Barack Obama spoke to a crowd of 100,000 over the weekend in St. Louis, Missouri.
** WALL STREET JOURNAL/NBC NEWS POLL: OBAMA BY 10. Well, maybe it won’t tighten up before expanding again. This new national poll has Barack Obama way out in front of John McCain, 52% to 42%. The poll was conducted for the WSJ and NBC from Friday through Monday night. Obama has opened up a big lead with independent voters and with suburban voters.
And, further eating into McCain’s strength as the candidate of experience and a steady hand, nearly as many voters say they are comfortable with Obama as commander-in-chief as with McCain.
** SCHWARZENEGGER LIVE WEBCAST ON RENEWABLE ENERGY THIS AFTERNOON, WILL CALL POST-ELECTION SPECIAL SESSION ON CHRONIC BUDGET CRISIS. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger appears at California State University at Dominguez Hills to announce a new public/private partnership to generate 8 megawatts of electric power on campuses around the state using renewable energy sources.
Schwarzenegger will call a special session of the Legislature after next month’s election to deal with California’s chronic budget crisis, which has worsened due to the epic financial crisis and economic downturn. It should come before the end of November.
** U.S. SENATE REPUBLICAN LEADER MCCONNELL ALL TIED UP IN KENTUCKY. The new Survey USA poll of Kentucky shows US Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell having slid into a dead-even race with Democratic challenger Bruce Lunsford, a former state commerce secretary under former Governor John Y. Brown. It’s McConnell 46%, Lunsford 46%.
McConnell was first elected to the Senate in 1984, narrowly beating Democratic Senator Walter Huddleston in the midst of Ronald Reagan’s landslide re-election.
McConnell is helped by the collapse of actor Sonny Landham’s Libertarian candidacy for the office. Landham was the Libertarian nominee until a few months ago, when the party disavowed his candidacy following Landham’s very intemperate remarks about Arabs. Landham, a member of the Cherokee nation, was a well-known figure in ’80s action hits, co-starring in 48 Hours and in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Predator.
** MANY NEWSPAPERS SWITCH FROM BUSH TO OBAMA. There are at least 26 newspapers that endorsed President Bush in 2004 that have since backed Barack Obama over John McCain. These include such biggies as the Denver Post, Salt Lake Tribune, and Houston Chronicle. As well as a half-dozen California papers, including the San Bernardino Sun in the formerly Republican Inland Empire.
** INDIANA POLL: OBAMA BY 2. In the new Public Policy Polling survey of longtime red state Indiana, Barack Obama leads John McCain, 48% to 46%. Obama slender edge is due to widespread concern about the economy and a 10-point edge amongst independent voters.
** NEW HAMPSHIRE POLL: OBAMA BY 7. Although battleground New Hampshire is the state that revived John McCain’s campaign with his strong primary win there, Barack Obama leads in the Granite State, 50% to 43%, in this new Concord Monitor poll. Fully 41% recall voting for McCain before, in 2000, when he beat George W. Bush, and 2008, including 30% of the Democrats and 45% of the independents. But Obama has a much better favorable/unfavorable rating, 55/33 to McCain’s 45/44. One big problem for McCain in New Hampshire? Running mate Sarah Palin.
** INTRIGUING PROFILE OF JERRY BROWN. An interesting profile in the new issue of California Lawyer magazine of state Attorney General Jerry Brown. Typically, Brown starts out challenging the writer to find something new to say about him. Brown, of course, has been around the block a time or four, as two-term Governor of California, two-term Mayor of Oakland, two-time runner-up for the Democratic presidential nomination, former California secretary of state, and former California Democratic Party chairman. Oh, and he was on the LA community college board, too.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
Barack Obama is in Lake Worth and Miami, Florida. Obama is spending his second day in a row in Florida in an effort to lock down the Sunshine State. Yesterday, Hillary Clinton joined him for a rally in Orlando that drew 50,000 people and dominated statewide news. Obama’s Lake Worth event is an economic summit of sorts with Google CEO Erich Schmidt (who has bestirred himself from Silicon Valley and is campaigning for Obama this week in high tech centers around the country), former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker, and the governors of Colorado, New Mexico, and Michigan.
