New Obama Ad Out

I'm Back!

Hi, everyone! Sorry I was so quiet over the weekend. I was busy walking neighborhoods... IN LAS VEGAS! Yes, you may call me crazy. I walked in 100°F heat for Obama and for our endorsed Congressional candidate Dina Titus (NV-03).

I'll provide more details later. In the mean time, chat away. ;-)

Wow.

In my 50 years, I have never seen a campaign try to influence the moderator of a debate to ask easy questions because it obviously know its candidate isn't up to the other candidate:

First Two Tracking Polls of the Day

Rasmussen is out with his Monday tracking poll. He finds the race essentially static:

Obama 50
McCain 45

Rasmussen observes:

That’s the fourth straight day Obama has been at 50% and the fourth straight day McCain has been at either 44% or 45%

Research 2000/Daily Kos finds that Obama's position has improved since yesterday and since the debate:

Obama 51
McCain 42

DemFromCT comments about the new results:

On successive days, Obama was up +7 Fri, +9 Sat and +11 Sun (MoE +/- 5.1 for individual days.) That +11 yesterday (single day polling) was Obama's strongest single day of polling, and is reflective of the debate Friday.

A random thought

Let me tell you a little suspicion that I have. I think the Republicans aren't even trying this year. I think they want McCain to lose. I think they anticipate the next president will face such a colossal mess that the people will saddle us Democrats with the responsibility for their disaster for a generation.

Barack Obama is going to have to surprise them. Once we win this damned election, we have to save the country again like we did under Franklin Delano Roosevelt and turn the country blue for 50 years to come.

Campaign first

John McCain likes to run around crying, "Country first," but this week showed us what he instinctively puts first. There are several accounts now circulating across the web that tell us quite frankly what we had suspected from the first, that John McCain's quixotic antics last week displayed a willingness to try and save his campaign in the face of crashing poll numbers even if it meant wrecking the country.

Frank Rich yesterday wrote a searing article that describes the events that surrounded McCain's decision to "suspend" his campaign, trying both to reverse his terrible poll numbers and cover up Sarah Palin's disastrous interview with Katie Couric. Frank commences his must-read piece with the observation:

What we learned last week is that the man who always puts his “country first” will take the country down with him if that’s what it takes to get to the White House.

The Washington Post today in a piece aptly titled, Days of Chaos, Improvisation and Drama, chronicles how McCain last week lurched "from one strategy to the next, defensively reacting to events while trying to regain his footing." The article repeats the word, "lurch," over and over, and time and again refers to McCain's "disasters," born as the outcomes of his impetuous and imprudent improvisations. McCain did this apparently despite repeated requests that he butt out of the process. Markos this evening has a long post that describes how McCain was asked to refrain from interfering in the negotiation over the Bailout Bill but still ran through the process like a bull in a china closet.

I mean, really. The last eight years have been horrible. I truly believe the dictum that you will know a tree by the fruit it bears. We need to put this country back together again. If we somehow mysteriously elect John McCain our president, get ready for Mr. Toad's wild ride. This guy is erratic and will lurch from one disaster to the next without regard to anyone's interests but his own. Last week was his, "Alright, Mr. Demille, I'm ready for close-up," moment.

You want to know what a McCain presidency would be like? Just study his behavior last week.

The Oliphant cartoon the Washington Post won't print, but CNN still can laugh at the Palin interview

Michael Calderone reports The Washington Post declined to print this cartoon. I am glad "Saturday Night Live" wasn't shy about laughing at Palin's gibberish:



And neither were commentators at CNN shy about laughing at Governor Palin's interview with Katie Couric:

For your Sunday afternoon viewing enjoyment

Second two daily trackers are out

Diageo Hotline suggests that both Obama and McCain each declined one point from yesterday's polling:

Obama 47
McCain 42

Since the relative percentages yesterday were 48 and 43, Diageo Hotline indicates a stable five point race.

The interesting news for us Democrats, however, comes from Gallup Daily which shows Obama surging:

Obama 50
McCain 42

That's an eight-point spread where yesterday there was a five-point spread (49-44).

