Prime Time is Obama Time

At 8 p.m. this evening, 37 minutes before the Phillies take the field for the second half of their potentially Series-clinching game, Barack Obama will talk to the American public for half an hour on all major networks save ABC. The newspapers are calling it an "infomercial," and saying it targets the everyman. McCain and other Republicans are attacking Obama, calling it presumptuous and arrogant and oversaturation. But they kind of have to say that, since McCain doesn't have the money to respond in kind, and even Republican strategists agree that - even if it is overkill - it's still a huge advantage for Obama.

Pollster.com continues to show solidifying stability in the race for Obama. The notable exception - today - is Pennsylvania, where there appears to be some slight narrowing. But that doesn't mean McCain is suddenly within the margins. Obama remains up by 8 or 9 points, and over 50%, which keeps it a very high liklihood that Obama will win (98%, according to Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight.com).

The main point of this post, though, is to refer you to a fantastic piece by the Politico editors about why McCain is "getting hosed" among the press, which he once referred to as "his base." Thoughtful, whimsical and self-deprecating, this editorial examines Politico and the greater media, and explains why bias among reporters is rarely to blame for anything. in the news The fact is, in this instance, that McCain is losing. Writing pieces about how even the race is would be not only irresponsible, it would be inaccurate. When it comes to the fact that McCain has been criticized more for negative ads than Obama, the editors are candid that, on one front, this is not fair. Obama runs a lot of negative ads, too, and he has gotten less criticism than McCain from the press. But there is an additional element, as well: McCain denounced these same tactics harshly when they were used against him 8 years ago. Hypocrisy or evolution, it makes the story more compelling than one about Obama, who has always (read: for the last 14 months) combined soaring rhetoric with sharp elbows. A more compelling story will be reported more. Likewise, the fact that McCain used to be an open, accessible, unconventional candidate and is now, well, not, makes his transformation interesting to reporters, many of whom saw him in both states. One can say the reporting is uneven or even unfair, but it was hardly unforseeable.

The best exposition in the editorial is about the major driver of stories being reporter boredom. This is absolutely true. The one unstoppable force of political journalism is monotony; reporters want a new story, and so they will find one. Is it bias? Maybe a certain type of it, but not an uneven one. Anyway, the story is great and you should read it.

Aside from that, there are few major changes. Georgia, Mississippi and Kentucky all have Senate races where powerful and senior Republicans are in dead heats with challengers, but remain slightly ahead. Alaska's Ted Stevens lost his corruption trial, so he'll probably lose to Mark Begich, which I've been thinking was going to happen anyway. He says he's innocent and he'll keep fighting. Good luck with that.

McCain's pollster is on MSNBC now sounding very confident that he thinks the race is "functionally tied," by which he means within the margins. He says his thinking is based on an expected break among undecideds toward the Republican party, which he says historically happens. Neat idea. Shame pollster.com beat you to it, and you're wrong. But neat idea. As I've written at length in some navel-gazing posts, it is entirely possible he's right and this is way closer than we think. It is, however, not possible that there is independent data to back him up.

Come to think of it, it's been strange how little campaign news there's been. Since Powell's endorsement, there has been nothing to qualify as even close to the media-mandated October surprise. And when an endorsement is your biggest news of an election October, you have no big news. I don't know if the Obama thing tonight will change that, but it seems to me unlikely. If this ends the way it looks right now, McCain supporters will have a strong case to make that the tanking economy just made it impossible for their candidate to ever have a fighting chance.

8 Days Out

So as I lay the groundwork to go to Philadelphia tonight and watch the Phillies hopefully win the World Series, the political talk at the moment is all about 8 days not being a lot of time for John McCain.

While I do not believe the race is over, things do not look good for a McCain campaign that has stumbled from one message to the next. Nate Silver, of FiveThirtyEight.com, who invented the baseball statistic PECOTA, took a crack at how he would run the last 8 days for Mac, and it came down to: Give up on Pennsylvania, fight in New Hampshire and some should-be red states, and pray that something delivers you all of the toss-ups.

Speaking of toss-ups, Georgia is now one on pollster.com. While I expect John McCain to win Montana, Georgia, Indiana, North Carolina, North Dakota and his home state of Arizona, the fact that these states are all in any type of discussion shows just how bad a spot McCain is in.

Still, for all the possibly premature postmortems, there's not much actual news to talk about. So here's some reading if you're bored on this Monday.

• A brief letter in The Lancet puts McCain's risk of dying in the next four years at around 22%
• There will be plenty of time, if things continue this way, to consider if a different running mate would have changed McCain's fortunes. But Tom Ridge admits that at least PA would be different if it had been he instead of Palin as VP.
• Weirdest story of the election so far: A McCain supporter in Pittsburgh makes up a story about a scary black man attacking her for political reasons. To sell this story, which never fooled the police, she carved a B into her face.
• There are lots of postmortems going around, but you know it's a good column when it starts like this: "There are many ways to lose a presidential election. John McCain is losing in a way that threatens to take the entire Republican Party down with him."
• Here's a defense of Sarah Palin from the Weekly Standard. The problem with it is that it's wrong. People who work with Sarah Palin tend to like her less, not more (see the Alaska legislature), and the widespread criticism of her is almost purely political, not personal, as the writer claims. I don't dislike Sarah Palin because she names her children after objects (which is odd, but not relevant to her candidacy); I dislike her because she is the most extreme in a long list of anti-intellectual ideologues churned out by the modern GOP.
• Michele Bachman joins Sarah Palin in the non-apology apology club.
  
