... 'we have been there, we've tried that, and we're not going back.' Romney's ... most compelling message [was] his convention line: ['What America needs is] jobs. Lots of jobs,' ... in ninth. ...

"The company used its trademarked 'Master Message' system and conducted the poll online to expose people to lengthy quotes. ... Obama's top two testing messages set up Romney as supportive of old Bush-era policies that have failed in the past ... Romney only has one message that is resonating with independents, [Billy Mann, Penn Schoen Berland's managing director] said, and that's his foreign policy critique of the president that ranked at number 12: 'The President said the developments in the Middle East are "bumps in the road." Bumps in the road? We had an ambassador assassinated. We had a Muslim Brotherhood member elected to the presidency of Egypt. Twenty thousand people have been killed in Syria. We have tumult in Pakistan, and of course Iran is that much closer to having the capacity to build a nuclear weapon,' Romney said at a campaign event in Pueblo, Colo. on Sept. 24. ...

"[T]he lowest scoring message overall was Romney's '12 million jobs' line from a campaign rally in Jefferson County, Colo. on Sept. 23, 2012: ... 'My choice will lead us on a path that will create 12 million new jobs and rising take-home pay.' ... Penn Schoen Berland polled 1,003 likely voters online from Sept. 28-Oct. 1." http://politi.co/Wi21EU

Analysis: Much at Stake for Romney With Debate Audience
As I watched my hometown Detroit Tigers clinch their division last night (Awesome!), I noticed the two teams with different colored Sox were not making the playoffs and basically ending a very disappointing season. The Chicago White Sox (President Obama’s team) and the Boston Red Sox (Gov. Romney’s team) were ending their year not meeting expectations and underperforming. The hometown teams seem to perfectly represent two unelectable candidates running against each other, though in this case they are the only teams in the playoffs, so one will win, writes National Journal's Matthew Dowd.

Analysis: Romney Softens on Immigration, But Will it Help Him With Hispanics?
Mitt Romney’s advisers have long insisted that economic doldrums--not immigration policy--would turn Hispanic voters toward the Republican nominee. But Romney’s decision to break his silence on allowing young illegal immigrants to stay in the United States reflects a shift in that failing strategy and an implicit admission that the increasingly powerful Hispanic vote could, in part, cost him the election, writes National Journal's Beth Reinhard.

http://www.nationaljournal.com//poli...nics--20121002


The Wall Street Journal: One debate goal: Sway the swayable
 By Janet Hook 
The presidential debate will give Obama and Romney one of their last, best shots at winning over an ever-dwindling number of uncommitted voters.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...=ITP_pageone_2


MINOW: The debates are a moment of respect for the intelligence of voters. ”The debates are an institution now, and among the most watched television events in America. They are one place in the modern campaign — perhaps the only place — where the voter is treated with respect. They are the one time when the major candidates appear together side by side under conditions they do not control. They are a relief from the nasty commercials that dominate the campaign, fed by donations that are effectively unlimited and anonymous. Broadcasters provide the television time for the debates, without commercials, as a rare public service…The debates are one of the few features of our political campaigns that are still admired throughout the world.” Newton N. Minow in The New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/03/op...c=nl_wonk&_r=0


MILBANK: Romney’s candidacy already has too much “Zinger” in it. “The Zinger is an unwholesome confection. One serving of this Hostess snack, which is basically a Devil Dog or a Twinkie with icing, has 35 percent of your daily allowance of saturated fat -- and some trans fat thrown in for good measure. The first ingredient listed is sugar, followed later by corn syrup, high-fructose corn syrup, artificial flavor, glucose and polypropylene glycol…Probably the Republican nominee has been equipped not with packaged snacks but with that other type of zinger, the one-line putdown commonly used in presidential debates. Unfortunately, the nutritional value of this zinger is the same as its namesake confection. At a time when even his fondest supporters are pleading for more substance, Mitt Romney is giving them the political equivalent of junk food. His has been the Zinger candidacy -- all sugary platitudes, no protein.” Dana Milbank in The Washington Post.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinio...wpisrc=nl_wonk

POLLS: OBAMA LEADS IN OHIO, BUT RACE IS TIGHTER IN FLORIDA AND VIRGINIA. As they head into their first debate, President Obama remains stubbornly ahead in Ohio, while the race against Mitt Romney remains close in Florida and Virginia, according to new NBC News/Wall Street Journal/Marist polls released early on Wednesday. In Florida, Obama leads, 47 percent to 46 percent; in Ohio, 51 percent to 43 percent; and in Virginia, 48 percent to 46 percent. The latest United Technologies/National Journal Congressional Connection Poll released on Tuesday showed the two deadlocked among likely voters, though an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll on Tuesday showed Obama with a 3-point lead and an NPR Poll released on Wednesday showed Obama with a 7-point lead.

THE MOST IMPORTANT QUESTION TONIGHT. The most important question in tonight’s debate may be,“Why aren’t you seriously trying to solve the jobs crisis?” The so-called “jobs plans” both President Obama and Mitt Romney have put forth are, put simply, nowhere near aggressive enough to close the gap between where the economy should be right now and where it actually is, due to the Great Recession and the feeble recovery that followed it. National Journal’s Jim Tankersley writes that Jim Lehrer should hammer the candidates on that disconnect tonight—for all 90 minutes if he must—because voters are desperate to hear real solutions for persistently high unemployment.

Fixbits:

A new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll shows Obama’s lead nationally is at three points.

Paul Ryan said in 2011 that 30 percent of Americans “want the welfare state.”

The Democratic super PAC American Bridge is up with 25 issue briefs on Romney in advance of tonight’s debate.

Romney is asking three states — including Wisconsin — to extend their deadlines for receiving military ballots.


“8 questions about the first presidential debate” – Dan Balz, Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv...?wpisrc=nl_fix

“Moderating presidential debates: harder than it looks” — Paul Farhi, Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifest...&wpisrc=nl_fix





THE AIR WAR-

OBAMA OUTSPENDING ROMNEY ON TV: For every 5 Romney commercials that aired in Colorado during the last two weeks of September, Obama ran 7. In Florida, there were about 50% more Obama ads. "In Ohio and in Iowa, in Norfolk, Va., and on the Boston stations that feed New Hampshire, Mr. Obama out-advertised his rival after the parties' nominating conventions, according to data compiled by the political advertising monitoring firm Kantar Media/CMAG," the New York Times reports: http://goo.gl/a2Zw8.

OBAMA COAL AD SAYS ROMNEY USES WORKERS AS PROPS: "Seen the coal miners in these ads? Turns out they were told that attendance at Mitt Romney's rally was, quote, 'mandatory,'" a narrator says in an Obama ad running in Ohio. "Their mine was closed, lost the pay they needed, all to be props in Romney's commercial." This was first reported by ABC: http://goo.gl/YDR5P.

BATTLEGROUND BRIEFING-THE PATH TO 270:

PENNSYLVANIA VOTER ID LAW SET ASIDE FOR NOVEMBER ELECTION: "Pennsylvania voters who go to the polls without photo identification will be able to vote in next month's presidential election after all. They won't even have to fill out provisional ballots," the Philadelphia Inquirer reports. "So ruled a Commonwealth Court judge Tuesday in the closely watched legal battle over Pennsylvania's controversial voter-ID law. Judge Robert E. Simpson Jr. upheld the law - but blocked it from taking full effect in the Nov. 6 election. In essence, the rules remain as they were during the law's so-called 'soft roll-out' in the April primary: Voters will be asked for the photo ID required by the new law, but if they don't have it, they can still vote. Whether Simpson's ruling is the last word was not yet clear. Corbett administration officials said Tuesday through spokesmen that they had not yet decided whether to mount an appeal." http://goo.gl/80o5s

GOP FIRM KNEW OF POSSIBLE FLORIDA FRAUD IN AUGUST: "On Tuesday, new details emerged that Strategic Allied Consulting knew of problems in Florida weeks ago in what is now a case of possible voter registration fraud in a dozen counties," the Tampa Bay Times reports. "The Republican Party of Florida filed an election fraud complaint last week that is now part of a criminal investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. Up until this summer, RPOF ran an in-house voter registration program that used paid staff to collect voter registrations...The RNC already had an arrangement with Strategic Allied Consulting, so the state party says it followed the national party's lead. Company representatives have said they kept Florida Republicans informed once they were alerted of questionable registration forms in Palm Beach County and fired the employee responsible on Sept. 18. Republicans say they didn't hear about the flawed forms until a week later when told about them by a Palm Beach Post reporter. But Cheryl Johnson, Lee County's voter registration director, told the Times/Herald on Tuesday that she noticed some odd applications that came quite a bit earlier, on Aug. 28." http://goo.gl/Ogfxw

[Count Bobulescu]

The consensus is that Romney “won” the debate. I prefer to think that Obama “lost” it. The debate was full of policy details which doesn’t make for “exciting” teevee, and probably turned off a lot of casual viewers interested in the gladiatorial aspect. But one thing you can say is that the debate was substantive and certainly not a vacuous 90 minutes. Obama got almost four minutes more speaking time but Romney spoke faster and said more words.
Lots of commentary today, so two posts.

Six reasons Mitt Romney won the first debate
Most everyone agrees: Mitt Romney won the first debate of the 2012 presidential election on Wednesday.
A CNN/Opinion Research poll released after the debate showed 67 percent of viewers thought Romney won, while just 25 percent said the same of President Obama. And a CBS poll showed 46 percent of undecided voters said Romney won, compared to 22 percent who said Obama won.
While Romney’s workman-like performance may have lacked one single big moment, there were a lot of reasons he came out ahead.
Below, we expound upon six of them:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...-first-debate/


In the first debate, Romney went on offense, forcing Obama to defend his record. “Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney took the offensive in the first presidential debate Wednesday night, forcing President Obama to defend his record in a series of sharp exchanges in which Romney charged that the President's economic policies have ‘crushed’ the middle class. Appearing more vigorous than he often is on the campaign trail, Romney painted Obama's first term as a time of rising poverty, slowing economic growth and struggle for millions of Americans. t.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politi...wpisrc=nl_wonk


The press consensus was clear from almost the first minute: Romney won. “There was wide agreement among the press Wednesday night that Mitt Romney won the first presidential debate, and that President Barack Obama was ‘rusty’ and uncomfortable on the stage. Immediately after the debate wrapped, CNN's Wolf Blitzer said it was a ‘pretty good night’ for Romney. The Republican nominee ‘clearly held his own’ against Obama, Blitzer said. He pointed out that the president failed to bring up Romney's Bain Capital experience, tax returns or ’47 percent’ comments — key talking points of the Obama campaign in recent months.” Mackenzie Weinger in Politico.
http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/...wpisrc=nl_wonk

But will it be enough to turn around a lagging Romney campaign? “For the last six months, since the moment Mr. Romney emerged as the winner of the Republican nominating fight, the two candidates and their respective campaigns in Boston and Chicago have traded charges and countercharges. But a month after the political conventions ended, Mr. Obama appears to hold the upper hand in the race and Mr. Romney arrived at the debate with the goal of changing the dynamic of the campaign before views harden even further…Both campaigns acknowledged that the race is close enough that the first debate had the capacity to reorder a contest that has recently seemed to been tilting in Mr. Obama's favor.” Jeff Zeleny and Michael D. Shear in The New York Times.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/04/us...c=nl_wonk&_r=0

Behind it all, a true debate about the role of government. “Somewhere in the wonky blizzard of facts, statistics and studies thrown out on stage here on Wednesday night was a fundamental philosophical choice about the future of America, quite possibly the starkest in nearly three decades. As President Obama and Mitt Romney faced off for the first time, their largely zinger-free styles may have disguised a fierce clash of views not only over taxes, spending and health care, but over the very role of government in American society in a time of wrenching problems.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/04/us...wpisrc=nl_wonk

The best takes on the debate

TANKERSLEY: A moderate Romney in debates blurred the contrasts between himself and Obama. “Apparently Mitt Romney likes government regulation, loves Medicare the way it is, agrees fairly regularly with President Obama, and does not, in fact, want to cut taxes very much. Those are gross simplifications of Romney's economic platform, and ones very much at odds with the anti-tax, anti-regulation, pro-entitlement-reform campaign the former Massachusetts governor has waged for more than a year. But if you were tuning into the presidential race for the first time on Wednesday night, you'd be forgiven if you thought the simplifications were actually the crux of Romney's plan for the country…
http://nationaljournal.com/politics/...wpisrc=nl_wonk

PHILIP KLEIN: Romney won this debate with specifics. “The best part of his debate performance was how specific he got. For instance, when criticizing Obama's financial regulatory reform, he didn't merely give a generic Republican attack on’regulation’ — he explained the unintended consequences of creating too big to fail banks and how it hurts smaller community banks.

http://washingtonexaminer.com/articl...k#.UG2WYxgjF0m

EZRA KLEIN: No, actually, he won precisely because he was inspecific. “[T]his debate was where Romney's strategy of being purposefully vague about the nature of his policies paid off. The first third of the debate was an argument over the missing numbers in Romney's tax plan. Romney fiercely objected to Obama's characterization of his tax plan as a $5 trillion tax cut. After all, he says he'll pay for all of it, somehow, later…

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...wpisrc=nl_wonk


GALUPO: And Obama lost it by being sluggish. “President Obama was listless, exhausted, halting. When he should have been vigorously twisting the knife, he would pause, search for words, and take 15 seconds to make a point that should have taken five seconds. Romney, by contrast, was gamely and ultraprepared; he never once seemed caught off guard…Critically, in the first third of the debate, Romney seemed to waltz through the bog of statistics in which Obama aimlessly waded, and pounded his message of jobs, jobs, jobs.” Scott Galupo in The American Conservative.

