Presidential debate thread

[alexey]

If you believe that Romney will close unspecified loopholes then you must also have believed Obama when he promised to go through the federal budget line by line and cut unspecified programs that do not work. Sheep!!!

[Burgold]

Finally, honesty in politics.

Mitt Romney said right after the primaries that he was going to shake the etch a sketch and spin a new tale to give the audience he was facing whatever they wanted most.

Think about what he said during the primaries, his donors in private, on the stump speech, and then to a general tv audience... and envision him smiling while twirling the knobs of an etch a sketch.

[Going Commando]

One thing I wonder is how serious Mitt Romney is about ending loopholes and protection regulation and, making business fair.

Sometimes I get the feeling he's telling the truth, that the businessman in him truly does yearn for fair competition.

Then I think, yeah ****ing right.

A good thing I hope does come out of this debate is an earnest dialogue and attempt at reforming the tax code, specifically these supposedly rampant tax arbitrage abuses.

No matter who is in power, this seems like a good thing for the country. Basically Mitt's identified it as a way to raise revenue that would have bipartisan support because its a way for Republicans to get around their commitment to that damned Norquist pledge.

[alexey]

Sometimes I get the feeling he's telling the truth, that the businessman in him truly does yearn for fair competition.

....

The goal of a business is to make money. For a businessman, competition is a problem.

Competition is good for the system, for consumers, etc.

[Wrong Direction]

Do you have any evidence that government actually is most capable of making bubbles happen?

The tech bubble and the housing bubble were the two biggest I've ever seen. I blame both on government intervention.

Serious question given the issues we have (unemployment, defeciet, healthcare costs, etc.) do you really believe much of a Presidential debate should focus on closing SOME tax loopholes (essentially those to the most wealthy that will help off set their decrease in the tax rate, but not even all of them necessarily and not any in particular)?

I mean I could understand if you were talking about major sweeping changes to the tax code (e.g. going to a flat tax), but Romney appears to have centered the most of his argument around a revenue neutral tweaking of the tax code that isn't really going to put more money in people's hands, and isn't even necessarily going to reduce the complexity of the tax code.

Is that really his solution?

I think the flat tax doesn't sell, so you get a lesser version of it. Upon further reflection, I also think the idea behind this flattening is that a lot more people get tax breaks than have their effective rates raised because they take advantage of write-offs. So, if my theory is right (and I think I've heard Ryan say this, but I could be wrong), a lot more small businesses will get a cut.

Also, his plan makes another major philosophical change that I cannot believe I didn't pick up on since it's a philosophy I generally believe in. Here it goes:

My personal opinion is that corporate taxes should be very similar to individual taxes. The current incentive is for individuals to pay themselves as opposed to putting the money back into the corporation where it would be used for reinvestment in capital (human, physical, intellectual, whatever) and dividends. This is paid for by removing loop holes and raising individual rates.

So, in theory, Romney's tax plan not only helps small businesses who are less likely to get huge deductions, it also helps corporate entities (e.g., the company). This, in my opinion, is a substantial strategic improvement for how to implement a tax system and incent companies to reinvest in themselves. It also reduces incentives to move corporate divisions over seas, and provides a better tax scenario to attract companies back to America.

[mistertim]

It doesn't matter if he was leading the polls in recent weeks. Romney was leading in the polls a month ago. Polls always shift. Debates are very significant. I'm not saying Romney is guaranteed to win now. He did however make this race much more interesting. Comparing it to a football game, Romney just scored 17 unanswered points in the 4th quarter to tie the game back up.

"Debates are very significant" doesn't have all that much historical support.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/09/29/presidential-debates-rarely-have-much-effect-on-election-outcomes.html

From Al Gore’s loud sighing to Jimmy Carter saying he consulted his 12-year-old daughter on nuclear proliferation, presidential debates are full of memorable moments. But despite the fanfare that surrounds each election cycle’s televised events, historical data shows the debates are rarely game changers.

“There are a handful of cases in which a debate had a notable effect on the polls,” political scientist John Sides says. “But most debates don’t produce that kind of shift.”