• And lastly, here is a LONG analysis of the McCain campaign by Robert Draper, the author of "Dead Certain," who I admire for his lack of agenda. He traces six separate narratives written by the campaign campaign over the last few months. If McCain does, in fact, lose the election, the most important of these may be the fifth narrative Draper lists, John McCain v. John McCain. "And yet on this landscape of new tricks — calling your opponent a liar; allowing your running mate to imply that the opponent might prefer terrorists over Americans — McCain sometimes seemed to be running against not only Barack Obama but an earlier version of himself."

SJS: Not a Holy Text

Good morning-

As I await Pollster.com's morning update and Politico's playbook of the day, I want to link some old stories that I haven't gotten in because Sarah Palin's non-apology bothered me too much.

• One thing I did not say about Colin Powell was his wonderful and needed shots at Islamophobia. I saw Religulous last night (more on that later) and it was one more reminder of how voices like Powell's are needed. His imagery of a dead young American soldier with a crescent on his grave is a reminder that America is supposed to be a place where different people come together. One day, if we as a nation survive, we will have a Muslim president. Given the past 10 years, that will be a good thing, not a bad one. Also, if you haven't read Roger Simon's excellent story about different moments in Powell's career, do it.
  
• Lost in the ooohing and aahhing over Obama's money totals are the nuances of fundraising. The Times has a story on how, with all the small donors, the continuing rise of BIG donors (more than $25,000, through various backdoor indirect donations) is being overlooked. The Wall Street Journal has a good story on how McCain, who took the public financing, is relying on loopholes for help.
• One of those loopholes is the RNC funding little things, like Sarah Palin's clothes for $150,000. This is just the latest in a McCain campaign that has never gotten rolling without falling over itself. On the back of a new quasi-populist strategy, they go and spend six figures on clothes for their supposedly populist veep. And the best they can do to respond is say "she needed clothes" and that it was always the intent that the clothes be donated to charity. Really? What charity needs dresses that cost 10 grand? It's not even that I mind that much, it's just really poor execution. And that's what the Mac campaign may be remembered for: a continuing inability to handle basic level stuff. It doesn't help when you have a candidate who may be remembered as the least smooth since Walter Mondale. But one of the reasons the GOP is starting the blame game today is that the campaign has demonstrated no ability to string together 7 good days, which they'll need to make this a race. UPDATE: Palin, in an interview in Pittsburgh with the Chicago Tribune, says it's all a lie. Sort of.
  
• Okay, so I recognize McCain's stuck with his running mate, and he can't say much else, but is it really smart to just lay into other Republicans who think Palin's not ready? On an interview with Imus, Politico quotes McCain as saying:

  “She is a governor, the most popular governor in America,” McCain said. “I think she is the most qualified of any that has run recently for vice president.” “I’m amazed. I’m amazed. Which is better? Serve 35 years in the United States Senate and say you’ve got to divide Iraq into three different countries, or be governor of a state and a reformer and give people their tax dollars back and bring about reform in the way that your state does business? Which is better?”

• I don't know what he's defining as "recent," but Mitt Romney and Bill Richardson both ran this year. If you mean was on one of the tickets, then you're saying she's less qualified than George W. Bush was, which is sadly not even true; as bad as he was at it, Bush had run an oil company and a baseball team before spending a few years in Texas politics. Before that, you're talking Clinton, who was the senior governor in the country when he ran. As for the second part... I'm kind of stupefied. It's better to have been in the Senate and recognize that Iraq is really multiple countries than it is to have run a state for a couple years with big oil revenue and convince even your own party in the state legislature there that you're totally oblivious. But the bottom line is, when this is over, McCain will have to look himself in the mirror and come to grips with the fact that, for all sorts of reasons, picking Palin for purely political reasons hurt him more than he ever could have imagined.
  
• Two more old stories from the Politico. This one on how the Dems, accustomed to losing, can't jump to the point where the GOP seems to be on this race, and instead are largely certain something will happen to ruin their dreams. And there's a chance I linked this already but if I didn't, it's a must-read: Racists for Obama?

Okay, Pollster just posted it's morning status update. One very strange thing has been the focus on PA, an expensive state that Obama seems to have locked up. McCain insists they can win here, and have just dumped more and more money and time into the state. From Pollster:

The one exception to the overall trend [in Obama's direction] is Pennsylvania, where we logged five (yes five) new surveys yesterday. The results are remarkably consistent, showing Obama with leads of 10 to 13 percentage points and 51% to 53% of the vote. The new surveys narrow Obama's margin on our trend estimate to 13.4% (52.9% to 39.5%). The margin is just over two points narrower, but still comfortably in the "strong" Obama category.

At that rate (2 pts a week), McCain will catch up to Obama - in Pennsylvania - some time in January. When your good news is that your one target that isn't slipping is now down to 13 points, that's bad.

Okay, movie review/religion section of today's post, on Bill Maher's new movie "Religulous"

First, it's important to remember that Bill Maher is a comedian, and he is funny. The director of the movie, Larry Charles, was also the director of Borat, and it shows. Like Borat, Religulous has moments of laughter that are born mostly of terrifying ignorance from those on the stage. Unlike Borat, Maher is there, as himself, to make jokes and keep things from ever getting too depressing and satirical. So - until the unnecessarily and unexpectedly heavy ending - it's a mostly enjoyable film. Even if you're religious, as long as you have a sense of humor, you'll enjoy a lot of what Maher does.

