By Michael Kaufman

I’m glad the president showed up for the second debate. At the first one he reminded me of a boxer approached by a mobster before a big fight and told to go in the tank or else something terrible would happen to his children.  (I’m not joking: For the first time in years I thought of the chilling book Weigh-in: The Selling of a Middleweight  [1975 ] by former middleweight contender Fraser Scott.) Most people think Obama won this one, which is fine by me.  Romney’s bully-boy tactics, which served him well in the first debate, fell flat when Candy Crowley—unlike Jim Lehrer—refused to roll over and play dead.

I like the “Town Hall” format that allows audience members to ask questions directly to the candidates. I’m not sure how they decide who gets to be in the audience and who gets to ask the questions though. Some sort of screening takes place beforehand, which makes things a lot less interesting.  I would have liked to see an audience member ask Romney why he is afraid to show more of his tax returns, for example. What doesn’t he want voters to see?  Then the president might say, “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”

And I would have liked to see someone ask the president why on earth he is waiting until 2014 to bring the troops home from that futile and murderous war in Afghanistan? Have we learned nothing from history?

Surely someone should have asked Romney about the Sensata employees (and their families, friends, and neighbors in Freeport, Ill, now dubbed “Bainport”)  who don’t understand why Bain is closing the plant after a year of record profits and, yes,  moving production to China. Is this what you call job creation, Mr. Romney? How does this square with all your complaints about China’s “cheating” and “not playing by the rules?” Would you consider using your influence with your pals at Bain so they keep the plant in Freeport?

Mr. President, I liked your explanation about eliminating the “middle man” (private banks) so  student loans can be offered at a lower interest rate and at payoff terms more favorable to hard-pressed borrowers. Why not call for doing the same thing with health care? Eliminate the middle man (private insurance companies) and have a single payer system that comes out of the general tax fund? Healthcare costs will be lower and the onus will no longer be on employers, large and small, to provide health insurance to employees. Speaking of which, why do you let Romney get away with the spurious argument that “Obamacare” is responsible for the rising health costs that deters businesses from hiring fulltime people? This trend has been going on for all the years that healthcare costs have been skyrocketing. That’s why Walmart hires so many part-time workers; it’s a major cause of outsourcing.  You are right when you say that the cost has gone up by a smaller percentage since passage of the Affordable Care Act—but it was already too high, so  that isn’t exactly going to impel companies to start hiring again. (Don’t worry about being called a socialist: the opposition already has you pegged as a non-citizen, secret Muslim, Black militant reincarnation of Joseph Stalin anyway.)

Mr. Romney, how can you say you want to create “good paying” jobs when you and your fellow Republicans refuse to raise the minimum wage? It is so low now that anyone working full time for those wages cannot support a family. Won’t raising the minimum wage help achieve your goal of reducing the the number of families who have to rely on food stamps?

I can think of many more questions for the candidates between now and Election Day. But now, dear Zest readers, it’s your turn. If you were to have an opportunity to ask a couple of questions of the candidates, what would they be?

Michael can be reached at michael@zestoforange.com.