Handkerchief Excuses And Tempered Expectations

First the left blamed Jim Lehrer for Obama’s poor performance at Wednesday night’s debate. Then Al Gore blamed the altitude. Now the left is accusing Romney of having a cheat sheet during the debate which turns out to be nothing more than a handkerchief. They’re grasping at anything to create an excuse for Obama. It shouldn’t surprise anyone, it’s fairly common for people who have placed absurd expectations on someone to make excuses when they fail. Look at the Atlanta Braves last night. Everyone in Atlanta is talking about the horrible infield fly call by one of the worst umpires in baseball. The call is to blame for the Braves loss according to fans, the truth is the Braves were down in the game because of three errors. The truth gets lost in the excuses.

Having said that, the excuses will have an affect on future debates. Well, some of them anyway. Handkerchief bans likely won’t be created and maybe they’ll go back to Denver in a future election. But the real affect will be on Candy Crowley and Bob Schieffer, the moderators of the last two Presidential debates. You can probably add Martha Raddatz, the moderator of the VP debate to the list of the affected. The message was sent loud and clear by the left in their attacks on Jim Lehrer. Keep Romney under control or face the wrath of the people you want to love you. Expect to see the moderators try to control Romney while letting Obama get away with whatever he wants.

Obama meanwhile is on the offensive against Romney. Apparently Obama thinks he was debating with a cast member of Dancing With the Stars. Obama and the left continue to lie about Romney’s tax plan, despite the fact that Romney shot down the attack with perhaps the best and most memorable line of the debate. Does Obama think that by continuing to lie about the Romney plan that people will believe it? With nearly 70 million people watching the debate, it seems a bit absurd to think that Obama is going to be able to convince people that Romney is lying about taxes.

What Obama can’t lie about is the national debt. The CBO confirms that the deficit for the last fiscal year was $1.1 trillion. That’s the fourth straight year the deficit has been above $1 trillion. Keep in mind, the 2009 fiscal year’s budget was signed by Obama in March of 2009, making him fully responsible for it. Obama is trying to blame Bush for all his problems but the numbers are damning. The debt has increased over $5 trillion since he took office. There’s just no way around that. Our national debt is over $16 trillion, Obama is responsible for over $5 trillion of that. Does the President really think people will blame Bush over him?

The VP debate is next week and its time to temper  expectations for Paul Ryan. Ryan has never been on the debate stage before. He’s never run for President so he doesn’t have experience in 20+ debates like Romney has. Biden was in the VP debate in 2008 and he has previously run for President. As much as we want to believe that Biden will make one gaffe after another at the debate, the fact is he’ll be prepared and he’ll do a serviceable job. As much as we want Ryan to be great, it’s tough to walk into an unfamiliar environment like this and dominate. No doubt the moderator won’t let him get away with anything. Expectations are too high for Ryan, he’ll never be able to meet them.