.http://www.theamericanconservative.c...wpisrc=nl_wonk


CILLIZZA: Obama also failed to invoke some of his campaign’s key attacks. “Inarguably, Obama came into tonight's debate with more obvious set-piece attacks on Romney. But, he seemed to be disinterested in using them. He made no mention of either Romney's "47 percent" comment or Romney's work with Bain Capital — two demonstrably difficult topics for the former Massachusetts governor.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...wpisrc=nl_wonk

DOUTHAT: The gap between Obama and Romney in terms of delivery was staggering. “[Romney's] overall fluency in policy was still striking: It made a remarkable contrast with basically every Republican nominee in my lifetime…Now fluency is not the same as perfect honesty: Romney had his share of bogus lines…and dubious arguments…But Romney profited immensely from the contrast with his opponent.

http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.c...l_wonk#Douthat


BARRO: But does a Romney win in the debate count for anything? “The most surprising fact about tonight's debate is that President Obama spoke for four minutes longer than Mitt Romney did. It certainly didn't feel like that watching the debate, in which Romney seemed to have far more to say than Obama…[O]n the opening question, about how to create jobs, Romney offered an answer that was both more heartfelt and more specific than the president's…Obama seemed tired and out of ideas, unwilling to mount a vigorous defense of his record or to go after Romney.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-1...wpisrc=nl_wonk



YGLESIAS: Romney shook the Etch-A-Sketch tonight. “Barack Obama’s timid approach to debating--I saw a lot of analogies to a prevent defense in football, but I think it was more like the four corners basketball offense that’s so deadly boring it’s now against the rules — was the most striking element of tonight’s debate, but the most important one is probably that Mitt Romney finally shook the etch-a-sketch tonight and moved to the center…Obama wasn’t very good at pointing this out tonight. And Romney is nothing if not good at remaking his persona. To be ideologically plastic enough to win a general election in Massachusetts in 2002 and a GOP presidential primary in 2012 is tough…

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/...wpisrc=nl_wonk


GOLDBERG: Romney’s performance may undermine Obama’s narrative about him. “I've been getting more and more cautiously optimistic about Romney in the last few days and, going in, I had a pretty good feeling about tonight's debate. But I had no expectation that Romney would simply control the night the way he did…[T]onight Romney brilliantly dismantled the strawman Obama has been running against for months…

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner...wpisrc=nl_wonk

DIONNE: The debate will certainly change the direction of the campaign. “Romney entered the debate facing a skeptical pundit class and a party faithful that perceived his campaign as floundering. This, at least, he reversed on Wednesday. By going on the attack, Romney won himself strong press notices and shouts of joyous relief from his own camp. Obama, by contrast, surprised many of his supporters by not even repeating criticisms of Romney he has made in his own stump speeches.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinio...wpisrc=nl_wonk


Analysis: Incumbent Debate Curse: Barack Obama Falls to Mitt Romney
Call it the curse of incumbency. Like many of his predecessors, President Obama fell victim Wednesday night to high expectations, a short fuse, and a hungry challenger, writes National Journal's Ron Fournier.

http://www.nationaljournal.com//2012...omney-20121003


Fact Checking the Presidential Debate
The first presidential debate between President Obama and Mitt Romney on Wednesday night covered topics ranging from taxes to health care to job creation. Here is a look at some of their statements and how firmly they are grounded in fact, provided by National Journal's Meghan McCarthy, Katy O'Donnell, Amy Harder, Catherine Hollander and Fawn Johnson.

http://www.nationaljournal.com//poli...0121003?page=1

Analysis: 'Thoroughly Passive' Jim Lehrer Gives Romney an Opening
Throughout the 90-minute clash Jim Lehrer, a veteran of 12 presidential debates, played a thoroughly passive role. He didn’t challenge facts or assertions, or ask piercing or detailed questions. He looked flummoxed when the candidates ignored his efforts to impose order, writes National Journal's John Aloysius Farrell.

http://www.nationaljournal.com//poli...ening-20121003

SIX TAKEAWAYS FROM THE FIRST FACEOFF. The first debate between Obama and Romney was like a heavyweight fight, writes National Journal’s Ronald Brownstein. In the end, Romney won solidly on points. He probably didn’t upend the race, but he did dislodge the perception that Obama’s current advantage in almost all polls was irreversibly hardening. Read more

http://www.nationaljournal.com/2012-...ebate-20121004


CHALLENGE STARTS NOW FOR ROMNEY. Mitt Romney hit his stride Wednesday night, looking energetic, prepared, aggressive and, at times, persuasive. But the real challenge starts now. With a month left before Election Day and early voting well underway, Romney needs to morph a solid debate performance into a winning streak. Read more
http://www.nationaljournal.com/polit...ebate-20121004


CANDIATES TALK TAXES, BUT SAY LITTLE. Despite the many words uttered about taxes in Wednesday night’s presidential debate, neither President Obama nor Mitt Romney unveiled any new policy specifics. Even the potential zingers about taxing the rich or the huge number of people who pay no federal income taxes never materialized. Instead, viewers were subjected to small-bore discussions on the taxes on corporate jets or caps on itemized deductions. See NJ’s fact check on the presidential debate.

http://www.nationaljournal.com/polit...fid=mostViewed


ROMNEY SOFTENS THE EDGES OF HIS AGENDA. Apparently Mitt Romney likes government regulation, loves Medicare the way it is, agrees fairly regularly with President Obama, and does not, in fact, want to cut taxes very much. Those are gross simplifications of Romney’s economic platform, and ones very much at odds with the campaign Romney is running. But if you were tuning into the presidential race for the first time on Wednesday night, you’d be forgiven if you thought the simplifications were Romney’s plan for the country. And Romney did his best to give that impression. Read more

http://www.nationaljournal.com/polit...trast-20121003

[Count Bobulescu]

Continued..............

BRIGHT SPOT FOR OBAMA IN DEBATE: MEDICARE. In a tough debate for President Obama, Medicare may have been the high point. Obama made a strong case that the Medicare proposal offered by Mitt Romney could shift costs to seniors and potentially undermine the traditional government insurance program, even if the plan includes it as an option. Romney never fought back on Obama’s central assertion, that his plan amounted to a “voucher,” even after moderator Jim Lehrer asked him if he supported “a voucher system.” Read more
http://www.nationaljournal.com/healt...icare-20121003


CANDIDATES OVERSTATE ENERGY’S ROLE AS JOBS ENGINE. As they’ve done on the campaign trail for months, both Mitt Romney and President Obama on Wednesday night proposed higher energy production as a means of helping to bring down the nation’s 8.1 percent unemployment rate. But as economists have also said for months, energy production won’t come close to creating enough jobs to put most of the nation’s 23 million unemployed people back to work. Read more

http://www.nationaljournal.com/polit...ngine-20121003

As Romney and Ryan head to the Old Dominion, McCaskill raises millions off Akin's rape comments and voters worry about the fate of Big Bird, here's your daily guide to the permanent campaign.


EXCLUSIVE - RESTORE OUR FUTURE GOES UP IN WISCONSIN: The Romney super PAC is putting $1.2 million behind an economic-focused attack ad against the president. "Welcome to the new normal," a narrator says, "where over 8 percent unemployment is 'doing fine' and millions of Americans have simply given up, where our children will grow up under the weight of crushing debt in a world where America is no longer the leader. And we're told we're going 'forward,' even as we fall further behind...This is President Obama's economy. Demand better." The buy signals that, with Paul Ryan on the ticket, Restore our Future continues to see the Badger State as a prime pick-up opportunity. A Marquette University Law School poll released yesterday put Obama ahead by 9 (53-42), five points tighter than in mid-September. Watch: http://goo.gl/anNTP.

FIRST LOOK - ACU POLL HAS ROMNEY AHEAD IN COLORADO: The American Conservative Union will unveil a new national poll at their first-ever "CPAC Colorado" event today that has Obama up four nationally (49-45 among likely voters) but Romney leading by four in this state (50-46). GOP pollster John McLaughlin, in the field Sunday through Tuesday, finds a 43% plurality believe the mainstream media is biased for Obama. 50% want Obamacare repealed and replaced. Asked about the death of the U.S. ambassador in Libya, 40% say the president has taken a firm stand and 54% agreed more with the statement that "the tragedy is another example of how President Obama's policies of appeasement and apologizing have failed." There's a 3.1 percent margin of error for the national numbers, and a 5.7 percent margin for the Colorado oversample. Four of the Romney sons will speak at today's conference. Here's the schedule: http://goo.gl/9uuzb. ACU executive director Gregg Keller will brief activists on their polling in a speech later this morning. Here's a 44-slide PowerPoint presentation with lots more numbers from the poll: http://goo.gl/iWB9b.

POST-DEBATE MESSAGING-
OBAMA VIDEO-"Romney's debate lies": The president didn't use the word lie during the debate, but a new Obama fact sheet identifies 12 "Romney lies" during the debate in a fact-check document. "On Wednesday night, some saw Mitt Romney sounding polished. Many saw Romney avoid specifics at every turn, as Americans have come to expect," a press release that went out at 4:15 a.m. MT said. "But when the dust settles, Romney's dozen flat-out falsehoods will be the only thing remaining from his debate performance - because avoiding the truth has been the very definition of Romney's candidacy, and he can't escape that with a single smooth appearance." Here's an accompanying, 90-second web video: http://goo.gl/pXUjb.

ROMNEY AD - "12 million jobs": "Let me tell you how I will create 12 million jobs when President Obama couldn't," Romney says in another direct to camera ad. "First, my energy independence policy means more than three million new jobs. Many of them in manufacturing. My tax reform plan to lower rates for the middle class and for small business creates seven million more. And expanding trade, cracking down on China, and improving job training takes us to over 12 million new jobs." Watch: http://goo.gl/O8aZ6.

ROMNEY BRACKETING: Two mobile billboards will roam around Obama's Wisconsin event. "In the Obama economy, over 20 million young Americans are living back home with their parents. It's your choice: move home with mom and dad OR 12 million new jobs for American workers." Photo: http://goo.gl/Cko0p.
RNC VIDEO - "Smirk": A 100-second video zooms in on Obama's smirk and highlights his efforts to avoid eye contact with Romney while the challenger highlighted the shortcomings of his economic policy: http://goo.gl/omBTo.
DNC VIDEO - "What a guy": The Democrats respond with a 40-second clip of Romney interrupting the moderator and saying he should get the last word: http://goo.gl/67gIJ.

AMERICAN BRIDGE VIDEO - "I left my heart in the Caymans": "The place you put your money makes a pretty clear indication of where you heart is," Romney told Obama during last night's budget in reference to the deficit. The liberal super PAC uses the quote in a one-minute video that highlights his overseas bank accounts and investments: http://goo.gl/b0rlv.




RNC VIDEO - "Smirk": A 100-second video zooms in on Obama's smirk and highlights his efforts to avoid eye contact with Romney while the challenger highlighted the shortcomings of his economic policy: http://goo.gl/omBTo.

DNC VIDEO - "What a guy": The Democrats respond with a 40-second clip of Romney interrupting the moderator and saying he should get the last word: http://goo.gl/67gIJ.

INSTA-POLLING-

CNN POLL OF REGISTERED VOTERS: 67% said Romney won, 25% said Obama won. http://bit.ly/UffaRQ

CBS POLL OF UNDECIDED VOTERS: Romney 46%, Obama 22%. http://bit.ly/QZm5bC

AIR WAR-
CHAMBER LAUNCHES NEW ADS IN 9 DISTRICTS - SIX IN NEW YORK: This brings the total for their blitz (since Sept. 17th) to nine Senate races and 19 House races. They are going up in six New York districts (NY 1, NY 18, NY 21, NY 24, NY 25 and NY 27). They'll also be up with TV ads for two Democrats - Jim Matheson in UT 4 and John Barrow in GA 12. Additionally, they're airing radio ads in the FL-22 race. They all focus on the economy and/or health care. Most target candidates who support the law. Watch the ads -Tim Bishop: http://goo.gl/m5Lq2. Sean Maloney: http://goo.gl/dHKUd. Bill Owens: http://goo.gl/WJtOA. Dan Maffei: http://goo.gl/ATVzX. Louise Slaughter: http://goo.gl/17BH8. Kathy Hochul: http://goo.gl/lkceu. John Barrow: http://goo.gl/HfDVR. Jim Matheson: http://goo.gl/nk5nu.