Joe Biden is in Greeley and Commerce City, Colorado. The Centennial State is trending Obama, there are signs that McCain is going to pull out, and Biden is there to start locking it down.
John McCain is in Bensalem, Harrisburg, and Moon Township, Pennsylvania. The Keystone State is McCain’s sole remaining chance for a blue state takeaway. He hopes that the Bittergate comments in the primary give him some added traction there he wouldn’t have otherwise, and is pushing uphil against Obama’s lead.
Sarah Palin is in Reno and Henderson, Nevada. The Silver State is a hotly contested swing state where Obama has a slight lead. Palin is trying to do something about it.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger launches a new public-private partnership that will create 8 megawatts of renewable power at California State University campuses throughout the state this afternoon. The event is in Southern California at the campus of Cal State Dominguez Hills.
John McCain’s new TV ad uses Joe the Plumber to say that Obama would raise most people’s taxes.
** INSIDE THE “BRADLEY EFFECT.”Barack Obama has won all three presidential debates over John McCain. He has a solid lead in the polls. What could go wrong for him? Well, many say the polls could be wrong, skewed by a hidden racist vote.
The “Bradley effect” — the notion that white voters lie to pollsters when a black candidate is in the race — has become widely known. But what you think you know from the campaign that gave rise to the phrase, then Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley’s ultimately near-miss race for governor of California in 1982, isn’t so.
I was in the middle of that, doing opposition research for Bradley’s campaign. I vividly recall election day that November, as reports from the exit polling done by California’s leading polling organization, the Field Poll, circulated. It seemed that Bradley, the first black mayor of Los Angeles, was headed for a big win as California’s first black governor. … From my Friday Huffington Post column.
** THE “MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE” FANTASY: PARANOIA AND IRONY ABOUND. “He’s … an Arab.” It’s perhaps fitting that last week ended that way for John McCain — face to face, embarrassingly, with an angry supporter sputtering about Barack Obama — given that he began it with a speech playing to the deep swamp of fevered innuendo about Obama as a “Manchurian candidate” out to seize the presidency and take down America. …
The Manchurian candidate ugliness began reaching critical mass over two years ago. That’s when it became apparent that Obama could be the figure of the future in American politics. …
Produced in 1962, The Manchurian Candidate is a darkly satirical view of far right politics in America. It was made with the encouragement of President John F. Kennedy, who was all too aware of the dangers of the paranoid style in American politics, starring his good friend Frank Sinatra, as Sinatra himself recounted in a 1988 documentary on the making of the film. … From my Wednesday column.
Russia and India have developed the world’s fastest cruise missile.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, which I know as a former DemRussia advisor, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Among them is what I’m sure is the first piece examining Schwarzenegger’s legacy as governor of California. Since he will actually be governor of California until 2011. No technology known to be disruptive to the space/time continuum was used in its preparation.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND NATIONAL ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. After crashing over $147 for yet another record on July 11th, crude oil is trading in the $71 to $72 per barrel range. It’s anticipated that there will be an OPEC production cut on Friday to preserve profit margins in the face of the global economic slump.
Deutsche Bank issued a forecast over the weekend that crude oil will trade at $60 per barrel in 2009 amidst a possible “major global recession.”
The drop of $76 per barrel since the record high three months ago comes on acknowledgment that the weak US economy will cut future demand and the easing of geopolitical tensions in the Middle East. The Russian war with Georgia, confounding much speculation and reporting to the contrary, actually decreased the geopolitical risk premium in the oil market.
General Colin Powell discussed the presidential race yesterday on Meet The Press and endorsed Barack Obama over his old friend John McCain.
… LATE-BREAKING: OBAMA SUSPENDS CAMPAIGNING ON THURSDAY AND FRIDAY. Presidential front-runner Barack Obama is suspending his campaign on Thursday and Friday to visit his ailing grandmother in Hawaii. I believe this knocks out events in Iowa and Wisconsin, both of which I expect Obama to win.
** END OF DAY. A funny day today. On a personal note, after running around late morning, at mid-day I felt a possible flu coming on, so throttled way down for a few hours. Thus delaying a column I’ve been prepping on the TV ad wars. But I wasn’t quite buying what I’d found, that John McCain’s campaign would focus on Joe the Plumber ads to try to come from behind against Barack Obama.
