There has been a thought percolating in my brain about that first debate. Since we are now "safely in the clubhouse", I would like to see if that thought might have any basis in reality. I certainly understand this is a moot question, and I held off on discussing this purposely so that it would be moot. The thought is that, with the first debate being such an out of character performance, could it have been a purposeful strategic gamble? Follow me over the orangeness for why I think this and why it may have been one of the best moves to pay off in this campaign.
When you are participating in a debate there is always a certain strategy involved. Sometimes, you want to play aggressive, other times you want to play passive defense, allowing your opponent to look too aggressive. Then there is what is known as "trap" debating. Was the entire first debate a "trap"?
Remember where we were going into that debate. Governor Romney had stumbled badly for a number of weeks, a situation that had not been remedied by even the traditional salve of all primary woes, the party convention. His candidacy was reeling, in all but name, a convincing win in that first debate by President Obama, would have essentially ended it right there, there would have been no coming back.
And while that would have been nice, especially for those of us who went into a deep funk following the first debate performance, I now believe it would have been the absolute worse thing that could have happened.
If Governor Romney's candidacy had been written off that early a number of things would have happened.
1. President Obama's victory on Tuesday would have been presented by the right as "Of course he was re-elected, look at the milquetoast he ran against", "It wasn't us, it was the candidate", not that they aren't doing that now, but it would have seemed to be a lot more believable with a mortally damaged campaign. With a still viable candidacy from Mitt Romney, this now allows us to say that this was a solid win on the ideas behind the candidates, not just the candidates themselves. That the American people had made a valid endorsement on the "referendum" election that was the Romney campaign's strategy.
2. Money and talent would have fled the Romney campaign and that focus would have started flowing downballot more. Would we have made the gains that we in fact made in the Senate? This was a year where we held 2/3 of the seats up for election and to actually gain seats?
3. President Obama's performance in that first debate also allowed the Romney campaign to believe that there was ground they could start to stake out by being more moderate, really "shake up the Etch-A-Sketch" and once he started to make that pivot, there was no going back. Well, there was some going back (Jeep jobs to China anyone?) but it became the obvious desperate move that it was.
This may seem like 11th dimension chess, and it was certainly a risky gamble. However, President Obama showed that he is very familiar with "trap" debate tactics. Remember the Romney "You didn't call it an act of terror!"? President Obama's respons"Please proceed Governor." is classic "trap" debating.