At least one thing is clear from last night, Obama is not
very good at debating, especially against an opponent who shifts his views as
quick as he speaks them. Obama was obviously prepared for the debate, but
whoever prepped him, failed to mention that the person he will be debating is
notoriously shifty and prone to changing his mind. Romney’s strategy is pretty
simple; say nothing about his policies that are unpopular, like massive cuts to
education, and cherry pick all of Obama’s good ideas and co-opt them as his
own. This chameleon tactic has served him well the past few months, and he
showed last night that he will go step for step with the president on any
policy that he likes, without committing to anything that is unpopular. I’m not
sure how you combat this ‘have your cake and eat it too’ philosophy, but it
certainly isn’t how Obama tried to play it last night by remaining cool and
collected. He just looked weak and impassive. He let Romney throw out false
claims about his own policies and Obama’s and without challenge. That was a
mistake. The only way to turn the tables on a people pleaser like Romney is to
call him out repeatedly on specifics; pin him down to something, anything that
you know is unpopular, like the Medicare voucher program for instance.
This was
probably one of the most boring debates in a long time; it was riddled with
abstract numbers thrown back and forth by both men, and lacked substance
from either side. There was a clear
policy difference, however, if you stuck around to listen for it, and Obama
should have seized this difference and used it to his advantage. Romney was
very clear about one thing; his philosophy is fundamentally different than
Obama’s. Romney made it abundantly apparent that he puts his faith in the free
market, not the government. He stated that he would leave many government
institutions to the private market; the entire federal education and healthcare
systems, including Medicare. Romney thinks the private sector will fix all of
our problems, through competition and profit.
Obama should have put his foot down
at this philosophy and pointed out that what Romney was really saying; that he
would get rid of our public education and replace it with private charter schools,
and that he is going to eliminate Medicare and replace it with private
insurance voucher system. These ideas may be popular with a small number of
conservatives, but the majority of voters are opposed to them. Instead of
citing study after conflicting study, ad infinitum, Obama should have just
leveled a hardball at Romney such as ‘turning Medicare into a voucher system is
wrong for our seniors and costs way more money in the long run.’ Let Romney
debate the specifics, but at least tell people the truth. A Medicare voucher
system is already in place for people with disabilities and it is one of the
worst run programs in the country. Clients don’t receive enough money for
benefits and there is a waiting list 10 years long to even get on the voucher system.
It doesn’t work for disabled, why would it work for the elderly?
The claim that somehow letting the
free market take care of all of the details is preposterous. If it were up to
the private insurers, they would drop anyone high risk and refuse to insure
people that are sure to have high medical expenses, ie the elderly. Just look
what happened in Florida
after the Hurricane season in 2004. Insurance companies cut and run, leaving
millions of people without insurance because it was too expensive for them to
maintain coverage on such high risk properties. Florida responded by creating a Medicare
system of insurance called Citizen’s United, a government failsafe insurer of
last resort. It ended up becoming the largest insurer in the state, because
private companies are not going to insure losing investments. This is precisely
why we need subsidies like Medicare and Citizen’s United, to provide support
for all those people that are just uninsurable. Obamacare fixes this problem,
but the President failed to present his case effectively. He let Romney walk
all over Obamacare, picking policies he says he will keep, but not explaining
how he would pay for them.
When it comes to education, Romney
proposes the same thing, a voucher system and ‘school choice.’ This means
privatizing our public schools. It’s the end of community based public
education, and the beginning of a new era of charter schools and private
schools that are subsidized by tax dollars. There is no substantial proof that
Charter schools are any better that public schools, and really the only
beneficiary to this system is all of the private companies that setup theses
schools for profit. Why give our tax dollars to private schools, when they have
no oversight, or public transparency like our current schools? There’s no
accountability for these charter schools since they don’t have to answer to the
voters, but rather their own small board of investors. We have a history with
our current public schools that goes back centuries; it can adapt and fix itself
if we invest the money and time. Rather than abandoning our schools when they
need help most by cutting off money and sending it to private companies, we
should be rallying behind these schools, getting grants and coming up with
creative solutions that will make them viable for future generations. It will
be a sad day in America
if we let our public school system disappear, and that is exactly what Romney
and conservatives are proposing. If you like the community feel and
transparency of your child’s local school, then you have to fight for it.
Otherwise, you may be driving you child 30 minutes or more a day to a privately
run Charter school where you don’t really have a say in the administrative or
policy choices of that school.
Instead of citing studies that no
one has ever heard of, Obama should have just been frank and to the point with
his criticisms. His ideas are popular so tell people what they are!
Unfortunately, he didn’t articulate his ideas clearly enough for most people to
understand that, and Romney was able to capitulate on this by agreeing with the
popular policies and not committing to anything that isn’t popular. Somehow,
Obama thought the debate was going to be a contest of policy and specifics,
when it was really what all debates are: a competition of who seems more
commanding. Debates are not about facts, they are about appearances. It doesn’t
matter that the $716 billion comment is
misleading and false, Romney just kept repeating it over and over until people
just assume he must be right. People want to see confidence and energy, not
boring digressions about the intricacies of some bill no ones heard of. In this
aspect, Obama failed miserably, and Romney definitely came off as if he knew
what he was talking about, even if he was wrong. If Obama doesn’t turn it
around in the next two debates, he’s going to have an uphill battle because
Romney is looking more and more viable after last nights disaster. And that’s
really all that matters; viability not content.
