Gallup talks trends…

Obama has led McCain by close to 10 points for each of the past six days, and by a statistically significant margin of at least four points for more than two weeks.

It has been a full month since McCain held a significant lead over Obama, the last time being from Sept. 8-10 when he led with 48% of the vote, to Obama’s 44%.

More tomorrow…

Obama gains 2 today, but the story for the past couple weeks in these daily tracking polls is “stability”…

This is the sixteenth straight day that Obama’s support has ranged from 50% to 52% while McCain has been at 44% of 45%.

And given McCain’s inability to cut into Obama’s lead, Americans now think this one is almost all but done…

Fifty-five percent (55%) believe Obama will win the election, 15% expect a McCain victory, and 27% say it is too close to call.

The 5 day:
10/11/2008: McCain - 45%, Obama - 52%
10/10/2008: McCain - 45%, Obama - 50%
10/09/2008: McCain - 45%, Obama - 50%
10/08/2008: McCain - 45%, Obama - 51%
10/07/2008: McCain - 44%, Obama - 52%

More tomorrow…

Lost in this week’s market craziness (and with good reason) is the minor issue of President Bush’s legacy.

Two term president’s usually begin thinking about their place in history during the final months of their administration.  After all, there’s not much left for a lame duck but to run out the clock and ponder their legacy.

In the case of President Bush, this can’t be a pleasant experience.   I’ll probably delve more deeply into Bush’s legacy after the election, but in my book I ranked him 34 out of the 42 presidents.  “It’s too soon to take a serious cut at President Bush’s place in history,” starts the chapter, “but it’s not too soon to call the invasion of Iraq one of the worst decisions in presidential history.”

My basic contention was that the invasion of Iraq completely negated what would otherwise had been a decent record.  Among his successes:  the immediate handling of Afghanistan and the aftermath of 9-11, the strengthening of domestic security, and creating a strong economy.   It’s easy to forget that President Bush inherited a recession and tech bubble implosion, which was then compounded by the devastation of the 9-11 attacks, and yet still managed to avoid a deeper recession.  The economy grew at a solid pace from 2003-2007, and even the housing bubble seemed to be just a blip on the radar.

And now all that’s changed.  Turned out the economy was running on borrowed time and bad loans, and millions of Americans were living way beyond their means.  While President Bush isn’t completely to blame — truth be told the President holds little sway over the economy — the bottom line is that the worst financial collapse since the Great Depression occured on his watch.  And because of that, it accrues to his legacy.

So now he can put the worst presidential blunder and arguably the worst financial calamity in history on his resume.  He’s in a tight competition with Ulysses S Grant for the worst two-term president in history. That’s a contest you don’t want to win.

www.nickragone.com

The “state sponsor of terrorism” label has been one of our few substantive bargaining chips during these talks and, originally, we were supposed to delist North Korea after they shut down their nuclear facility last June. But when North Korea refused inspections to verify its compliance, the U.S. refused to go through with the delisting. North Korea has responded by rattling sabers. This move is designed to decrease those tensions while also advancing the greater goal of nuclear disarmament.

The question now is: in what condition will the Bush administration leave the North Korean diplomatic situation? The removal of North Korea from the state sponsor of terrorism list is conditional on that nation following though on inspections. If that’s the deal and if North Korea reneges early within the next administration, will reinstating North Korea to that list be a punitively feasible response or will the next president need a new bag of tricks? I would imagine that John McCain and Barack Obama would handle the situation quite differently. Just one more thing to think about as we head towards the election.

Not only are they wrong…they’re REALLY wrong.

First, here’s McCain’s response to the report…

Today’s report shows that the Governor acted within her proper and lawful authority in the reassignment of Walt Monegan. The report also illustrates what we’ve known all along: this was a partisan led inquiry run by Obama supporters and the Palins were completely justified in their concern regarding Trooper Wooten given his violent and rogue behavior. Lacking evidence to support the original Monegan allegation, the Legislative Council seriously overreached, making a tortured argument to find fault without basis in law or fact. The Governor is looking forward to cooperating with the Personnel Board and continuing her conversation with the American people regarding the important issues facing the country.

So McCain thinks this inquiry was run by Obama supporters?

Well…let’s look at the record…

The legislative committee that approved this report is composed of 8 Republicans and 4 Democrats. That’s not just a bi-partisan inquiry, that’s HIGHLY skewed towards a conservative point of view.

And again, this is a violation of the public trust. So given that this is the same thing that Palin has been charging Obama with recently with her “Who is the REAL Barack Obama?” charge, isn’t her credibility shot when it comes to accusing anybody of not being truthful?

Would the late William F. Buckley approve of his son throwing his support behind the most liberal Senator EVER!!!?

Something tells me the answer to that would be: possibly.

Why? Because I think this has less to do with Obama and more to do with how far McCain has fallen.

From The Daily Beast:

I have known John McCain personally since 1982. I wrote a well-received speech for him. Earlier this year, I wrote in The New York Times—I’m beginning to sound like Paul Krugman, who cannot begin a column without saying, “As I warned the world in my last column…”—a highly favorable Op-Ed about McCain, taking Rush Limbaugh and the others in the Right Wing Sanhedrin to task for going after McCain for being insufficiently conservative. I don’t—still—doubt that McCain’s instincts remain fundamentally conservative. But the problem is otherwise.

McCain rose to power on his personality and biography. He was authentic. He spoke truth to power. He told the media they were “jerks” (a sure sign of authenticity, to say nothing of good taste; we are jerks). He was real. He was unconventional. He embraced former anti-war leaders. He brought resolution to the awful missing-POW business. He brought about normalization with Vietnam—his former torturers! Yes, he erred in accepting plane rides and vacations from Charles Keating, but then, having been cleared on technicalities, groveled in apology before the nation. He told me across a lunch table, “The Keating business was much worse than my five and a half years in Hanoi, because I at least walked away from that with my honor.” Your heart went out to the guy. I thought at the time, God, this guy should be president someday. [...]