McCain is trying now, with some heavy personal campaigning, to take Pennyslvania away from Obama. It’s his only shot at a blue state takeaway. And it really looks unlikely to me. McCain is also trying to stop Obama from red state takeaways, but sees the Mountain West and Virginia sliding away, amongst others. Obama is spending two days in Florida right now, joined by Hillary Clinton.
I don’t think Joe the Plumber ads are enough, especially when Obama is swamping McCain with his own TV ads. The Bill Ayers stuff is now sliding down to the robocall level. After crying “socialism,” McCain is trying today to make Obama’s readiness an issue, seizing on a Joe Biden comment at Seattle funder that the next president is likely to be tested by a geopolitical crisis in the first six months of 2009. But now we know Colin Powell, McCain’s most admired man, who backed McCain over George W. Bush in 2000, will be lending a hand. I’m wondering, what’s the play? Perhaps a return of the Wright Stuff?
Stephanopoulos also makes the point that Colin Powell’s endorsement of Barack Obama is not just a signal of his backing for the Democrat; it’s an explicit rejection of what Powell sees the Republican Party becoming.
** SCHWARZENEGGER TO OHIO FOR MCCAIN. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has been completely absent from the presidential campaign trail since the primaries, will travel to Ohio at the end of next week to appear with John McCain.
Here’s what Schwarzenegger said late this morning at his event in San Diego for Prop 11, the redistricting reform initiative, in answer to a local reporter’s question: I think that I will be next week sometime, the end of next week in Ohio, in Columbus, Ohio, which is the city where I traditionally always go and campaign, like the weekend before the election. I have done this is 1988 and in 1992 and so on, so I will be going there for one event to Columbus, Ohio.
The former action superstar is very popular in Ohio, and has significant business interests in Columbus, where he holds the annual Arnold Classic bodybuilding and powerlifting festival. His appearance for President Bush there in 2004 might have helped tip the state – and the election – to Bush. The scenario in this election appears to me to be different.
** VIRGINIA SENATE RACE: DEMOCRAT WARNER BY 25. John McCain needs to win my ancestral state, Virginia. But he’s down 10 to Barack Obama in the latest Rasmussen (Republican) poll. Another Rasmussen poll of Virginia brings no better news. The Democrat, former Governor Mark Warner – who keynoted the Democratic national convention in Denver, not terribly well, actually – leads the Republican, former Governor and RNC chairman Jim Gilmore, in the race to replace retiring Republican Senator John Warner by an enormous margin. It’s Warner 61%, Gilmore 36%. They won’t be calling him Happy Gilmore …
** COMING UP … A NEW COLUMN ON THE TV AD WARS. Mad men, indeed.
** VIRGINIA POLL: OBAMA BY 10. The new Rasmussen poll of battleground Virginia shows Barack Obama expanding his lead over John McCain in this traditionally red state, 54% to 44%. Obama has been blowing out McCain in TV advertising former Navy Secretary-turned-Senator Jim Webb has campaigned hard in the Old Dominion for the freshman llinois senator. Over half of Virginia voters say that McCain has run a heavily negative campaign and that it’s a good idea to increase taxes on people making more than $250,000 a year.
** NORTH CAROLINA POLL: OBAMA BY 7. The new Public Policy Polling survey of traditionally red state North Carolina shows Barack Obama leading John McCain in the Tarheel State, 51% to 44%. Obama is winning heavily amongst independent voters and his Democratic support is up over 80%.
The Morning Column: MONDAY MORNING QUARTERBACK
Two full weeks of campaigning remain in the seemingly endless presidential race. Barack Obama, fresh from a record-shattering fundraising month and with the endorsement of America’s most respected military man, is on the offensive this week, campaigning exclusively in states previously won by President Bush. John McCain is playing a mix of defense and offense.
Meanwhile, California’s initiative wars are approaching the home stretch.
And looming over all the politics is the specter of what Deutsche Bank describes as a potential major global recession. Pressured by the European Union’s plan to establish a council to oversee the world’s 30 largest banks, many of them American, President Bush, who has already taken previously unthinkable steps in the form of partial government ownership of major US banks, will host a post-election global economic summit in New York.