A 2008 Gallup study found that between 1960 and 2004, there were only two years where debates made a difference in actual votes. Instead, the most common outcome of the presidential debates is a slight popularity bump. But that bump doesn’t necessarily translate into votes.

“They sometimes have a short-term effect, a bounce in response to the debates, but at the end of the day there often is not much of an effect,” says Robert Erikson, author of The Timeline of Presidential Elections.

Romney won the debate, IMO but it wasn't a situation where Obama came out and just looked completely lost or had any really memorable flubs; he just wasn't super on his game. If he doesn't step it up for the next two debates and Romney really dominates them then I could potentially see it making a difference for Mitt, but the notion being peddled by the Right after the debate, that everything is now changed and its a whole new race, is unlikely to be very realistic.

[Going Commando]

The goal of a business is to make money. For a businessman, competition is a problem.

Competition is good for the system, for consumers, etc.

I think a true entrepreneur values competition as an ideal because they like to compete. They believe if the game is fair, they can win. But I think there is obviously a lot of corruption in big business and anti-competitive behavior, which I suspect Mitt might earnestly take umbrage with... maybe. I'm not sure. Hence the talk about ending unfair and anti-competitive loopholes.

I do think Mitt resents that powerful corporate figures are widely dehumanized and characterized as amoral Galacti, devourers of worlds (corporations are people comment). I think Mitt believes that he and his social circle behave according to the same sets of morals as everyone else. The world he knows is not glamorized/demonized/lionized/what have you like it is for us normals. But he really doesn't know what the world is like for the vast majority of people, how some of the things he thinks are fair and natural are immoral to everyone else.

That's my armchair psychology anyway.

EDIT: Actually, you know what? Nevermind.

Romney's an unprincipled, bullying liar. He is not a good dude. And the people outside of the norms of his world might as well be dead to him.

That was me desperately hoping for some sort of silver lining in him being president.

[RabidFan]

I DVR'ed the debate and watched some last night and I'll finish watching the rest tonight. I think Romney looked good but his tax plan really alarms me as a tax payer. I'm a home owner and I'm worried that under his plan I won't be able to deduct my interest. Sure, his plan will let me take home more but I won't get as large of a return as I normally would.

Am I understanding this correctly? This is probably a deal breaker for me if this is the case.

Tack on parents who pay daycare and to charities....that and mortgage interest deductions will certainly lower your refund or increase your payout.

It's a tax basically but under deduction removal clothing.

Sure more jobs means more payroll tax revenue but how long will that take and how many jobs to offset a tax cut across the board plus increase in defense spending? many years i think so the bottom line deficit will increase until that happens.

[DallasCowboyFan156]

Are any conservatives concerned that last night heralded the return of liberal Mitt Romney? I was surprised by how many of his policies last night were non conservative positions, defending government regulation for instance.

[PeterMP]

The tech bubble and the housing bubble were the two biggest I've ever seen. I blame both on government intervention.

I'm not going to say the goverment is blameless, but to primarily blame the government, and even further the tax code, for either doesn't hold much water.

I guess if you wanted to blame the government via the Fed, there might be something to talk about in terms of it being pretty far up the list, but if you start listing where the tax code had a role in either one, you'd have to get down the list to about 100.

I think the flat tax doesn't sell, so you get a lesser version of it. Upon further reflection, I also think the idea behind this flattening is that a lot more people get tax breaks than have their effective rates raised because they take advantage of write-offs. So, if my theory is right (and I think I've heard Ryan say this, but I could be wrong), a lot more small businesses will get a cut.

Also, his plan makes another major philosophical change that I cannot believe I didn't pick up on since it's a philosophy I generally believe in. Here it goes:

My personal opinion is that corporate taxes should be very similar to individual taxes. The current incentive is for individuals to pay themselves as opposed to putting the money back into the corporation where it would be used for reinvestment in capital (human, physical, intellectual, whatever) and dividends. This is paid for by removing loop holes and raising individual rates.