But that was—sigh—then. John McCain has changed. He said, famously, apropos the Republican debacle post-1994, “We came to Washington to change it, and Washington changed us.” This campaign has changed John McCain. It has made him inauthentic. A once-first class temperament has become irascible and snarly; his positions change, and lack coherence; he makes unrealistic promises, such as balancing the federal budget “by the end of my first term.” Who, really, believes that? Then there was the self-dramatizing and feckless suspension of his campaign over the financial crisis. His ninth-inning attack ads are mean-spirited and pointless. And finally, not to belabor it, there was the Palin nomination. What on earth can he have been thinking?

Listen folks, I actually considered voting for McCain if Hillary won the nomination because I was very unhappy with Hillary’s tactics. But something tells me that I would have just sat this one out completely if McCain ran the same kind of campaign against Hillary that he has ran against Obama.

Yes, both campaigns have put out hacky ads, but the difference with McCain is that he has had very few problems going after Obama on a really low level. Sex ed for kindergartens? Suggesting that he’s buddies with terrorists? Really?

Case in point…we’re now hearing these words from his supporters on the campaign trail: “Terrorist” “Off with this head” “Treason” “Kill him”

It’s like Ann Coulter is up there with this venom, not John McCain. Seriously, it’s THAT incongruous.

And it’s not just Buckley that’s expressing these reservations. Former Republican Governor of Michigan William Milliken recently backed away from McCain’s campaign, citing this new, destructive tone…

“He is not the McCain I endorsed,” said Milliken, reached at his Traverse City home Thursday. “He keeps saying, ‘Who is Barack Obama?’ I would ask the question, ‘Who is John McCain?’ because his campaign has become rather disappointing to me.

Still, Buckley does cite some reasons why he thinks Obama will be a great leader…

As for Senator Obama: He has exhibited throughout a “first-class temperament,” pace Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.’s famous comment about FDR. As for his intellect, well, he’s a Harvard man, though that’s sure as heck no guarantee of anything, these days. Vietnam was brought to you by Harvard and (one or two) Yale men. As for our current adventure in Mesopotamia, consider this lustrous alumni roster. Bush 43: Yale. Rumsfeld: Princeton. Paul Bremer: Yale and Harvard. What do they all have in common? Andover! The best and the brightest.

I’ve read Obama’s books, and they are first-rate. He is that rara avis, the politician who writes his own books. Imagine. He is also a lefty. I am not. I am a small-government conservative who clings tenaciously and old-fashionedly to the idea that one ought to have balanced budgets. On abortion, gay marriage, et al, I’m libertarian. I believe with my sage and epigrammatic friend P.J. O’Rourke that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take it all away.

But having a first-class temperament and a first-class intellect, President Obama will (I pray, secularly) surely understand that traditional left-politics aren’t going to get us out of this pit we’ve dug for ourselves. If he raises taxes and throws up tariff walls and opens the coffers of the DNC to bribe-money from the special interest groups against whom he has (somewhat disingenuously) railed during the campaign trail, then he will almost certainly reap a whirlwind that will make Katrina look like a balmy summer zephyr.

Indeed.

No doubt that the Obama campaign will jump all over this. But will this come up in the next debate? Or will Obama continue to ignore Palin and simply focus on McCain?

Seems like Biden might come out and start hammering here on this.

So then, what will be the fallout here?

Looks like there was enough “there” there for a 12 person legislative committee to unanimously decide to release this report and find her guilty of ethics abuse.

From NY Times:

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — A legislative committee investigating Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has found she unlawfully abused her authority in firing the state’s public safety commissioner.

The investigative report concludes that a family grudge wasn’t the sole reason for firing Public Safety Commissioner Walter Monegan but says it likely was a contributing factor.

The Republican vice presidential nominee has been accused of firing a commissioner to settle a family dispute. Palin supporters have called the investigation politically motivated.

Monegan says he was dismissed as retribution for resisting pressure to fire a state trooper involved in a bitter divorce with the governor’s sister. Palin says Monegan was fired as part of a legitimate budget dispute.

Again, this was a 12-0 vote. This was not a partisan witch hunt. She abused her power and now she has been called out on it.

No word yet on what type of punishment she’ll face, but this certainly couldn’t come at a worse time for McCain.

Meanwhile, I’m not holding my breath for this to appear as a massive headline with flashing red lights on Drudge.

More…

From CNN:

“Governor Palin knowingly permitted a situation to continue where impermissible pressure was placed on several subordinates in order to advance a personal agenda,” the report states.

And here’s the link to the full report.

UPDATE:
Here’s an excerpt…

Finding Number One
For the reasons explained in section IV of this report, I find that Governor Sarah Palin abused her power by violating Alaska Statute 39.52.110(a) of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act. Alaska Statute 39.52.110(a) provides The legislature reaffirms that each public officer holds office as a public trust, and any effort to benefit a personal or financial interest through official action is a violation of that trust.

Finding Number Two
I find that, although Walt Monegan’s refusal to fire Trooper Michael Wooten was not the sole reason he was fired by Governor Sarah Palin, it was likely a contributing factor to his termination as Commissioner of Public Safety. In spite of that, Governor Palin’s firing of Commissioner Monegan was a proper and lawful exercise of her constitutional and statutory authority to hire and fire executive branch department heads.

Finding Number Three
Harbor Adjustment Service of Anchorage, and its owner Ms. Murleen Wilkes, handled Trooper Michael Wooten’s workers’ compensation claim property and in the normal course of business like any other claim processed by Harbor Adjustment Service and Ms. Wilkes. Further, Trooper Wooten received all the workers’ compensation benefits to which he was entitled.

Finding Number Four
The Attorney General’s office has failed to substantially comply with my August 6, 2008 written request to Governor Sarah Palin for information about the case in the form of emails.

Seems pretty straightforward. Firing Monegan was legal, but her conduct was unethical.

Giving credit where credit is due, McCain is finally addressing the tone of some of his recent gatherings and trying to tell the crowds that Obama is not a scary guy.

The only problem? The mob doesn’t care.

From Politico:

“I am enthusiastic and encouraged by the enthusiasm and I think it’s really good,” McCain said. “We have to fight and i will fight but we will be respectful. I admire Sen. Obama and his accomplishments and I want to be respectful.

“I dont mean that you have to lose your ferocity. I just mean you have to be respectful.”

A moment later, another woman stood up and urged McCain to speak up so voters “really have an understanding of who the candidates are.”

“There’s a difference between rhetoric and record,” McCain said, adding that Obama voted to raise taxes 94 times. “He has the most liberal voting record in the United States Senate, even more liberal than Bernie Sanders.”

Once again, McCain repeated, “I want all of you to tell your neighbors about the difference between rhetoric and record, but let’s do it respectfully.”

Later in the event, man in the audience stood up and told McCain he’s “scared” of an Obama presidency and who he’d select for the Supreme Court.

“I have to tell you. Sen. Obama is a decent person and a person you don’t have to be scared of as president of the United States,” McCain said as the crowd booed and shouted “Come on, John!”

The question now: did McCain’s “palling around with terrorists” message create a monster meme he simply can’t contain? Because it honestly sounds like his supporters feel that Obama is dangerous. And as I’ve stated before, that’s a really bad thing to be suggesting about the first viable African-American presidential candidate.

More as it develops…

McCain - 49%
Obama - 46%
MOE: +/-4

Is this an outlier? Well, FiveThirtyEight gives the poll a weight of 0.89, and that means it’s not nearly as reliable as other polls like Gallup’s daily, which carries a weight of 1.76.

Still…any poll numbers that show a lead this small for McCain at this point in the race has to be cause for concern. And with their resources dwindling, Obama may be able to make a final push that could put him over the top.

Also, let’s remember that Obama beat Hillary by a massive 35 point spread (66% to 31%) in the primaries, so he enjoys an extremely large base of support in the Peach State.

More as it develops…

In a time like this, what kind of message are you sending to the American people when you’ll go on NBC’s comedy show, but you refuse to be interviewed by NBC’s journalists?

Still, I suppose this is somehow ironically appropriate given the seriousness of her as a VP pick.

From NY Post:

SOCCER moms and Joe Sixpacks, listen up. Get your beer, mooseburgers and caribou dips ready. Sarah Palin is doing “Saturday Night Live.” Not Tina Fey doing Sarah Palin doing “Saturday Night Live.” But the Sarah Herself. She has already OK’d it. She’s booked. It’s confirmed. Done deal. Sketches are being sketched as we speak. She - eyeglasses, haircomb, designer jacket and trunkful of gosh-darns, golly-gees and gol-dangs - will be on “SNL” Saturday night, Oct. 25. Sarah’s rehearsal time has already been penciled in for Friday the 24th. And it’s because she wants to do it.

So, my question is: Does this mean Tina Fey has plans to run for VP?

My guess is, at this point, Sarah Palin is looking out for Sarah Palin. She knows this is probably her one shot to stay on the national stage and any additional exposure.

Live from New York…

The details…

The major news of the day is the economic crisis and its dramatic effect on the world’s financial markets, which to some degree drowns out the typical campaign back and forth that characterizes the presidential race at this point.

About half of Americans indicate in Gallup’s economic tracking measures that they personally had worried about money the day before they were interviewed, underscoring the major impact the economy is having on Americans’ lives and the degree to which their presidential choice may be filtered through the prism of economic angst.

More tomorrow…

Once again, a matter that should be decided through the democratic process is usurped by the courts.

What’s really unfortunate is that Connecticut was the first state to allow civil unions not because of a court order, but because of a law passed by the state government. With enough time and effort, Connecticut could have become the first state to legalize same-sex marriage in a democratic manner.

I do not place all the blame on the courts. They have the right to interpret the law and certainly people of good conscience can disagree on such interpretations. What really irritates me is politicians who support civil unions but oppose gay marriage. That’s political expedience boarding on cowardice.

During the Vice Presidential debate, when Joe Biden affirmed his and Barack Obama’s opposition to gay marriage, I thought I heard chickens bawking in the background. I don’t for a minute believe politicians like Obama and Biden have a moral problem with gay marriage but are just fine with civil unions and homosexuality in general.

If they and other elected officials had the courage to fight for same-sex marriage in the court of public opinion, we might not see so many courts of law preemptively deciding the matter.

I don’t know if you could point to another Republican who has been as sympathetic to the ideas of immigration reform. And yet McCain is floundering when it comes to this group.

From Politico…

Polls show Obama winning the broadest support from Latino voters of any Democrat in a decade, while McCain is struggling to reach 30 percent, closer to Senator Bob Dole’s dismal 1996 result than to Bush’s historic 40% four years ago.

McCain seems to have wound up with the worst of both worlds: He appears to be getting no credit from Latino voters for his past support for immigration reform, while carrying the baggage of other Republicans’ hostility to illegal immigration. [...]

“I feel bad for McCain,” said Sam Rodriguez, the president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference and a prominent supporter of George W. Bush in 2004, who is neutral this year. “We find ourselves between the proverbial rock and the hard place. We really like John McCain. We really don’t like the Republican Party.”

And Hillary said that Obama was going to have a problem getting the Hispanic vote?

Thoughts?

Gee…ya think?

Top McCain campaign officials are grappling with how far to go with negative attacks on Sen. Barack Obama in the final weeks of what is turning into a come-from-behind effort.

Sen. John McCain has allowed a series of increasingly harsh broadsides in new campaign ads and in speeches by his wife, Cindy, and his running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin. But the Arizona Republican has rejected pleas from some advisers to launch attacks focusing on Sen. Obama’s former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

Some McCain campaign officials are becoming concerned about the hostility that attacks against Sen. Obama are whipping up among Republican supporters. During an internal conference call Thursday, campaign officials discussed how the tenor of the crowds has turned on the media and on Sen. Obama.