Obama is coming off a great weekend. On Saturday, he had gigantic rallies in Missouri, a state conceded to McCain by most a few months ago, with 100,000 in St. Louis and 75,000 in Kansas City. Obama leads by 6 in the latest Show-Me State polling.
Late Saturday night, word came out of the Obama campaign that it had destroyed its own previous monthly fundraising record, raising an astonishing $150 million in September. This is why Obama is able to out-gun McCain on the air by a 4 to 1 ratio.
Early Sunday morning, Obama won the endorsement of General Colin Powell, America’s most admired military man, who served in the highest posts in Republican administrations as national security advisor to President Reagan, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for the first President Bush, and secretary of state for the second President Bush. Powell is an old friend of John McCain. In fact, McCain has described Powell as the man he admires most. Which must have made Powell’s indictment of McCain’s campaign, and his selection of Sarah Palin, all the more galling.
Bill and Hillary Clinton are also on the trail for Obama this week. The former president is in Nevada and Hillary Clinton joins Obama for a big Monday night rally in Orlando, Florida.
Nevertheless, while Obama plays almost exclusively in red state territory this week, I expect the national tracking polls to tighten somewhat. Not because of Obama slippage – he’s consistently in the high 40s to 50 – but because of McCain picking up some undecideds.
Then the margin may expand again at the end.
John McCain’s attack ad on Obama uses Joe the Plumber to claim that Obama would raise most people’s taxes.
McCain is playing the Joe the Plumber card, invoking him more than running mate Sarah Palin, who polls show has become a liability outside the conservative Republican base. That means scaring voters about Obama and his “socialist” policies, as McCain put it the other day, as a big tax-and-spender. But in this environment, most voters probably want government to spend in order to stimulate the economy and provide of a safety net. So the success of this tack depends on the McCain campaign’s ability to convince people that Obama would raise their taxes, and not the taxes of rich people and corporations. The real world Joe the Plumber’s taxes would go down with Obama.
Despite the very promising tidings for Obama, running mate Joe Biden warned against overconfidence at a big weekend fundraiser at the Silicon Valley home of former state Controller Steve Westly, one of Obama’s earliest and biggest backers. The sentimental Biden, notes Westly, quoted Irish poet Seamus Heaney in closing:
History says, don’t hope
On this side of the grave.
But then, once in a lifetime
The longed-for tidal wave
Of justice can rise up,
And hope and history rhyme.
Turning to California, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is pushing this week for his long-sought redistricting reform, this time in the form of Proposition 11. He and his various good government and business allies have a shot, especially with powerful public employee unions like the teachers, service employees, and firefighters staying neutral this time.
The anti-gay marriage initiative fight may be down to the wire, too. It looked headed for defeat, but effective TV ads on its behalf, featuring San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom seeming to taunt opponents – “Whether you like it or not!” – are cutting hard.
Former Speaker Willie Brown, who as San Francisco’s mayor started Newsom’s political career by appointing him to the San Francisco board of supervisors (SF is a combination city and county), wrote again in his weekend column how badly Newsom’s gaffe is hurting the same-sex marriage cause. Same-sex marriage is now legal in California after a decision by the state’s Republican majority Supreme Court.
But the big imponderable is the global economy. One thing is for sure. The Wall Street bailout was just the start of efforts to stabilize things. And the economy will – absent some over-the-top development on the Terror War front – dominate the last 16 days of this election season.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
Barack Obama is in Tampa and Orlando, Florida.
Joe Biden is in Seattle, Washington.
John McCain is in St. Charles, Columbia, and Belton, Missouri and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Sarah Palin is in Colorado Springs, Loveland, Grand Junction, Colorado and Reno, Nevada.
Bill Clinton campaigns for Obama in Nevada while Hillary Clinton joins up with Obama for a big rally in Florida.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is campaigning today for Prop 11, the redistricting reform initiative, in Southern California.
Schwarzenegger will be joined in San Diego by Chamber of Commerce President Reuben Barrales, San Diego County District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis, San Diego City Councilmember Donna Frye, Pastor Gerald Johnson of the NAACP and former Democratic state Senator Dede Alpert.
** INSIDE THE “BRADLEY EFFECT.”Barack Obama has won all three presidential debates over John McCain. He has a solid lead in the polls. What could go wrong for him? Well, many say the polls could be wrong, skewed by a hidden racist vote.
