By: Andrey Fedyashin, The first round of election TV debates ended in Denver on Wednesday. Judging by early opinion poll results, Obama has lost the first debate. This doesn’t mean he ought to surrender the White House to his Republican contender. Obama has lost the debate, not elections. But from now on, he will have to take on a much more confident Romney. The Voice of Russia’s Andrei Fedyashin reports. Romney has done what was expected of him. He has ‘returned’ to the election race after a series of failures. Obama has failed to outplay his Republican challenger. “When Governor Romney indicates that he wants to cut taxes and potentially benefit folks like me and him, and to pay for it we’re having to initiate significant cuts in federal support for education" “Mr. President, you’re entitled to your own airplane, your own house, but not your own facts. I'm not going to cut education funding. I don't have any plan to cut education funding.” If Romney had lost the debate, he would have been written off from the campaign list. However, the first express polls demonstrated that 65 per cent of viewers ascribe victory to Romney, while one fourth back Obama. Of all respondents, 35 per cent said that they would vote for Romney, 18 per cent said they would vote for Obama, and 47 per cent were undecided. Vyacheslav Nikonov of the Russian Foundation “Politika” believes that Romney has all but saved his election campaign. "In my opinion, Obamas defeat was not serious. History demonstrates that the incumbent president always loses the first debate. As a rule, the rival party, which finally gets a chance to face the president directly," has an edge. US analysts are still at odds about whether the TV debates can be trusted to gauge voter moods, or they are transient and could be false. In all likelihood, the latter sounds more plausible, particularly since nationwide opinion polls speak in favor of Obama. A debate victory doesn’t promise a victory in the presidential race. In 2004, Senator John Kerry outflanked George W. Bush by nearly 20 percent in the debates but to no avail. Obama’s campaign strategists must have got the presidential conduct scenario wrong. While Obama kind of waited for Romney to make lapses, the latter were making none and seemed better prepared for the campaign. Moreover, he was more aggressive and much more confident. As a result, Romney beat Obama on all debate points, including tax, medical service, pensions, budget deficit, unemployment and economic growth. But Obama is far from being on the losing side, Andrei Sidorov of the Moscow State University’s world politics department, says. "I don’t think that debates could radically change public moods, or reduce the current gap between Obama and Romney. I believe that Obama will win in the long run." As the election campaign intensifies, the main players and their strategists don’t stop short of using any means at their disposal. An American analyst has described this decisive stage of the election campaign as an “arms race”. The next TV debate between the two candidates will take place on October 16 and 22. Source: Voice of Russia
