“Who is this guy?” tens of millions of American voters asked themselves last night. “This isn’t the Mitt Romney the media’s presented to me over the last six months.”

Free of the corrupt media’s filter; free of the spin, the lying fact-checkers, the gotchas, and the desperate effort to cover up any and all bad news that might hurt Obama — by every standard, every measure, every opinion, and every opinion poll, what we witnessed last night at the first presidential debate of 2012 was a commanding, dominating blow-out performance by Governor Mitt Romney.

Last night the GOP contender showed up to kick butt and chew bubblegum, but unfortunately for Barack Obama, Romney was all out of bubblegum. The real loser, though, was a corrupt mainstream media that had just spent months desperately crafting a Mitt Romney that doesn’t exist — a Mitt Romney voters would not find acceptable as president.

We’ve all seen what’s happened month after month after month after month: Obama’s Media Palace Guards have assured us that Romney can do nothing right and Obama can do nothing wrong. This carefully crafted media game-plan (coordinated openly with the Obama campaign) was meant to strip Romney of the single quality voters demand in a president, and that’s competence. If you’re not competent, you’re not an acceptable alternative, which means we’re going to vote for “the devil we know.”

But last night all of this blew up in the media’s face, and this morning the American people trust the media even less than they did the night before — and for one very simple reason: they were lied to … again. Where was the bumbling, elitist, out of touch, awkward, wife-killing, gay-hating, corporate vulture who tortures dogs and stumbles through Europe like Chevy Chase in a “Vacation” sequel?

Well, he didn’t show up last night because that’s not who Mitt Romney is. That Mitt Romney is a media creation manufactured out of lies and desperation by those who spend 24 hours a day crafting trip wires, fabricating gaffes, and standing before the elephant of Barack Obama’s failures and asking, “What elephant?”

For all of moderator Jim Lehrer’s flaws last night, the 78-year-old semi-retired PBS newsman did the only thing we conservatives ask of the media: he mostly stayed out of the way and offered up a fairly level playing field. There were no gotcha questions and no What about your gaaaaaffes? To his great credit (though he did try to rescue the president more than once), Lehrer kept the debate in an arena no liberal can win in –and that’s on the issues.

Unlike his cretin colleagues, Lehrer was actually interested in the issues that matter. So he asked about taxes, job creation, education, the deficit, and an overall governing philosophy. In other words, he didn’t stack the deck to distract from what a horrible philosophy big government liberalism really is. With a rare opportunity like this, if you’re smart, prepared and all out of bubblegum, a conservative can win any debate. Obviously, Mitt Romney not only won last night, he delivered the kind of satisfying drubbing to Barack Obama we conservatives have been waiting four years to savor.

Yes, someone finally was given and took full advantage of the opportunity to point to that little emperor and say to the world, “Look, he’s naked!”

And now the lying, biased, corrupt, degenerate mainstream media has a problem on its hands. Because now the whole world knows that they were not only pointing to clothes that didn’t exist but also attempting to destroy anyone who dared cry “Naked!”

In ninety short but delicious and unforgettable minutes, Mitt Romney not only exposed President FailureTeleprompter as the churlish, entitled failure he truly is — he also destroyed the caricature our thoroughly corrupted media institutions had built around him.

Romney’s commanding victory was Reaganesque, and so is the result. In 1980, the media did everything in its power to scare voters away from Ronald Reagan by portraying him as a scary warmonger. But during his first and only debate with then-President Jimmy Carter, Reagan proved the media a liar.

This is exactly what Romney did last night, but unfortunately, he has two more debates ahead of him. This means that the media has two more kicks at the cat to rescue Obama, and Romney had better be prepared, because the push is already on to ensure he is asked, What about your gaaaafffes?

Even though Obama enjoyed four more minutes to speak than Romney, immediately after last night’s debate, the left marched in unison to blame the moderator for not controlling things enough. And this makes perfect sense. Leftists know they can’t win on a level playing field. But if the referee takes control, victory can be had!

This means that for the two upcoming debates, Romney had better be prepared for questions about his dog, Bain, gaffes, wealth, taxes, high school bullying, perfect hair, the mole that wasn’t there before, and his disastrously racist victory over Obama in the last debate.

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC