"Raison d'être" is a French term that means "reason for existence". A "Tell" is a poker term for the subconscious actions or mannerisms that give away ones hand.
Throughout the campaign, the Romney ticket has focused largely on the state of the economy as defined by the official unemployment rate published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). That is, the economy is bad because unemployment is high. They could have focused on sluggish GDP, on the types of jobs created, or a host of other factors - but they didn't. They have painted themselves in a box. This probably looked like a winning strategy in the spring as the economy appeared to slow, but over the summer, things began to tick up. We saw it in such indicators as auto sales, consumer confidence, and the stock market - and are now seeing it in tax receipts. For the past few months, it seemed as if there were positive signs all around us, even the non-governmental employment surveys looked to be picking this up. ADP (the private payroll survey) was showing 50,000 - 75,000 more jobs per month than the government survey, and Gallup was showing an unemployment rate at 7.9% even while the government survey (BLS) was at 8.1%. It was only a matter of time until we saw a pick-up in the government numbers - the only thing we didn't know was when.
Now for the Tell. Politico had a story of the concern on the Romney plane Friday morning after the Jobs numbers. On a day they should have been euphoric, there was concern. Mitt's campaign was on life support before the debate. There was no energy, the polls were horrible, and big donors were defecting. By Thursday morning, his campaign was in the best shape it had been since before the Republican Convention. So why the grave concern? The good jobs report came 2 months too early for them. Yes, 7.8% is still to high, but there is a growing consensus that things are getting better, and getting better at an accelerating pace - they had just lost their Raison d'être and they knew it!