As commander in chief, i will maintain the Strongest Military in the world, keep faith with our troops and go after those who would do us harm, but after a decade of war, we all realize we have to do some nation building here at home. Weve been through tough times we always bounce back because of our character, because we pull together. If i have the privilege of being your president for another four years, i promise you i will always listen to your voices, i will fight for your families, and i will work every single day to make sure america continues to be the greatest nation on earth. Thank you. Bob, mr. President , folks at Lynn University. Good to be with you. Im optimistic about the future. Im excited about the prospects as a nation. I want to see peace. We have an opportunity to have real leadership. Americans will continue to promote principles of peace to make the world a safer place, and make people in this country more confident that their future is secure. I also want to make sure that we get this economy going. And there are two very different paths the country can take. One is a path represented by the president which at the end of four years would mean we would have 20 trillion in debt, heading toward greece. Ill get us on track to a balanced budget. The president s path will mean declining take home pay. I want to make sure take home pay turns around and starts to grow. The president s path means 20 million out of work struggling for a good job. Ill get people back to work with 12 million new jobs, i want to make sure we get people off food stamps, not by cutting the program but by cutting jobs. Americas going to come back, for that to happen, we are going to have to have a president who can work across the aisle. I was in a state where my legislature was 87 democrat, i learned how to get along on the other side of the aisle. We have to do that in washington. Washington is broken, i know what it takes to get this country back. Well work with good democrats and republicans to do that, this nation is the hope of the earth, weve been blessed by having a nation thats free and prosperous thanks to the contributions of the greatest generation that held a torch for the world to see, a torch of freedom, hope and opportunity. Now its our turn to take that torch. Im convinced well do, we need strong leadership. Id like to be that leader with your support. Ill work with you. Ill lead you in an open and honest way, and i ask for your vote. Id like to be the next president of the United States to support and help this great nation. And to make sure we all together maintain america as the hope of the earth. Thank you so much. Gentlemen, thank you both so much. That brings an end to this years debates. We want to thank Lynn University and its students for having us. As i always do at the end of these debates, i leave you with the words of my mom, who said, go vote. Makes you feel big and strong. Good night. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. [ applause ] a more civilized debate than the first debate. There were a few areas where they got into it, they fought over it. You can see the children up there, mitt romneys five sons, the wives, grandchildren are all there. Standing on the stage for a few minutes. This was a debate where they wound up agreeing, basically in terms of the big picture agreeing on a lot, libya, syria, even on china, basically the thrust was one of agreement, even now at times they had little rhetorical flourishes against each other. Its going to be interesting to see what happens as far as the vote is concerned. Our Fact Checkers are going through all the facts. Our focus group is taking a close look to see what they thought were minds changed as a result of this debate. Were going to have an instant poll coming up soon of people who watched this debate. Well continue to show these pictures. Candy crowley is on the scene. What did you think . I thought they came with very different agendas tonight. The president came to rough up mitt romney. I think he acted like a person that had to sort of stop some momentum. He went after him, youre all over the map, thats not what you said before, i mean, almost every single answer from the president had something to do with mitt romney. I feel as though mitt romney approached this like a position, first do no harm. He didnt come in to necessarily w win. I think he came in as a man whos had a certain amount of momentum over the last few weeks and not wanting to ruin it. I want to bring in James Carville democratic strategist. Ari fleischer is with us. Impressions . Its obvious that the president came to attack governor romney came to agree. It seems like that someone gave governor romney the same drug they gave the president before the first debate. He was trying to run the clock out, he agreed with me, i dont know how many times. He didnt have very much to say to tell you the truth. I dont this debate is going to change a thing about the trajectory of the race. Mitt romney has the momentum, you almost got the sense that the American People are so focused on the economy this cycle, Foreign Policy is not going to move people. I do think mitt romney had one goal in mind when he came here tonight. And that was to make sure he could appeal to women voters. He a tone about him. The president wanted to define him as the too muscular republican. Mitt romney wanted to define himself very differently. He was not going to be painted as a war monger. This debate didnt matter, the reason theyre going to say that, this debate was rowdy. You know what happened out there tonight. And ill give you credit for coming up with a good talking point. The public is it focused on the economy. I think weve all seen that and known it for a year. Stick with me. We want to go back to anderson. You certainly saw the advantage of being a sitting president and getting briefings for the last four years. The president is the commander in chief, he does this every day. Theres no question debate coaches would score this one for the president. However, i think its important, governor romney came in here not to push to the right, he pushed to the middle. The president