But the problem is that Maher is trying to do more than make a joke. He's trying to convince us to give up religion. And, on that front, he ranges from offensive and uninformed to hypocritical and myopic. If you've read any of the recent atheism books by Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens or John Allen Paulos, you're familiar with the argument: Religion makes people do violent, destructive things based on the certainty that they are right, when all of their beliefs are really quite silly. So we should get rid of it. And if you're religious but not fundamentalist, you're just giving cover to those that are. So we need to stop religion, or the terrorists win.

My frustration with this type of argument is quite literally enough for a book, but here are three biggest greivances I have, at least with Maher's movie:

1. Hypocrisy + Uninformed = Annoying. At least Christopher Hitchens knows something about religion. Maher has read the Bible, but it is clear he knows very little about religion in general. As a religious studies major, I think it's pretty important that, if you're going to criticize, say, Islam, you know something about it other than what you see on TV. It would be helpful to understand the difference between the Quran and the Hadith, for example. But that's not Maher's game, which is okay as long as he sticks to comedy. Once he starts telling Muslims on screen what's in their religion, he strays into the exact behavior of which he accuses others: Certainty that they are wrong, despite having no evidence or proof of it, and ridicule of them as buying into the wrong system.
   
2. Blaming every bad thing on religion is remarkably dumb. Religion has lots of forms, and is comorbid with all sorts of societal and cultural things, good and bad. To say that the only reason we kill each other, or want to, is religion, displays a willful ignorance. Pol Pot didn't need religion to kill millions; neither did Stalin. Saddam Hussein killed plenty of people, and he did it because of power and tribal allegiances. A thoughtful critique of religion must embrace nuance, not just more of the all-or-nothing thinking that you say is so awful when religious people do it.
   
3. This is the most unhelpful idea ever. Saying we should give up religion is roughly like saying we should give up alcohol. Is it sometimes bad for us? Is it the cause of escapism? Is it a contributor to many of society's ills? Sure. But we've had it since we stopped being apes, and our odds of giving it up are about as high as our odds of giving up war. If we could stop killing each other, religion wouldn't be so bad, would it? So why not make a movie saying we should stop killing? Because everyone would recognize it as idealistic and silly.
   

I'm not devout, and I don't believe an actual shrub caught fire and talked to Moses. I haven't gone to a service in a long time. I am hardly the poster child for organized religion. I believe my religious texts represent thousands of years of wisdom and stories, some of which is antiquated (I do not believe we should kill someone for homosexual sex, working on the sabbath, or planting the wrong crops next to each other), but some of which is still useful or even insightful. I like Bill Maher's point is that basically everything we attribute to God is the work of men. But as humans we are capable of wanting something more than what we have. That will always involve belief in the unseen, which will always be in some sense a religion. The key, as with alcohol, is not to strive for a prohibition that will never happen, but to move toward a responsible and moderate use that enhances - or at least won't destroy - lives.

When is An Apology Not an Apology

In general, when that apology comes from a politician, athlete or movie star. The non-apology apology is one of those things that has fascinated me - really, annoyed the crap out of me - since I can remember. I really, really, dislike it for three reasons. One is that apologizing is free; it quite literally costs you nothing to say "I clearly hurt/offended people, and I'm sorry." And in fact, I think, it makes you more human. Another reason I hate non-apologies is the sheer weenieness of them. It takes real strength to admit when you should have done something differently; it takes real cowardice to couch your apology as someone else's fault. The third reason is that it makes all real apologies - which in my brief experience are rare, valuable and important things - a little diluted. Apologies mean you wish you had done something different, and you feel remorse about what happened. You can't apologize for someone else's feelings, because you could not have felt differently for them. My friend Jonathan once told me that the words "I was wrong" are the three words in the English language that are true more often - and spoken less often - than any other. Since he told me that a decade ago, I've tried to make that a major part of my professional and personal vocabulary.

Lots of annoying people - especially obvious with sports figures - have garnered great respect in my eyes by actually apologizing. One is Boston Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling, who is headstrong loudmouth evangelical right-wing blogger, in addition to being one of the best postseason pitchers of all time. One time, he said something damn stupid about Barry Bonds. Bonds is hardly the most sympathetic guy, and if Schill had just weaseled away, no one would have faulted him. But he went right out and posted on his own blog how it was a dumb thing to say, he called Barry and apologized, and he was legitimately and profoundly remorseful for saying it. Another one was Ed Hochuli, maybe my least favorite pro football referee, who blew a bad call this year that the rules did not allow him to take back or review. He immediately apologized to the coach of the Chargers for costing them the game, which was way more than referees ever do, but then, when fans of the Chargers sent him angry emails, he sent every irate fan an apologetic email telling them how badly he felt. That type of public remorse takes real guts.

Incidentally, I've also gained respect for people who don't apologize when they're not sorry. Then-Pittsburgh Steelers guard Alan Faneca, when asked if he was excited by then-rookie quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, said "No" because it was due to the injury of his friend, Tommy Maddox, and at that point Ben hadn't won anything yet. When there was an outcry that he wasn't supporting his team, and a reporter asked Faneca if he was going to apologize, he said (I'm paraphrasing): "The question was, 'am I excited by a rookie quarterback?' and the answer is no. Ben is going to be great, and I think we're a great team, but I am not excited to lose a pro bowler for a rookie." It must have been rough to stare an angry Pittsburgh fan base in the camera and say "I meant what I said, and I'm not sorry."