Someone yelled “Off with his head” at a rally Wednesday for Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin in Pennsylvania. Later that day in Ohio, a man stood outside a rally holding a sign that said “Obama, Osama.” At a rally in Jacksonville, Fla., on Tuesday, someone in the crowd wore a T-shirt depicting Sen. Obama wearing a devil mask.

Stiil…do you really think these attacks will stop? I mean, this is all they have left. Attack, attack, attack. And that’s backed up by an independent study that shows McCain’s advertising is almost 100% negative.

Crazy…

The numbers stay the same, but as the numbers suggest…it’s all about the economy…

Here’s more…

As economic issues dominate, 66% now believe the U.S. economy is in a recession, up eight points from a month ago. Just 8% rate the economy as good or excellent while 66% say it’s in poor shape. Six percent (6%) say economic conditions are getting better while 78% say they are getting worse. The Rasmussen Consumer Index shows both consumer and investor confidence has fallen to new all-time lows.

Among voters who consider economic issues to be the most important voting issue, Obama leads 65% to 31%. Among all other voters, McCain leads 60% to 36%. It is hard to overstate the impact of the recent economic crisis on Election 2008. Prior to the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the recent Wall Street meltdown, McCain held a very modest lead over Obama nationwide.

Only 9% of voters now believe the United States is heading in the right direction while 88% say the nation has gotten off on the wrong track.

The 5 day:
10/10/2008: McCain - 45%, Obama - 50%
10/09/2008: McCain - 45%, Obama - 50%
10/08/2008: McCain - 45%, Obama - 51%
10/07/2008: McCain - 44%, Obama - 52%
10/06/2008: McCain - 44%, Obama - 52%

More tomorrow…

You know, I’ve been trying to put my finger on why the Bill Ayers stuff bugs me so much. Sure, it’s an absurd charge, but now I think I realize why it really bothers me.

Why would the McCain campaign put Sarah Palin out there to ask “Who is the real Barack Obama?” when 95% of the country didn’t know who she was until a month ago?

Let’s look at the facts…

• She blames the media for her bad interviews.
• She’ll no longer do any interviews with unfriendly news sources.
• She won’t hold a public press conference.
• She won’t go on any of the Sunday newsers.
• Meanwhile, her husband belonged to a secessionist political group for years that still advocates Alaska leaving the Union.
• Meanwhile, the founder of that group is quoted as saying, “My government is my worst enemy. I’m going to fight them with any means at hand.”
• Meanwhile, she recorded a video greeting for their convention this year.

So I ask you…who is real Sarah Palin?

Seriously. I’m not being dramatic. What do we really know about this woman? What do we know about her beliefs? Can you imagine if Michelle Obama belonged to a secessionist group? I mean, come on people…why isn’t this getting more traction?

Doug pointed me towards the following video, and the videographer asks McCain supporters about their opinions about Obama after these latest charges.

It ain’t pretty…

So then…

Do McCain and Palin really think it’s a smart move to hint at the idea that the first African-American president could be a terrorist? Sure, they’re not saying that explicitly, but when you talk about “palling around” with terrorists, what do you think your supporters are going to believe? I think we saw the result in that video.

Or, to put it another way, don’t you think that idea could get inside some nuts’ head and they might think they have to stop Obama for the good of the country?

How dare she.

And furthermore…how dare he.

It’s all about kleptocratic business leaders, weak-willed politicians and the complete absence of accountability for the empowered class.

Just a taste:

Now ask yourself another question. Has anybody resigned, from either the public or the private sectors (overlapping so lavishly as they now do)? Has anybody even offered to resign? Have you heard anybody in authority apologize, as in: “So very sorry about your savings and pensions and homes and college funds, and I feel personally rotten about it”? Have you even heard the question being posed? O.K., then, has anybody been fired? Any regulator, any supervisor, any runaway would-be golden-parachute artist? Anyone responsible for smugly putting the word “derivative” like a virus into the system? To ask the question is to answer it. The most you can say is that some people have had to take a slightly early retirement, but a retirement very much sweetened by the wherewithal on which to retire. That doesn’t quite count. These are the rules that apply in Zimbabwe or Equatorial Guinea or Venezuela, where the political big boys mimic what is said about our hedge funds and investment banks: the stupid mantra about being “too big to fail.”

Yes, it’s one of Hitchens’ polemics, but it’s worth the read.

St. Louis, MO…

“Who do you think will win around here?” I asked.

“Obama,” Robbie Haggard answered flatly, and several others agreed.

“But Missouri’s always been Republican,” Pyle protested.

“I think Missouri’s had about enough,” Holly Haggard said.

Sedalia, MO…

People like Maureen O’Hare, whom I found shopping for shoes in the Sedalia Wal-Mart with her daughter Ashley Smith and bright-eyed 2-year-old grandson Traven. Sedalia is an old railroad town of about 20,000 people — a population essentially unchanged in the past 90 years. George W. Bush won two-thirds of the vote in Sedalia and surrounding Pettis County in 2004, and one of those votes belonged to O’Hare. But after years of voting for Republicans, she told me, she feels compelled to change horses. Of Obama, she said simply, “I think he would do better in a crisis.” Her daughter nodded in agreement as Traven watched impatiently from a shopping cart.

Troy, MO…

I met Kim Cannon on a bench outside the Hair Design Team salon in Troy, where she was taking a smoking break between customers. It was a pleasant afternoon, and from where she sat, the green hills of northeast Missouri — Mark Twain country — rolled gently in every direction. A lifelong resident of Lincoln County, Cannon has seen those hills stitched with new roads and dotted with parking lots, but not so much that she can’t still spy open fields in the distance.

Politics is a popular topic at Hair Design Team. “The funniest part are my clients who say Obama is the Antichrist,” Cannon said. “I just laugh.” Because after months on the fence between the two candidates, Cannon has come down on Obama’s side, and the reason is simple: “The economy is terrible, and he is more for the working man.”

As they say…so goes Missouri, so goes the election…

Unfortunately, no one really knows what will calm global markets. On the heels of the United States’ $700 billion bailout package, countries from Japan to Britain to China to Iceland have made serious steps to shore up their nation’s banking system by infusing money into the system and/or cutting rates to encourage lending. So far, stock markets have shrugged off such maneuvers and continue to fall.