The “Bradley effect” — the notion that white voters lie to pollsters when a black candidate is in the race — has become widely known. But what you think you know from the campaign that gave rise to the phrase, then Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley’s ultimately near-miss race for governor of California in 1982, isn’t so.
I was in the middle of that, doing opposition research for Bradley’s campaign. I vividly recall election day that November, as reports from the exit polling done by California’s leading polling organization, the Field Poll, circulated. It seemed that Bradley, the first black mayor of Los Angeles, was headed for a big win as California’s first black governor. … From my new Huffington Post column.
** THE “MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE” FANTASY: PARANOIA AND IRONY ABOUND. “He’s … an Arab.” It’s perhaps fitting that last week ended that way for John McCain — face to face, embarrassingly, with an angry supporter sputtering about Barack Obama — given that he began it with a speech playing to the deep swamp of fevered innuendo about Obama as a “Manchurian candidate” out to seize the presidency and take down America. …
The Manchurian candidate ugliness began reaching critical mass over two years ago. That’s when it became apparent that Obama could be the figure of the future in American politics. …
Produced in 1962, The Manchurian Candidate is a darkly satirical view of far right politics in America. It was made with the encouragement of President John F. Kennedy, who was all too aware of the dangers of the paranoid style in American politics, starring his good friend Frank Sinatra, as Sinatra himself recounted in a 1988 documentary on the making of the film. … From my Wednesday column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, which I know as a former DemRussia advisor, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Among them is what I’m sure is the first piece examining Schwarzenegger’s legacy as governor of California. Since he will actually be governor of California until 2011. No technology known to be disruptive to the space/time continuum was used in its preparation.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND NATIONAL ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. After crashing over $147 for yet another record on July 11th, crude oil is trading around $74 per barrel. The price is up a few dollars on anticipation of an OPEC production cut coming on Friday to preserve profit margins.
Deutsche Bank has issued a forecast that crude oil will trade at $60 per barrel in 2009 amidst a possible “major global recession.
The drop of $73 per barrel since the record high three months ago comes on acknowledgment that the weak US economy will cut future demand and the easing of geopolitical tensions in the Middle East. The Russian war with Georgia, confounding much speculation and reporting to the contrary, actually decreased the geopolitical risk premium in the oil market.
Josh Brolin, the former Mister Sterling and star of the Oscar-winning No Country For Old Men, is W.
** SO, WHAT ABOUT W? Like most people I know, I haven’t been dying to see a movie about President Bush. I feel like I’ve been in the movie, for going on eight years now. But the trailer looks good, Oliver Stone is a very talented if erratic director, gifted not only at lefty agitprop but actual bravura filmmaking, and I like Josh Brolin, who plays the man himself. So, after seeing USC beat Washington State 69-0 and watching the Chinese Grand Prix, which started at midnight Pacific time, and sleeping for awhile before watching Colin Powell make his presidential endorsement on the 6 AM edition of Meet The Press, and sleeping some more after that, I popped over to the theater to catch W.
It’s pretty good. Definitely entertaining and pretty funny.
I have to confess that, personally, I’ve always liked Bush. I’ve met him and he has a certain charm. As I’ve always written, and have always been attacked for it, he is smart. Not a genius, but definitely smart. His problems are not due to any lack of intelligence.
In 2000, as my old friend and colleague Marc Cooper not infrequently reminds me, I described Bush as “Bill Clinton with a glint of steel.” That may have been somewhat incorrect.
In any event, Josh Brolin is terrific as Bush, giving you a sense of a fun-loving smart aleck heading down the tubes till he is rescued by the love of a good woman and a renewed sense of purpose in religion. Who then returns the favor to us all by besting the brother who was supposed to be the president, and trying to best his father, by ascending rapidly to the White House himself.
Quite a few moviegoers, according to exit polling, felt that the movie wasn’t critical enough of Bush. Of course, the audience is overwhelmingly anti-Bush, even more than the country, and liberal to boot.
Stone is actually rather sympathetic to Bush, perhaps as one rakish ex-rich kid to another, though you never get the feeling that Bush really should be president. The movie takes you through Bush’s hell-raising early life through the invasion of Iraq and the beginning of the very big trouble there in the invasion’s aftermath.