So, when all of the headlines said that Sarah Palin "apologized" on CNN for her "real America" comments, I was intrigued. A genuine apology from Palin - who has been incredibly tightly managed, and generally whiney about any press inquiries about her - would really have raised her in my esteem. Her whole thing is that she's somehow "real," right? Well, then, I figured, this was finally some evidence; like a real person, she makes mistakes.

Here's what she said originally that, combined with statements by McCain aide Nancy Pfotenauer (the real Virginia) and Rep. Michele Bachman (R-MN) about how the media should investigate liberal's anti-Americanism prompted a particularly fiery Special Comment from Keith Olbermann the other night:

"We believe that the best of America is in these small towns that we get to visit, and in these wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard-working, very patriotic, very pro-America areas of this great nation," she told the crowd.

Okay, now, Bachman's statement was way worse, and Pfotenauer's was dumber. But Palin's is up there, as far as being disturbing in its clear suggestion that some parts of the country are pro-American, and other parts are less so. That's the only way to read that statement. If she calls places "real America" and says those parts are "very patriotic, very pro-America," that means that other places are not, or else the English language means nothing. So, given that, she needs to play the misspeak card: I didn't mean to say that, and I'm sorry I said it.

For example, Rep. Robin Hayes (R-NC), said something similar at a McCain rally: "liberals hate real Americans that work and accomplish and achieve and believe in God."

Congressman Hayes, when being confronted with it, decided to man up and apologize for saying something he clearly regretted:

"I genuinely did not recall making the statement and, after reading it, there is no doubt that it came out completely the wrong way," Hayes said in a statement released by his campaign. "I actually was trying to work to keep the crowd as respectful as possible, so this is definitely not what I intended."

Look, I don't know Hayes, and he may be a jerk. But he apologized, he was sincere, and you really can't ask for anything more at this point. Good show.

So, given a template for what it was clear she had to say, let's look at what Palin said in her "apology."

"Ehhh, I don't want that misunderstood. No, I do not want that misunderstood. You know, when I go to these rallies and we see the patriotism just shining through these people's faces and the Vietnam veterans wearing their hats so proudly and they have tears in their eyes as we sing our national anthem and it is so inspiring and I say that this is true America, you get it, you understand how important it is that in the next four years we have a leader who will fight for you. I certainly don't want that interpreted as one area being more patriotic or more American than another. If that's the way it's come across, I apologize."

Go ahead and read it again. See if you can fins an actual admission of guilt and remorse in there. Let's go line by line:

Ehhh, I don't want that misunderstood. No, I do not want that misunderstood.

Fine, but no one misunderstood it. We understood it perfectly. You used plain, simple English; we got what you meant. You meant that the places that you like - small towns, Republican-heavy areas - are more patriotic than other places. So okay, but no one misunderstood. And are you really starting your apology by blaming us for not getting your complex and intricate subtlety?

You know, when I go to these rallies and we see the patriotism just shining through these people's faces and the Vietnam veterans wearing their hats so proudly and they have tears in their eyes as we sing our national anthem and it is so inspiring...

Okay, I get where you're going. You go to a rally, and the patriotism touches you, so you lose yourself a little bit by preaching to the choir, and you're setting yourself up to say, hey, I went overboard...

and I say that this is true America, you get it, you understand how important it is that in the next four years we have a leader who will fight for you.

...what? You're apology is to repeat that "this is the true America," and that those people who are true Americans want John McCain? Where are you going?

I certainly don't want that interpreted as one area being more patriotic or more American than another. If that's the way it's come across, I apologize.

...Ok.

Let me restate:

You not real Americans didn't get it. It's just that I was right that you aren't as patriotic as my Americans, and I was just so right that it makes me misty how right I was. And I don't want that misinterpreted by fake Americans. So if you're a fake American, and the fact that there are real Americans offends you, then I'm sorry you couldn't grasp the full weight of my words.

I'd say shame on Sarah Palin, except she appears to be unfamiliar with the concept. But shame on the news outlets, particularly CNN, for saying this was an apology. It wasn't. It was, in fact, the opposite of an apology: a paragraph confirming her belief in the original statement, and then apologizing for us if we were upset by her saying something she means.

Next time, Governor, just say you meant what you said. If you're going to be an intolerant, condescending jerk, at least let me respect your honesty and bravery.

Colin Powell: The Voice of Center?

So Colin Powell went on TV yesterday morning. The former future first black president talked with Tom Brokaw on meet the press, as you may have heard, and delivered a strong endorsement of the man who may just be the actual future first black president. More than what he said about Barack Obama, though, it was what he said about John McCain and the Republican Party that resonated. More on this in a moment.

In the interest of full disclosure, I feel compelled to let you all know that, Friday night, I made my first ever monetary donation to a political campaign. I sent $25 to Obama-Biden, which was matched by another donor. I was one of 620,000 new donors to the Obama campaign last month, bringing Obama's total to 3.1 million donors (about 1 in every hundred Americans), who have donated an average of $86 each. I, like many, donated via the Internet. Obama raised $150 million last month, and has now raised $600 million. Take a look at those numbers. No campaign will ever be the same after this.

