Quote of the Week (with updates)

"Wednesday’s presidential debate promises sharp contrasts. One candidate wants to repeal Obamacare, one candidate invented it. One opposed the auto industry bailout, one takes credit for it. One doubts the scientific consensus about climate change, one believes in it. One wants to 'voucherize' Medicare, one wants to save it. One dismisses nearly half of Americans as a bunch of moochers, and one claims to champion the struggling middle class.

"It promises to be an epic clash: Mitt Romney vs. Mitt Romney. Oh, and President Obama will be there, too."

- Eugene Robinson

By the way, here is a question that I hope will be asked at tomorrow's debate: "Gov. Romney, how does your economic plan differ from what George W. Bush did when he was president?"

In fact, this is such an obvious line of inquiry that I'm certain Romney has prepared an answer, but I still would like to hear the question asked.

UPDATE: And speaking of debates, this is interesting:

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) insisted Monday night that he didn't support the budget sequester put into place last summer that Congress is now trying to get out of. But, well, he did vote for it.

During a debate with his Democratic challenger Wayne Powell, Cantor blamed President Barack Obama for pushing through a debt deal in August 2011 that included a $1.2 trillion sequester, or a trigger for automatic, across-the-board spending cuts set to kick in at the end of this year. The sequester was never intended to take effect. It was supposed to spur lawmakers to come up with a better way to cut trillions in spending. But Congress failed to come up with a bipartisan plan, so the possibility of the sequester taking effect now looms.

Barack Obama is a pretty good politician, but insisting on the sequester may have been his most savvy political move yet. It is giving the GOP fits. As Andrew Sullivan noted in a recent Newsweek article:

Obama’s long game was designed for this climactic moment. When it became clear last summer that a grand bargain was impossible, Obama cut a deal that would put the Pentagon, the Bush tax era, and popular entitlements simultaneously on the chopping block after the election, a combo, understandably dubbed Taxmageddon, that could very well tip the U.S. economy back into recession. Romney now says he regrets the deal. He is right to. It gives a reelected Obama maximal leverage in a period when a critical decision really has to be made. If the GOP refuses to budge, they lose two of their most treasured policies: big defense spending and Bush’s tax legacy. And they could be blamed for the resulting economic damage. In some ways, Obama’s second term could be fiscally defined by the last two months of his first.

If Obama wins reelection, then the last couple months of this year could be very interesting politically. The GOP's Pact With The Devil -- namely, Grover Norquist's anti-tax pledge -- will be put to the test in a big way.

UPDATE II: A few other people also want the "How would your economic policies differ from Bush's?" question asked at tomorrow's debate.  Ed Kilgore thinks Obama should use the line as a "zinger," but I believe it would be more effective if it was an actual question asked by the moderator.  It's one of those tough questions that would cut right through the Romney/Ryan horseshit.