So to review, the four tracking polls show the following today:

Diageo Hotline: Obama, +5
Rasmussen: +6
Research 2000/Daily Kos: +7
Gallup Daily: +8

The McCain plan to change the campaign conversation

McCain senior adviser Steve Schmidt says that the McCain campaign is going to attempt to change the conversation from the economy to other topics. The two themes that they are going to attempt to inject into the national conversation are these:

One is that Obama is not ready to be commander in chief and that, in a time of two wars, "his policies will make the world more dangerous and America less secure." Second . . . McCain will argue that, in a time of economic crisis, Obama will raise taxes and spending and "will make our economy worse."

Okay, let's get this straight: The two themes that McCain has been running on throughout the campaign and have left him with a six- to seven-point deficit in the polls are the themes that McCain is going to "introduce" into the campaign.

Great. I have to ask Mr. Schmidt, and I hope I am not blowing your cover, are you a secret Obama operative?

The idea that these heretofore impotent themes are going to be veritable Viagra to the McCain campaign is contemptuously silly. Someone once defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

The McCain camp clearly does not understand what is happening in the country. Thank God, because I am foursquare for a Democratic victory in November.

They're getting pretty desperate

London's Sunday Times has an article today titled, "McCain camp prays for Palin wedding." The first two paragraphs read:

n an election campaign notable for its surprises, Sarah Palin, the Republican vice- presidential candidate, may be about to spring a new one — the wedding of her pregnant teenage daughter to her ice-hockey-playing fiancé before the November 4 election.

Inside John McCain’s campaign the expectation is growing that there will be a popularity boosting pre-election wedding in Alaska between Bristol Palin, 17, and Levi Johnston, 18, her schoolmate and father of her baby. “It would be fantastic,” said a McCain insider. “You would have every TV camera there. The entire country would be watching. It would shut down the race for a week.”

Yes, I am certain that just as Lady Diana's vows to love and honor Prince Charles riveted our attention all those decades ago, unwed mother Bristol and high school dropout Levi's wedding will mesmerize us and hold us in its thrall.

If this is their October surprise, I will be relieved.

First Two Tracking Polls of the Day are Out

Rasmussen has its percentages and margins from yesterday holding steady:

Obama 50
McCain 44

Rasmussen comments:

This six-point advantage matches Obama’s biggest lead yet and marks the first time he has held such a lead for two-days running.

Research 2000/Daily Kos also is up, and it shows that Obama improved his standing:

Obama 50
McCain 43

The numbers yesterday were Obama, 49 and McCain 43, so this is a one point increase. As you know, each of the tracking polls includes data from three days of findings, so the polls include two days prior to the debate and one day after the debate. Only Research 2000/Daily Kos reveals each day's individual results. DemFromCT observes:

Yesterday's polling, the first after the debate, was the strongest Obama day picked up by the R2K tracking poll. He led 51-42, and therefore, Obama had a +9 on Sa to go with +5 Th, +7 Fri.

While the three-day tally has a standard error of +/-3.0, the finding from any one day has a possible standard error of +/-5.1, so we shouldn't read too much into Saturday's individual findings.

New Polls Say that Obama Won the Debate

A USA Today/Gallup poll suggests Obama beat McCain in the debate on Friday night quite handily. Among viewers of the debate the percentage who said Obama won and the percentage who said McCain won were:

Obama 46%
McCain 34%

Rasmussen also polled the question, and though they found Obama the winner of the debate, their numbers made his win quite marginal:

Obama 36%
McCain 33%
Not Sure 31%

Saturday Night Live's

parody of Sarah Palin was devastating:

McCain thinks that a tied debate is a McCain win

John McCain offered a somewhat more candid assessment of his performance than the glowing comments his campaign has issued. Reporters overheard him say in a telephone call to a Republican congressman:

I was a little disappointed the media called it a tie, but I think that means when they call it a tie that means we win.

Frankly, I think that when an opponent I claim is my inferior proves he's at least my equal, he wins.