And I did what I did for many of the same reasons Colin Powell did what he did. The Republican Party has flat out become a place no one should want to be. Once the party of reason, problem-solving, and limited government, today's GOP is a culture-obsessed monstrosity that seems to have no core values beyond what will help them and their friends the most. John McCain has redefined what it means to race to the bottom, now using the same robocalls he denounced as "hate calls" when they were used against him in South Carolina in 2000, and throwing around words like "Socialism." Whereas one commenter on this blog suggested that perhaps McCain is concerned with his legacy, I see only a person ready to mortgage every piece of goodwill he's gained in a long career if it can help him have a hope of winning. He chose a woman he barely knew to be his running mate, when she clearly lacks not just the experience but the basic abilities necessary to be president. She had one qualification: She was the most right-wing person he could find.

There are not many moderates left in national politics. Men like Powell are few in either party, but particularly scarce in a GOP that, under a super-sized version of Karl Rove's Texas strategy, has systematically squeezed out everyone who was not radical enough. And if you think I'm being overly harsh, I'd draw your attention to the Republican response to Powell's endorsement. Right-wing radio went predictably insane, led by Rush Limbaugh, saying that the only reason Powell endorsed Obama was race. This is stupid for two reasons 1) Powell is a Republican who served in the Bush White House, not an adviser for Jesse Jackson or any other black politician. 2) He gave a lot of reasons, and none of them were race. One can argue over Powell's career, but I think a man of his stature deserves to have his words taken at face value. Other Republicans publicly said Powell was trying to rehab his image; a friend of his called that theory a word I won't use, but Politico did, showing you that it was someone they trust. Privately, other Republicans have said that it was a devastating moment for McCain; one called it "a nail in the coffin."

The reality is that Powell's voice was representative of so many of us stuck in the middle. I believe that a great deal of the country would rather not feel like the only options are to be a war-hawk or a socialist, which is what the GOP has been selling for 8 years. Powell isn't a class warrior, which is why he carries so much cache with independents. The fact is that there are not that many loud voices for the middle, and the fact that so many Republicans responded to the first one they heard with vitriol and dismissive theories only proves how right Powell was. Wouldn't it have been something if, instead of saying "well, what did you expect from a black man?" prominent Republicans had said "I listened to what he had to say, and it's becoming clear we need to take a look at our party. When we're losing men like General Powell, that's not a good sign."

Meanwhile, the McCain campaign has $47 million to spend in October, and he seems content to play the role of Bob Dole, charging full-steam ahead with the same negative losing strategy that's got him behind. John Micek has an important lesson for all campaigns: Just because you CAN send a press release, doesn't mean you SHOULD. McCain is ramping up attacks about ACORN, which strikes me as a truly dumb idea. I know and care a lot about politics, and ACORN means little to me, at all. I got that some shmucks made up some names and took money, and those people are very bad and should go to jail. But this posed no threat to anyone because IMAGINARY PEOPLE CAN NOT VOTE, and for McCain to say they were "threatening to unravel the fabric of democracy" when it is his party that has passed laws designed to disenfranchise poor and/or black voters in Florida (as in, actually screwing up democracy) was beyond hypocrisy. Also, let's remember, ACORN isn't running for anything. In a mildly related note, Florida is - shockingly - having problems with early voting. And, from the You're Not Helping Department: Nancy Pfotenauer, McCain aide, went on TV and called Northern Virginia "not real Virginia." Okay, I get that DC exurbs are different from Richmond or Blacksburg, but you may want to avoid calling one-third of a swing state fake. Is it so much to ask that people campaign hard without treating everyone who might not vote for them as subhuman?

Links to Read

I have some links for those of you who are bored and/or looking for some insight:

The best (and shortest) is this great piece by Stephen Waldman on how Obama's big surge in polls has been coincident with a surge among mainline protestants. He was down 43-40 over the summer, but now leads double digits in this group that Bush won by 12 points. One key finding: McCain's move to solidfy his base in Sarah Palin opened the door for Obama to court the more moderate mainline protestants, which he did brilliantly with a series of house parties nationwide targeting "American Values." Many mainliners were not enamored of her reactionary abortion policy and thin credentials. Plus, Obama's faith-heavy rhetoric early on, which seemed to target evangelicals, made many mainstream protestants more comfortable with him. Anyway, read the story.

From the Freakonomics blog, two posts: One on why the economic wave of death isn't that bad for you if you're not a bank. And another one on how money doesn't matter that much in politics, and how McCain has a weird buy-hate relationship with the media.

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette broke some ground investigating where the candidates differ on drafting women. Obama would explore removing restrictions on women for combat situations, and McCain would not.

The New Yorker has a story by George Packer about Ohio's working class, which is quite similar in mentality to Western Pennsylvania's. It's a great story, because it's about people, and how they see this race. At least one other writer has called this story "important."

Irony Dept send us this: Congressman Tim Mahoney (D-FL 16th) has a mistress scandal likely to cost him the seat he won two years ago. It was Mark Foley's seat. One important difference, at least to me, was Nancy Pelosi's response, which was that she demanded investigations immediately. One of the most despicable things that the Republican Congress did a few years ago was protect guys like Foley, and it's nice to see someone who doesn't believe it is okay for members of her own party to break the law.

USA Today says a 15-point polling lead in PA does not make the state a sure thing for Obama.