It looks like a successful movie to me, though hardly a hit. It opened at $10.6 million for the weekend, not exactly Dark Knight territory, but it only cost $25 million to make and should play pretty heavily in foreign markets and on DVD.
It got an awful lot of TV advertising for a political movie. The mini-major studio behind it, Lion’s Gate, was the producer of Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11. So my guess is that they wanted to make a political splash with the election on. Besides, that Moore picture was a gigantic hit around the world, so they can afford it.
Speaking of the frequently preposterous Mr. Moore, he is the thinly veiled target of yet another political movie now at the box office. A comedy about a lefty documentary filmmaker who hates America, directed by one of the Zucker brothers (Airplane), the one who made some very unfunny political ads a few years back.
An American Carol is a big bomb. Its producers reportedly cried foul about the box office receipts its opening weekend, which were only around $3 million. After three weeks in wide release, it’s up to $6.8 million at the domestic box office, with no foreign box office prospects. It only cost $5 million less to produce than W.
** GENERAL COLIN POWELL ON THE PRESIDENTIAL RACE. From this morning’s Meet The Press, in which Powell endorsed Barack Obama, criticized the McCain campaign and the Republican Party for its tack further to the right, and dismissed what we call the Manchurian candidate fantasy: I know both of these individuals very well now. I’ve known John for 25 years as your set-up said, and I’ve gotten to know Mr. Obama quite well over the past two years. Both of them are distinguished Americans who are patriotic, dedicated to the welfare of our country. Either one of them, I think, would be a good president.
I have said to Mr. McCain that, um, I admire all he has done. I have some concerns about the direction that the Party has taken in recent years. It has moved more to the Right than I would like to see it, but that’s a choice the Party makes.
And I’ve said to Mr. Obama, “You have to pass the test of, Do you have enough experience? Do you bring the judgment to the table that would give us confidence that you would be a good president?”
And I’ve watched them over the past two years, frankly, and I’ve had this conversation with them. I have especially watched over the last six or seven weeks as both of them have really taken a final exam with respect to this economic crisis that we are in, and coming out of the Conventions.
And I must say that, uh, I’ve gotten a good measure of both. In the case of Mr. McCain, I found that he was a little unsure as to how to deal with the economic problems that we’re having. And almost every day there was a different approach to the problem and that concerned me. It’s sensing that he didn’t have a complete grasp of the economic problems that we had. And I was also concerned at the selection of Governor Palin. She’s a very distinguished woman and she is to be admired. But at the same time, now that we have had a chance to watch her for some seven weeks, I don’t believe she’s ready to be President of the United States, which is the job of the Vice President. And so, uh, that raised some question in my mind as to the judgment that Senator McCain made.
On the Obama side, I watched Mr. Obama and I watched him during this seven-week period. And he displayed a steadiness, an intellectual curiosity, a depth of knowledge, and an approach to looking at problems like this, picking a Vice President that I think is ready to be President on Day One. And also in – not just in jumping in and changing every day – but showing intellectual vigor, I think that he has a definitive way of doing business that would serve us well.
I also believe that on the Republican side over the last seven weeks, the approach of the Republican Party and Mr. McCain has become narrower and narrower. Uh, Mr. Obama, at the same time, has given us a more conclusive, more reach into the needs and aspirations of our people. He’s crossing lines – ethnic lines, racial lines, generational lines. He’s thinking about all villages have values, all towns have values – not just small towns have values.
And I’ve also been disappointed, frankly, by some of the approaches that Senator McCain has taken recently – or his campaign has – on issues that are not really central to the problems that the American people are worried about. This Bill Ayers situation that’s been going on for weeks became something of a central point of the campaign, but Mr. McCain says that he’s a watchdog of terrorists. Then why do we keep talking about him? And why do we have these robocalls going on around the country, trying to suggest that because of this very, very limited relationship that Senator Obama has had with Mr. Ayers, somehow Mr. Obama is tainted. What they’re trying to connect him to is some kind of terrorist feelings. And I think that’s inappropriate.
Now I understand what politics is all about. I know how you can go after one another. And that’s good. But, I think this goes too far. And I think it has made the McCain campaign look a little narrow. It’s not what the American people are looking for.
