This was his message from the start of the primaries. Obama spent months successfully dismantling it. Then, for the much larger audience of the first debate, Obama let it all go. AND, in spite of his change of style, he still let it go in the second debate!
Romney started right off with:
I know what it takes to create good jobs again.
There was no comeback like
You've never created good jobs, not in Massachusetts where you finished 49th in job creation, and not at Baines where you made hundreds of millions for your investors from businesses which you closed or moved to China.
Yes, Obama got lots of good points in and "won" more rounds than Romney did. But Romney still successfully got his campaign message across within the first 3 minutes without any challenge. It's hard to see how that wasn't worth more votes than all of the rest of the debate put together.
It really reminds me of the Wisconsin recall campaign where the Republicans kept saying
He's doing what he said he would and it's working
for months. Even though both halves of that could easily be refuted, the Democrats seemed to be focused on their own message instead (as well as the idea that they could wait until after the primary to do it).
Oh well...
Note:
A similar diary by jplanner went up last night about not responding to Romney's claims to have worked across the aisle in Massachusetts:
Obama did GREAT but Romney was allowed to advance This argument last night-how do we help?