My love for Pollster.com grows: They've added interactive flash graphs and - wait for it - a national map of competitive House races! Today was uneventful, but the electoral map for Obama grew more daunting yesterday, as Florida, Michigan, and Colorado. Most bizarre of all is that North Dakota is now a toss-up. In house news, Phil English is losing to Kathy Dahlkemper in the PA 3rd. English has been one of my least favorite Pennsylvanians for a while now, so this is good news where I am.

Ohio continues to try and figure out how to vote without fraud. This story wins for best line of the day: “As far as we can tell, the problem with the current system (of cross-checking) is not that it is insufficiently user-friendly, but that it is effectively useless,” wrote Judge Jeffrey Sutton, writing for the majority.

And the Hawk gives us a view from the ground in Bloomsburg, PA, where racist extraordinaire Lou Barletta is beating incunbent Dem Paul Kanjorski in the PA 11th.

Can Mac Come Back (Again)?

With 21 days to go, McCain's campaign is on its second tour of being declared dead in this election cycle. You'll recall when he was nowhere in polls against the GOP field, couldn't pay bills, and various cognoscenti like yours truly said he had no chance anymore. Well, we're sort of there again.

Polls maintain a national lead for Obama in double digits, and Pollster.com's sensitive trends have him leading significantly for 320 electoral votes (you need 270 to win, and that total doesn't count VA, NC, IN, MO, NV, or WV, where he's ahead or within the margins). The Obama people are terrified that landslide talk will drive down turnout, and if I'm worried about the Bradley Effect, I think it's probably fair to say they live in chronic horror of it.

Plus, this is where McCain is at his best. He loves playing the underdog, and he has a new speech and strategy for our last three weeks. Centered on his role as a fighter who trusts the American people to keep government away from the Democratic triumvirate of Obama, Reid and Pelosi, who will of course raise everyone's taxes to spend on hand-woven books of gay Communist Zulu poetry to be given to mass murderers for rehabilitation in lieu of prison time.

It's a good plan, and I don't believe Obama will win by 10 points. These things have cycles, and it just seems like there's at least one or two swings left in this race. That doesn't mean that McCain's campaign - which has been basically terrible at everything so far - can carry off this new strategy to the tune of victory. I like the use of scaring people with a united government, but I don't know how effective it is. I know the American governmental system is built to be divided, to some extent, but I do wonder how many people consider that when voting.

New York Times Token Right-Winger and All-Out Nutjob Bill Kristol has a column today titled "Fire the Campaign," criticizing McCain's campaign for its "combination of strategic incoherence and operational incompetence." He suggests they scrap everything and go back to Straight Talk, charming the press, and being feisty. Hard to do in three weeks, and one wonders if Sarah Palin's strengths would really be accentuated by more press interviews, but the real problem for me is that it might be a tough sell after months and months of being the most run-of-the-mill right-wing, Bushesque candidate we could imagine. Steve Schmidt and Mark Salter put their eggs in the basket that got W elected twice; it doesn't appear to be working, because we're in different times and he's against a better oppoonent. But I don't know that that means, if the old McCain were to reemerge suddenly, that their efforts over the past six months could just be forgotten.

For one, would the press really buy that? Now, before you instinctively trash the MSM, remember that this the campaign that started booting great reporters like Dana Milbank off of Straight Talk One. The McCain campaign has been the most anti-media campaign in recent memory; even Bush's people played ball with the press until they were in office. McCain-Palin, though, has been downright hostile, and not particularly good at it. Remember the obviously feigned sexism outrage at the media's treatment of Palin (i.e., they treated her like anyone else)? Remember how they demanded "deference" to her position, as if being governor of Alaska were something to which one should defer? How every story about Palin or McCain, no matter how legit, was answered with spewing bile directed toward reporters who were just doing their jobs? McCain benefitted from a Brett Favre-like media affection for his entire 10-year presidential campaign, and then suddenly turned on the one group of people who had been good to him for doing what they were supposed to be doing all along. If he suddenly switches back to Mac the scrappy fighter, those same reporters might remember the last six months. Unless they really are as pathetic and needy as people seem to think they are.

Another problem is the American public. When McCain corrected that woman at his rally (she said Obama was an Arab whom she can't trust, he said that Obama was a good American family man), it got me thinking: Why would he do that? His campaign is clearly helped by people thinking that, and it's not like he's corrected similar things in the past. And then it occurred to me that maybe Schmidt and Salter are worried they're turning into one of losing campaigns Dems are so familiar with. It's easy to forget how toxic the anti-Bush rage was in 2000 and especially 2004. The Dems who hated Bush REALLY hated him, based on a combination of things ranging from legit policy issues to blind hostility. The Dems thought that energy was good. They forgot that a firebreathing angry zealot gets only as many votes as an underinformed guy who wants to have a beer with someone. McCain's supporters at his rallies have been reportedly getting more and more aggressive and anti-Obama (I say reportedly not because I doubt it, but because it was significant enough for people to report). McCain's people may have realized that, if they don't stop the progression, they'll wind up with the most dedicated 40% of the electorate ever mobilized. For all of the analogies with Obama, it may be McCain whose candidacy is looking the most like Eugene McCarthy's.