MORE REACTION - WHAT THEY'RE SAYING:
News Corp chief Rupert Murdoch: "Surprise! Romney better than strongest supporters hoped for. Aced Obama. All polls narrowed last few days. This may be turning point." http://goo.gl/9JLS5

The Weekly Standard's William Kristol: "Mitt Romney stood and delivered the best debate performance by a Republican presidential candidate in more than two decades. Romney spoke crisply about the next four years as well as the last four years, was detailed in clarifying the choice of paths ahead, and seemed more comfortable, more energetic-and even more presidential-than the incumbent." http://bit.ly/Uff8JP

MSNBC's Chris Matthews: "I don't know what [Obama] was doing out there. He had his head down, he was enduring the debate rather than fighting it. Romney, on the other hand, came in with a campaign. He had a plan, he was going to dominate the time, he was going to be aggressive, he was going to push the moderator around, which he did effectively, he was going to relish the evening, enjoying it ... Here's my question for Obama: I know he likes saying he doesn't watch cable television but maybe he should start. Maybe he should start.." http://bit.ly/Ufkgh2

The Daily Beast's Andrew Sullivan: "Look: you know how much I love the guy, and you know how much of a high information viewer I am, and I can see the logic of some of Obama's meandering, weak, professorial arguments. But this was a disaster for the president for the key people he needs to reach, and his effete, wonkish lectures may have jolted a lot of independents into giving Romney a second look." http://bit.ly/Ufhybn

National Review's Rich Lowry: "I think Obama scored some on Romney's vagueness and Romney occasionally relied too much on assertion, especially when it came to how he'll cover people with pre-existing conditions. Otherwise it was overwhelmingly Romney's night. He was more confident, more energetic, and better informed than President Obama. He exposed the president's shallowness and got under his skin. If the proverbial Martian had landed to watch the debate he would have guessed that Romney was the incumbent president. ... I've said occasionally the last few weeks that Romney is a very articulate man who is not a great communicator. Tonight he was both." http://bit.ly/QZoZgB

James Carville on CNN: "I had one overwhelming impression. I did everything I could not to reach it, but it looked like Romney wanted to be there and President Obama didn't want to be there. He seemed like he was happy to be there and Obama gave me the impression that the whole thing was kind of a lot of trouble ... I'm not sure that that aggressiveness, how that sits overall with people I'm not sure, but I do think Romney had a good night. I think he wanted to be there, he had a good night."

POLITICO's Maggie Haberman: "The conventional wisdom about Denver will hold this morning. Mitt Romney was the victor over President Barack Obama in the first of three debates marking the last month of the 2012 campaign. The debate was relatively sleepy, and there were no fireworks or big "moments" to speak of, but Romney scored on points against a barely-there incumbent. ... What Romney definitely did was earn himself a second look from the slim pool of undecided and persuadable voters still considering their options, and give himself a tighter messaging framework to use, if he is able to, before the next debate in New York two weeks from now." http://politi.co/UGKxzi

CNN's John King: "I think without a doubt you saw that participating in so many Republican primary debates helped Mitt Romney - he was, right from the beginning, more comfortable debating. The president was rusty. He hasn't done this in four years. He's the president of the United States. That's not an excuse... But he was rusty as a debater. As Wolf [Blitzer] said, we didn't hear about Bain Capital, we didn't hear about 47 percent."

The Washington Post's Dan Balz and Amy Gardner: "Romney came into the 90-minute exchange after several difficult weeks but appeared rejuvenated by the opportunity to take his case directly to Obama and the American people. He was well prepared and aggressive as he hammered the president. The contrast with Obama was striking, as the president appeared less energetic even as he rebutted some of Romney's toughest attacks." http://wapo.st/VykNbI

FRONTIERS OF OBAMA SPIN-

MESSINA STATEMENT ON 'TESTY' ROMNEY: "The President spoke directly to voters tonight about his vision for an economy that grows from the middle out, while Mitt Romney spent the night on the defensive, doubled down on the same bad ideas that crashed the economy, and got testy when he was pushed on specifics."

PLOUFFE ON ABSENCE OF '47 PERCENT': "First of all on the 47 percent, that's an issue that just about 100 percent of the country knows about. It's been chewed on over and appropriately so. The reason it's called Romney's problem is because it wasn't a gaffe. It was a revealing moment. We we've run advertising on it so our strategy here was not zingers necessarily." http://politi.co/Vyq9DR

MODERATOR WOES - MEDIA PANS LEHRER: "Lehrer, the executive editor of PBS Newshour, sat behind the desk for the 12th time in the history of televised presidential debates on Wednesday night - and drew some of the most blistering reviews of his career," POLITICO's Mackenzie Weinger writes. "The consensus: Lehrer did not control the debate, failed to enforce the time limits, did not press the candidates enough and generally was steamrolled by the presidential candidates, Mitt Romney in particular." http://politi.co/UGJNKL

DEBATE WAS BIGGEST NIGHT IN TWITTER POLITICAL HISTORY: More than 10 million tweets were sent about the debate last night - more than on any one night of the DNC or the RNC, and the highest tweet volume surrounding a political event ever, per Twitter's blog. Here's a map from Twitter showing spikes in Twitter activity during the 90-minute debate: http://bit.ly/UGO152.


LIGHTER CLICKS-

JON STEWART made fun of the Fox and Drudge hype of the 2007 Obama video: http://goo.gl/LwAM4.

JET BLUE is flying voters unhappy with the election outcome to tropical locations: http://politi.co/QZl2bz.

TEDDY won his first-ever Presidents' Race at Nats Park yesterday: http://wapo.st/Ufh5pG.

BIG BIRD mentions on Facebook increased 800,000% last night: http://bit.ly/VygVHC.

OBAMA has shaved a few strokes off his handicap since 2008 and plays to about 18, Don Van Natta Jr. writes in a story for ESPN Magazine about the president's efforts to hide his golf game from the world: http://goo.gl/nSruX.

CODA - QUOTE OF THE DAY: "All of a sudden you see these black SUVs come up really quick and I thought we were about to get robbed." -- Marty Arps, the manager of the Chipotle where Romney ate lunch Tuesday http://bit.ly/UGU7Ci

[Griska]

Obama had a bad night.
It's the only logical explanation for making Mitt Romney appear credible.

From twitter:

If Obama really wants to be Bill Clinton, he'll balance the budget and invade Yugoslavia.

[Count Bobulescu]

Web sites lose to Google in race for Obama, Romney campaign ads
Google and a handful of other tech firms are acting as advertising middlemen for the presidential campaigns, taking a huge cut of the revenue from online ads.
These firms have given the campaigns greater precision in targeting voters, but the process is starving politically oriented media sites in what once was their most lucrative season.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/busine...7eb_story.html


The Hill: Romney says he was 'completely wrong' on '47 percent' comment 
By Mario Trujillo 
GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney said Thursday night he was “completely wrong” when he made comments about the 47 percent of Americans who do not pay taxes at a secretly recorded fundraiser in May.
http://thehill.com/video/campaign/26...ercent-comment


The Hill: NRA endorses Romney, calls him ‘only hope’ for firearms freedom
 By Jonathan Easley 
The National Rifle Association (NRA) endorsed Mitt Romney for president late Thursday.
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefi...rearms-freedom


The Hill: Obama, the day after, slams Romney's claims 
By Jonathan Easley 
President Obama didn’t repeat the mistake of his lackluster debate performance in his first post-debate appearance on Thursday, coming out swinging at Mitt Romney.
http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/...be-mitt-romney


The New York Times: Entering Stage Right, Romney Moved to Center
He used the first presidential debate to speak out forcefully to its wide television audience against the idea of cutting taxes for the wealthy, noting that “high-income people are doing just fine in this economy.” Asked if there was too much government regulation, he answered, “regulation is essential.” And he praised the Massachusetts health care bill, calling it a “model for the nation.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/05/us...r.html?hp&_r=0


Cook Report: Mitt Romney Breaks His Losing Streak
Before Wednesday’s debate, the presidential race had been shaped by the Democratic convention and Mitt Romney’s “47 percent" remark. Romney’s strong performance broke his losing streak, but the key will be whether he regains ground in swing states, writes the Cook Report's Charlie Cook.
http://www.nationaljournal.com//colu...treak-20121004


Romney: Debate Let Voters 'Listen To Substance'
A re-energized Mitt Romney joined forces with Paul Ryan in the battleground state of Virginia on Thursday evening and said the previous night's debate enabled voters to "listen to substance," even as the Obama campaign began aggressively questioning the details of several of Romney's assertions, reports National Journal/CBS's Rebecca Kaplan and Sarah Huisenga.
http://www.nationaljournal.com//2012...ance--20121004


GAO Can't Find Voter Fraud In States With New ID Laws
Progressives can now cite the Government Accountability Office in their attacks against voter I.D. laws that they claim make it harder for Americans to vote, Influence Alley's Erin Mershon reports.
http://influencealley.nationaljourna...fraud-in-s.php


OBAMA POISED TO ALMOST DOUBLE 2008 AD SPENDING . President Obama's campaign has spent more than $300 million on television advertising, according to new figures compiled by sources watching the ad market, an amount that puts him on track to nearly double his own record-breaking spending from the 2008 election cycle, writes Hotline’s Reid Wilson. All told, Obama, Republican Mitt Romney and the outside groups that support them have poured $759 million into television and radio advertisements in an effort to communicate their messages with the tiny fraction of voters who remain undecided with just five weeks to go before Election Day. Read more
http://nationaljournal.com/politics/...nding-20121005


The good news for the Obama campaign is their huge September fundraising haul. ”President Obama's campaign raised more money in September than any candidate has raised in a previous month this year, according to several Democrats familiar with the campaign's money-raising operation. Several sources said the president's haul last month exceeded the $114 million he raised in August, in part on the strength of donations that flowed in after the Democratic National Convention and former president Bill Clinton's well-received speech. One Democrat familiar with the fund-raising effort said Mr. Obama and his allies at the Democratic National Committee raised more than $150 million in September.” Michael D. Shear in The New York Times.
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2...wpisrc=nl_wonk


BROOKS: The return of moderate Mitt. ”[O]n Wednesday night, Romney finally emerged from the fog. He broke with the stereotypes of his party and, at long last, began the process of offering a more authentic version of himself…Romney didn't describe a comprehensive governing philosophy, but he gave us a hint of a strong center-right pragmatic approach. It starts with 1986-style tax reform and Wyden-Ryan Medicare reform and then offers a glimpse of experimental pragmatism on most everything else…Romney's debate performance signals the return of Governor Mitt. Democrats call it hypocrisy; I call it progress.” David Brooks in The New York Times.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/05/op...wpisrc=nl_wonk


KRUGMAN: Romney’s sick joke. ”What Mr. Romney actually proposes is that Americans with pre-existing conditions who already have health coverage be allowed to keep that coverage even if they lose their job -- as long as they keep paying the premiums. As it happens, this is already the law of the land. But it's not what anyone in real life means by having a health plan that covers pre-existing conditions, because it applies only to those who manage to land a job with health insurance in the first place (and are able to maintain their payments despite losing that job)…What Mr. Romney did in the debate, in other words, was, at best, to play a word game with voters, pretending to offer something substantive for the uninsured while actually offering nothing. For all practical purposes, he simply lied about what his policy proposals would do.” Paul Krugman in The New York Times.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/05/op...wpisrc=nl_wonk


After Debate, a Harsh Light Falls on a Moderator” — Brian Stelter, New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/05/us...&wpisrc=nl_fix


Timothy Egan in The New York Times on the idiot undecided voter Egan is sick of pretending to care about the undecided voter, an uninformed idiot. "You’re not Solomon, carefully weighing the choices. You’re a ditherer. You probably panic at “paper or plastic” in the supermarket, backing up the checkout line. ...we don’t like you. Not because you can’t make up your mind, but because you won’t."
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com...ts-delight/?hp


THE PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGNS FIGHT OVER "FACTS" -
Romney ad- "Facts are clear": "Obama's four deficits are the four largest in U.S. history," a narrator says in a new commercial. "He's adding almost as much debt as all forty-three previous presidents combined. And over thirty cents of every dollar Obama spends is borrowed, much of it from countries like China. He's not just wasting money. He's borrowing it, and then wasting it. We can't afford four more years." Watch: http://goo.gl/Ui40s.


Obama video - "Mitt Romney's not telling the truth": A 2-minute video includes footage of NBC's Andrea Mitchell and ABC's Jon Karl fact-checking comments Romney made during the debate. Watch for the reelection campaign to release a series of short videos throughout the day built around Romney's comments on hiring more teachers, investing in clean energy, outsourcing American jobs and caring for the middle class. Watch: http://goo.gl/xyuhL.


