Overall, Romney came out stronger in tonight's debate than Obama. Romney's overall presence left the impression of being more passionate than the President. However, both did great jobs of getting into specifics, something people wanted. This debate was full of details. However, there are a three main points I would like to focus on: job creation, healthcare, and the role of Federal Government. These were areas in which the candidates seemed to have the most divergent views. Beginning with job creation, Obama opened with an emphasis on improving education. He mentioned that using the "Race to the Top" plan while also employing more math and science teachers allows for growth in these educational areas to provide jobs. Obama also emphasized investing in clean energy and raising tax rates for larger corporations. Romney responded with his plan for job creation, which consists of making America energy independent, opening up trade with foreign countries, and balancing the budget, along with tax cuts for the middle class in order to "Champion small business." Obama challenged Romney's $5 trillion in tax cuts (which Obama stated would benefit the wealthy), however, Romney responded that these would be tax cuts for the middle class and not for higher income individuals. In summary on job creation, Romney emphasized lower tax rates on small business to increase job creation in the private sector and Obama emphasized providing jobs by employing more teachers to create a better trained workforce.
Another highlighted topic was healthcare. Romney began by saying he would replace the Affordable Healthcare Act by giving this responsibility back to the states. He emphasized that Obama's healthcare plan hurts families and uses an appointed board to tell people what will be covered. He also stressed that free enterprise drives costs down, not government. Obama argued that the board Romney referred to can not make decisions about treatment plans, and that the program was similar to the one that Romney had implemented as Governor of Massachusetts.
Romney Responded to this by indicating that a healthcare plan on the national level was quite a different thing, and that his plan had not raised costs or put private insurance plans in jeopardy.
The last area which I felt was fairly important was the role of the federal government.
Obama started off by saying the Federal Government's role was to keep people safe, give gateways to opportunity, and provide more teachers for a better trained work force. Romney emphasized protecting people by maintaining the military, religious tolerance and individuals' ability to pursue their dreams. Regarding Federal responsibility for education, Romney believes it is the state's jurisdiction, however the federal government can help. Obama talked about a stronger emphasis on federal government aiding education, and that he would implement programs to hire more math and science teachers, thereby bolstering areas where America is loosing its edge. Romney stated how making schools more competitive by "grading" them would improve education. The main difference between the two was that Romney felt the state government should have more power than the federal government (especially in education) and Obama felt that the federal government should play a larger role to create benefits for America.
In my opinion, Romney shocked people tonight. He came off a lot more passionate than I think most people expected and responded very well to Obama's affronts. I feel this debate was definitely a benefit for Romney and revealed that he is still fighting to win this election. Do you think that this debate affected voter opinion? What needs to happen during the next debates for the two candidates to receive positive results?
3 comments:
I'm not sure if it's "too late" or not to change the opinions of the majority of voters, but I must agree with Addy that Romney did seem like he was very prepared and excited to be debating. Something I found very disappointing was the fact that neither candidate addressed issues that I personally was very interested to hear about (such as women's rights, climate change, gay rights, et cetera), and that negatively impacted my opinion of both, to some degree. That being said, there are more debates to come! Perhaps the next few weeks will turn out to be the most critical, and what the candidates say now will be the impression the public takes with them to the ballot boxes.
I was impressed by Romney's confidence during the debate despite some doubts expressed by Romney's own campaign almost as a way to mitigate foreseeable losses during the debate to the far more experienced President Obama. However, while Romney had the appearance of a very strong candidate willing to passionately stand up to the incumbent president to defend his own convictions, I found many of his statements to be largely devoid of any substantial specifics. Romney was very quick to criticize the shortcomings of the Obama administration, yet he spent hardly a minute or two out of the 90 minute debate actually detailing what he would specifically do as president to combat unemployment and health care qualms.
Furthermore, I found Romney's conduct to be far less than desirable. He was consistently disrespectful to the highly experienced moderator, Jim Lehrer (This is Lehrer's 12th time moderating a presidential debate after all) . I was disappointed to watch President Obama later follow suit by ignoring a few of the time constraints, but even these incidents cannot compare to Romney's multiple offenses of talking over the moderator to get his point across. I found it interesting to read that Fox News pinned the bulk of the blame on Lehrer as a moderator rather than Romney himself. Personally, I think all three could have performed better and blame should not rest solely upon a single player.
It should be interesting to note that while Romney appeared to be much more energetic than Obama in this debate, much of what he briefly covered was without specific factual evidence. The use of anecdotes from real people in critical swing states was also a sly ploy that Romney was able to slip in without directly mentioning his target constituents. However, I found one of Romney's statements on healthcare particularly misleading to the public.
"Let -- well, actually -- actually it’s -- it’s -- it’s a lengthy description, but number one, pre-existing conditions are covered under my plan. Number two, young people are able to stay on their family plan. That’s already offered in the private marketplace; you don’t have -- have the government mandate that for that to occur." Yes, Romney's plan covers pre-existing conditions, but at the same time it also excludes around 89 million Americans based on the fact that it is actually for
people with continuous coverage. Its very frustrating to see the fine print being omitted from the debate as well as the continual broad generalization of ideas that fail pinpoint on a specific point of view. So I guess if you heard tonight's debate, then Romney came out on top, but if you actually listened to the debate, then nobody really won.
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