While pundits and Obama supporters were moaning Thursday morning about how Mitt Romney gained momentum by aggressively going after the president in their first debate, fact-checkers were busy sorting out the truth from half-truth from outright inaccuracies.

Romney, it appears, certainly had more swagger, but Obama had stronger command of the facts.

The Republican nominee rejected parts of his own tax plan, denying he intended to increase tax breaks only for the rich. He also failed to respond with details when asked where he would get the money from to cut taxes for all Americans, increase defense spending and not increase the deficit.

His quick answer was he would put more Americans to work in better paying jobs, which would mean more people paying taxes, which would help close the gap.

Romney’s advisers before the debate essentially told him to stick with jabbing the president, tagging Obama with the still struggling aspects of the economy and not get mired down in the details. Leave the policy wonk patter to Obama and appeal to emotion.

Clearly, the plan worked, at least for a night.
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In an interview last month, David Bositis, a senior political analyst at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, said that Obama and the Democrats had not done a good job of making clear how the Romney plan would hurt Americans, especially the poor and people of color, even during Obama’s acceptance of the Democratic Party’s nomination at this year’s convention.

The Democrats, Bositis said, did a terrible job, “including Obama—his worst performance is not talking about how much he’s done…”

Read more at the Atlanta Black Star.