OBAMA RAISED $150+ MILLION IN SEPTEMBER: "The September total far surpasses the $114 million raised in August, when the Obama team snapped a three-month streak in which it was outraised by [Romney]," The Wall Street Journal reports. "At the time, the $114 million was the most the Obama campaign had collected in any one month in the 2012 election season. The most the Romney campaign has collected so far was $111 million in August." The campaign hasn't confirmed the report, nor is it clear how much money Obama's team has on hand. http://on.wsj.com/QVLq9l


DEBATE AFTERMATH-
67.2 MILLION WATCHED: That's 28 percent more than saw the first debate between Obama and John McCain in 2008, which 52.4 million viewers tuned in for: http://wapo.st/Q0d17l


AARP DOESN'T WANT OBAMA TO CITE THEM: The president name-dropped the senior lobby twice in the debate during the discussion on Medicare. "The remarks prompted a polite statement from AARP Senior Vice President John Hishta asking candidates to refrain from mentioning the group," per the Hill. 'AARP has never consented to the use of its name by any candidate or political campaign,' Hishta said. 'AARP is a nonpartisan organization, and we do not endorse political candidates nor coordinate with any candidate or political party.'


REACTIONS, ROUND TWO-CONSERVATIVE CRITICS LOVED IT:
Charles Krauthammer calls it "the biggest rout since Agincourt" in today's Washington Post: "If you insist, since the Carter-Reagan debate. With a remarkable display of confidence, knowledge and nerve, Mitt Romney won the first 2012 debate going away." http://goo.gl/dJHee


Peggy Noonan says the debate Romney was the "real" Romney. Noonan, the former Reagan speechwriter who's made no secret of her criticism for the Romney campaign lately, said the candidate delivered exactly what he needed to on Wednesday. "http://on.wsj.com/QVHKEw


George Will says "Romney hit a trifecta": "Before Denver, Obama's campaign was a protracted exercise in excuse abuse, and the promise that he will stay on the statist course he doggedly defends despite evidence of its futility. After Denver, Romney's campaign should advertise that promise." http://goo.gl/kTCvO


Rich Lowry decides Romney is an asset after all: "The Romney-Ryan Medicare reform is still a heavy lift. Obama will continue to benefit from a Bush over-hang," the National Review editor writes in his POLITICO column. "But at least in the debates, it is now clear that the Romney campaign has an underappreciated asset - none other than Mitt Romney himself." http://politi.co/QVKd1M


WHY DOES RYAN HAVE SUCH A LOW PROFILE? "Ryan, the campaigns says, has sat for more than 167 interviews since joining the ticket - a number increasing daily - including 26 national TV, 111 local/regional TV, 14 radio interviews, and 16 print," Zeke Miller reports for BuzzFeed. "But despite that impressive number, it's as if he's done them with his larynx removed. He has not made much news at all--and that seems an intentional choice coming from Boston. Ryan is usually asked roughly the same questions about Medicare and taxes and he stays within the lanes of the campaign's hazy policy plans, not his specific ones. On his swing through Iowa this week, Ryan invited a host of local and national reporters onto his bus - including Mark Leibovich of The New York Times." Zeke says Ryan has pushed internally to defend his policy views in public: http://goo.gl/tiWBn.


FEISTY POTUS RETURNS TO TRAIL: "The president - as feisty as he was low-key onstage Wednesday night - spent 20 minutes in his first post-debate speech mocking the genial, centrist Romney of that debate as an imposter who misled the American people," Glenn Thrush and Jen Epstein report. "Gov. Romney may dance around his positions, but if you want to be president, you owe the American people the truth," Obama told a crowd of about 12,000 in Denver. "Later in the day, he addressed his biggest rally of the campaign so far - 30,000 at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, according to the school's police chief - in a major attempt to change the conversation. Thousands more lined the motorcade route." http://goo.gl/TSQT7


BATTLEGROUND BRIEFING - THE PATH TO 270:

NETWORKS, AP NIX EXIT POLLS IN 19 STATES: "'Breaking from two decades of tradition, this year's election exit poll is set to include surveys of voters in 31 states, not all 50 as it has for the past five presidential elections, according to multiple people involved in the planning," the Washington Post reports. "Dan Merkle, director of elections for ABC News, and a member of the consortium that runs the exit poll, confirmed the shift Thursday. The aim, he said, 'is to still deliver a quality product in the most important states,' in the face of mounting survey costs.' http://wapo.st/Q0d17l


LIGHTER CLICKS-

JON STEWART noted last night that the country could agree on one thing: Obama bombed in the debate. http://goo.gl/G469g

JIMMY FALLON exaggerates how poorly the candidates treated Jim Lehrer for a sketch on his show: http://goo.gl/I6P9M.

AL GORE thinks altitude could be to blame for Obama's bad debate performance: http://goo.gl/Rixp6.

A PHOTO imagines what Obama and Romney would look like if they switched hair: http://goo.gl/kCO2d.

REUTERS/IPSOS found that 10 percent of voters would rather watch paint dry than watch the presidential debates. 8 percent would rather have jury duty: http://bit.ly/Q0gCT0.

CODA - QUOTE OF THE DAY: "Thank goodness someone is finally getting tough on Big Bird. It's about time." -President Obama, speaking at a rally in Colorado, making a quip about Romney's plan to cut PBS funding. http://politi.co/QVAmsR

[Count Bobulescu]

As the White House race enters its final stages, opinion polls are scrutinized ever more closely for evidence the nation's voters are tilting toward one candidate or the other. That recently has put pollsters under pressure to explain how they find a few hundred or a thousand people to stand in for the American electorate.

In the last few weeks, Republican figures such as Karl Rove and Rush Limbaugh have questioned polls showing leads for President Barack Obama over Republican nominee Mitt Romney—including, in Mr. Rove's case, in the opinion section of this newspaper. They say many polls are skewed because far more respondents are identifying themselves as Democrats than as Republicans.

Many pollsters say party ID is an attitude, not an attribute. The distinction is key, as attitudes can change while attributes are more stable. And attributes, such as race, age, and gender, are measured regularly by the U.S. Census Bureau, providing benchmarks pollsters can use to tweak their numbers—making adjustments to render samples more representative of the group whose opinion they seek to measure. So if, say, just 6.5% of the people answering a poll are between 18 and 24 years old, but 13% of adult Americans are in that range, each respondent in that group has his or her answers counted twice to make up for the shortfall.

There are no reliable, stable numbers, however, for how many Americans are Democrats, Republicans or independents. So if a poll finds that Democrats outnumber Republicans by 10 percentage points in the sample, after weighting for factors such as age, than many pollsters accept this as a finding rather than a mistake: More people are identifying themselves as Democrats.
There are regular swings in party identification, such as that between 2008, when Democrats outnumbered Republicans by seven percentage points in exit polling, and the 2010 mid-terms, when each group made up 35% of people surveyed by exit pollsters.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...=djemnumbers_t

How and why politicians get away with dodging questions 60-70% of the time,
If you have watched a debate, you have watched a pivot. "The pivot is a way of taking a question that might be on a specific subject, and moving to answer it on your own terms," O'Donnell says.

http://www.npr.org/2012/10/03/162103...cc=sh-20121006

Obama Poised to Nearly Double '08 Ad Spending
President Obama's campaign has spent more than $300 million on television advertising, according to new figures compiled by sources watching the ad market, an amount that puts him on track to nearly double his own record-breaking spending from the 2008 election cycle, reports Hotline's Reid Wilson.

http://www.nationaljournal.com//poli...nding-20121005

The Hill: Dems say Romney lied during debate — and it will cost him
By: Mike Lillis
Lawmakers argue that the silver lining in President Obama's underwhelming debate showing is that Romney gave Democrats plenty of ammunition.

http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign...-will-cost-him

The Hill: Romney ribs Obama over debating skills
By Justin Sink
The Republican presidential nominee basked in an crowd energized by his successful debate performance during a rally in Florida.

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/...ebating-skills

The Hill: Polls show Romney making headway in swing states
By Justin Sink and Jonathan Easley
New numbers in Ohio, Florida and Virginia show Romney closing the gap or leading President Obama.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefi...latest-polling


BREAKING on @BarackObama: "1,825,813 people came together to raise $181 million for this campaign [Obama + DNC] in September [the biggest month for a campaign this cycle, but shy of the $193 million one-month record, set by Obama + DNC in Sept. '08]. ... Of the 1,825,813 people who donated in September, 567,000 were new to this organization-not having given before in 2008 or 2012. ... 98% of September's contributions were $250 or less, with an average contribution of $53. ... Since this campaign launched in April 2011, a total of 3,922,420 people have pitched in." Romney has not released September totals.

President Obama’s reelection campaign, which only two months ago fretted that it was losing the money race to Republican challenger Mitt Romney, said Saturday that it was on the cusp of raising $1 billion for the 2012 election after posting its strongest fundraising month of the year.

The Obama campaign and the Democratic National Committee raised $181 million last month, easily eclipsing the $114 million that they had raised together in August. The number falls just shy of the all-time monthly record of $193 million, however, which was set by Obama in September 2008.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politi...rc=al_politics

RICHARD McGREGOR, Financial Times Washington bureau chief, profiles Romney in 3,300-word "Born to run?": "Romney has helped mightily in dismantling his own life story. Instead of the election being a referendum on Obama's economy, the combination of Romney's serial missteps and the brutally targeted Obama campaign have made the poll much more of a vote on the Republican candidate. ...

If the Obama campaign wanted to invent a caricature of an out-of-touch plutocrat, they could not have done a better job than their opponent did himself [with the 47% tape]. ... Like John Kennedy, the first Catholic to be elected president, Romney is a trailblazer for the Mormon religion, long considered an outlier among religions in the US. His ambition also has a whiff of the psychodrama of George W. Bush's efforts to restore the family honour after his father was defeated after a single term in office. ..
.
"Many people who know him, or who worked with him in Massachusetts, yearn for the real Romney to reappear. Douglas Foy was one of many outsiders appointed by Romney to executive positions in Massachusetts. A lawyer who had established and run an environmental advocacy group for a quarter of a century, Foy's appointment to head a superagency overseeing transport, energy and the environment irritated sections of the business community. Foy remembers Romney as practical and straight and not as the stiff buttoned-up figure that many see today. 'I never understood why they had him walled off,' he says. ...

"If Romney does lose the election, the turning point might be his [mid-June] departure on his six-state bus tour from the New Hampshire farmhouse. While Romney was holding small rallies, generating positive local news coverage, the Obama machine cranked up a campaign of negative attacks costing tens of millions of dollars. Obama's air war was devastating. The portrait of Romney as a latter-day robber baron raiding companies and laying off workers at Bain Capital angered many business leaders. But it hit home with its target audience, the middle classes of middle America, in states such as Ohio, Iowa and Wisconsin. For many political professionals, Romney's fatal mistake was not to have advertisements up at the same time, telling his own life story on his own terms." Outside the pay wall! http://on.ft.com/UKlnzP

ROBERT DRAPER, in Sunday's N.Y. Times Magazine, "The Mitt Who Might Have Been ": "Only recently has Romney begun to detail the policies he would pursue, ... as if they were hatched from a few late-night strategy sessions after a string of bad news days rather than from the candidate's core philosophy. The fact that Romney is in charge of his own ... campaign doesn't appear to be especially reassuring to the electorate - and even so, his campaign tactics reveal only what he would do in order to win, not what he'll do once he has won. Romney faces an incumbent with his own leadership issues, though Obama has the benefit of surrogates who are deft at ascribing fittingly presidential characteristics.

... [T]hrough private conversations with Romney's senior strategists over the years, it's clear that they are as genuinely admiring of their candidate's biography as they are inept at selling it to the outside world.

"Bob White, who worked with Romney at Bain Capital, led his 1994 Senate campaign and later assisted him at the Winter Olympics and in every campaign since, said to me: 'The totality of Mitt's experiences - starting up a business, taking all that he learned from Bain and applying it to the Olympics where the situation was dire and then moving on to another broken situation in Massachusetts and fixing that as well - uniquely qualifies him for the challenges of the presidency.

Time and time again, Mitt has stepped forward.' You almost never hear Romney staff members cast their candidate in such a manner. Maybe it's because White's distillation calls to mind a lifelong technocrat who does whatever works rather than a conservative leader who sticks to 'what's right.'" http://nyti.ms/QSgHXx

The Hill: Obama's edge narrows in latest polling
By Peter Schroeder
New polling shows Mitt Romney continuing to gain ground on President Obama following the first presidential debate Wednesday.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefi...latest-polling


THE NARRATIVE - "Mitt gets personal," by James Hohmann in Apopka, Fla .: "It took six years of running for president, but Mitt Romney has realized one month before the 2012 election that he cannot depend on family and surrogates to humanize him. ... The Republican is using a three-day Florida swing to make a direct emotional appeal to voters. He is for the first time speaking more candidly to voters about his good deeds on behalf of others ... Starting on Friday night, Romney devoted nearly one-third of his stump speech to telling three revealing and personal stories that have been related before by other Romney allies - his wife, his friends - but never by himself. It's a dramatic, and seemingly intentional shift ...

