Official Debate thread for tonite. Be amusing. — Page 3

From my facebook:

[Republican albeit moderate friend]: Hmmm...these questions sure seem to favor Obama.
[Comment from another friend]: So do the facts.

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Romney promises college student, ‘I’m going to make sure you get a job’...

...but he left out the part of how is going to buy the company a year later and outsource the job to China!

My favorite was "it's not the role of government to create jobs," followed by "I will create 12 million jobs." Because somehow the President isn't part of the government?

EDIT GOD DAMMIT BEATEN BY A FVCKING IMAGE MACRO *seppuku*

Updated On: 10/16/12 at 11:42 PM

best phrases of the night:

"check the transcript" - Obama
"the base is aroused" - Chris Matthews
"sketchy deal" - Obama
"binders full of women" - yeah, him .....
"Mine's not a big as yours" 0bama (pension)
Sarah Silverman ?@SarahKSilverman .@MittRomeny is one of the most progressive thinkers of 1950

If you look at the Libya section of the debate, you see the whole workings of American politics, and Candy Crowley might have unwittingly cracked it open.

Romney (and the entire American right wing) had concocted this idea that Obama/Clinton/Ambassador Rice had "bungled" the attack in Benghazi by waffling for those two weeks about whether it had been caused by an act of terror or by a protest over the movie gone awry. And they were right about the two-week interval: Ambassador Rice had referred to it as a protest and the president had as well, and they both said they were waiting for the "facts." Conservatives were able to weave this into their narrative that the president is "soft on" Islamist extremists.

But Romney, every commentator at Fox News and everyone right of center neglected to go back and listen to what the president had actually said immediately after, when he said the now famous phrase "no acts of terror." He didn't specifically say "this attack on our embassy was an act of terror," which they could have nailed him on if they were being accurate, but nevertheless, he referred to it as an act of terror, even if it was in the plural.

Had they been content to confine their criticism to the "two weeks of muddle" and not gone for the gold of the "label as terror" meme, Romney would have won the point at the debate. But, filled with hubris, the conservatives have been gloating inaccurately--a dangerous way to gloat!--that the president "refused" to label it terror.

And so, with her simple "Actually, he did," Candy Crowley, dealt a possibly fatal blow to the spin of the Republican Noise Machine.

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So far, I have seen nothing Republican on my facebook wall today. But, I keep wondering if I dreamed up Romney saying green cards for everyone. Because people I least suspected agreed with me that giving them to everyone is a bad idea. One was even someone in the last election who immaturely said she might not vote because Huckabee or some other republican dropped out or didn't get the nomination.

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It's a new Republican tactic- they pick a spot and the pick at it incessantly- Obama apologizes too much, he hates America, He's different from you & me- regardless of it's truthfulness. They have written this narrative of a weak, Ameeica hating other and now their charges have a "truthiness" to the flock.

So last night we saw that play out- Romney rolled out the Republican Talking Point that Obama wouldn't even call this a terror attack for two weeks. He used his response time to call Obama a liar and insist that he didn't say "terror" in his rose garden address. And we all saw what happened- Romney looks foolish and stupid and misinformed.

But to the base Romney is right. Go cruise the comments on a right wing blog and you will see- Obama NEVER said "terror" until two weeks later. This is absolute conservative fact. If there is a video or transcript that says otherwise it is wrong- obvious liberal bias.

But if there are any uncommitted voters- they saw. Romney went off on an attack that was utterly false. That kind of man can't possibly be president. A president is calm and cool and gets all the facts before he attacks. And he was last night.

It's an old Republican tactic, actually, back beyond Karl Rove to Lee Atwater and Roger Ailes, both of whom worked for the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush campaigns.

Funny thing is that Republicans call it an old Democratic tactic, and they credit it to Saul Alinsky's "Rules for Radicals."

But if you actually read Alinksky, his tactics don't sound particularly Republican or Democratic. They sound like good, smart American marketing.

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I guess I see the "new" part is that it doesn't even need a grain of truth at it's core any more. The first time I saw it was in 2004 with the "swift-boating." You didn't need evidence or even credible witnesses, you could build an attack on entirely fabricated charges.

As disgusting as Atwater was, Dukakis was governor when Horton was released (whether he had anything to do with it or not). Nowadays I feel like they would just make the whole thing up.

I did see that Lee's old tricks are being pulled out of the closet in Florida and voters are getting cards that say the election is held on Wednesday instead of Tuesday or letters that advise people that any unpaid debts, taxes or tickets need to be cleared up before you will be allowed to vote. Stay classy, republicans!