The president proved that he was not catatonic, and that he actually wanted to be reelected, which is something given where he was after the first debate. But I suspect that this debate as a whole left many undecided voters with a sense that they are not alone in being disappointed with Obama, and that Romney is offering something for the future while Obama is offering nothing new.

◼ The Second Debate - Yuval Levin/National Review Online

The questions in Tuesday night’s town-hall debate... were, on the whole, questions from disappointed Democrats. That didn’t necessarily advantage one candidate over the other: It meant some of the subjects taken up in the debate heavily favored Obama but it also meant that the tone of the questioners was almost uniformly disappointed with Obama, which is probably the most dangerous of all attitudes for the incumbent president... Many of the questions were about the sorts of things liberals would want debates to be about.