I’m just starting to soak in the media reaction to the debate and it is the twist of the media narrative that some expected: A great night for Mittens means we still have a race and more weeks of ad revenue.
And if you judge by the theatrics and ignore the substance, you could make that case. The idea that the staging and talking points–the game of politics–always matter more than reality is crack for the beltway media. In the debate, Romney was tossing out the crack to the cheap seat. It was one wingnut fantasies after another wrapped in a slick word salad package to make it sound credible.
But there was a two line exchange about the budget and debt that exposed the nonsense of it all:
OBAMA: There has to be revenue in addition to cuts. Now, Governor Romney has ruled out revenue. He’s ruled out revenue.
ROMNEY: Absolutely.
In wingnutopia it is an article of faith that the Government does not need any new revenue and that tax cuts paired with deep spending cuts solve everything. There is zero evidence that this works. Every time it has been tried, it has failed to produce the results promised. The idea that you can dig yourselves out from a mountain of debt and balanced a budget without revenue is dark magical thinking. It is pixie dust. It is a fantasy.
And yet, this is what Mitt and his Party believe. Mitt doubled-down on this twisted fantasy throughout the debate.
Every credible commission, group, team of economists, etc., etc., who have looked at the debt/budget problem have said that it cannot be resolved without new streams of revenue. The President is correct, “There has to be revenue in addition to cuts.”
In rejecting this, Mitt Romney has rejected reality. It is par for the course as he has also bought into every other wingnut fantasy you can imagine–from energy to health care to torture to foreign policy to civil rights to immigration to woman’s right to well, all of it. On every issue they run against reality.
Romney is a wingnut extremist and his fantasies will lead to great and lasting harm if he gets his hands on power.
We will have a few days of pre-written and expected “Romney come-back stories”. They will all be based of theatrics and smoke. The substance of this race has not changed a bit. And in the debate Romney confirmed he is a man without ideas, details and substance. All he has is his lies.
His talking points are from crazytown and we need to double down and defeat this Wingnut. Our collective future depends on it.
Early voting has begun. It is time to get involved and GOTV. Make sure that you’re registered to vote (along with family, neighbors and friends) and learn how to get involved in the campaign at: www.gottavote.org (another useful site is CanIVote.org). And you can volunteer with the Obama Campaign here. There is a lot that each of us can do in the coming month.
Time to get fired up. Time to get going.
Cheers
ps: Yes, it is quite likely that all the FP folks will weigh in and step on each other, so scroll up and down and join in where you wish…