And I look at these kinds of approaches to the campaign and they trouble me. And the Party has moved even further to the Right. And Governor Palin has indicated a further rightward shift. I would have difficulty with two more conservative appointments to the Supreme Court, but that’s what we’d be looking at in a McCain Administration.
I’m also troubled by – not what Senator McCain says – but what members of the Party say, and it is permitted to be said: such things as, “Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim.” Well, the correct answer is he is not a Muslim. He’s a Christian; has always been a Christian. But the really right answer is, “What if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country?” The answer’s “No, that’s not America.” Is there something wrong with some seven-year-old Muslim American kid believing that he or she could be President? Yet, I have heard senior members of my own Party drop the suggestion he’s Muslim and he might be associated with terrorists. This is not the way we should be doing it in America.
I feel strongly about this particular point because of a picture I saw in a magazine. It was a photo essay about troops who were serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. And one picture at the tail end of this photo essay was of a mother in Arlington Cemetery. And she had her head on the headstone of her son’s grave. And as the picture focused in, you could see the writing on the headstone. And it gave his awards – Purple Heart, Bronze Star; showed that he died in Iraq; gave his date of birth, date of death. He was twenty years old. And then at the very top of the headstone, it didn’t have a Christian cross. It didn’t have a Star of David. It had a crescent and a star of the Islamic faith. And his name was Karim Rashad Sultan Kahn. And he was an American. He was born in New Jersey, he was fourteen years old at the time of 9/11 and he waited until he could go serve his country and he gave his life.
Now, we have got to stop polarizing ourself in this way. And John McCain is as non-discriminatory as anyone I know. But I’m troubled about the fact that within the Party we have these kinds of expressions.
So when I look at all of this and I think back to my army career, we’ve got two individuals. Either one of them could be a good president, but which is the president that we need now? Which is the individual that serves the needs of the nation for the next period of time? And I come to the conclusion that because of his ability to inspire, because of the inclusive nature of his campaign, because he is reaching out all across America, because of who he is and his rhetorical abilities – and we have to take that into account – as well as his substance – he has both style and substance – he has met the standard of being a successful president, being an exceptional president.
I think he is a transformational figure. He is a new generation coming into the … onto the world stage and on the American stage and for that reason, I’ll be voting for Senator Barack Obama.
** LIMBAUGH SAYS POWELL’S BACKING OF OBAMA IS TIED TO RACE. Now here’s a big surprise with regard to General Colin Powell’s endorsement of Barack Obama over John McCain, who previously said that Powell was his most admired person. It’s such a shock that radio yakker Rush Limbaugh, who dropped out of college and never served in the military, would say that. (And even less of a shock that many on the far right are following Rush’s Big Cue.) The problem with the Talk Radio Wing of the Republican Party is that they never know when to shut up. Though many Democrats have come to think of that as their most adorable characteristic.
Meanwhile, Obama spokesman and strategist Robert Gibbs says that Obama was not certain of Powell’s endorsement till he watched it this morning – very early this morning – on Meet The Press. I’m not sure I’m buying that baby.
** SUNDAY – WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
Barack Obama is in Fayetteville, North Carolina. Obama, campaigning yesterday in battleground Missouri, long a red state in presidential politics, drew crowds of 100,000 in St. Louis and 75,000 in Kansas City.
Joe Biden is in Tacoma, Washington.
John McCain is in Westerville and Toledo, Ohio.
Sarah Palin is in Roswell, New Mexico. No comments, please.
** POWELL ENDORSES OBAMA. General Colin Powell just endorsed Barack Obama on the 6 AM edition of Meet The Press. Powell is an old friend of John McCain, but he delivered a scathing review of his campaign and the increasingly rightward tilt of the Republican Party. Powell, a decorated Vietnam War vet, served as national security advisor to President Ronald Reagan, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for President George Bush I, and secretary of state for President George W. Bush. Under his leadership, America won the first Gulf War. He also, despite severe misgivings, delivered the United Nations address citing faulty intelligence about weapons of mass destruction which led to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
Powell had this to say about attempts to lash Obama to former Weather Undergrounder Bill Ayers: “I thought that was over the top. It was beyond just good political fighting back and forth.”
Powell also said that Sarah Palin is utterly unqualified for the office.
