The Debate - Romney/Ryan 1 Obama/Biden 0

There is no question who won the debate, hands down it went to Romney.  Obama looked defensive, unprepared, and downright surly at moments.  The way he constantly looked down instead of at Gov. Romney was truly outright rude.  I suppose, what else was he to do?  He knew he was getting his butt kicked all over the stage.  

I have wondered all day if the President just didn't think that Gov. Romney would be prepared as he was, did he not spend as much prep time as he should have, or is he just that arrogant?  I say the latter.  But, what ever it was, I doubt we will see this bad of a performance again.  He will be better prepared.  The next one is more likely in his wheelhouse as it will be a town hall format.  

What Romney did so effectively is that he allowed people who are still undecided or open to changing their minds that he is up for the job.  I firmly believe that one of the reasons that it is so hard to beat a sitting president is that Americans will feel far more comfortable dancing with the devil they know.  It is human nature to an extent.  

Did I love everything that Romney had to say?  No, not really.  But I did like some of it.  He acknowledged that education is best left to the state and local level.  As all my regular readers know, education is a push button issue for me.  I firmly believe we are reaching the point that it is becoming a national and economic security issue for this country.  We must improve the level of education in this country, and it must be done now.  

Romney was funny at moments when it was appropriate, had some somewhat memorable one liners; nothing along the lines of "There you go again" or "You're no Jack Kennedy", but the you pick losers was quite effective I thought.  

The reactions from the left were somewhat predictable.  Chris Matthew's meltdown was a riot to watch.  I will post here, just because you really can't watch this enough.  Here is a tweet from Bill Maher:

Obama made a lot of great points tonight. Unfortunately, most of them were for Romney

Their are very few that  I see are even attempting to spin it as anything other than a loss.  Now the excuses are getting more and more creative as the day goes on.  I especially like The Gorical's explanation that he was off due to the altitude of Denver.  Gee, is it any wonder that his cable channel gets few viewers?  After a statement like that, I don't see how there can be.  

The biggest excuse seems to be to blame the moderator, Jim Lehrer.  Because it is so well-known how much he favors conservatives. /sarc.  It has been said that Lehrer was allowing Romney to push Obama around.  Romney kept interrupting,  and Obama was trying to play by the rules.  Oh, OK if you insist on ignoring the facts that Obama did go over his allotted time and even had more speaking time than Romney did.  I guess you delude yourself into think this.  But the facts don't back it up.  Especially if you read the transcript, the CNN version has it notated when their was crosstalk and who was talking at the time.  I also think that the format was designed to be a little more free flowing and allow the audience listen to the two of them engage each other.  Apparently, not a format that Obama excels in.  Shocker!!!  

At the end of the day, Romney did complete some very important tasks.  He showed conservatives he respects the 10th amendment, he should the undecideds and squishy middle that is still open to changing their votes that he can be presidential.  He even has moved closer to getting a conservative blogger who doesn't want to vote for him, to pull the lever.  I say all and all, he did very well last night.  

One last thing, I don't know who went out and did the color check on Obama's tie, but they should be fired.  It was so clashed with the background color that it was very distracting.  I may be the only one who noticed it, but OMG, it was driving me mad.  

As I said, you just can't watch this enough: