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Romney's Successful Debate Plan: Lying — Political reporters and pundits lean heavily on the horse race method of coverage, which has badly hurt Mitt Romney for most of the campaign. Last night it helped him. Romney was forceful and articulate and dodged his association with almost all the most unpopular aspects of his platform.
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Obama Campaign Shifts Attack Strategy After Debate — They've been attacking “severely conservative” Mitt for months. Now they're calling Romney a flip-flopper. — Image by Kevin Lamarque / Reuters — DENVER — President Barack Obama and his aides rapidly reversed …
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New York Times, KDVR.com, Riehl World News and The Daily Caller

Live-Blogging The First Presidential Debate 2012 — 10.31 pm. Look: you know how much I love the guy, and you know how much of a high information viewer I am, and I can see the logic of some of Obama's meandering, weak, professorial arguments. But this was a disaster for the president …
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Politico, Hot Air, Reuters, Hugh Hewitt's TownHall Blog, Democracy in America, Wake up America, The Agonist, JustOneMinute, Washington Wire, Sabato's Crystal Ball, American Spectator, Mother Jones, Via Meadia, Althouse, MareZilla.com, The Daily Beast, Wonkette, Infidel753, Taegan Goddard's …, National Review, rubber hose, JOSHUAPUNDIT, Gothamist, Weekly Standard, Say Anything, Joe. My. God., Angry Black Lady Chronicles and Balloon Juice


Top Romney Adviser: States Will Have To Cover People With Pre-Existing Conditions Under President Romney — After the first presidential debate at the University of Denver in Colorado on Wednesday night, one of Mitt Romney's top advisers acknowledged that, as a result Romney's plan to repeal Obamacare …


Liberals Livid With Obama's Debate Performance — How bad was it for Obama Wednesday night? Even some of his biggest fans were livid that he let Mitt Romney walk away with a win, and they were not suffering in silence. — Within an hour of the debate ending, liberals and longtime Democratic operatives …
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Washington Monthly, GOP 12, Politico, The Impolitic, Scared Monkeys, The Huffington Post and Washington Post

Romney's Sick Joke — OK, so Obama did a terrible job in the debate, and Romney did well. But in the end, this isn't or shouldn't be about theater criticism, it should be about substance. And the fact is that everything Obama said was basically true, while much of what Romney …
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Firedoglake, Balloon Juice and Daily Kos

Chris Matthews Freaks Out At Obama: “What Was He Doing?” — “Tonight wasn't an MSNBC debate tonight, was it?” Chris Matthews said after the first Obama-Romney presidential debate concluded on Wednesday night. — “I don't know what he was doing out there. He had his head down, he was enduring the debate rather than fighting it.


At Last Night's Debate: Romney Told 27 Myths In 38 Minutes — Pundits from both sides of the aisle have lauded Mitt Romney's strong debate performance, praising his preparedness and ability to challenge President Obama's policies and accomplishments. But Romney only accomplished this goal by repeatedly misleading viewers.
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Smart Politics, Fox News, Associated Press, Reuters, ECHIDNE OF THE SNAKES, The Raw Story and Talking Points Memo


CNN Poll: Most watchers say Romney debate winner — Denver, Colorado (CNN) - Two-thirds of people who watched the first presidential debate think that Republican nominee Mitt Romney won the showdown, according to a nationwide poll conducted Wednesday night.
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Politico, Firedoglake, Outside the Beltway, Questions and Observations, National Review, Washington Examiner, The Times of Israel, Conservatives4Palin, Scared Monkeys, The Moderate Voice, Taylor Marsh, Hit & Run, Ricochet Conversations Feed, Ballot Box, Bookworm Room, Maggie's Farm and The Other McCain

Obama campaign: Adjustments will be made in debate strategy — Adjustments will have to be made in President Obama's debate strategy, his advisers said Thursday, the morning after the president stumbled in his first showdown with Mitt Romney. — David Axelrod, Obama's senior campaign strategist …
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Weasel Zippers

Polls Show a Strong Debate for Romney — Instant-reaction polls conducted by CNN and CBS News suggest that Mitt Romney was the winner of the first presidential debate. — A CNN poll of debate-watchers found Mr. Romney very clearly ahead, with 67 percent of registered voters saying he won the debate …

It's Over — I've been watching presidential debates for quite …
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RedState, Daily Kos, CNN, American Spectator, Los Angeles Times, UTSanDiego.com, ABCNEWS, The Lonely Conservative, TBogg, Balloon Juice and Whiskey Fire


