Yesterday was of course the second presidential debate and afterward I heard a lot of people talking about how they don’t matter. All over the Twitter and the Facebook, people were saying that these debates aren’t going to change the minds of the undecided. While I think they may be right about that, I think that they are wrong about that being the purpose of the debate.
The purpose of the debate isn’t to change the minds of die-hard conservatives or progressive and it isn’t to change the minds of the undecided directly. The purpose is to create a narrative for the media to talk about and to force your opponent to say something you can use in an ad to generate donations.
The narrative of the first debate was that Obama lost the debate and so Romney can still win the race. That was a strong narrative which actually pushed undecided voters toward Romney. The polls in key battleground states shifted significantly. Republicans who wrote off this election started to see hope that Romney could win. But as great as that was for Romney, he fucked up by going after Big Bird and that set the internets ablaze. Obama was able to use that sound-byte to energize his base and raise more money.
In this last debate, the narrative is that Obama can still kick some ass and that he is fighting back. This debate was all about Obama and that will help him get some of those undecided voters back. Plus, Romney was called out by the moderator for lying, which plays into the narrative of the VP debate that Ryan and Romney are full of “malarkey.”
Romney also delivered another sound-byte that will be used to generate support for Obama when he talked about his “binders full of women.” Instead of showing how great he is on women’s issues, it became a reminder of have horrible he is when it comes to treating women as equals in the workforce, in his faith, and on healthcare issues. It wasn’t that he said something wrong; it was that his story rings hollow.
Obama dominated this second debate and that narrative will help to show that the race really is over and Romney just isn’t going to win. That will discourage people from donating to a campaign they believe is doomed and will discourage voters Romney voters from voting.
Of course that will only happen if Obama can keep Romney in check for the last debate. The narrative has to be that Obama’s got this. So he has to at the very least tie the next debate. But if he crushes Romney in the next debate it will be over. Debates matter!
PS
Check out my HuffPost article: Dear Sally Quinn: Atheists Are Americans Too
