Obama Campaign Still 'Shell-Shocked' By Obama Debate Performance

President Barack Obama may have already been rattled, as Sarah Palin suggested on Thursday, in the days leading up to his disastrous debate with Mitt Romney on Wednesday because of a potential campaign finance scandal. 

But even if the Obama campaign had been consumed with blocking a story in the works by a national news outlet about potential illicit overseas campaign donations, as a Washington Examiner report indicated, advisers still did not think Obama would perform as terribly as he did when sharing a stage with Romney.  

“At least two” Obama advisers told The Daily Beast they were “shell-shocked” by Obama’s performance.

And former Obama Chief of Staff William Daley told the news outlet that many had assumed Obama would win, and Romney’s victory allowed people to give his candidacy a second look because opinion is “he had an extremely good night.”

Obama advisers are also worried that Romney’s victory would launch “a new media narrative declaring a Romney comeback, and a tightening of the race.”