There's no question that many factors contribute to voters' perceptions about debates and who wins and who loses.

Every day I am being told to sign up for Tumblr, Yammer, Friendfeed, Plaxo, Last.fm, ping.fm or the hot social-media tool du jour that happened to get mentioned on Mashable.com. It is like a social-media arms race. Each one of these new tools is like a cool new night club. Hot today, gone tomorrow, replaced with something else.

I've spent the better part of my career in politics and public policy working on and fighting for education reforms.

Technology and social media have brought power back to the people.

Presidents should do whatever possible and practical to encourage an environment of cooperation and bipartisanship. And they should maintain a certain level of decorum, diplomacy and decency. But, at the end of the day, presidents get elected to enact change.

A messy participatory process is representative democracy at its best.

Elections are about the future. And the GOP will not win a campaign focused on the past.