How Mitt Romney Won The First Debate
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Los Angeles Times, New York Times, BuzzFeed, the-reaction.blogspot.ca, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Gawker, p m carpenter's commentary, Ballot Box, Washington Free Beacon, Villainous Company, The Reaction, Wall Street Journal, Riehl World News, National Review, Taylor Marsh, Poynter, The Atlantic Online, Scared Monkeys, The Lonely Conservative, Sky Dancing, The Daily Caller, Liberal Values, americanthinker.com, his vorpal sword, The Hinterland Gazette and American Power, more at Mediagazer »

There Went the Boom
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Ballot Box, GayPatriot and American Power

Dem Debate Meltdown: Stumbling Obama Surrogate Speaks Of ‘President Romney’
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americanthinker.com, Scared Monkeys and nation.foxnews.com

The Return of Massachusetts Mitt
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Esquire, Washington Post, Vodkapundit, The Daily Dish, American Prospect and Lawyers, Guns & Money

Mitt Gets Away With It—For Now
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Washington Post and A plain blog about politics

Obama camp promises tougher response to Romney in next debate
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CNN

CNN's Factcheck for the Ages
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Business Insider and The Maddow Blog

Obama's Debate Strategy: Unilateral Disarmament?
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The Atlantic Online, CANNONFIRE, The Hinterland Gazette and neo-neocon

Thoughts on the first presidential debate
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Wake up America, New York Magazine and Sense of Events

Undecided voters in focus group swing sharply toward Romney; Frank Luntz: 'I've never seen anything …
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Michelle Malkin, Villainous Company and JOSHUAPUNDIT

McCain surprised with Romney, Obama debate performances
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Politico


AARP's Statement on the Denver Presidential Debate — Below is the statement AARP released on this evening's Presidential debate: — Denver, CO—Earlier this evening the Presidential candidates discussed AARP, Social Security and Medicare during the first Presidential debate of the 2012 general election.
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Fox News, The Right Scoop, Weasel Zippers and Washington Examiner
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KitchenAid Jokes: Obama's Grandmother Was Lucky She Died Before He Became President — The company KitchenAid is primarily involved in the business of making cakes. But their Twitter account stirred up some political ire last night when it tweeted a “joke” about President Obama's dead grandmother.
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The Moderate Voice and The Raw Story
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KitchenAid Tweets Joke About Obama's Dead Grandma [UPDATED]
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BuzzFeed, theGrio, New York Magazine and Business Insider

We're Trying To Figure This Out — Getting a massive amount of coverage this morning is the CNN snap poll of the debate, which showed Romney winning the exchanged overwhelmingly. — But the internals of the poll look really strange. If you look at the breakdown of the sample …
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Mediaite and Mother Jones


Press Critics Pile On Jim Lehrer's Debate Performance — Jim Lehrer, the executive editor of PBS' “NewsHour,” moderated his 12th presidential debate on Wednesday, sitting on the sidelines as Mitt Romney and President Obama dominated the program and steamrolled the veteran newsman whenever he attempted to interject.
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Balloon Juice
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Obama's Stephanie Cutter knocks Lehrer
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CNN, NationalJournal.com, ABCNEWS, Mediaite, Betsy's Page, The Daily Caller, NO QUARTER USA NET, The Lonely Conservative and American Power

Media piles on moderator Jim Lehrer
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ABCNEWS, Guardian and Ricochet Conversations Feed

RESEARCH MEMO: Results Of Dial Group Session In Aurora, CO. — M E M O R A N D U M — TO: Priorities USA Action FROM: Geoff Garin, Garin-Hart-Yang Research Group — RE: Results Of Dial Group Session In Aurora, CO.
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Smartypants
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Why Obama Didn't Mention the 47 Percent Video
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Washington Monthly, Business Insider, No More Mister Nice Blog and Talking Points Memo

Priorities pollster: Romney gains on taxes, not likability
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Weekly Standard


Networks, AP cancel exit polls in 19 states — Breaking from two decades of tradition, this year's election exit poll is set to include surveys of voters in 31 states, not all 50 as it has for the past five presidential elections, according to multiple people involved in the planning.
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The Hill, Outside the Beltway, AEIdeas and Taylor Marsh


Romney's strong debate showing puts Europe on edge — (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's lackluster performance in the first U.S. election debate provoked uneasiness in European capitals on Thursday, where hopes are mostly, if unofficially, pinned on his securing a second term.
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Alan Colmes' Liberaland and The Lonely Conservative