I've just read several blog posts and articles that make somewhat similar, perhaps obvious points. But whether these observations are familiar or not, I think they get at a real problem unique to the Left.
Basically, these points are:
(1) The immediate post-debate reactions to the debate play an integral role in shaping public opinion;
(2) Social media may well be amplifying the reactions more than ever.
(3) Obama's descent in the polls might be attributed - at least - in part to a somewhat overwrought reaction by liberals.
I elaborate, with quotes to Chait, Dionne and others below the fold.
In his latest piece, Jonathan Chait asks "Did Liberal Hysteria Sink Obama?"
The question is rhetorical and not altogether serious. But he gets at something real, I believe:
It’s hard to figure out just how the first presidential debate turned into such an overwhelming political debacle for President Obama. After the debate, I thought Romney won, but the contest was closer than the already solidifying consensus held. Dave Weigel later observed, “the first presidential debate has come to remind me of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. Democrats walked out of the theater/turned off the TV saying ‘huh, well, I wanted it to be better.’ After a few days of talking to friends, it changes from a disappointment into the worst piece of crap in human history.”
But why did that happen? How did a debate in which Obama missed numerous opportunities but still landed some solid blows devolve into the worst piece of crap in human history? Of course, I’m biased, and I may well have been listening to Obama’s uneven performance, filling in the missing details of his policy digressions that he failed to spell out. I’m also not that great at filtering debate answers through the prism of undecided voters.
Chait looks to
E.J. Dionne for an answer.
After pondering what Obama needs to do differently, Dionne opines:
But there is another aspect of tonight, and that’s the part played by the staffs of the two candidates and their supporters. What people say during the debate — Twitter has really changed things — matters a lot. So does what happens after it’s over and how it’s interpreted and spun. These things can matter almost as much as the debate itself.
The Obama campaign simply could not offset the highly negative assessments of the president’s performance in the first debate that extended far beyond the world of Fox News. Team Obama could not manage to break through with any negative talking points about how Romney performed: the fact that Romney seemed overly caffeinated, hyped-up in attack mode, and that he said some things that were flatly untrue.
Notice, as others have pointed out in the past few days, that Republican spin-meisters did not worry in the least that they might have contradicted themselves by saying that Romney’s aggressiveness against Obama was a sign of leadership while Biden’s aggressiveness against Ryan was a sign of disrespect. Oh, yes, they would offer talking points about how the two performances were actually different, but they are not really worried about the contradictions because they know that this process of ours doesn’t reward intellectual consistency. No matter what Obama does tonight, be ready for an argument from Team Romney that Obama “overcompensated” in Debate Two by being too aggressive, while Romney looked “presidential.” I can guarantee it, even though I won’t bet you $10,000.
Finally, watch what Obama’s supporters make of the debate. Keep an eye on the Twitter feeds and on what the more liberal commentators say in their post-debate commentaries. As the first presidential debate went on, the feeds of progressives went almost silent. After the debate, Obama-leaning commentators might have been even more critical of his performance than neutral analysts were. The negativity built and metastasized to the point where Obama’s “defeat” looked far worse 24 and 48 hours later than it did at the time. To invoke a football metaphor, it would be as if post-game commentary had the power to spin a 24-to-14 defeat into a 38-to-3 catastrophe. That can’t happen in sports, but it can happen in political debates.
Similar thoughts were expressed last week by
Kevin Drum:
The hack gap is a liberal problem of long standing. Put simply, we liberals don't have enough hacks. Conservatives outscore us considerably in the number of bloggers/pundits/columnists/talking heads who are willing to cheerfully say whatever it takes to advance the party line, no matter how ridiculous it is.
My conservative readers may scoff at this notion, but rarely has the hack gap been on such febrile display as it has since last Wednesday's presidential debate. Ask yourself this: can you even imagine Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh tearing their hair out over a weak debate performance by Mitt Romney the way that liberals have been over President Obama's? I can't.
Drum continues,
Here's how things would have gone if liberals had their fair share of hacks. Obviously Obama wasn't at his best on Wednesday. But when the debate was over that wouldn't have mattered. Conservatives would have started crowing about how well Romney did. Liberals would have acknowledged that Obama should have confronted Romney's deceptions more forcefully, but otherwise would have insisted that Obama was more collected and presidential sounding than the hyperactive Romney and clearly mopped the floor with him on a substantive News reporters would then have simply reported the debate normally: Romney said X, Obama said Y, and both sides thought their guy did great. By the next day it would barely be a continuing topic of conversation, and by Friday the new jobs numbers would have buried it completely.
Instead, liberals went batshit crazy. I didn't watch any commentary immediately after the debate because I wanted to write down my own reactions first, and my initial sense was that Obama did a little bit worse than Romney. But after I hit the Publish button and turned on the TV, I learned differently. As near as I could tell, the entire MSNBC crew was ready to commit ritual suicide right there on live TV, Howard Beale style. Ditto for all their guests, including grizzled pols like Ed Rendell who should have known better. It wasn't just that Obama did poorly, he had delivered the worst debate performance since Clarence Darrow left William Jennings Bryan a smoking husk at the end of Inherit the Wind. And it wasn't even just that. It was a personal affront, a betrayal of everything they thought was great about Obama. And, needless to say, it put Obama's entire second term in jeopardy and made Romney the instant front runner.
Now, to be clear:
no one here is clearing Obama of responsibility. Had he performed up to expectations, the "hack gap" wouldn't have mattered. And certainly no one is suggesting that the pundits on MSNBC - or elsewhere - should be less than honest. We are, after all, the fact-based community.
But we should face it: the cascading impact of reactions on social media and elsewhere really can have an effect on this race. It's worth keeping in mind.