And all of that is without concern for resources, which McCain has and Obama, well, really doesn't. When it comes to money, it's kind of ridiculous. Obama had $77 million on hand at the end of August, and is on pace to add another $100 million by election day. He'll spend a couple million of that for a half hour of prime time air time on NBC and CBS October 29th. The last time someone in his position could afford to do that, it was Ross Perot (who got 26 million viewers). While there are concerns that it will look arrogant for Obama to have that much time in direct contact with viewers, few doubt that McCain would do it, too, if he could. Oh, and Obama is outspending McCain 8-to-1 in North Carolina, 3-to-1 in Indiana, Florida and Virginia and 2-to-1 lots of other places. By the end of this, Obama will have raised more than half a billion dollars, primary included, from an astounding number of donors. Even if he loses, there is no doubt that this is a transformational campaign. Don't worry, I'm waiting til it's over to do the "is it the greatest election ever?" post.

I suppose my point is that, while there are certainly some turns left in this road, and probabilities suggest that some of those will be in McCain's direction, it's getting a little late to switch strategies completely. Changing things costs money, which McCain doesn't have much of, and even if people haven't been paying much attention, reaching them costs money, too. Obama's going to be in their living rooms six days before election day, and some people are taking that as a sign that he just ran out of other places to spend money (how many campaign offices can one realistically open?). Think of this in sports terms: Your team is getting shelled. They're down, they start playing looser because they have nothing to lose. But the issue is that they've played badly the whole game; do you really believe they'll come back. A late underdog charge is a bread-and-butter play for McCain, but his campaign has to prove they can execute it better than they've executed anything else so far.

Internal Polling

In the midst of insanity, I find peace in numbers. I've been doing more emotional and instinctive analysis lately, so it's easy for me to forget that this whole weird exercise started as a look at 2006 polls. While I pay to use www.stopjuststop.com as the address for this site, the hosted URL on blogger contains the string of letters: "ilovepolling." But this election, I am finding numbers to be less comforting, even when they bring me good news.

Even my Bradley-Effect-obsessed view is finding it harder and harder to disbelieve the insane lead that Obama is racking up. I've always thought PA was going to go Dem, but I never thought it would become dark blue (as in, we're really darn sure this state will vote for Obama) on pollster.com. Add that to steady trends in Florida, Virginia, New Mexico, Colorado, and even North Carolina, and there are real problems for McCain.

Not the least of which is money. He's already conceded Michigan, and he's still battling hard in the aforementioned no-longer-battleground of PA. Ken Vogel and Amie Parnes have a great story on the Politico today about this "high-risk gambit" of shelling out precious dollars in a state that numbers suggest McCain can not win. Perhaps he has internal polling or some secret knowledge of something I do not, but I really think that's a bad idea. McCain simply must win Ohio and Florida, and Obama is making him spend money to keep North Carolina, Georgia (which is now only a leans-Republican state that may elect a Democrat (!) to the Senate over incumbent Saxby Chambliss) and West Virginia. Obama has lots of money; McCain has less. Obama is a gifted strategist with one of the best organized campaigns in history; McCain has struggled to use the Internet at all with his campaign. In terms of resources, I just don't see the margins of contesting PA. The last Republican we voted for in this state was Ronald Reagan, and John McCain ain't Ronald Reagan.

If, in fact, we as a nation are ready for a black man named Barack Hussein Obama to be president, then I am wrong about one thing and right about another. Which is part of why I just can't get behind all this Obama-in-a-landslide talk. This election is internally conflicting, because it pits two deeply held beliefs I have against each other. Is history right, or are numbers right?

Am I right when I think that there is a great race problem with polling? CBS Sunday Morning, as I type, is telling me that black presidents in TV shows and movies have contributed to the elimination of the Bradley Effect. A CBS pollster lady just said she thinks the Bradley Effect is a relic of the 1980s. Why am I having difficulty believing that Morgan Freeman in Deep Impact has made it comfortable for white Catholics to vote Obama? Or am I right in my firm belief that campaigns in this country are still won and lost on the ground, with organization and strategy? Because if that is the case, Obama will win. He has more resources, and while McCain's uber-masculine campaign run by Steve "the bullet" Schmidt has its own chauvanistic 1950s charm, it's just outmoded and a couple steps behind Obama. A couple weeks ago, Obama just opened 35 new offices in Pennsylvania. For persepective: He's split Macungie into two sections.

The bottom line is this: If, 23 days from now, despite polling indicating a landslide, Obama loses tight races in all of those "leans Dem" states (FL, OH, MI, VA, CO, NM, NH, etc), will you be stunned? The sad reality is no one I know would be. I will, in fact, be far more surprised if Obama pulls out a victory of the type the polling suggests than if he loses. Does that make me a cynic? I know that 2006 races involving Harold Ford Jr. and Deval Patrick both showed no signs of the Bradley Effect. I also know that cell phones present a massive problem for pollsters that make it likely the Democrats' edge is even greater than it seems. I know that statistics at this point are far more convincing for Obama than they were for many of those Congressional races in which I had faith two years ago. So why do I feel like this is neck-and-neck? I've always thought of myself as an optimist, as someone who looks to progress and the future, and who firmly believes the American people are capable of damn near anything. We've done so many things that no one else could; why am I having so much trouble accepting that we may, at this not particularly early moment, elect a person with darker skin than me?



Okay, I swear I was going to end the post there, and then a new Obama ad (it's a couple days old) came on television. It is, quite simply, the best political ad I've ever seen. I can't embed it, though, which is bad, because... wow. Here it is on the Politico. Then, while I was looking for it, another one came on about education, where he encouraged parents to turn off the TV and deal with their children. Can't find that one at all. Suffice it to say that the whole "gifted strategist" thing wasn't an exaggeration. I will say this: If Obama doesn't win, it's not because he wasn't a good enough campaigner.

