Tis not the end of the world quite yet, folks:
http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/...
At the same time, incumbent presidents just aren’t that easy to defeat. Mr. Obama’s approval ratings are now hovering around 50 percent and don’t seem to have been negatively affected by his performance in Denver. Although Mr. Obama’s approval ratings may be slightly lower among those most likely to vote — meaning that Mr. Romney could win with a strong turnout — historically that number has been just good enough to re-elect an incumbent. (Mr. Bush’s approval ratings were in the same range late in 2004.)
In some ways, then, the election might not be quite so unpredictable as it appears. There was reason to believe that Mr. Obama’s numbers would fade some after his convention — and the first debate has quite often been a time when the challenger drew the race closer.
I'll just say this - I get that the President's debate performance did him no favors. But this idea that we're suddenly in a sprint and not a marathon is overly panicky. Let's not underestimate the competitive fire of Barack Obama - and let's not ignore the huge advantage he has in the ground game.