TORONTO – U.S. President Barack Obama and his camp swung into damage control Thursday after headlines and editorials splashed across North America decided his Republican opponent Mitt Romney won the first of three presidential debates.
Global News spoke to Canadian journalist Steve Paikin, anchor and senior editor of TV Ontario’s (TVO) flagship program The Agenda with Steve Paikin. Paikin, who hosted the 2006, 2008 and 2011 Canadian leaders’ debates, shared his thoughts on Wednesday’s debate.
Global News: Who really won the presidential debate?
Steve Paikin: It seems to be pretty indisputable that Mitt Romney won the debate. And by winning, I think people really mean he exceeded peoples’ expectations, while the president failed to live up to peoples’ expectations. Frankly, I wasn’t surprised. Romney debated 35 times this past year on the way to getting the Republican nomination. Obama hasn’t had to debate in four
years. Both facts showed last night.
GN: Will this debate impact the race?
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SP: You’re asking me to predict the future and I can’t do that. Some debates completely change the landscape. Others don’t. Brian Mulroney clobbered John Turner in the 1984 leaders’ debate, then won the biggest majority of all time. But John Tory pretty clearly bested Dalton McGuinty in the 2007 Ontario leaders’ debate and it didn’t change the outcome of the election at all. Gerald Ford made the biggest blunder in presidential debate history (claiming the Soviets didn’t control Eastern Europe), and yet he only lost to Jimmy Carter by 1 per cent. Ya never know.
GN: What do you think of the debate format?
SP: I had fewer problems with the format, but more problems with the set layout. If both leaders are behind podiums, a long distance from the moderator, who is seated, the poor moderator is at a significant physical disadvantage if he’s trying to keep things under control. We saw that last night. When Mitt Romney kept talking over Jim Lehrer, he was in a physically commanding position to do so. And Lehrer is too much of a gentleman to tell him to shut up.
It’s why, even though many people didn’t think it looked prime ministerial enough, I liked it when all the leaders were seated at a table during the 2008 leaders’ debate. They were all close enough to me, which really helped me keep order.
GN: There are two more debates: a townhall and then one in a similar format to this one on foreign affairs. What does Romney need to do? What does Obama need to do?
SP: Well, these are questions for political scientists, and I’m not one of them. But for the president, he does have to show up. He didn’t last night.
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