Mother, flag, and blows below the belt. Obama the populist beats Romney.
Il Giornale, October 18th, 2012
Obama and Romney, hand to hand. In the previous TV face-off Romney had easily crushed Obama, who looked kind of knocked out, with 67 per cent of watchers saying they thought Romney won, as opposed to 25 per cent for Obama.A failure. This time on the other hand he was normally reactive, loaded with information; his team had trained him as a boxer who will have to seize his last chance when the gong strikes. According to CNN he now leads by 46 percent to 39 percent, according to CBS 37 to 36, a tight bout that Obama won on points by using populist rhetoric. Romney however didn’t seem to be affected; he came across as lively yet poised, focused toward results. His promises on economic issues were realistic, consistent with his referred experience as a private entrepreneur; if anything, his total repudiation of George W. Bush was maybe overdone, as he didn’t pay him the least even formal tribute.
But the debate moderator, CNN’s Candy Crowley, purposely geared the course of the debate, by allowing Obama to talk 3 minutes and a half (a lifetime in television terms) longer, by interrupting Romney 28 times and Obama 9 times only, as well as by intervening with a purported journalistic stance on Libya. On this issue Obama unsheathed his main weapon of the debate, i.e. populism, bringing up the flag and the country, whereas Romney fumbled the topic, which was a right one. Romney charged Obama to have minimized the attack that had Ambassador Chris Stevens killed, denying for weeks that it had stemmed from organized terrorism, ascribing it instead to “demonstrations” in Bengasi against the anti-Mohammed film. As a matter of fact, when the Embassy asked for more security, the State Department didn’t answer. The UN ambassador Susan Rice claimed that there was no Islamist extremism attack on the US, but only a reaction to the clip, and two days ago Hillary Clinton had taken full responsibility for the strategic blunder in order to save Obama. But Obama refuted the charge, arguing he immediately used the term “act of terror”: but it was actually voiced while he was commemorating the dead in Afghanistan and Iraq, while the thesis of Western provocation was raging at the White House. CNN’s journalistadfirmed for him that “The President did call it an act of terror”. At this point Romney should have nailed him down, arguing that, keyword or not, Obama hadn’t run to the rescue ofhis ambassador who had consequently been killed. But Obama purportedly argued, as he had already done in the past, “While we were still dealing with our diplomats being threatened, Governor Romney put out a press release”. Romney so bounced back, while Obama was smearing his affection toward his Ambassadors, “my ownguys in the world”, and their families. Hopefully Romney will manage to resume this issue again, considered that the Administration got tarnished not only by a mistake but by perjury, dangerous for the whole world.
Of course the debate overwhelmingly focused on economic issues: to Romney’s realistic charges on the worsening of economy, Obama replied with few points thatshould prove that the situation will improve, reaffirming just his utopistic attitude, claiming to be an advocate of the middle class, fierily charging Romney to want to put in place a tax cut for the wealthy only and to be an out-of-touch millionaire himself. As if he were a poor guy of the banlieu. Obama didn’t answer Romney’s questions on nine millions unemployed people which is an all-time high; when a member of the audience asked how he plans on improving access into the workplace for women, the President engaged in a lecture about his single mother who worked all her life long to support her kids, and about his grandmother, an extremely brilliant humble employee … A series of hints that should have inferred how important women issues are for him, without granting any practical commitment. Romney himself is not that women’s champion, he suggested that for the sake of women we must improve the socialissuesanyhow... butat least he wasn’t rhetoric. Finally, Obama waited in a corner to put down hislast question so thatthat Romney could not answer because of the debate rules,and reminded the audience of Romney’s remarks off the cuff criticizing the 47% of Americans who base their life on public help. It was a blow below the belt, really totally unelegant, butthe guyis in jeopardy. Elegance is certainly now not his goal, it is survival.