A panel of political insiders from around California joined a live conversation about the first presidential debate Wednesday night and shared their insights with Patch readers.
President Barack Obama and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney squared off in Colorado at the University of Denver. Journalist Jim Lehrer moderated.
Going into the debate, expectations were high and partisan lines were already drawn. Republican Kevin Hangman, chairman of the Napa County Republican Central Committee, anticipated "Obama defending his failures on the economy."
Democrat Jeff Kravitz, an attorney and former candidate for Sacramento County supervisor, said he was interested in seeing "how Romney believes cutting government spending and hence jobs of government workers could help the economy."
The panel also included Michael Barber, an independent and chief legislative aide for San Mateo County Supervisor Dave Pine; Gil Gonzales, Republican candidate for State Senate in the San Gabriel Valley; and Nathan Mintz, a Republican and former candidate for State Assembly in the South Bay region of Los Angeles County.
Below are some highlights from the panelists' conversation about the debate.
On Taxes
Gonzales: "[Donald] Trump is not a small business...don't know small businessmen/women with their own reality tv shows or jets."
Barber: "Romney is full of it to say he will help middle class taxpayers. What little we know of his plan, will increase our deficit."
Federal Deficit
Hangman: "Took Bush 8 years to run up $5 T debt. O did it in THREE!"
Barber: "After he inherited two unfunded wars...."
The Economy
Barber: "If California could keep the $ we pay in federal subsidies to the federally subsidized states, we would be golden again."
Social Security
Mintz: "The simple reality is that the current entitlement system is unsustainable. Go ask 20 people under 40 if they think any of it will be there when they are old enough to benefit....see how many laugh."
Healthcare
Barber: "Romney wants to overturn Romneycare. Keep healthcare for the wealthy...the poor can just use the emergency room."
Gonzales: "One is states rights. The other is Federal power. Voters need to decide which to elect is the best method to meet their health needs."
Mintz: "real solution is to blow up the medicare-insurance complex and go back to high deductible catastrophic care and pay your doctor direct for routine care."
Immigration
Hangman: "I think all illegal aliens who graduate with math and science degrees should get visa's. If they agree to teach for two years at minimum wage!"
Mintz: "Immigration is totally broken because it isn't tied to work...it's tied to who got here first. Time for a reform."
Though divided on several issues during the debate, the Patch panelists found common ground. Everyone enjoyed Romney's reference to "trickle-down government."
They also agreed moderator Jim Lehrer was not on top of his game. And they felt Romney and Obama smirked way too much.
The panelists also united on who they thought won the debate. Barber, an independent, did not weigh in, but the rest of the panel members cast their votes for Romney.
Hope and change my A$$.
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/09/18/Obama-Admin-Illegally-Purchased-Chinese-Made-Solar-Panels-With-Stimulus-Funds
Like a litigator, Obama found comfort writing notes and not feeding into a heated exchange with a master dodger. I don’t believe Obama was unprepared or under confident, this is a thinking man, a very busy man that thinks about what he says and does. It’s unbelievable how much BS way passed on by Romney at the first debate. So who paid for the “coin toss”? How much of illusion was being produced in the programming and moderating. Remember that the “facts don’t lie, liars figure” Romney’s “Your overconfidence will be your undoing” is what to watch for in the next debate as voters want the facts not a smooth presentation as his party and his supporters only care about, as they made up their minds a when Obama was elected and Congress has been a “do nothing congress” every since. Like Children that transfer from private schools to public schools, a private (un regulated) job maker/breaker/outsourcer/company-merger(crusher) won’t adjust well to a government job where 100% of the country’s people need leadership. People need, not just want to hear, need a reality leader, not an “idealist” with principles to trust on being delivered after election. Doesn’t anyone supporting Romney want to hear detailed truthful facts?
Seriously "Go out and find a job", is laughable!!
And WHY do you want that? Isn't it enough that someone ACTUALLY goes to the polling booth?
The middle class and the poor are really the losers when government is let loose and is not controlled by the citizens. The President is just one branch of the government obviously, but he sets the tone, the approach, the vision, that the country be going in. That's why the US is trying to pick itself up after this huge depression/recession caused by two terms of Republican President Bush. His ineptitude allowed us to be attacked, allowed financial markets to fall into ruin, and why he raised the deficit by putting two fake wars, medicaid expansion on the Fed's credit card. All in all Obama inherited an uphill struggle with an economy on the verge of collapse. I think any President would have faced the same odds, and so its no surprise we have such a slow recovery. Bush did a good thing though. He got the first Stimulus passed and that started the turn. Pity it had to happen after we started seeing banks and insurance companies failing losing millions and throwing millions of people on to the streets. So I would say the middle class and poor pay for it in the end. Only the rich have escaped the downturn. Look at the stock market. It's at its HIGHEST its been. Btw I agree with your assessment on the debates. Both candidates didn't come with their 'A' game - and Lehrer was just lost. We'd have been better served if Howard Stern had been moderating.
I don't know how you arrive at this "fact" when Romney clearly has no route to 270 electoral votes. It appears that you are confusing wishful thinking with facts. Oh, and "liar", not "lier". You're welcome.
Apparently Romney is for Regulation now. Ask a Republican or libertarian, and I'm sure they'd be against regulation. "Remove it all!" they say. So do they agree with Romney that Regulations are okay now? I just saw it as Romney saying anything to appeal to the voters.
I think he wants to make the rich poor and the poor even poorer. What a great job he's doing.
That's rich. Anybody says that gets my vote for standup comic.
Trick or Treat!!!
Big Bird's tax dollars won't matter after this..........