"One of the stories references Romney's religion in a prominent way, something he has generally avoided. He spoke of ministering to 14-year-old leukemia patient David Oparowski as 'Brother Romney' when David questioned him about the afterlife (although the 'Brother Romney' reference was dropped in the second telling). The campaign has also been playing the biographical video from the [convention] that features home video from the Romneys' private life. ... The campaign realized that it had made a mistake playing the video before prime-time during the convention [in favor of] Clint Eastwood ... [Officials have] begun playing it on big Jumbotrons set up at some Romney rallies, including here on Saturday night. At this rally outside Orlando, Romney auditioned to be healer-in-chief." http://politi.co/RJybs0


SHOT -- N.Y. POST wood: "MITT'S ALIVE! 2-point lead [Rasmussen!] after debate" ... inside: "ROMWARD & UPWARD: Poll-vault over Bam after win in debate."

CHASER - DAN BALZ "The Sunday Take" column on WashPost A2, "One week does not a campaign make" : "Has the 2012 election created a new model in which the battlegrounds perform differently than the national numbers? Ohio is the prime example this year. Until last week, the polling in Ohio showed Obama with a substantial lead - at least five or six points ... Obama was enjoying a bigger lead in Ohio than he was nationally. That's out of line with how Ohio has generally performed in relation to the national numbers. ... States do change behavior. New Jersey is a classic example. It was once a true swing state, but in the 1990s it became, presidentially at least, a Democratic stronghold. ...

"There's no sign that Ohio is moving that dramatically. But is Ohio now becoming more like Michigan and Pennsylvania? Those two states are still nominally considered swing states but tilt more toward the Democrats, which is why Romney hasn't been able to put them into play this fall. Have the effect of the auto bailout and now the drop in the national unemployment rate to go along with Ohio's rate that is below the national average given Obama a boost in Ohio that changes the equation there? If that's the case, it would have an outsized impact on the shape of the electoral map. Or will Romney's debate performance help to snap Ohio back to its more traditional posture?" http://wapo.st/R7B0R3

THE MAP - "30 Days Out: Fundamentals Still Favor Obama," by ABC's Amy Walter: "Electoral map is shrinking, not expanding. Despite earlier predictions by the Romney campaign that they would be competitive in traditionally blue states like Michigan, Minnesota and Pennsylvania, they are putting no serious effort into any of them. Moreover, the Paul Ryan pick gave Romney only a short-lived bounce in Wisconsin. The latest polls in the Badger State show Obama with a healthy advantage in the state. This has left Romney has a very narrow path to 270, and no room for error. If Romney loses Ohio and Wisconsin, he would have no choice but to win almost every single other battleground state to win." http://abcn.ws/R7ipEA

[Count Bobulescu]

Pew poll shows Romney leading by 4 percent

Mitt Romney has jumped out to a slight lead in the aftermath of a strong debate last week, according to a new poll from the Pew Research Center. Pew, which in mid-September showed Romney trailing President Obama by eight points, now shows him leading the president by four points among likely voters — the first time Romney has led by that much. The poll is the second survey today to suggest a significant post-debate bounce for Romney. A Gallup tracking poll conducted in the three days after the debate showed Romney and Obama tied at 47 percent among registered voters.

Read more at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...likely-voters/

THE FIX: Eight takeaways from the new Pew poll
The latest Pew poll shows Mitt Romney ahead of President Obama by 49-45 among likely voters. And there's still more interesting data. 
» Read full article

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...=nl_pmpolitics


POLL BOMBSHELL - Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, "Romney's Strong Debate Performance Erases Obama's Lead: GOP Challenger Viewed as Candidate with New Ideas": "Romney has drawn even with Obama in the presidential race among registered voters (46% to 46%) after trailing by nine points (42% to 51%) in September. Among likely voters, Romney holds a slight 49% to 45% edge over Obama. He trailed by eight points among likely voters last month. The latest national survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, conducted Oct. 4-7 [debate was Oct. 3] among 1,511 adults, including 1,201 registered voters (1,112 likely voters), finds ... Romney's supporters far more engaged in the campaign than they were in September. ...
"Romney has made sizable gains over the past month among women voters, white non-Hispanics and those younger than 50. Currently, women are evenly divided (47% Obama, 47% Romney). Last month, Obama led Romney by 18 points (56% to 38%) among women likely voters. ... Obama continues [to] hold leads as the candidate who connects well with ordinary people and takes consistent positions on issues. ... In June, Obama held a 17-point lead as the candidate voters thought was more willing to work with leaders from the other party. Today, the candidates run about even on this (45% say Obama, 42% Romney)." http://bit.ly/Qc2ZPF

How non-voting non-citizens affect the outcome of the election.

If President Obama wins reelection by three or four Electoral College votes next month, the reason may be simple: noncitizens, mostly immigrants, who don’t have the right to vote. No, I’m not talking about his immigration policy or his popularity with Latinos. Nor does this have anything to do with voter fraud. Rather, an Obama victory could hinge on a quirk in the Constitution that gives noncitizens, a group that includes illegal immigrants and legal permanent residents, a say in electing the president of the United States.

As required by Article I and the Fourteenth Amendment, the decennial census, which allocates to each state its congressional seats and Electoral College votes, is based on a count of all people who live in the United States, citizens and noncitizens alike — or as the Constitution phrases it, “the whole number of persons in each state.” That means millions of noncitizens who are ineligible to vote are included in Electoral College calculations, and that benefits some states over others. Most of these noncitizens are here legally; however, the Pew Hispanic Center estimates that about 45 percent of noncitizens are undocumented immigrants.

So if including noncitizens distorts the Electoral College and potentially affects the outcome of our nation’s most important vote, why do we continue to count “the whole number of persons” — noncitizens the same as citizens — in the census?
There are many good reasons.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinio...y.html?hpid=z4


Associated Press: Romney looks to cut Obama's early voter advantage
 By Stephen Ohlemacher
Mitt Romney's campaign is working hard to chip away at President Barack Obama's advantage among early voters, and there are signs the effort is paying off in North Carolina and Florida, two competitive states that the Republican nominee can ill afford to lose.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories...10-08-03-06-57

The New York Times: With Biden up next to debate, Obama's aides plot comeback
 By Peter Baker and Trip Gabriel
President Obama’s campaign is working feverishly to restore its momentum after a lackluster debate performance last week, an effort that began with a conference call 10 minutes before the debate even ended and led to new advertisements, a rewritten stump speech, a carefully timed leak and a reversal of months-old strategy.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/08/us...dayspaper&_r=0

COMING ATTRACTIONS - "A veep debate that could really matter," by Jonathan Martin : "If 'Gentleman Joe' [Biden] took the stage four years ago, determined not to come off as patronizing or bullying Sarah Palin, it seems almost certain that Thursday [in Danville, Ky.] will bring the appearance of 'Scranton Joe,' the scrappy pol who's never been afraid to throw a punch. ... [T]his is the rare presidential year in which, from a policy standpoint, one side is running as much against the other's veep pick as they are the presidential nominee. ... Biden ... will seize any opportunity to highlight [Paul] Ryan's views on Medicare and Social Security as real or perceived space between the Republican ticket mates. ...

"Ryan officials ... know they're going to face heavy incoming and are counseling the wonky House Budget Committee chairman to stick to the big picture. 'This isn't a Budget Committee hearing,' said one Ryan adviser." http://politi.co/POwSnU

--AP'S PHIL ELLIOTT in Dubuque, "Ryan-Midwestern Style -- Please, thank you, sorry: Ryan polite campaigner' : "Ryan easily does what the top of the GOP ticket - Romney --struggles to do: connect with voters on a personal level while engaging in retail politicking. When Romney campaigns alongside the No. 2 on the ticket, Ryan's casual attitude and, well, simple tone seem to soften Romney's sometimes awkward stature and bracingly formal approach. ... Should Romney lose the race this year, the ease at which Ryan works a crowd would be an asset if he chose to seek the presidency ... Ryan's celebrity rise in the two months since being named Romney's running mate hasn't seemed to change his mild Wisconsin manners -- or his willingness to engage with just about anyone." http://sacb.ee/R6COge



THE NARRATIVE - OBAMA HAS A GROWING ENTHUSIASM PROBLEM: A new POLITICO/George Washington University Battleground Tracking Poll of likely voters shows Obama ahead of Romney 49 percent to 48 percent nationally, a statistical tie and a point closer than a week ago. The head-to-head numbers have held remarkably steady through the past three weeks, but there's been a notable shift of intensity from the Democrats to the Republicans since the party conventions over a month ago. Most of the poll's calls were made before Romney's strong performance at the first presidential debate in Denver. Only 73 percent who support Obama say they are "extremely likely" to vote, compared to 86 percent who back Romney. Among those who say they are extremely likely to vote, Romney actually leads Obama 52 percent to 46 percent. That's up from two points last week. Obama led 50 percent to 47 percent among this group three weeks ago.

FOR POTUS, 3 KEY CONSTITUENCIES NOT WHERE THEY NEED TO BE: While 82 percent of whites (who break for Romney by a 15-point margin) say they're "extremely likely" to vote, only 71 percent of African-Americans and 70 percent of Latinos do. Just 68 percent of 18 to 29-year-olds put themselves in that category.

WHY THIS MATTERS: A more energized base frees up Romney to focus more of his energy on wooing independents and others unhappy with the president but not currently supporting him. The trend lines suggest that Obama will be forced to devote more time than he'd like in the final weeks toward motivating African-Americans, Latinos and college kids. James' story: http://goo.gl/GBEzB.


WSJ A1 - GOLDMAN TURNS TABLES ON OBAMA: "When Barack Obama ran for president in 2008, no major U.S. corporation did more to finance his campaign than Goldman Sachs Group. This election, none has done more to help defeat him," The Wall Street Journal's Liz Rappaport and Brody Mullins report. "Prompted by what they call regulatory attacks on their business and personal attacks on their character, executives and employees of Goldman Sachs have largely abandoned Mr. Obama and are now the top sources of money to [Romney] and the Republican Party. In the four decades since Congress created the campaign-finance system, no company's employees have switched sides so abruptly. Employees at Goldman donated more than $1 million to Mr. Obama when he first ran for president. This election, they have given the president's campaign $136,000...By contrast, Goldman employees have given Mr. Romney's campaign $900,000, plus another $900,000 to the super PAC founded to help him." http://goo.gl/F4QN6

Romney Foreign Policy Speech Review

In what his campaign billed as a major foreign policy address, Romney claimed that "this president’s policies have not been equal to our best examples of world leadership.

http://thehill.com/blogs/global-affa...in-middle-east

Romney on Obama Foreign Policy: Hope Is Not a Strategy
By Abby Livingston

Mitt Romney indicted President Barack Obama's foreign policy today in a speech delivered at the Virginia Military Institute. Full Story
http://atr.rollcall.com/mitt-romney-...ot-a-strategy/


The Hill: Team Obama to Romney: 'Bring it on'
By Justin Sink
President Obama's campaign aggressively hit back against Mitt Romney's foreign policy speech on Monday, challenging the GOP nominee to "bring it on."

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefi...ey-bring-it-on




AFTER REPEATEDLY FUMBLING on foreign policy during his campaign, Mitt Romney delivered Monday a coherent and forceful critique of President Obama’s handling of the upheavals in the Middle East. Arguing that a fateful struggle is playing out across the region, he said the United States is “missing an historic opportunity” because of Mr. Obama’s failure to more aggressively support liberal forces against dictators and Islamic extremists. “It is the responsibility of our president to use America’s great power to shape history — not to lead from behind, leaving our destiny at the mercy of events,” Mr. Romney said.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinio...y.html?hpid=z4

The Romney Doctrine

Sounds eerily like the Obama one.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinio...rc=nl_opinions


The new old Romney

A change in tone, but not in policy.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinio...rc=nl_opinions



Joe Nocera in The New York Times on the changes in campaign finance In Austin Powers, world leaders laugh at Dr. Evil when he asks for a million dollars, a pathetically small sum. That's kind of how campaign finance is; the $35 million spent on 1976 campaigns seems small compared to millions of today. "What feels different now is that the sums are so large, and that it has the potential to influence not just Congressional and Senate candidates but the presidential candidates as well."

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/09/op...n.html?hp&_r=0

How Good Are Romney's Postdebate Odds?

By Charlie Cook

By the end of this week, we should have a better idea of the true degree that Mitt Romney’s strong--and President Obama’s weak--debate performance had on this contest. In the live interviewer polls to respondents with landline and cellular telephones, Obama had a lead of between 3 and 5 points before the debate.

http://www.nationaljournal.com//colu...odds--20121009



LIGHTER CLICKS-

SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE mocks Obama's performance in the first debate: http://bit.ly/RoMNuP.

