Going into the first Presidential debate last week, voters expected President Obama to do better than Mitt Romney by a margin of 51 to 29-percent. This week, voters expected Representative Paul Ryan to edge Vice President Joe Biden but by a smaller margin during a debate in Kentucky, Bob’s home state. Good for the pundits, neither debate matched expectations.
Vice President Joe Biden gets feisty during his debate with Representative Paul Ryan, Oct. 11, 2012.
Doyle McManus is Washington columnist for the Los Angeles Times. Here are links to some of the stories referenced during his chat with Bob this week.
President Obama was expected to win first debate with Mitt Romney.
In the Vice President debate, Rep. Paul Ryan was narrowly expected to outperform Vice President Biden.
The New York Times aggregated fact checkers on the night of the debate: http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/debates/vice-presidential/2012-10-11. Watch the full debate here.
After the first debate, Obama and staff went to work to fix campaign… starting with a conference call 10 minutes before the last debate even ended http://nyti.ms/SWtf04.
On October 1st, according to Real Clear Politics average of leading polls, Obama had a four point advantage. As of today, October 12th, Romney’s pulled ahead by 0.7%.
But in the key battleground state of Ohio, Obama still maintains a lead of RCP’s average, but barely, up 1.3%: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/oh/ohio_romney_vs_obama-1860.html)
Obama has lost significant ground in Florida (Romney’s up 1.4%) and Virginia (Obama’s hanging on with a 0.6% advantage).
For a glimpse into debates past, Slate highlights: “When Ronald Reagan Blew a Presidential Debate and Dropped Seven Points in the Polls” http://ow.ly/2sC0JE.
The race for Senate in Massachusetts is a high profile seat where Elizabeth Warren is challenging Senator Scott Brown. They had their third debate Wed eve: http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2012/10/10/brown-warren-clash-third-debate/TBzTKmKWe00AZ5ZAhlYvmL/story.html and RCP average has Warren ahead slightly, 1.7%: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/senate/ma/massachusetts_senate_brown_vs_warren-2093.html.
There has been good economic news this week – but not good enough to help give Obama a bump in the polls: jobless claims hit a 4-year low http://on.mktw.net/STCCNq and foreclosures are at a 5-year low http://www.marketwatch.com/story/foreclosure-activity-drops-to-5-year-low-2012-10-.
Until next week!
Ariana