I keep hearing references to the Great Depression. And while I am nervous about the current situation, I also know our nation and most other nations are taking steps never even considered in 1929 and the early 1930’s. We have likely already reached or will soon reach the natural bottom of this market correction – any greater declines will be panic based. So, the key is to stop the panic before it snowballs.

Hopefully, this weekend’s meeting in Washington will come up with ways to do just that.

Virginia for the first time in 40 years is up for grabs.

What’s more, if electoral history is any judge, the pickup of West Virginia wouldn’t necessarily be a surprise. Going back to the election of 1968, Dems have won the state 6 out of the last 10 elections.

Still, is it likely that Obama will get 380?

No. My best guess is he won’t pick up West Virginia, Indiana, Ohio, North Carolina or Missouri, which would leave him at 318. Obviously that’s still a healthy margin, and would be considered a big win, but not a landslide.

Also, here’s another handy guide from DemConWatch that aggregates all of the polls and shows which pollster considers states going for Obama, Obama Leaning, Tied, McCain Leaning and going for McCain.

More as it develops…

Somebody should tell her it doesn’t work this way…

From the AP:

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - On the eve of a report on a legislative panel’s abuse-of-power investigation into Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, campaign officials released their own report clearing her of any wrongdoing.

Palin, running mate to Republican presidential nominee John McCain, is the subject of two inquiries into whether she abused her power by firing her public safety commissioner. The commissioner says he was dismissed for resisting pressure to fire Palin’s former brother-in-law, a state trooper. [...]

The report the McCain-Palin campaign released Thursday night says the firing was based on a budget dispute. Since then, the report says, the matter has been muddled with innuendo, rumor and politics.

You know, I have no idea if the real report will have anything damaging in it or not, but I’m more inclined to think there’s fire behind that smoke if the McCain camp is going to the trouble to try and muddy the waters beforehand.

Jonathan Adler at The Volokh Conspiracy shares similar opinions…

While I never thought the “troopergate” story made for much of a scandal, the aggressiveness with which some are trying to shut down an investigation would suggest otherwise. I suppose we’ll see soon enough.

Here’s the executive summary…

Beginning in October 2007, Governor Sarah Palin and members of her administration repeatedly clashed with Department of Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan, a member of her cabinet, over budgetary issues and department direction. On July 11, 2008, after multiple efforts to reach a consensus had failed, Governor Palin offered Mr. Monegan a new position as head of the Alaska Alcohol Control Board. Mr. Monegan declined the offer and was dismissed as a result.

In the following months, this straightforward personnel decision would be muddied with innuendo, rumor and partisan politics. The facts, however, have not changed: Mr. Monegan, who under the Alaska state constitution serves as an at-will appointee at the pleasure of the Governor, chose to ignore the direction, principles and policies of the Palin Administration. Unable to understand and accept the administration’s policies, to comply with established interagency processes, or to execute goals, Mr. Monegan failed to effectively perform his duties as a member of the cabinet and head of the Department of Public Safety (DPS).

The following analysis will further outline and highlight the multiple acts of insubordination and repeated budget clashes that led to Monegan’s dismissal. The report will also discuss the questionable origins of the Legislative Inquiry and why Governor and Todd Palin were right to express their concerns over Trooper Mike Wooten.

Governor Palin’s reform agenda. Governor Palin came into office in 2006 on a platform of reform, budget discipline and agency oversight. Governor Palin directed her agencies to embrace this policy and work with the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to cut costs while still meeting important department goals.

Monegan’s failure to understand and accept administration policy. Mr. Monegan proved unable to follow the policies of the Palin administration and pressed his own agenda without regard for the formal budgeting process. Emails show a pattern of Mr. Monegan refusing to take administration direction and ignoring attempts by members of Governor Palin’s staff to reach a working consensus on budgetary issues.

Monegan’s failure to comply with established interagency processes. Mr. Monegan worked outside and around the administration, lobbied for funding that was not approved and ignored policy goals that the DPS was expected to meet.

Monegan’s failure to meet Administration goals. Mr. Monegan’s dismissal was based on his repeated refusal to execute the Palin Administration’s vision on budgetary matters and the direction of the Department of Public Safety.

In the months following Mr. Monegan’s dismissal, theories behind his dismissal have arisen, including one pushed by a longtime critic of Governor Palin. On July 16, Andrew Halcro, a former state representative defeated by Governor Palin in the 2006 gubernatorial election and author of a vehemently anti-Palin blog, met Trooper Mike Wooten for drinks at a three-and-a-half hour meeting at the Sheraton Hotel bar in Anchorage. (Governor Palin’s sister had been the third of Wooten’s four wives.) Later that evening, on his blog, Halcro originated the notion that Monegan was reassigned due to his refusal to fire Wooten because of Wooten’s rogue behavior, which is chronicled below. Halcro was the first person to suggest this theory. The following document will prove Walt Monegan’s dismissal was a result of his insubordination and budgetary clashes with Governor Palin and her administration. Trooper Wooten is a separate issue.

It is worth noting, however, that the Palins had good reason to raise concerns about Trooper Mike Wooten. Trooper Wooten has a long history of unstable and erratic behavior, including drinking beer in his squad car, killing moose illegally, using a taser on his 10-year-old stepson and threatening to kill a member of the Palin family. These events are not mere allegations, nor are they limited to the Palin family; in 2006, a formal review by the director of the Alaska State Troopers formally concluded that Wooten had engaged in these acts of misconduct, imposed punishment, and stated that a civilian found to have committed the same acts would have received criminal sanctions. Understandably concerned about a pattern of behavior demonstrated by someone entrusted with the responsibilities of law enforcement, the Palin family reported the behavior to the appropriate authorities, and continued to express concern about Wooten’s continued patrol assignment of their neighborhood and claims of being above the law due to his trooper status.

