Weigel weighs in:

What Losers Look Like

This is what losing looks like: five stoic strategists for the Obama campaign camped out in the spin room. They do not deny that Mitt Romney just beat the president on all the points that count in TV debates. How can they, when even the foreign press, heavy in accent and fond of existential questions, keeps asking why the president blew it? In one corner stands David Plouffe, the president’s chief strategist, fielding question after question about optics.

“Why wasn’t the president more aggressive?” asks a dark-suited man with a Swedish accent.

“The president did exactly what he had to do,” says Plouffe. “He talked in very deep specifics about the economy, about jobs, about Medicare. That’s why he had a good debate tonight.”

“Would you agree that he was too low-key?” asks a Japanese reporter.

“No!” says Plouffe. “I would not agree with that at all! He did what he had to do. He had a very clear message to the American people.”

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