seconds without saying something that contradicts something he said the week before, the month before, that gets the base upset, that is confusing, that reporters can t quite understand? i don t know how he does it. he s tied himself into knots on this particular question. on the other side, i do know some obama aides who are a little worried that the president, who sometimes can be overly professorial, may use the time not to his advantage either. they d like to see more succinct answers. they each have the opposite issue to deal with. how romney can speak coherently about health care in a way that s convincing and obama doesn t go too far down the debate. i think he s going to get through this on sheer unadulterated memory. what we saw on 60 minutes seemed like opening arguments. scott pelley interviewed mitt romney, and steve krupp interviewed president obama. take a look at their competing visions for the government, what we should be doing in the federal government.
0 he doesn t have emotion he doesn t have any kind of idea of any reason he s there except to get the job. he has no passion that i can ever spot, and spontaneity, he s got to have it memorized like cookies coming down a chute already baked for him so he doesn t have to think. if he thinks, as you say if you ask this guy any question you hadn t heard before, what would come out of his mouth? the romney from massachusetts or the romney from bain or the romney from nordquist or the neocons? the interesting thing about the debate format is each candidate is going to be given a lot of time to answer some of these basic questions. that may not be good for romney. you get the sense, particularly on health care, while governor romney of 2003 could give a good ten-minute answer on health care and what he thought about it, what he wanted to do about it, what he had accomplished in massachusetts, how can mitt romney talk for five minutes on health care, even like 90 seconds without saying
right before that debate the kennedy brothers arrived to discover something weird had happened. the temperature was meat locker level. so cold they couldn t believe it, and they knew why. kennedy s television adviser went racing to the basement and found nixon s guy standing watch on the thermostat. nixon had sweated in that first debate, and it cost him. this time the nixon people were intent on freezing the room so cold that nixon couldn t sweat at all. well, after a standoff in that basement in our headquarters and some threats to call the police, they agreed to bring the temperature up. well, think this stuff doesn t matter? it all matters. just like everything we do, wear, look like, act like, seem like in our first debates actually our first dates when we were growing up, remember? today we look at the serious stuff that will matter, where they stand and they disagree. i m joined by bob shrum and the great david corn, famous for having unearthed that very important 47
i think he s going to get through this on sheer unadulterated memory. what we saw on 60 minutes seemed like opening arguments. scott pelley interviewed mitt romney, and steve krupp interviewed president obama. take a look at their competing visions for the government, what we should be doing in the federal government. making government smaller, don t build these massive deficits that pass debt onto our kids. rebuild the foundation of america s strength with great homes, great schools, with entrepreneurship and innovation. there s no bigger purpose right now than making sure that if people work hard in this country, they can get ahead. that s the central american idea. that s how we sent a man to the moon, because there was an economy that worked for everybody and that allowed us to do that. great homes. maybe we can build a bunch of homes with elevators mcmansions. let me ask you, bobby shrum, what would you i d ask him what government agencies or departments you sa