More as it develops…

While not unprecedented, we haven’t seen this type of move in a while. In fact, I think the last person running for office to do this was Ross Perot.

From Hollywood Reporter:

Barack Obama has purchased a half-hour of primetime television on CBS and NBC, sources confirm.

The Obama campaign is producing a nationwide pitch to voters that will air on at least two broadcast networks. The ad will run Wednesday, Oct. 29, at 8 p.m. — less than a week before the general election.

The direct purchase of such a large block of national airtime right before an election used to be more commonplace before campaigns began to focus their endgame strategies exclusively on battleground states. Such a move is not without precedent in modern presidential politics, however — Ross Perot did a similar purchase in 1992.

The special is a smart move for the Obama campaign, said Larry Sabato, a political analyst and director of the Center of Politics at the University of Virginia.

“Obama’s theme is not just change but unity, so he’s appealing to the whole nation rather than a handful of tossup states,” Sabato said. “He wants to win the popular vote by a good margin, which will enable him to govern.”

The Obama campaign is also said to be in negotiations with Fox. I wonder if ABC said no.

No doubt this would cost tens of millions of dollars, but with Obama’s war chest seemingly overflowing, that’s a cost he can easily bear.

He suggests that Obama hasn’t been honest about it…

Speaking to Dennis Miller, a comedian and conservative radio talk show host, former Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating said Obama should be more forthright about his background and what he called his “very extreme” record.

“He ought to admit, ‘You know, I’ve got to be honest with you. I was a guy of the street. I was way to the left. I used cocaine. I voted liberally, but I’m back at the center,’” Keating, a co-chair of McCain’s campaign, said Obama should tell voters. “I mean, I understand the big picture of America. But he hasn’t done that.”

An aide to John McCain said Keating was not directed by the campaign to make the comments.

“We didn’t ask him to do it,” the aide said. “He didn’t clear it with us, but obviously he’s read Senator Obama’s books.”

And do know…it’ll only get uglier.

This according to Ipsos/McClatchy…

Washington, DC – A new Ipsos/McClatchy poll of undecided voters who watched last night’s second Presidential debate indicates that Barack Obama seems to be picking up momentum among the small number of voters who have not yet decided on a candidate.

Before the debate, these undecided voters leaned toward John McCain (Obama 45%/McCain 55%) – but after last night’s debate, nearly six in ten lean toward supporting Obama (Obama 57%/McCain 43%).

I’m honestly surprised to see that Americans thought he won it hands down. I mean, I certainly thought he certainly won, but not by the margins we’re consistently seeing.

In fact, it was unanimous…

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (CNN) – An investigation into Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s firing of her public safety commissioner can proceed, Alaska’s Supreme Court ruled Thursday, clearing the way for a Friday report to the state Legislature on the issue.

The justices rejected an effort to halt the probe by the Republican vice presidential nominee’s allies in the Legislature, who called the investigation an attempt by partisan Democrats to sabotage the GOP ticket.

The justices unanimously upheld an Anchorage judge’s ruling last week that dismissed the Republican lawsuit and upheld subpoenas for top Palin allies.

I think the report is set to come out tomorrow.

More as it develops…

Another bad day for Wall Street as the Dow lost 7% and fell below 9,000.

Since a year ago today, the Dow has shed 39% of its value.

It’s not pretty out there.

McCain should have known better than to tell somebody that they didn’t know a fact about the economic crisis.

Because something like this may happen…

How did I feel about Sen. McCain stating “You probably never heard of Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac before this.”

Well Senator, I actually did. I like to think of myself as a fairly intelligent person. I have a bachelor degree in Political Science from Tennessee State, so I try to keep myself up to date with current affairs. I have a Master degree in Legal Studies from Southern Illinois University, a few years in law school, and I am currently pursuing a Master in Public Administration from the University of Memphis. In defense of the Senator from Arizona I would say he is an older guy, and may have made an underestimation of my age. Honest mistake. However, it could be because I am a young African-American male. Whatever the case may be it was somewhat condescending regardless of my age to make an assumption regarding whether I was knowledgeable about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Ouch.

(h/t: First Read)

Four polls so far and four big wins for Obama.

Here are two more…

USA Today:
Obama 56%
McCain 23%

While 53% of the 735 people surveyed said their opinions of Obama had not changed, 34% said they thought more favorably of him and 12% viewed him less favorably. All 735 said they had watched the debate.

The reactions to McCain were almost mirror opposites: 54% said their opinions about him had not changed, 33% felt less favorable and 12% felt more favorable.

Rasmussen:
Obama 45%
McCain 28%

Only 10% of voters in the new survey say they did not watch any of the debate Tuesday night. Fifty-five percent (55%) say they watched all of it.

Among those who watched all of the debate, Obama won even more decisively 57% to 29%.

Both men and women declared Obama the winner of the second debate – male voters by 10 points, women by 22.

What else to say? He’s two for two.

Now, onto next Wednesday!

Is this an outlier? Perhaps. But even if it is, the race is probably a lot closer to being tied than most think.

The key here is Independents are breaking for Obama 50% to 38%. And I think, once again, that this shows the Palin pick doesn’t necessarily speak to “small town Americans.”

Nate Silver has some analysis…

Nevertheless, if Obama has a double-digit lead in Pennsylvania — and all of the polls seem to think that he does — that means he’s had to have made at least some progress in the “Pennsyltucky” region in the interior of the state.

And if he’s made progress in Pennsyltucky, that probably means he’s made progress in West Virginia. West Virginia — like Pennsylvania — is also a place where the Democrats retain a substantial edge in party identification, and perhaps the economy has really brought Democrats home.

Indeed, for the past week or so, just about every poll taken in a Kerry state has shown Obama with a double-digit lead, with the minor exception of Minnesota, where the polling has been erratic.

Maybe there’s more room for electoral gains than I had thought…

Not that this is any surprise, but I sincerely hope that McCain loses by a landslide now that he’s trying to convince people that Obama is basically a terrorist’s best friend.

But hey, take a look for yourself.