So, in theory, Romney's tax plan not only helps small businesses who are less likely to get huge deductions, it also helps corporate entities (e.g., the company). This, in my opinion, is a substantial strategic improvement for how to implement a tax system and incent companies to reinvest in themselves. It also reduces incentives to move corporate divisions over seas, and provides a better tax scenario to attract companies back to America.

Doesn't this depend on the deductions that get cut?

If you cut the deduction for health insurance for small business owners, that's going to be a pretty large tax increase on many small businesses.

I guess this might be true if you assume the magic right combination of deductions, but because Romeny isn't laying them out, I think it is difficult to make that argument.

Both Obama and Romney talked about DECREASING corporate tax rates, I believe just for those reasons.

Nobody talked about raising corporate tax rates- real or effective. Nobody talked about tying corporate tax rates to individual tax rates.

I think you are trying to make what Romney said into what you want him to do.

[Larry]

Sure more jobs means more payroll tax revenue but how long will that take and how many jobs to offset a tax cut across the board plus increase in defense spending? many years i think so the bottom line deficit will increase until that happens.

Oh, I think the biggest problem with the current GOP platform of "Double Down on Trickle Down", is that the fundamental theory is "If only corporations had more profit, they'd hire more people. So, if we cut their taxes, they'll take the extra money, and they'll hire more people, and we can tax the workers to make up for the taxes we aren't getting from the company any more".

Well, the problem is that businesses and the people who own them are already making record profits.

And they aren't hiring.

There's no evidence at all to say that "well, if they only were making more than record profits, well, then they'd hire people".

----------

Or, another way I look at it:

When a business (I'll say a McDonalds) is deciding how many employees to schedule for lunch rush tomorrow, the owner doesn't look at his bank account and say "what's the maximum number of employees can I pay, with this much in the bank?"

He looks at his sales projections, and he asks "What's the minimum number of employees I can pay, and still have enough burgers to sell to my customers?"

Putting more money in the owners bank account will not make him hire more employees.

Putting more customers at the cash register will.

[88Comrade2000]

Are any conservatives concerned that last night heralded the return of liberal Mitt Romney? I was surprised by how many of his policies last night were non conservative positions, defending government regulation for instance.

If Romney said those things in the primaries; he wouldn't be the nominee.

He's just lyng thru this teeth to somehow get elected. I full expect him to be called on it in the second debate.

[Going Commando]

Oh, I think the biggest problem with the current GOP platform of "Double Down on Trickle Down", is that the fundamental theory is "If only corporations had more profit, they'd hire more people. So, if we cut their taxes, they'll take the extra money, and they'll hire more people, and we can tax the workers to make up for the taxes we aren't getting from the company any more".

Well, the problem is that businesses and the people who own them are already making record profits.

And they aren't hiring.

Oh Larry, I think you're confused. It's called supply side now thank you very much. The term your looking for is trickle down government. That's the true evil!

Trickle down = bad. I's poll tested, we know its a bad word. Government = bad. Trickle down government. Voila.

(Anyone else appreciate the irony last night in Romney trying to [inaccurately] slam Obama for being a proponent of trickle down government, tacitly admitting "trickle down x" is a dirty word and flawed concept, while simultaneously promoting trickle down economics?)

[zoony]

Trickle down urine, that's the worst. Usually when you're in a hurry at the urinal and wearing winkle free slacks

[visionary]

http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/04/politics/debate-next/index.html?hpt=hp_c1

How the debate changed the game

What's next: Can Obama recover or will Romney run up the score?

Mitt Romney's solid debate performance Wednesday night gives him the type of energy and momentum that President Barack Obama now will have to work overtime to undo.

"The thing that this debate did is it gave people reasons to think about (a) President Romney," said John Geer, chairman of Vanderbilt University's political science department. "This often happens with challengers in the first debate. Now Obama needs to reconnect with the American public and (make the case of) why he should be re-elected."

According to a CNN/ORC International survey conducted immediately after the debate, 67% of registered voters who watched the debate said that the Republican nominee won, with one in four saying that President Barack Obama was victorious. Before the debate, however, another CNN/ORC national poll of likely voters showed that 56% felt Obama would win.

What a difference a night makes.

