(CNN) -- Groups of graduate students who hang out at The Partisan, an indie band bar near the University of California-Merced campus, like their liquor and their politics straight up. Many of them felt they only got one of those things after watching the debate between President Barack Obama and Republican nominee Mitt Romney on Wednesday night. "I don't know what universe Romney is living in," said Beth Hernandez-Jason, a doctoral student in American Latino literature. "I was kicked off my parents' health insurance by age 25 as was my little sister and she was reinstated because of the changes in the health care system."
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Merced, California, has one of the nation's highest foreclosure and unemployment rates
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Debate watchers in that city wanted the candidates to lay out plans for the economy
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Many felt Romney's polices were off track and Obama's performance fell flat
In an area that some residents call @placeholder's "fruit basket," the housing crisis has further compounded the area's woes.