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David TrifunovOctober 10, 2012 13:19
Obama 'too polite' during first debate with Romney, he tells radio show
President Barack Obama tells Tom Joyner that he will be 'more active' in next two debates with Romney.
President Barack Obama tells Tom Joyner that he will be 'more active' in next two debates with Romney.
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US President Barack Obama (R) and Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney (L) shake hands moments before the start of the first presidential debate at Magness Arena at the University of Denver in Denver, Colorado, October 3, 2012. (SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images)
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President Barack Obama admitted during a radio interview that he was “too polite” during his first debate with Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney.
Speaking with the Tom Joyner Morning Show today, the president said he would be “a little more active” in the next encounter.
“It’s fair to say I was just too polite,” Obama said during the interview, a transcript of which is at Blackamericaweb.com.
“But, you know, the good news is, is that’s just the first one. Governor Romney put forward a whole bunch of stuff that either involved him running away from positions that he had taken, or doubling down on things like Medicare vouchers that are going to hurt him long term.”
More from GlobalPost: Romney can’t score knockout, but perhaps a turnaround
The next two presidential debates are scheduled for October 16 and 22, while the vice presidential debate between Joe Biden and Paul Ryan will take place Thursday.
When asked if he could reassure voters his campaign wasn’t flailing, the president suggested the race against Romney was never going to be easy.
That led Obama to take a couple of less-than-polite shots at his opponent.
“Governor Romney kept on making mistakes month after month, so it made it look artificially like this was, might end up being a cakewalk,” he told the radio host.
“But we understood internally that it never would be. That it was going to be tight, it tightened over the last three or four days, but it could have tightened after the convention if they hadn’t had such a bad convention.”
More from GlobalPost: Obama pokes fun at his debate during LA fundraiser
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/americas/united-states/121010/obama-too-polite-during-first-debate-romney-he-t
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