has let governor romney move toward the center, the president challenged him more on that front. The question is, does this impact the race, all this talk about iran, afghanistan, libya and the like . I dont know. I thought both campaigns could come out of this happier tonight. In the early part of the debelate, i thought mitt romney did fairly well. President obama dominated the early part of the debate. The lines of the night . The bayonets. Exactly. I think mitt romney did something important, he passed the commander in chief test. I think it leaves a very competitive race, i dont know whether its going to tip it or not, as say, i think president obama has had two very good nights. I think by doing a very surprising thing, by coming at obama occasionally from his left to say, were not going to kill our way out of this, he avoided the trap of being the war monger, i think he did that successfully and came across as a responsible sounding commander in chief. Lets listen to one of the things mitt romney said tonight. Greatest threat of all is iran four years closer to a nuclear weapon. And were going to have to recognize that we have to do as the president s done, i congratulate him on taking out osama bin ladin and going after the leadership in al qaeda, we cant kill our way out of this mess. It is what he was saying is, are those the policies he would have as president . He seemed tore agreeing with president obama an awful lot. He actually, where he attacked him, he attacked him from the left, he said you dont have enough of Civil Society strategy. You dont have enough of an education strategy toward islamic extremism, youre just the cowboy. Whats strange here is, this was a version of what mitt romney did in the first debate. Romney surprised obama in the first debate by being more cen 2ri69, im not going to do anything to raise the deficits. Except this time obama was ready, and i think that david is exactly right, he knew how to effectively. Gloria, your point, lets hear one of the comebacks from president obama. I think governor romney hasnt spent a lot of time looking at how our military works. We have fewer ships in the navy than 1916. We also have fewer horses and bayonets. We have aircraft carriers, we have ships that go underwater, nuclear submarines. A little sarcastics. That was pretty brutal. An easy to come back from. Governor romney has used that for weeks now. Right. If there were a word cloud over mitt romneys head tonight it would have been peace. He emerged as the peace candidate. It was his strategy. My blackberry started buzzing from conservatives when mitt romney said troops out of afghanistan in 2014. Before this we had been hearing, okay, the generals on the ground have to make the decision. His point tonight was the troops are getting ready for 2014. General mcgovern has risen again . Is there was a very clear romney strategy tonight. That is in a country that thinks were on the wrong track, headed the wrong way abroad. We see the world on fire. We want change. And mitt romney is safe change. He was make change safe. He was hugging obama, where they agreed, being a reasonable republican. Who came in on the attack tonight . Barack obama. Why do you attack . Because youre behind. And tonight we saw a very aggressive obama who used the same strategy as in the second debate, attack. It didnt help him in the second debate. I think he won tonight on points, barack obama, no doubt. But the political win tonight, romneys momentum, if he has it in ohio, is undimmed tonight. He passed the leadership test, hes a safe republican, thats not the opponent that barack obama has been planning for a year to run against in just a couple weeks. I thought that he did not pass the commander in chief test. I thought he sat there and looks sort of out of his depth often, he was kind of sweating, kind of nixonian style. I thought he was out of his depth. And then he changed his position on so many things. I brought my etchasketch to keep track of all the times he changed his position. He changed on iraq, afghanistan. This is, i think the only memorable thing that he said was that great line about we cant kill our way out. But again, that was from the left. Obama made thats not from the left, lets clear that up. Ill finish my point, you finish your point. Obama made important points for people in ohio, he said, if we listen to you, sir. We would be buying cars from china instead of selling cars to china. Obama improved his game, i thought romney collapsed tonight. Can we make one point, though, that democrats are not the only people who think we cant kill our way to a Peaceful World . That republicans actually arent for killing a lot of people. That republicans think if you have peace through strength, a stronger nation, you can avoid problems throughout the world . Saying that because strength is important to project and to be able to extend across the world. Republicans say, we should fund more Civil Society. Arab scholars at the United Nations. All those words were going to have a lot more from our panel obviously, lets go back to wolf right now. Our expert team of producers, researchers, reporters, theyve been very busy throughout the course of these 90 minutes trying to figure out if the candidates were telling the truth. John is ready with our first reality check after this debate. John . One of the first heated moments is when they spard over troops in iraq. President obama claimed mitt romney said the u. S. Should still have some troops there. You say youre not interested in duplicating what happened in iraq. But just a few weeks ago, you said you think we should have more troops in iraq right now. What are the facts here . In 2011 romney said this, we should have left 10,000, 20,000, 30,000 personnel there to help transition to the iraqis own military capabilities, and then just a couple weeks ago, he said, americas ability to influence for the better in iraq hadden undermine by the abrupt withdrawal by our entire troop presence. Our vert is, true with important conte context. Coming up, this is the important context, on iraq, mitt romney claimed president obama was looking to keep some troops