overall employment and underemployment rate up to 14.7% and unchanged a very bad number indeed. i think that reflects what people see around them and i don t think this helps the president very much. chris: mara, 7.8%. do you think that changes people s perception that well, maybe the economy is getting better. in. i think it can. but i agree with brit. t has to do with how people are feeling about their own situation. we have seen consumer confidence getting better. i would say one of the reasons that the president had been doing a little better recently until the debate was because not only did he have a good convention and the republicans didn t have a great one but also because people are paying down their debt. more people are feeling confident about the future. consumer spending is going up. there has been a little bit of uptick in the way people feel about the economy a little more optimistic. whether one month of jobs data is going to make a huge difference, i doubt it.
your candidate always assume you are on camera and that they are looking at you even if the other guy is speaking. you know, it is funny, though, chris, the debate history, presidential debate history is replete with examples of where candidates don t pay attention to how they look and say things and are only worried about what they say. audiences tell us they take as much as 65% of the meaning from how candidates or how people say things. you have the famous george bush looking at his watch or al gore sighing in the debate. and this time around we have the president who seems to be disinterested, who seems to be irritated and not focused on the debate. chris: what do you tell a candidate to do when the other guy is speaking or even attacking? well, you know, certainly you can take notes, you can look out at the audience but every now and then you need to look at your opponent. it is kind of odd if a person
you have got to get on offense. you have to use the things that have been successful to this point for them in the campaign. it was shocking that he didn t go into the 47% remark or bain capital. or some of the other things that he has been using which seemed to have given him a per septemberivperceptive advantagg into the debate. more importantly he has to offer a vision. the president had no vision for are the future in terms of what he would do and where he would take the country. and governor romney s vision was very clear. if you are governor romney you have to stay on message and keep pressing on offense. that worked for him in the debate but he has to be ready for a different president obama. the risk s like al gore back in 2000 if the president changes his persona too much, folks will report, well, a different president showed up and that hurt al gore in the 2000 debates. the president really has a problem on his hands in terms of how he approaches the next
president not true. he said he would cut the deficit in half and we had four years of it is not true. you know. you are in the united states senate. $10 trillion is what he inherited and you should know that the deficit is now around $15 trillion or $16 trillion. it is not true. you said it and you are repeating governor romney. he has added more debt than any other president. that is not true, senator. that is not true. that is not true. president bush left him with a $10 trillion deficit. bush added 4.8 over chris: guys. i said i was going to be tougher than jim lehrer and i m going to be. let s discuss a big issue that never came up in the debate and that is the fiscal cliff coming at the end of the year, sequestration it is called unless the president and congress work out a deal. under what is called the warren act employers and this is not just federal employers, all companies must tell workers 60 days in it advance of mass
cutting spend or is it always a mistake to take on big bird? well, big bird is pretty popular but maybe the president would say big bird didn t build his own nest, i don t know. but i think that it is it probably maybe not going after big bird but is certainly pbs and public broadcasting is popular in terms of taking them on in the spending side. i don t think he was going down the wrong path. maybe not so much with big bird. chris: a couple of minutes left. i want to look forward. what do you expect from this week s vice presidential debate between joe biden and paul ryan? well, i am sure that vice president biden got a phone call from the white house and said you know look, we didn t go after governor romney as much and so you have got to turn up the heat. because the debates are about controlling the ground. whoever is viewed as the one who controls the debate, who is on the offense, i don t