Secretary of Explaining Things

The first presidential debate between Messrs. Romney and Obama affected the media's election narrative but did little to provide the average voter with a substantive understanding of key issues.

The widespread and bipartisan media consensus is that Mitt Romney won Wednesday's first presidential debate.  A somnolent President Obama spent most of his time on stage looking down at his podium, handing an easy victory on appearances to the guy who dissed Big Bird. What was reinforced to me, though, is that these debates -- barring the emergence of a popular caricature of one of the candidates -- are aimed at influencing the media's election narrative, not at voters.

These debates are supposed to elucidate a candidate's positions and to help voters distinguish between their choices.  But in practice, we're not given much to work with.  The candidates present what seem like "Mad Libs", random numbers without context or explanation ("4 million jobs" from energy independence; "2 million more slots in our community colleges"; a "$5 trillion tax cut"; "$2 trillion in additional military spending"; a "$4 trillion deficit reduction plan").  The result is empty speechifying, not debating.  And in a generally polite encounter without memorable "zingers" from either man, my eyes were glazing over.

America's Forgotten Poor

Scant attention has been paid to the record rise of poverty levels in America.

Click graphic above to see a detailed breakdown on poverty in the U.S. (Source: NPR)

Mitt Romney and Barack Obama and their campaigns have spent much of this election season tripping over themselves to appeal to all-important middle-class voters.  During the political conventions, Ann Romney spoke about how she and her husband once lived in a tiny apartment using an ironing board as a table.  She didn't note that they were living off of Mitt's investment income -- hey, he was the son of a multimillionaire governor -- while Mitt finished his studies.  Michelle Obama told a story about how when she began dating Barack his car was "rusted out" and had a hole in the door.  She skirted the fact that the pair met while working for a prestigious Chicago law firm.

The point here isn't to attack either candidate for their typical stretched "we're just like you" spiel, but to draw attention to the entire large segment of the populace that no one is overly concerned with winning over: the poor.  Over 15% of Americans, nearly 50 million people, live at or below the poverty line, defined as $23,000 for a family of four.  While much election-year rhetoric concerns the tax burden of the rich, or who is the real champion of the middle class, little more than lip service is paid to the lower rungs of our society.

No Easy Way

Faced with limited options in dealing with the latest spike in unrest in the Middle East, and the inability to effectively control the situation, the Obama administration is right to have a measured response.

AFP

I've seen the infamous anti-Muslim video Innocence of Muslims, and it's almost impossible to believe that this is the symbolic center of the biggest geopolitical crisis of the year.  It's a nonsensical jumble of scenes that don't form a cogent movie or trailer, and has the production value of an elementary school play.  Actors in cheap Halloween costumes and brownface, their spoken lines badly dubbed over with incongruous voices to spout inscrutable references to Mohammed, and crude allusions to homosexuality and rape -- one would think such a video would be left to languish in total obscurity on a corner of the Internet... and yet, here we are.

But this video isn't really what's fueling the latest round of unrest in the Arab world.  Hardly anyone has actually watched the film, but the masses are appalled at the very idea of their religion being disrespected.  Meanwhile, certain groups have seized upon this video as a pretext to achieve their own goals of whipping up anti-Americanism and fomenting violence.  Protests (albeit of limited size) are currently raging throughout North Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia; tragically, last Tuesday the Ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens, was killed along with three other Americans at the consulate in Benghazi.  The attack may have been a calculated terrorist strike that took advantage of the chaos.  Meanwhile, Israel has sounded fresh alarm bells over Iran's progress with its nuclear program, with President Benjamin Netanyahu urging the U.S. to deal with Iran while threatening to attack first himself.  Amidst this maelstrom, the Obama administration has acted with restraint, commendably withstanding the high political pressure and bias toward doing something.