McCain’s “maverick” brand is forever damaged with independent voters. But I guess that’s less important than the hope of somehow pulling out a win.

The end.

When you miss a detail as big as this, you have to wonder if the hand at the tiller is all that steady.

This phrase was originally in McCain’s plan: “Lenders in these cases must recognize the loss that they’ve already suffered.”

Well, that was wrong. Lenders won’t be suffering any losses at all. Instead, McCain’s plan calls for the government to buy up the mortgages at their current value and pass any losses onto the taxpayer.

A campaign official characterized the mistake as such…

“That language was mistakenly included in the initial draft and it’s been corrected. It doesn’t reflect the intentions of the initiative, which necessitated the correction and the removal of the sentence. A simple mistake.”

A simple mistake? Hardly. A simple mistake would be a few typos or the addition of the word “not” in an inappropriate place. This was an entire sentence that completely changed the intentions of the plan.

Big mistake folks, and it’s troubling to say the very least.

Moving on…

The details…

These results, based on Oct. 6-8 polling, include one day of interviewing after Tuesday’s debate in Nashville and come amid continuing consumer anxiety about the economy. Several of Gallup’s economic tracking measures are as negative as has been measured at any time since daily tracking began this year.

Signifying a general stability in the race, Obama has maintained a share of the vote between 48% and 52% over the last two weeks, while McCain’s share during that same time period has been between 41% and 45%. The next and final presidential debate will be held Wednesday, Oct. 15 at Hofstra University in New York.

More tomorrow…

Now, McCain has amended his plan and is proposing to pay face value for the loans. This means that McCain wants to buy loans at their original inflated prices and then issue new loans at a reduced, market-rate-adjusted price. Taxpayers would absorb the losses but both homeowners and financial institutions would come out ahead (The Wall Street Journal explains in more detail and offers their reservations about such a plan).

I always thought McCain was a “share the burden” guy. In many of these cases of bad loans, both the homebuyer and the lender made very poor decisions. While I know that predatory lending did occur, I’m also pretty sure that most buyers understood the risks. They tried to make a home an investment and they lost the gamble. While I sympathize with these people, I don’t feel we have the responsibility to bail them out anymore than we have a responsibility to bail out the financial institutions who failed to do due diligence before issuing these loans. So why does McCain want the taxpayers to suffer the entire burden?

Clearly, McCain wants to 1) show the public he cares about people in trouble and 2) wants to attempt to stop to bleeding before the economy completely hemorrhages. Both noble goals. But this plan is too one-sided. Homebuyers and lenders who made bad decisions should shoulder a fair share of the consequences. As a taxpayer, I am willing to help out but I find the McCain plan fundamentally unfair. Plus, the precedent it sets is horrible and will do little to prevent poor decisions in the future.

McCain should really consider revising his plan yet again.

Things are getting extremely dire…

WASHINGTON — A draft report by American intelligence agencies concludes that Afghanistan is in a “downward spiral” and casts serious doubt on the ability of the Afghan government to stem the rise in the Taliban’s influence there, according to American officials familiar with the document.

The classified report finds that the breakdown in central authority in Afghanistan has been accelerated by rampant corruption within the government of President Hamid Karzai and by an increase in violence by militants who have launched increasingly sophisticated attacks from havens in Pakistan.

The report, a nearly completed version of a National Intelligence Estimate, is set to be finished after the November elections and will be the most comprehensive American assessment in years on the situation in Afghanistan. Its conclusions represent a harsh verdict on decision-making in the Bush administration, which in the months after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks made Afghanistan the central focus of a global campaign against terrorism.

Note the part about Pakistan in there. This is why Obama is winning that argument. The “Talk Softly” strategy that McCain wants to employ simply isn’t an option because of how incredibly bad things are at this point.

Obama loses one today, and McCain pulls within a margin he had about 10 days ago.

Some recent polls like Hotline/Diaego and Zogby have shown a much tighter race, but Zogby’s credibility is shot at this point and Hotline/Diaego is very new and samples far fewer than either Rasmussen or Gallup. This is also why I’m not showing the Research 2000/Daily Kos tracking poll that has Obama leading by 10.

Rasmussen shares some numbers about demographics and national mood…

Obama now leads by 13 points among women but trails by two among men. Among White Women, it’s McCain 48% Obama 47%.

Among voters not affiliated with either major party, Obama leads by seven.

Just 10% of voters believe the country is heading in the right direction. Eighty-seven percent (87%) say we’ve gotten off on the wrong track.

The 5 day:
10/09/2008: McCain - 45%, Obama - 50%
10/08/2008: McCain - 45%, Obama - 51%
10/07/2008: McCain - 44%, Obama - 52%
10/06/2008: McCain - 44%, Obama - 52%
10/05/2008: McCain - 44%, Obama - 51%

More tomorrow…

Unfortunately, American electoral politics has consistently shown that, when a black candidate is running against a white candidate, the black candidate’s pre-election poll numbers end up being higher than their actual vote tally. The theory is that certain white voters, for fear of seeming racist, will tell pollsters they are voting for the black candidate when they actually intend to vote for the white candidate. Or, they change their vote at the last minute.

Whatever the cause of the Bradley effect, we can’t assume it won’t apply this November. Already in this election cycle, some observers questioned if the effect played a role in the New Hampshire primary where polls showed Obama ahead of Hillary Clinton by as much as 13% before he ended up losing the state by 3%. There are plenty of other reasonable explanations for the discrepancy (not the least of which is bad polling) but, certainly, the Bradley effect is a real concern.

I do believe we are a less racist nation now than we were even ten years ago and I’d be surprised if a significant number of voters are intentionally misleading pollsters. I expect, barring one heck of an October surprise, that Obama will win. But it’ll be interesting to see if there’s any Bradley effect in what is the biggest election ever between a black candidate and a white one.

The New York Times talked to three people in the audience at the town hall on Tuesday, and they all thought the actual debate was a wash.

However, after the debate left, McCain stuck around for a few minutes and then left. Obama stayed for a long time and tired to shake everybody’s hand.

