Both the Obama and Romney camps have been pretty actively engaged in trying to set a low bar for their respective candidates for the upcoming presidential debates starting this week. Adding on to the ‘President Obama has had no time to prepare and Mitt Romney is a simply fantastic debater’ rhetorical dogpile, the DNC let it be known that they believe Mitt Romney will indeed be the victor of the first debate:

Woodhouse says the way the DNC sees it, challengers win the first debate when they are up against incumbents.

“Mitt Romney has had a lot more time to debate, the president has not debated in the past four years in terms, of a campaign debate. I think the president will hold his own, but he’s not known for sound bites. And these are 60 second, 90 second responses.”

Obama adviser David Plouffe said much the same thing on ABC this morning: “[Romney]’s been a good debater in the past, he’s very prepared, he’s all these clever zingers and lines in his pocket, so we understand he’ll probably have a good night on Wednesday night,” he said.

Funnily enough, Republican New Jersey Governor Chris Christie would pretty much agree that statement.

We have a candidate who is going to do extraordinarily well on Wednesday night. … I’ve seen Mitt Romney do this before. He’s gonna’ come in Wednesday night, he’s going to lay out his vision for America, he’s going to contrast what his view is and what the president’s record is, and the president’ view for the future, and this whole race is going to turn upside down come Thursday morning. … What he’s going to be doing on Wednesday night is not going to be filtered by anybody. … The American people are going to get 90 minutes to look these two men right in the eye in their living rooms, and make a judgment on their vision for the future…

As Jazz already wondered earlier today, it remains to be seen whether or not people will actually tune into the debates en masse and, if they do, whether anything short of some revelatory bombshell will actually manage to move the needle in either direction. But, as Christie points out, maybe Team Romney should have a little more reason to show some more confidence — wouldn’t want to get cocky or anything, but when paired face-to-face with President Obama’s distraction-peddling, Mitt Romney’s big-picture free-market vision has truth and righteousness on its side. If he can lay it out correctly, then win the “domestic issues” debate, he shall.