THE NEW YORK TIMES looks behind the scenes on how SNL put together that episode: http://nyti.ms/OgV7Pg.

JON STEWART AND BILL O'REILLY debated in D.C. this weekend: http://nyti.ms/Rp0h9Q.

LINDA MCMAHON'S CAMPAIGN leaks selected portions of an email exchange with The Huffington Post's Amanda Terkel, a blunder that was 100% certain to backfire: http://goo.gl/bJeug.

PAUL RYAN is an exceptionally polite campaigner: http://goo.gl/EcJrB.

PAUL RYAN had a contentious back-and-forth with a Michigan ABC reporter who asked about guns and taxes after their sit-down had ended. Michael Steel intervened: http://goo.gl/nnKtj.

DAVID LETTERMAN did a skit with "Romney Gangnam Style." http://goo.gl/MQk2W

JON STEWART made fun of conservative who have criticized Sesame Street for trying to brainwash kids: http://goo.gl/4bfL3.

MIKE HUCKABEE does a lot of parodies on his radio show: http://goo.gl/caicQ.

LADY GAGA visited Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London last night: http://goo.gl/zzv6K.

CODA - QUOTE OF THE DAY: "I was like, 'Oh, my God. There's Wolf Blitzer.' Like two drinks in, I just start talking. 'So, about Ahmadinejad's nephew ...' Wolf was surprised I followed politics." - Actress Mila Kunis reflects on going to the 2011 White House Correspondents' Dinner in an Esquire interview http://goo.gl/2ckYU

[Richardbouvet]

The polls are now apparently putting Romney ahead, and I now think we must accept that Obama is probably gone.

It is a very great shame - things could have been so much better.

There will be plenty of time for progressives to dissect where and why it all went wrong.

[Count Bobulescu]

Poll of Polls (National)

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epo...bama-1171.html

Sate by State polls.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epo...lls/president/

POLLING-

GALLUP switched to likely voter screen yesterday: Romney leads by 2 (49-47). http://goo.gl/KPDI1

ABC/WAPO: says voters prefer the wives: Michelle has a 67/29 fav/unfav. Ann has a 56/30, up from the spring. Michelle is 12 points more popular than her husband. Ann is 9 points above Mitt. http://goo.gl/CCCfM

CNN of OHIO: Obama up 4 (51-47). http://goo.gl/YKlCq

WMUR of NEW HAMPSHIRE: Obama up 6 (47-41). Obama led by 15 in the poll they put out at the beginning of last week. http://goo.gl/QdWZR

ARG of COLORADO: Romney up 4 (50-46). http://goo.gl/kIX0D

The Hill: Done with fundraising, President Obama hits the campaign homestretch

By Amie Parnes and Niall Stanage
President Obama will attend his last fundraiser of the 2012 campaign Thursday and then shift into top gear following his disastrous recent debate performance that vaporized his polling lead over challenger Mitt Romney.

http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign...ts-homestretch

Rarely has a vice presidential debate been as crucial as the one between Vice President Biden and Rep. Paul Ryan on Thursday night will be. After Mitt Romney’s lopsided victory over President Obama in Denver last week, the exchange will arrive at a fluid and potentially pivotal moment in the campaign.
For the Obama team, Thursday will offer an opportunity to short-circuit the advances Romney has made since the first presidential debate. For the GOP, Ryan will have a chance to piggyback on Romney’s performance and solidify the gains their ticket has made in recent days.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politi...rc=nl_politics

The Hill: Ryan and Biden get ready to rumble
By Christian Heinze
Thursday night’s debate between Vice President Biden and GOP running mate Paul Ryan offers a delicious contrast in style, age, vision, temperament and ideological persuasion.

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/...mble-in-debate

The Hill: Team Romney looking for knockout by Ryan
By Justin Sink
Republicans believe a strong performance by Paul Ryan at Thursday’s vice presidential debate could keep the reeling Obama campaign from regaining its footing.

http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign...ockout-by-ryan

Los Angeles Times: Biden-Ryan debate highlights nation's Catholic political divide
By Mitchell Landsberg
The Roman Catholic vice presidential rivals are both steeped in their faith but disagree sharply on issues of crucial importance to the church, as do Catholic voters in Iowa and nationwide.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationwo...,2285748.story

Romney is making big gains in the FiveThirtyEight model. “Mitt Romney gained further ground in the FiveThirtyEight forecast on Monday, with his chances of winning the Electoral College increasing to 25.2 percent from 21.6 percent on Sunday. The change represents a continuation of the recent trend: Mr. Romney's chances were down to just 13.9 percent immediately in advance of last week's debate in Denver. He has nearly doubled his chances since then.” Nate Silver in The New York Times.

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes...wpisrc=nl_wonk

Romney is closing the gap in the battlegrounds in 2012. “President Obama holds a slight four-point lead over Mitt Romney among those likeliest to vote in the crucial swing state of Ohio, a CNN/ORC poll released Tuesday shows -- an advantage that is slimmer than polls showed the incumbent holding in the Buckeye State before last week's debate. Obama leads Romney 51 percent to 47 percent in the poll of likely voters, with one-in-eight saying they could change their mind before Election Day.” Sean Sullivan in The Washington Post.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...wpisrc=nl_wonk

That means it’s all hands on deck in Ohio for both campaigns. “Two presidential campaigns dealing with sudden reversals of fortune descended on this must-have state Tuesday, one hoping to sustain a new momentum, the other hoping to regain its footing. In both rhetoric and demeanor, President Obama and Republican Mitt Romney came to Ohio acutely aware of the altered terrain. Romney, buoyed by new polls that show him pulling ahead of the president, has shed the languid pace that characterized his travels as recently as last weekend. He appears renewed, even ebullient, and so do his crowds…[T]he race comes down to a few crucial battleground states, none more important than Ohio. And Romney has struggled here.” Bill Turque and Jerry Markon in The Washington Post.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politi...wpisrc=nl_wonk

MORNING MINDMELD: The media narrative has turned in dramatic - and, for Obama, dangerous -- ways. Talk to top Democrats, and suddenly it's Obama who has suspect personal and political skills -- and a vague, uninspiring agenda. It's Romney who has his groove, is drawing bigger crowds, feeling love from his base, and seeing a nice bump in the polls. Ask any professional Democrat's private take on the president, and it's usually mixed, if not downbeat. Many will be quick to criticize if the turbulence continues. And just ask Mitt Romney what happens when prominent members of your own party go on the record to bash you.

--STAN GREENBERG tells GREG SARGENT about one danger sign for POTUS: "Greenberg did dial sessions among Colorado swing voters during the debate, and also conducted post-debate questionnaires. He found that unmarried women didn't respond to Obama's vow to improve the economy -- which they found lacking in a clear overarching message. 'They heard nothing there that was relevant to them ... They were not hearing about ... things that Obama would do that affect their lives.' Romney ... succeeded in communicating with unmarried women, Greenberg says, by prefacing talk of his five point plan with an extended discussion of the economic strain of middle-income Americans." http://wapo.st/ROZLUO

--"Angst grows among President Obama's supporters," by Glenn Thrush, with Maggie Haberman: "Some progressives seem to be going into primal panic mode - to the profound annoyance of the Democratic professional political class and an Obama campaign predicting a rebound at next Tuesday's debate in Long Island. ... [One] source of anxiety for some Democratic strategists: A level of what they view as inconsistency in the campaign's messaging and tone since the debates. Two veteran party operatives ... said they were unhappy with Obama's focus on Romney's joke about Big Bird." http://politi.co/Tgkpdc

--JOE SCARBOROUGH, on POLITICO, "Obama's Rocky Mountain horror show": "You have to want it. And you have to work for it. Those have been twin truths in American politics since Andrew Jackson took presidential politics to the people in the 19th century. Barack Obama, however, lost that memo last week in Denver - a single evening, yes, but one that raises a fascinating and timely question: Is the 44th president no more than a mediocre political talent who's had one of the greatest runs of luck in history? And did that luck begin to run out in Denver ...? Obama didn't look like he wanted it ... Now the question is whether he can prove he's more a master of fate than a child of good political fortune. http://politi.co/OnzVY0

THE MOMENT WE'RE IN - ROMNEY GOT A BOUNCE, BUT...: Pollsters warn that it's far from certain how big or how lasting such a bounce will be. Scott Keeter, the director of survey research for the Pew Research Center, tells Score that that Romney's most dramatic gains came among women - a segment of the electorate with which the GOP nominee has struggled all cycle - and young people. He guesses that this is partly because the debate was entirely about economic issues, so these voters did not hear Romney's more conservative positions on social issues. Democratic pollster Tom Jensen, who runs PPP, plans to go into the field in Florida, Ohio and North Carolina between Friday and Sunday , after the vice presidential debate and before the second presidential debate. "To me as a Democratic pollster, that's when I'm going to decide whether to ***** out or not," he told us. "I'm open to the idea of freaking out, but I'm not quite there yet." http://goo.gl/3eOAj

NYT A1 - "AS ROMNEY REPEATS TRADE MESSAGE, BAIN MAINTAINS CHINA TIES": "As a candidate, Mr. Romney uses China as a punching bag...But his private equity dealings, both while he headed Bain and since, complicate that message," Sharon LaFraniere and Mike McIntire write on the front of today's New York Times. "Mr. Romney's campaign insists he has no control over his investments since they are held in a blind trust. That said, a confidential prospectus for one of the Bain funds, obtained by The New York Times, promotes China as a good investment for some of the same reasons that Mr. Romney has said concern him: 'Strong fundamentals' like manufacturing wages 85 percent lower than what Americans earn, vast foreign exchange reserves and the likelihood that China will surpass the United States as the world's largest economy."

MORE from a story likely to spawn another Obama attack ad: "Among the companies in which the Bain funds have invested is a global auto parts maker that is in the process of closing a factory in Illinois and moving most of the equipment and jobs to Jiangsu Province, where the Chinese government has built it a new plant; a Chinese electronics retailer accused by Microsoft of selling computers with pirated software; and a Hong Kong-based Chinese appliance maker that was sued for copying another company's design for a deep-fat fryer." http://goo.gl/QrgWa

BATTLEGROUND BRIEFING-THE PATH TO 270:

DEMOCRATS KEEP REGISTRATION LEAD IN 4 BATTLEGROUNDS: "Democrats hold the registration advantage over Republicans in four of six battleground states that will play a key role in the presidential election, even as Republicans and independents have recorded larger net gains since late 2008, data compiled by Bloomberg shows," John McCormick reports. "Democrats have the edge over Republicans in Florida, Iowa, Nevada and North Carolina. In Colorado and New Hampshire, Republicans outnumber Democrats, according to the analysis of state data. Three other battlegrounds -- Ohio, Virginia and Wisconsin -- don't report registration statistics by party...Independent voters collectively grew by about 764,000 in the six states reviewed. Republicans have added almost 195,000 voters in those states since the 2008 presidential election -- boosted in part by a competitive primary campaign this year ... while Democrats saw a net decline of about 258,000." http://goo.gl/FvxWx

UNIONS WIDEN OBAMA'S OHIO GROUND GAME: "Best known for opening a new spigot of anonymous corporate giving in elections, the Supreme Court's Citizens United vs. FEC decision in 2010 also allowed labor unions to use their general treasury cash, including dues, to reach out to all voters, not just union members," The Washington Post's Roz Helderman reports. "In Ohio, the list of potential voters whom the AFL-CIO will reach out to in the last month before the election has nearly doubled, from 1.2 million in 2008 to 2 million this year." http://goo.gl/XtKFL

LIGHTER CLICKS -

RICK SCOTT, the governor of Florida, accidentally gave out a toll-free number for an adult phone service during a media briefing yesterday when he meant to give out the Dept. of Health's number: http://goo.gl/QRftk.

SARAH PALIN says she's writing a fitness book: http://goo.gl/ez3Dm.

JON STEWART mocks the vagueness of Romney's plan to cut the deficit: http://goo.gl/9AZ7q.

BIG BIRD is on the cover of today's New York Post: http://goo.gl/GZqwe.

RAINN WILSON, who plays Dwight on "The Office," calls for Election Day to become a national holiday in this 2-minute video: http://goo.gl/6vKgV.

SCOTT BROWN was asked in an old video released yesterday who he would like to "stalk." His answer: The Pussycat Dolls. http://goo.gl/RG2Uv

CODA - QUOTE OF THE DAY: 'No video or audio recordings allowed . . . thank you in advance for your understanding and cooperation.' - Sign outside a Paul Ryan fundraiser http://goo.gl/ieIx9

[TotalMayhem]

[C. Flower]

The polls are now apparently putting Romney ahead, and I now think we must accept that Obama is probably gone.