Here’s what the voters thought…

Both women, as well as the third audience member, were especially emphatic about their feelings on the two men’s performance after the debate. All three said that Mr. McCain shook hands with several audience members and then left fairly quickly. Mr. Obama and his wife, Michelle, stuck around to shake far more hands, pose for pictures, sign autographs, and answer more questions, including from people who had been on stage but did not get a chance to ask their questions. Only when Secret Service agents told them it was time to go did the couple leave (upon which they headed for a post-debate fundraiser at Al and Tipper Gore’s house nearby).

“McCain leaving right afterward was pretty shocking to me – even some of the big McCain fans among us were really surprised he did that,” Ms. Jackson said. “I thought the Obamas came off like real people much more in the end.”

Ms. Trella added: for, “I was very impressed that the Obamas stayed til the very end, shook everyone’s hand, and just seemed very accessible. I think they won some people over by just sticking around and seeming happy to talk more.”

Here’s the video…

Why did McCain have to leave so abruptly?

Hearts and minds…

Sad, but true.

The simple mathematics show that if Obama maintains his 6-8 point lead, and picks up key red states (where he is already leading) such as Florida, Virginia, Ohio, Nevada, New Mexico, Missouri and Colorado, it will be a full on blowout, similar to the one that George H.W. Bush enjoyed over Michael Dukakis in 1988.   In that election, Bush won the popular vote by eight points, which translated into a whopping 426 electoral votes (to the Duke’s 111).

A route of those proportions would certainly mean big gains in the House and Senate for Democrats.  While voters tend to be smart about ticket splitting and preserving divided government (poll after poll shows that most voters prefer that each party control one branch of government), this is clearly a change election, and there’s no doubt the Democrats will have entrenched majorities.

With that, Barack Obama will have a mandate — and a long honeymoon — to get things done, particularly on the economy and Iraq, the two biggest issues.  He won’t receive any Congressional roadblocks to enacting his economic plan (whatever that is … I’m still not sure) and summarily pulling the troops out of Iraq (irrespective of how close they are to the finish line).  It will be his ballgame, and the Republicans in Congress will be in a similar position to the ‘93 Congress, where they played loyal opposition to President Clinton.

It’s way too early to begin forecasting how this will play out, but it’s not too early to begin thinking about the impact of an Obama blowout.

www.nickragone.com

As the author of Bush’s infamous “Axis of Evil” line, Frum is keenly aware of the appropriate framing. And Bush was able to ride that frame to a two term presidency.

So no doubt Frum sees that the next 2 years will be incredibly bad for the Republican brand and they do themselves no favors by pushing the “Obama is a terrorist’s best friend” meme. It was a dog from the beginning and it continues to get increasingly absurd with each utterance.

Long story short, Frum doesn’t want to give Obama the firepower for a cake walk in 2012.

Conservatives take note.

From the beginning I argued that Palin was a great pick for the base, but would prove to be ineffectual with Independents.

In fact, directly after Palin’s much ballyhooed speech, I said the following…

Why give a speech that was really designed to rally the Republican base when John McCain consistently gets more Republican support than Obama gets Democratic support?

Why go on the attack with petty snipes at Obama when you have the chance to frame yourself as a true, transformative political figure and rise above it all?

[...] my guess is that the large majority of independents want to see a lot more out of you than the speech you gave if you have ANY chance of winning their vote. In fact, you may have lost a good portion of them last night.

And since white men and women make up the majority of Independents, that’s a big problem for McCain. His campaign knows that there will probably be a larger than normal African-American and youth vote coming out this season, so he had to win these key white groups by a larger margin than usual if he had any chance of winning.

Well, now Pollster has collected numbers from 56 separate polls to gauge the “Palin Effect” and it’s more bad news for McCain.

But first to explain the following graph What you see below is a shifting horizontal red line representing white women, a shifting horizontal blue line representing white men, and a straight horizontal gray line representing a “TIE” line. That means that the lower the blue and red lines go, the bigger the advantage for McCain. The closer they get to the gray line, the more Obama cuts into McCain’s lead.

Also, the vertical red line marks the date at which Palin was picked as the nominee.

Pretty striking, no?

From the moment that Palin really started taking tough questions she lost roughly 5 points among these key voting groups. And nothing is turning that around at this point. She had her last shot at the debate and she tried to wink her way into the Oval Office.

Now, I do think that it’s unfair to pin all of this swing on Palin. There are obviously some incredibly big things happening in the economy right now. But her lack of poise and candor has proven deadly with Independents. And those lines starting trending towards Obama well before the economic crisis.

Of note, there is another graph over at Pollster that shows a slight swing back among women for Palin, but since Pollster said that graph was more sensitive to outliers (unreliable polls), I chose to use this one instead since the conclusion is pretty much the same.

Electoral Projection Averages 10.06.08: Obama 340, McCain 198.

So what could happen in two days?

Plenty.

Five Thirty Eight: Obama 346.8, McCain 191.2


Electoral-Vote.com: Obama 349, McCain 174, Ties 15


Real Clear Politics: Obama 364, McCain 174


Pollster: Obama 320, McCain 163, Ties 55


Electoral Projection Averages 10.08.08: Obama 354, McCain 184

Obama has added 14 and that means McCain has lost the same number.

As always, I split “Ties” as evenly as I can between the candidates, even though that may not be an accurate representation of how the actual electoral votes would be allocated.

I’ll keep doing this when I see any shifts in the numbers, which I definitely anticipate in the coming days as the state polls catch up with the most reliable daily nationals, those being Gallup’s and Rasmussen’s.

However, we’re honestly starting to see Obama hit a electoral ceiling. Because if Nevada, Colorado, Virginia, Missouri, Ohio, Florida and North Carolina keep trending his way (which is shown above in the Real Clear Politics map), the only state left that I think he has a realistic shot at getting is Indiana. And if the Hoosier state goes blue, the numbers will be as such: Obama 375, McCain 163.

At this point I don’t think that’s very likely, but unless he can somehow swing Georgia into his column, 375 is the highest