Perhaps McCain Thought He Was Playing Scrabble, And Wanted to Avoid a Proper Noun

Well, the second debate was supposed to be a town hall, but mostly it was the same joint press conference, except with tired-looking people on all sides. Most of the pundits so far have McCain losing, with the reasoning being that he needed a win and got a draw at best (also, the polls seems to indicate a 10-point difference in Obama's favor with respect to debate performance). He looked strong at moments, and had one great moment where he connected with a questioner who was a chief petty officer. Obama, on the other hand, was solid throughout, and seemed less prone to rambling than his opponent. While he had no great knockout punches, but I grow ever more admiring of his ability to counterpunch when his opponent overreaches. In this debate, it took the form of McCain once again saying that Obama didn't understand, and Obama came back and delivered a stinging line about not understanding how McCain could say "next stop, Baghdad" when Afghanistan was still very much a work in progress.

The weirdest moment of the night came when McCain inexplicably pointed behind him at Obama and referred the Senator from Illinois and Democratic nominee for president who currently has an 8-point national lead on McCain as "that one." There has been a lot of punditry on the comment, and nobody - including this one - has any idea what the hell that was. Was it an insult? Was it racial? Was it dismissive of youth? It was reminiscent of George Allen's "macaca" moment, where the implications were undefinable but still seemed vaguely awful, though this appears to lack the weight of that campaign-killing utterance. And then McCain quite obviously avoided shaking Obama's hand, exacerbating whatever it was that "that one" meant.

I think, more than anything, the "that one" comment was indicative of a McCain who all night appeared like he was having even less fun than the audience. It was reminiscent of some of those Hillary days during the primary where you could just tell that she was frustrated with the success of a young upstart whose credentials were inferior to hers but whose campaign was beating hers up and down the floor. McCain was supposed to be in his element last night, with a town hall format, but he looked unhappy and it showed in his dismissive and rude attitude toward his opponent. If the voters care about what Peggy Noonan has dubbed "Patriotic Grace," then McCain had a bad night, because we saw a man who was graceless, condescending and sarcastic. Once again, it was a reminder of how far we've come; the man who seemed our only real hope of a civilized, thoughtful, honorable campaign now won't say his opponent's name or even shake his hand.

Not that I can blame Mac for being unhappy. The market took another 500-point dive yesterday, and it's down another 200 as of this writing today, though a treasury yield-fueled rebound seems to be in the works. All this focus on the collapsing economy is not good for Republicans in general or McCain in particular, who has not been convincing when it comes to his competence on economic matters. At the end of the night, NBC political director Chuck Todd said he thought the market would matter more than the debate, and there's no question who it hurts more. Beyond that, though, the polling numbers are just bad for McCain right now. Pollster.com's sensitive trend has every close state moving farther into Obama territory, with even Florida at a 5-point clip for Barack now. The electoral college, if you believe the polls, is potentially a landslide. His attempt to singlehandedly save the economy resulted in transparent politicization of an important issue, utter failure to get his party to vote for his bill, and then laughable self-congratulation. The initial flurry over Sarah Palin has changed from excitement to ridicule at a choice that is now obviously political, since she is so clearly bringing nothing to the governing table. He wants to be president maybe more than anyone ever has, and he is clearly growing to resent the man who is running against him,

Another things seemed odd last night. As Obama railed against spending increases, McCain last night mentioned another $300 billion bailout to buy bad mortgages. This is after the Bush administration pushed through a $700 billion bailout for failing corporations. If you are a true conservative, then you don't believe that the government should nationalize bad mortgages. There just is no such thing as a fiscal conservative on the national stage anymore, and even the traditional ideas of the way the parties behave has become completely inverted. Just remember: A free market means lots of people and corporations fail. If your Congressman is only for the free market when people win, then he's for Soviet-style corruption, not a free anything.

Another thought I had last night, as the Dow is surges, approaching even on the day, was that Gwen Ifill should host every debate. And that, if Chuck Todd doesn't get to host Meet the Press next, she should. She is just fantastic, and especially compared to the inept non-management of the old white triumvirate of Brokaw, Lehrer and Schieffer (who gets the last debate next week), she seems engaging and full of life. I mean, if she can keep Joe Biden and Sarah Palin reasonably on point, doesn't that demonstrate a rare enough savvy to keep her on the job until further notice? Seriously, she's a fantastic journalist, a thoughtful analyst, and a moderator who doesn't look tired of being there. I have a fever, and the only prescription is more Gwen Ifill.

One last thought: I remain less convinced of Obama's success than many others, and that has mostly to do with the Bradley Effect. Perhaps I am actually too afraid to believe that we are ready to elect a black man, and don't want to risk catastrophic depression by believing it until it happens, but whatever my reasons, it is important to remember that black candidates lose 7-10 points from polls to voting booths, every single time. Well, not in 2003 for Bobby Jindal or 2006 for Harold Ford Jr., but it does happen. Obama looks dominant right now, but subtract 7 points from his lead in every state, and he loses. My point is not to suggest that the American people are a bunch of abject racists, but that polls turn and no one has voted yet. If you're an Obama supporter, this election has a month left, and there is a lot of work to do. If you're a McCainiac, there are lots of things that happen between now and early November. Trends are big for me, and those are all going Obama right now, but I suspect we've got a turn or two left in this road.