It is a very great shame - things could have been so much better.

There will be plenty of time for progressives to dissect where and why it all went wrong.

It was such a truly dismal performance - basics, such as not looking into the right camera, loused up - that it is hard to believe that he was not told to throw it.

[Count Bobulescu]

Tonight is the only Veep debate of the cycle. Foreign and domestic policy will be covered. Biden is a FP expert. Domestic is Ryan's strong suit. Watch it livestream at 9.pm eastern, or recorded at the time of your choice here.

http://www.2012presidentialelectionn...bate-schedule/

What to watch for tonight. ”Expect Mr. Biden, who is able to deliver cutting sarcasm without seeming angry, to continue to make up for Mr. Obama's passivity at the first debate by accusing Mr. Romney of dissembling about long-held policies. Mr. Ryan is prepared to vigorously set the record straight when he thinks the vice president is distorting, such as the charge that Mr. Romney has proposed $5 trillion in tax cuts directed toward the wealthy…Mr. Biden would love to see Mr. Ryan, a self-described ‘numbers guy,’ get lost in the weeds of budget baselines and other details that he sometimes uses to explain this discrepancy. But the trap seems too easy. If there is one thing that Mr. Ryan has been working on in his debate rehearsals, aides said, it is condensing inside-the-Beltway arguments into crisp, two-minute answers.” Trip Gabriel in The New York Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/11/us...06C3494D89B764

What both Biden and Ryan will try to do tonight. ”The dark art of the vice presidential debate begins with a single rule: If everybody's talking about you, you're doing it wrong…By now, both parties have worked out tactics for this odd ritual. They require the barbed wit of an insult comedian and the humility of the hind legs in a two-man horse costume. Candidates are told: Talk up your running mate. Zing your opponent. But avoid letting your career or your policy ideas become the focus. On the biggest night of your political life, it's not about you. On Thursday, the stakes will be unusually high, and the job of playing second banana especially tough. Biden spent 36 years in the Senate. Ryan crafted a plan for remaking the entire government.” David A. Fahrenthold in The Washington Post.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politi...wpisrc=nl_wonk

What the VP debate can do for the Democratic and Republican tickets. ”Vice-presidential debates rarely do have a significant impact on the outcome of elections. At best, observed Tad Devine, a Democratic strategist, they can increase momentum for a ticket considered to have won the first debate of the presidential nominees, or serve as ‘a circuit breaker’ for the ticket that lost. That is precisely what President Obama hopes his experienced vice president, Joseph R. Biden Jr., can do in his debate in Danville, Ky., on Thursday against Mitt Romney's youthful running mate, Representative Paul D. Ryan.” John Harwood in The New York Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/11/us...wpisrc=nl_wonk

Biden, in particular, will need to whip up Dem enthusiasm. ”It is probably too late for Mr. Biden and Mr. Obama to do anything about the high level of Republican enthusiasm. Since the Denver debate, Republicans are feeling better about Mr. Romney's candidacy — and they were already fired up about the opportunity to oust Mr. Obama. But Mr. Obama and Mr. Biden may be able to return bedrock Democrats to the fold. Although some of the Democratic advantage in registered voters comes from groups like Hispanics and young voters who are always difficult to get to the polls, Mr. Obama's debate performance may also have turned off other types of Democrats who can usually be counted upon.” Nate Silver in The New York Times.

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes...wpisrc=nl_wonk

SIMON: Pray for Joe. ”The media mind-set is dependent not on fact, but on attitude. And now comes a man who can change that attitude: Joe Biden. Say it ain't so, Joe…So it's up to you, Joe. The stakes are high. The party faithful are in what Obama senior adviser David Plouffe used to call ‘bed-wetting’ mode…The British got through the entire Second World War with the motto: ‘Stay Calm and Carry On.’ The very least Democrats should be able to manage now is: ‘Eat Some Crow and Pray for Joe.’ Joe is in a tough spot. If he wins the debate, the media will grumble that it's ‘only a vice presidential debate’ and it doesn't really matter much. But if he loses, the headline will be: ‘Team Obama 0-2.’ But you can do it, Joe. Keep in mind that you were being sworn in as a United States senator when Paul Ryan was 2 years old.” Roger Simon in Politico.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories...wpisrc=nl_wonk


THE MODERATOR - "Martha Raddatz takes center stage," by Dylan Byers : "Raddatz has never moderated a nationally televised debate. In fact, she's never even hosted her own television show. ... She is the senior foreign affairs correspondent for ABC ... Raddatz's relative distance from the political horse race, and her experience as an on-the-ground interviewer - rather than an in-the-chair anchor - may be assets in the new debate format, in which moderators are expected to ask probing questions but leave control of the back-and-forth debate to the candidates. ... Jon Karl, ABC's senior political correspondent, [said:] 'Martha has a no-nonsense approach to interviews, which means she'll be a moderator who can't be messed with' ... She's been married ... to Ben Bradlee Jr., the son of the famous Washington Post editor; then to [FCC] Chairman Julius Genachowski; and now to NPR correspondent Tom Gjelten. ..
.
"She joined ABC News from NPR in 1999 as a State Department correspondent and was named senior national security correspondent five years later before moving to White House correspondent for Bush's second term. (It was during that time that Raddatz landed some of her most memorable interviews, including the one with Cheney in which she mentioned the declining public support for the Iraq war and he simply replied, 'So?') ...

"The ... format will differ ... from the first presidential contest ... Instead of six 15-minute segments, ... there will be nine 10-minute segments. Each candidate will have two minutes to answer a question, and the remaining time to debate with one another. Roughly half the segments will focus on domestic policy, the rest on foreign policy. ... 'Martha is ... trying to put herself in the place of the people watching this debate and to engage the candidates in a meaningful discussion,' [said] Robin Sproul, ABC's Washington bureau chief." http://politi.co/Oqart7

FIVE QUESTIONS FOR TONIGHT

1. Can Biden draw blood? Ryan's perceived weakness - his wonkery and penchant for speaking in numbers - may actually prove to be the congressman's greatest asset, a rope-a-dope tactic that will take voters into the policy weeds and blunt Biden's attacks on tax policy, spending and foreign affairs.

2. Can Ryan defend himself and the GOP ticket? Ryan's challenge is to defend the Romney positions he disagrees with without seeming inauthentic in doing so.

3. Will Ryan let his feel-your-pain flag fly? If Biden shows emotion, watch to see how far Ryan modulates from his numbers-guy, PowerPoint image.

4. How disciplined is Biden? One Democratic aide, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that despite the weeklong prep, Biden was like a "box of Cracker Jacks - you never know what prize you're getting till you rip it open."

5. How will foreign policy play? Benghazi almost certainly gives Ryan a toehold on a topic that has favored the Democratic ticket so far this cycle.
THE SUBTEXT: "Ryan and Biden are widely believed to be considering their own campaigns in 2016 (Ryan only if Romney loses)." http://goo.gl/XwfUS


POLLING ON THE NUMBER TWOS-

PLURALITIES EXPECT RYAN WIN- From CBS: "In Colorado, 47 percent of voters picked Ryan as the likely winner, while 30 percent picked Biden and 22 percent said they didn't know." In Wisconsin, it was 49/32. In Virginia, it was 41/36. http://goo.gl/eN0Iz

BIDEN IS UNDERWATER - From Pew: "Biden's image is far less positive than it was shortly before his 2008 debate with Sarah Palin; Ryan is viewed less favorably than Palin was just prior to the last vice-presidential debate." Nationally, Biden's fav/unfav is 39/51. Ryan's is 44/40. http://goo.gl/yiRpD

RYAN HAS LACKLUSTER LIKABILITY TOO - From Gallup: Gallup pegs Biden's fav/unfav at 44/45 and Ryan's at 43/40. "At 44%, Biden has the lowest pre-debate favorable rating of any Democratic vice presidential candidate of the past six elections. At 43%, Ryan's favorable score is no better, but he is viewed more positively than Vice President [Dan] Quayle was in 1992 and roughly on par with [Dick] Cheney in 2000." http://goo.gl/XF2zr

PUTTING IT IN PERSPECTIVE - From Gallup: "NONE of the eight vice presidential debates occurring from 1976 to 2008 appears to have meaningfully altered voter preferences." http://goo.gl/2QA9n


BATTLEGROUND BRIEFING-THE PATH TO 270:

UNION SPENDING LIKELY TO BE DOWN FROM 2008 AND 2004: With smaller memberships, less excitement and a languishing economy, unions aren't guaranteed to be the help they once were. Dave Levinthal and Tarini Parti: "Several high-ranking union officials and Democratic operatives confirm that labor's overall presidential race spending will likely be down from four or eight years ago...As a result, unions are taking a Moneyball-like political approach to maximize the effect of the money and muscle they do have. That may mean money goes to a congressional race or ballot initiative rather than to Obama. It also means that instead of spending big on TV ads like the outside groups helping Republican Mitt Romney, unions are preaching old-school political fundamentals: phone banking, door-knocking, member-to-member outreach. Some unions have even turned to contests and gimmickry to cultivate their grass-roots." http://goo.gl/SXFVp

Romney Looks to Close Ground-Game Gap
By David M. Drucker
As Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney moves to capitalize on his October surge in the polls, his campaign is relying on ground-game and social-media strategies that aides believe have been underestimated. Full Story

http://www.rollcall.com/issues/58_28...email&pos=epol


Why’d Romney Take So Long to Move to the Middle?
By Stuart Rothenberg
The surprise about Mitt Romney’s recent move to the middle isn’t that it occurred but that it took so long. Full Story

http://www.rollcall.com/issues/58_28...email&pos=epol

The Washington Post: No. 1 rule of VP debates: Chatter can’t be about you
By David Fahrenthold
The dark art of the vice presidential debate begins with a single rule: If everybody’s talking about you, you’re doing it wrong.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politi...y.html?hpid=z2

LIGHTER CLICKS -

JON STEWART mocked the Obama campaign for its focus on Big Bird: http://goo.gl/Bq0MI.

STEPHEN COLBERT did a segment on 7-11 and Pizza Hut's election-themed promotions: http://goo.gl/IGbX5.

A FAKE CANDIDATE releases an 80-second spoof commercial outlining all the bad stuff he's ever done: http://goo.gl/UbYwZ.

LIQUOR was sold at the debate between Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Ill.) and Tammy Duckworth, which sounds like it played a key role in creating a boisterous crowd that helped fuel a vitriolic debate: http://goo.gl/KCHy5.

MARK HAMILL thinks the Star Wars character Obama is most like is Obi-Wan Kenobi: http://goo.gl/7eBIF.

GOOGLING "completely wrong" yesterday brought up pages of stories about Romney. Now it brings up several articles about that.

[Count Bobulescu]

Biden and Ryan debated foreign and domestic policy last night. Here’s what you need to know.

“Vice President Biden and Rep. Paul Ryan clashed over Libya, Afghanistan and the economy in the campaign's only vice-presidential debate Thursday, interrupting and re-interrupting one another during a 90-minute exchange shaped by Biden's aggressive tone. Ryan picked up themes used by his running mate, Mitt Romney, in last week's presidential debate. He criticized the Obama Administration for its handling of an attack in Libya, and accused it of dodging hard questions about the debt…

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politi...wpisrc=nl_wonk

The VP candidates offered sharp contrasts which will divide voters along partisan lines. “It was the debate that President Obama and Mitt Romney did not have a week ago. Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Representative Paul D. Ryan fiercely quarreled at the vice-presidential debate here on Thursday night, with Mr. Biden using the cutting attack lines against the Republican ticket that Mr. Obama did not and Mr. Ryan delivering a spirited case for conservative policies that Mr. Romney had soft-pedaled.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/12/us...wpisrc=nl_wonk

SILVER: How you should read these VP debate poll numbers. “Instant polls conducted after the debate are suggestive of something between a tie and a modest win for Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr…The social media sentiment during the debate also seemed to flow along these lines. The liberals in my Twitter feed seemed a bit more satisfied with Mr. Biden's performance than the conservatives were with Mr. Ryan's, but it wasn't a slam dun

k…

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes...wpisrc=nl_wonk

The debate will certainly be remembered for Biden’s attacks. “It was a sharp and spirited debate, with both candidates delivering some lacerating blows, but Mr. Ryan at times seemed disconcerted by the sheer blowhard intensity Mr. Biden brought to the night. Mr. Ryan tried to be respectful, listening to the vice president with a tilted head, choirboy smile and puppy-dog eyes, but he showed his irritation when Mr. Biden kept interrupting to attack his policy on Medicare…

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/12/us...wpisrc=nl_wonk

But also for Biden’s facial expressions. “Did the vice president help or hurt his case with his animated display of grins, grimaces, gesticulations and finger wagging?

