This year's presidential debates may actually settle something.
A pair of new polls- one from the Washington Post and ABC News, and the other from Politico and George Washington University- each show President Obama leading Mitt Romney 49% to 47%. The ABC News- Washington Post poll, however, shows Mr. Obama with an 11-point lead in the swing states.
It should be borne in mind that the polls this year have been widely criticized for an abnormaly high percentage of the voters being polled who are Democrats.
In any event, Wednesday night's debate is crucial for Romney. He has to do what he thus far has not done- effectively answer the Obama campaign's systematic misrepresentation of his positions on taxes, Medicare, and other issues- and show himself to be a viable alternative to President Obama.
The conventional wisdom is that debates don't, as a rule, change anybody's mind, and all of the polls show a smaller-than-normal number of voters who are still undecided, in any case. But in an election this close, 2012 could prove to be an exception. And seldom will a candidate have as many potential "there you go again!" moments as Mitt Romney will have Wednesday night.
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