The Damage

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Sometimes — actually, often — I publish emails that I don’t agree with but that I think are important to read. That’s my thought with this one from TPM Reader MG. I don’t really comprehend this kind of thinking. And I’ve seen no *reliable* reports (as opposed to stuff in the Tory hack press from the UK) that President Obama thought he’d done a good job after the first debate. But here’s one readers take …

I’m still going to vote for Obama (if for no other reason: Supreme Court nominations), but I don’t really think, on a personal level, that a much-improved performance from Obama this Tuesday is going to heal the wounds from the first debate.

Because, ultimately, Obama’s public performance in that debate was the analog of Romney’s private chat at the fundraiser: it revealed the true Obama; it confirmed all of my worst fears about his character and personality. Whatever performance he pulls in on Tuesday, it won’t be genuine. It won’t be what Obama wants to be and who he truly is. By most accounts, Obama stepped off the stage after the first debate thinking that he had won. He lives in an alternate reality, not much different from the one Romney’s wealth constructs for him. I’m sad and disappointed, and that’s not going to be reversed by what happens on Tuesday.

I gave my own read on the effects of the first debate here. And they weren’t positive. But this I don’t get.

But then I’m not the kind of voter the President needs to get pumped or persuaded for early November.

What do you think?

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