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2...wpisrc=nl_wonk

There was more than a bit of generational tension onstage. “It was the Young Gun against the Old Hand, the reformer ready to turn the page on an aging social compact that dates to the New Deal jousting with the veteran — alive for much of that compact's construction — defending the tried and true…

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/12/us...wpisrc=nl_wonk

FIVE TAKEAWAYS FROM THE BIDEN-RYAN CLASH. Strong performances from Biden, Ryan, and moderator Martha Raddatz produced one of the most engaging, enlightening, and entertaining debates of recent memory, one marked by dramatic contrasts in priorities, ideology, and personal style. The debate was intriguing in many ways, and National Journal’s Ronald Brownstein presents five takeaways. Bottom line: while the debate will probably help walk back despondent Democrats from the ledge, it actually showed why the nation appears headed for its third photo finish in the past four presidential elections. Read more

http://www.nationaljournal.com/2012-...ebate-20121012


FACT CHECKERS ASSESS BOTH CANDIDATES’ STATEMENTS. National Journal’s fact checkers watching last night’s vice presidential debate scrutinized statements on health care, the economy and several foreign policy issues, including a spat over looming defense cuts; whether the administration has credibility on sanctions in Iran; and whether the administration knew about the U.S. embassy in Libya’s requests for more security before the September 11 attack that killed four Americans. Read more
http://www.nationaljournal.com/polit...0121011?page=1


INSTAPOLLS SPLIT:

--CNN.com - Ryan 48, Biden 44: "Forty-eight percent of [381] voters who watched the vice presidential debate think that Rep. Paul Ryan won the showdown, according to a CNN/ORC International nationwide poll ... Forty-four percent say ... Biden was victorious. The Republican running mate's four point advantage among a debate audience that was more Republican than the country as a whole is within the survey's sampling error." http://bit.ly/QgR5VH

--CBSNews.com - Biden 50, Ryan 31: "Fifty percent of uncommitted voters .... said they see Vice President Joe Biden as the winner over ... Ryan, R-Wis., according to an instant poll taken by CBS News. Of the 431 polled immediately following the debate, 31 percent deemed Ryan the winner, and 19 percent said they felt it was a tie." http://cbsn.ws/Waejjz

QUICK SURF:

--BIDEN V. BIDEN, by Jonathan Martin and John F. Harris : "Vice President Biden gave Democrats what they needed most from the debate --- a jolt of energy that came from hitting Republicans in all the places they are presumed to be most vulnerable, and chasing away memories of President Barack Obama's flaccid debate performance the week before. But Biden didn't do much more than that. It is clear that Biden's substantive high points-and there were several places where he took clear command of the debate on issues ranging from entitlements to taxes-would be at least partly shadowed by his nonstop succession of incredulous smiles, sneers, taunts and guffaws that were apparently intended to show self-confidence and fighting spirit but struck many viewers as undignified and rude. =
"Paul Ryan ... gave Republicans the minimum they needed .
" http://politi.co/TbnA6l

--NYT A1, "News Analysis: The Fire This Time," by Jonathan Weisman : "To some and particularly his party's combative liberal base, Mr. Biden's aggressiveness might have appeared both appropriate and overdue given Mr. Obama's more timid performance ... " http://nyti.ms/SUGH3T


--WashPost 2.5-col. lead, "Biden and Ryan Pull No Punches: TRADING JABS ON TAXES, FOREIGN POLICY - Vice-presidential debate highlights gulf on key issues," by Dan Balz and Philip Rucker : "In sharp contrast to last week's exchange between President Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney, the vice-presidential candidates clashed repeatedly ... The other contrast with the presidential debate was the absence of a clear winner. Romney was universally judged to have bested Obama in Denver, but Biden and Ryan each made their points with force and conviction. ... Biden tried to dominate the debate and was a far more vigorous presence than the president last week. But he may have hurt his case by smiling sarcastically as Ryan made some of his points and interrupting repeatedly as the Wisconsin congressman defended his and Romney's policies." http://wapo.st/SVAlY9


WHAT LIBERALS ARE SAYING-

Talking Points Memo publisher Josh Marshall: "It might be the big follow-on tomorrow: Biden got Ryan to admit that he and Romney support at least the principle of eliminating Social Security and replacing it with private accounts. In other words, the 2005 Bush plan." http://goo.gl/JfDXd

The Atlantic's James Fallows: "Ryan, who was fine, did not advance his team's prospects beyond what Mitt Romney had done last week. Whereas Joe Biden, who put on the best performance of his long career, supplied the only good news his team has had in six days (since last Friday's jobs report). Even though, yes, he could have smiled less. Obama owes him, BFD-style." http://goo.gl/gPNep

Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne: "In 2004, after John Kerry's clear victory over George W. Bush in the first presidential debate, then-Vice President Dick Cheney came out on top in most of the commentary about his encounter with Democrat John Edwards. Cheney thereby slowed Kerry's momentum. Dick Cheney has never been Joe Biden's role model, but Biden's imperative last night was the same as Cheney's eight years ago. And with a very different style, he achieved the same result." http://goo.gl/ghHgs

New York Magazine's Jonathan Chait: "In case you missed it, I predicted that Paul Ryan would wipe the floor with Joe Biden. That did not so much happen. Ryan did not perform quite as well as I expected - he seemed greener, younger, and he visibly gulped when challenged. But Biden delivered a revelatory performance that proved me utterly wrong." http://goo.gl/QFwo5

Washington Post blogger Ezra Klein: "I'd give the edge to Biden, but Ryan delivered a solid performance, and it's hard for me to imagine many voters changing their minds because of a vice presidential debate. But what's unquestionably true is that Biden succeeded tonight. He had a simple job: Stop the bleeding. Buck up the troops...And so Biden came out tonight and picked a fight...Biden gave Democrats hope tonight. But the real question is whether, in the next presidential debate, Obama will give them change." http://goo.gl/yy56T

Democratic strategist Hilary Rosen: "Joe Biden won - not because he was aggressive which he was - but because he didn't let Ryan get away with making stuff up."

WHAT CONSERVATIVES ARE SAYING-

PowerLine blog's John Hinderaker: "Sarah Palin did a much better job against Joe Biden in 2008 than Paul Ryan did tonight. Bizarre, but true." http://goo.gl/LcBp3

National Review editor Rich Lowry: "I found Biden's conduct appalling. A high-school sophomore who did that in debate class would get dismissed. BUT it was effective at least in controlling the agenda and keeping Ryan from getting much rhetorical elbow room the first hour." http://goo.gl/PmhXd

The Wall Street Journal's Peggy Noonan: "For the second time in two weeks, the Democrat came out and defeated himself. In both cases the Republican was strong and the Democrat somewhat disturbing. Another way to say it is the old man tried to patronize the kid and the kid stood his ground. The old man pushed, and the kid pushed back." http://goo.gl/YJrC7

Herman Cain: " There were no winners. This debate was not a debate. It was a Distraction. #Biden used interruption as tactic to suppress Ryan's substance... Ryan simply too respectful of the Vice President." http://goo.gl/GPQOP

GOP consultant Alex Castellanos: "Biden [is] irritating, but wouldn't be surprised if [O]bama base is liking him. [A]t least he's fighting for them, unlike Obama last week."

Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.): "Biden came across as a rude curmudgeon who could not defend the failing policies of the Obama administration so he tried to smirk, shout and laugh his way through the debate." http://goo.gl/6GqO1


The Cook Report: There's No Question, Romney Changed the Game
The first debate was a game changer. The president will need to be both aggressive and presidential in the second.
By Charlie Cook

President Obama has a fine line to walk in the next debate. He must be more aggressive, but going too far risks not coming across as presidential.
http://www.nationaljournal.com//colu...-game-20121011


LIGHTER CLICKS -

ROMNEY watched the debate over pizza with Christine, the winner of a campaign contest. Photo from Zac Moffatt: http://goo.gl/Tvo4U.

OBAMA watched aboard Air Force One. White House photo: http://goo.gl/S0ST4.

JON STEWART made fun of Todd Akin, Allen West, Joe Walsh and Paul Broun in a segment on down-ballot Republicans last night: http://goo.gl/TAYIJ.

KID ROCK and SEAN PENN record a funny 11-minute public service announcement intended to tear down political stereotypes by confronting them head on: http://goo.gl/ckmP2.

STEVE KING, the Iowa congressman, jotted notes down on his hand ahead of a debate in which neither candidate was allowed to bring notes. Photo: http://goo.gl/r1ceC.
RYAN demonstrated his workout technique at a Wisconsin gym in a photos hoot for Time last December. Six outtakes that went viral and became memes yesterday: http://goo.gl/PnFYw.

HUMA ABEDIN, Hillary Clinton's aide and Anthony Weiner's wife, arranged for Ben Affleck to shoot some of his new movie "Argo" - about the Iranian hostage crisis - at the State Department: http://goo.gl/hpOJx.

RYAN and BIDEN told People Magazine what's on their iPods: "Favorite song on the campaign trail? Biden chose the soulful and sultry love song 'You Are The Best Thing,' by Ray LaMontagne, while Ryan went with AC/DC's hard-rocking 'It's a Long Way to the Top.' Sentimentality also hit different notes in the category 'song that reminds me of home.' 'When Irish Eyes Are Smiling,' said Biden. ... And Ryan? 'At Wisconsin Badgers [college] football games in Madison, they start every fourth quarter with House of Pain's 'Jump Around,' so [that song] brings me back to Wisconsin.'" http://goo.gl/zA0ST

BLOOMBERG BUSINESSWEEK runs 72 pages of charts, graphics, images and articles to tackle the question of are we better off than we were four years ago. The answer apparently is that it 'depends on the meaning of 'we.'' http://goo.gl/ktfBJ


CODA - QUOTE OF THE DAY : 'I find myself gazing at CVS. I just want to walk in there, walk in there and walk around, pick up some soap." - Michelle Obama http://goo.gl/wK4h2

[fluffybiscuits]

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/1...Destroy-Romney

After all Romneys prattling about American jobs and American people has he just shot himself in the foot?

Romney's Bain Capital did what they do best. They bought out a company called Sensata Tech and are in the process of outsourcing it to China.

They even brought in Chinese workers for the current employees to train. Yea, they were forced to train their own replacements.

And Bain Capital forced the company to take down their American flag and put up a Chinese flag while they trained them.

[Count Bobulescu]

Way back in the mists of time at the beginning of this thread Baron von Biffo argued that the thread was improperly named and that a more accurate thread title would be US Electoral College Election 2012. I acknowledged that Baron made valid points but disagreed and there were a series of posts back and forth on the topic. In the end, the Baron not content with having been acknowledged as technically correct, took the huff, gathered up his toys and went home.
A classic case of a man unwilling to take YES for an answer.

Without re-litigating all the points made, now is an appropriate time to revisit the issue of the Electoral College.

The quickest easiest way to explain why the Baron’s proposed title is unworkable is to take a statement he made and contrast it with the legal requirements in just one state. Note, EC = Electoral College.

Back at post # 12 Baron stated,

…”Far from paying scant attention to the EC, the declared candidates for president are giving it 100% of their attention. They're spending a fortune to ensure the election of their preferred candidates to it in the expectation that those worthies will reciprocate when the presidential election comes around.

It's the EC election that all the razzmatazz is about. The actual presidential election is an arid little affair by comparison.”

Contrary to the assertion above that the Presidential candidates were then or are now, focused on wooing the members of the EC, it should be noted that who the candidates for inclusion in the EC are, was not at that time known, is not currently known, and will not be known definitively until after the popular vote has taken place.

In fact the deadline for the political parties to submit the names of their candidates for inclusion into the EC to the State Board of Elections in Md, was
Friday Oct.5, 2012, thirty days before the election as evidenced by the third line from bottom on page 10 of the election calendar of the Md. State Board of Elections below.


Friday, October 05, 2012 COB Presidential Electors
Deadline for the State political parties of the
Presidential nominees to submit to SBE the names
and addresses of 10 electors.
At least 30 days before the general election.


For confirmation click the link below, and than click calendar (center of page) then scroll down to bottom of page ten.

http://www.elections.state.md.us/

The other non-legal but very practical observation that confirms that the Presidential candidates are not paying attention to the Electoral College Electors now or later is that immediately after the popular vote takes place all election advertising also stops.

Here’s a fifty minute radio discussion between two law professors on the workings of the Electoral College.

http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/20...-college-works


The first of the official ballots have just become available. These ballots vary county by county. Consequently, the number of ballot questions (Referenda) varies by county. All counties in Md. will have the seven statewide “numbered” questions plus a varying number of county wide questions signified by a “letter”. The example chosen below, Prince George’s County has an additional seven countywide questions. When Senatorial, Congressional, and Judicial elections are included voters have 25 questions to answer, hence the early distribution of the ballots so that voters can familiarize themselves with the issues. It would not be possible to simply walk into the booth and answer yes or no without first doing some research. The ballots are quite a bit more complicated than anything I remember from Ireland.

To see the actual ballot in PDF click any of the numbers on the right side of this page.

http://www.princegeorgescountymd.gov...ViewBallot.asp