But poor initial debate performances rarely shift the tide of an election, experts say....

[pointyfootball]

Sure, his plan will let me take home more but I won't get as large of a return as I normally would.

Am I understanding this correctly? This is probably a deal breaker for me if this is the case.

So....if that happens, increase the amount withheld each paycheck to give the government an interest-free loan and then you will get a larger return come March/April.

Rewarding people for incurring debt is poor policy in my opinion. I would like to see most deductions go away. We are ALL going to pay higher taxes, sooner than later, most likely.

---------- Post added October-5th-2012 at 07:38 AM ----------

He's just lyng thru this teeth to somehow get elected. I full expect him to be called on it in the second debate.

That doesn't make him any different from any other presidential candidate, including the current president.

[Skinz4Life12]

It doesn't matter if he was leading the polls in recent weeks. Romney was leading in the polls a month ago. Polls always shift. Debates are very significant. I'm not saying Romney is guaranteed to win now. He did however make this race much more interesting. Comparing it to a football game, Romney just scored 17 unanswered points in the 4th quarter to tie the game back up.

i think that's a bit of an exaggeration. 98% of the voting population already has their mind up. Romney didn't land any knock out blows on Wednesday night so I'm not sure about your analogy. Romney scored a TD but not 17 unanswered to tie the race IMO

[mojo]

I could win a debate too if I lied about almost every issue and went back on like every word I had been spewing for months. Obama was caught of guard completely by that. Most than a few times Obama looked like he wanted to tell him he was full of crap. He was just too professional for that.

So he just stood there looking overwhelmed and unprepared? They're politicians, lying is their business. Obama should have been able to cite some specifics to diffuse the situation.

[skinsmarydu]

[quote name=SpringfieldSkins;9187151 Sure' date=' his plan will let me take home more but I won't get as large of a return as I normally would.

Am I understanding this correctly? This is probably a deal breaker for me if this is the case.[/quote]

Your "return" is the amount of taxes you overpaid. That means the government has "borrowed" your money throught the year, paying you no interest.The objective is to not get anything back, and not owe anything...to pay the correct amount of tax all year through.

[Going Commando]

http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/04/politics/debate-next/index.html?hpt=hp_c1

CNN might want to check the sample used for that poll.

[mrcunning15]

http://news.yahoo.com/us-jobless-rate-falls-7-8-pct-44-123110986--finance.html

Going to be a good talking point for the next debate.

[Burgold]

Wow! 7.8 is a big number. Almost suspisciously big.

[AsburySkinsFan]

http://news.yahoo.com/us-jobless-rate-falls-7-8-pct-44-123110986--finance.html

Going to be a good talking point for the next debate.

Hmmm unemployment is now where it was when Obama inherited the rapidly declining economy, must be a dead cat bounce.

[Larry]

Wow! 7.8 is a big number. Almost suspiciously big.

I agree with you. That seems like a really big decline.

They're also saying that the rather rosy job numbers they posted for the previous too months turned out to be even rosier than they posted, though.

Maybe it's a case of "this isn't a sudden miraculous jump, it's been getting better for a few months".

I hope it's true.

[Duckus]

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/04/opinion/an-unhelpful-presidential-debate.html?_r=0

New York Times Editorial: An Unhelpful Debate

Virtually every time Mr. Romney spoke, he misrepresented the platform on which he and Paul Ryan are actually running. The most prominent example, taking up the first half-hour of the debate, was on taxes. Mr. Romney claimed, against considerable evidence, that he had no intention of cutting taxes on the rich or enacting a tax cut that would increase the deficit.

That simply isn’t true. Mr. Romney wants to restore the Bush-era tax cut that expires at the end of this year and largely benefits the wealthy. He wants to end the estate tax and the gift tax, providing a huge benefit only to those with multimillion-dollar estates, at a cost of more than $1 trillion over a decade to the deficit. He wants to preserve the generous rates on capital gains that benefit himself personally and others at his economic level. And he wants to cut everyone’s tax rates by 20 percent, which again would be a gigantic boon to the wealthy.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/04/opinion/an-unhelpful-presidential-debate.html?_r=0