there as well. Which the president denied. You and i agreed there should have been a status of forces agreement. What i would not have done is left 10,000 troops in iraq that would tie us down. That would not help us in the middle east. What are the facts here . Well, leon panetta was negotiated to keep 3,000 to 5,000 troops in iraq, within a status of forces agreement. This fell apart over the issue of weather u. S. Troops would have certain immunity from prosecution. Our verdict from what mitt romney says is mostly true. The president was willing to leave some troops in iraq the forces agreement negotiation collapse. Theres a result all u. S. Troops out of iraq. Good initial reality check, john, thanks very much. Jessica yellin, jim acosta are joining us as well. Lets go to jessica first. You have a guest . I do. Im with david axelrod, one of the most senior advisers in the Obama Campaign. The president asked mitt romney, the navy, he compared it to bayen ets and horses. Now, already the Romney Campaign is saying this can be put to use in their benefit in norfolk and portsmouth. Important swing areas. Did the president hand him an open something. Thats the way they think about all these policies. They think about it in very narrow political terms. They said, we dont have 2 trillion extra to spent on defense, that the pentagon isnt asking for. And we have other needs in terms of rebuilding our country and in terms of our National Defense. We have to have a National Defense for the 21st century. We dont need the navy of 1916, because we have aircraft carriers and submarines, we have a modern 21st century, strategic scheme that he is unaware of. I think this was just the whole night was a case of a president whos a strong decisive commander in chief who knows what he believes, says what he believes, is consistent in his beliefs. And governor romney who is wrong and reckless and all over the place. This was a rather decisive evening. At one point the president said that to sequester, which is this big fiscal cliff were facing at the end of the year, he said its not going to happen. Are there secret talks going on . How can he be sure . When people vote on november 6th and the president is reelected, a strong message will be sent that the American People want a balanced approach to solving this problem, there are plenty of people on both sides who want to get that done, and will get that done. We cant get it done if you take the position that governor romney has taken, which is, were not going to ask for one extra dollar from any american no matter howellthy to solve this problem, there isnt a person who knows anything about this, who suggests we can do it, if we did, it would wreck our economy and retard our ability to grow. It would be disastrous. The president understands there are partners there for him. But the American People are going to put this imprint on this issue on november 6th. David axelrod, thanks very much. The obama team is feeling very good about this debate in this hall dont. And a big relief all around from them. Thanks very much. Jim acosta has a special guest as well, jim . Im with ohio senator rob portman. I want to ask you about an exchange that happened at the end of the debate. It was over the auto bailout for the car industry. The president reminding viewers about the op ed letting detroit go bankrupt. Mitt romney said i never said i would liquidate the industry. The president said you cant air brush the history. Did he not say he opposed the auto bailout. Thats great for us to get the issue out. The facts are, its president obama who took the Auto Companies through bankruptcy. Governor romney advocated that policy as well. He also advocated government help for the Auto Companies to get them back on their feet. What he didnt advocate is leave a lot of people out of retirement. He also shut down a lot of dealerships, picking and choosing, which ones would be closed or not. He chose to close two auto plants, also were still at about 20 billion if you were to have the bailout go into effect, the Auto Industry as it stood at that time would cease to exist . Not, not at all. Just the opposite. Just like macys, just like 7eleven werent through bankruptcy. He opposed the bailout . No, he wanted to do it sooner, president obama waited to do it later, he didnt want the government to play a central role in picking winners and losers. Very quickly on Foreign Policy, mitt romney agreed with the president on the killing of osama bin ladin, the use of drones and in afghanistan withdraw by 2014. After he criticized the president in the course of the year, it sounded like he agreed a lot with the president tonight . Where he agreed with the president , he said so. I think that was refreshing to a lot of viewers who are watching, including a lot of undecided voters. He also laid down very clear which the president did not do. I thought it was a great night for mitt romney. He was thoughtful, knowledgeable. The president did not sink his battle ship . He certainly did not. I think if anything, mitt romney seemed like the guy who was more ready to be commander in chief. He was more president ial. Thank you, appreciate it. Wolf, well send it back to you. Soledad obrien was watching with a group of uncommitted worker workers. How did it go . If you were watching on tv, you saw those squiggly lines. That was our focus group of watchers. They dialled up if they liked it. Down if they didnt. Roughly divided. 12 women, 13 men. Were crunching the final data right now. I should say, two professors at smu are crunching the data. At the beginning when the debate veered off Foreign Policy and went to education. Both men were talking about education, acting as if they were still talking about Foreign Policy, we saw a lot of people in our focus group, realizing they had veered off the topic. President obama got in a dig about mitt romney saying the navy was the smallest since 1916. He said, we have fewer horses and bayonets as well. We got some big laughs out of the crowd. Im going to start with them if i can. Often in the media we talk about moments. I think its just part of the game to keep you away from the f