2012 Presidential Debate: Jim Lehrer

This past Wednesday, the presidential candidates Mitt Romney and Barack Obama had their first 2012 Presidential Debate in Denver, Colorado with Jim Lehrer moderating. Jim Lehrer is an American journalist and a former PBS anchor who has been honored with many journalism awards. (Read more background information of Lehrer here) This past presidential debate was his 12th debate as a moderator. However, his moderation of the 2012 debate has received many tough reviews. Even before the Presidential debate ended Wednesday night, the social media Twitter was ablaze with criticism of Lehrer's performance. A review of Lehrer by USA Today says that, "Lehrer lost control, early and often. But just as clearly, he had a goal beyond presiding over a tightly structure debate-- which was to stay out of the way as much as possible and make the candidates run the debate themselves" (To read more of USA Today's review of Jim Lehrer click here). As stated by USA Today, Jim Lehrer was very insistent upon letting the candidates speak and staying out of the flow of the debate. Lehrer even says a moderator should be like a "baseball umpire, get out of the way and let the candidates speak" (The Washington Times). However, many believe this moderating philosophy left the debate wandering from surface point to surface point. So what do you think of Jim Lehrer's performance? If Jim Lehrer were not the moderator, would the debate have played out differently or more focused? Would the candidates had said anything differently or had said anything more?