More to follow …
** OBAMA SHATTERS FUNDRAISING RECORD WITH $150 MILLION IN SEPTEMBER. Barack Obama shattered his previous fundraising record by raising more than $150 million in September. In August, he had set the previous monthly fundraising record of $66 million. After many press reports speculated that his fundraising was down. That broke the previous monthly fundraising record, also set by Obama, of $55 million back in February during the height of his primary fight with Hillary Clinton.
Obama garnered 632,000 new contributors in September, giving him a total of 3.1 million contributors. Which is, of course, a new record breaking his own previous record.
** POLITICAL MOVIES. I have not yet seen Oliver Stone’s new movie, W, which looks to be successful. Political movies, well, there’s a lot to say about them. Which I will say, um, shortly. Perhaps after I see W. Campaign season is not a great time for movie-going. But one thing is sure. Political movies usually don’t do very well. Generally, the politics has to be wrapped in thriller mode, as political campaigns do not come off all that thrilling on screen. For some odd reason …
Below you see the trailer for An American Carol, an attack on the frequently preposterous Michael Moore, much advertised throughout the conservative media, yet a bomb. Nothwithstanding its wide release and big-name cast of Hollywood conservatives. One of whom, Dennis Hopper, now says he prays for the election of Barack Obama. Hmm … More to say!
An American Carol was the right-wing’s attempt at a conservative political comedy.
** SATURDAY – WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
Barack Obama is in St. Louis and Kansas City, Missouri.
Joe Biden is in San Franciso and Silicon Valley, California. Biden is in the Golden State for fundraising events, the largest of which is at the home of former state Controller Steve Westly.
John McCain is in Concord, North Carolina and Woodbridge, Virginia, trying to preserve red states that have gone Republican in presidential politics for the past 40 years.
Sarah Palin is in Lancaster, Pennsylvania and New York City. Palin appears tonight on Saturday Night Live.
UPDATE: This event will not be webcast live, but video of it will be archived on the governor’s website, linked below.
As some will recall, the firefighters, believing, erroneously, that Schwarzenegger’s personal intent was to eviscerate their survivors’ benefits, went all out to defeat his special election agenda in 2005. Since then, there has been a notable rapprochement.
** INSIDE THE “BRADLEY EFFECT.”Barack Obama has won all three presidential debates over John McCain. He has a solid lead in the polls. What could go wrong for him? Well, many say the polls could be wrong, skewed by a hidden racist vote.
The “Bradley effect” — the notion that white voters lie to pollsters when a black candidate is in the race — has become widely known. But what you think you know from the campaign that gave rise to the phrase, then Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley’s ultimately near-miss race for governor of California in 1982, isn’t so.
I was in the middle of that, doing opposition research for Bradley’s campaign. I vividly recall election day that November, as reports from the exit polling done by California’s leading polling organization, the Field Poll, circulated. It seemed that Bradley, the first black mayor of Los Angeles, was headed for a big win as California’s first black governor. … From my new Huffington Post column.
** THE “MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE” FANTASY: PARANOIA AND IRONY ABOUND. “He’s … an Arab.” It’s perhaps fitting that last week ended that way for John McCain — face to face, embarrassingly, with an angry supporter sputtering about Barack Obama — given that he began it with a speech playing to the deep swamp of fevered innuendo about Obama as a “Manchurian candidate” out to seize the presidency and take down America. …
The Manchurian candidate ugliness began reaching critical mass over two years ago. That’s when it became apparent that Obama could be the figure of the future in American politics. …
Produced in 1962, The Manchurian Candidate is a darkly satirical view of far right politics in America. It was made with the encouragement of President John F. Kennedy, who was all too aware of the dangers of the paranoid style in American politics, starring his good friend Frank Sinatra, as Sinatra himself recounted in a 1988 documentary on the making of the film. … From my Wednesday column.
** F1 WEEKEND. The Chinese Grand Prix, penultimate race of the globe-spanning Formula One racing circuit, is this weekend. The race goes off live from Shanghai at midnight Saturday night on Speed TV. England’s own Lewis Hamilton, first black driver in F1, has a slight lead over Brazilian Felipe Massa of Ferrari in the race for the world race driving championship.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, which I know as a former DemRussia advisor, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Among them is what I’m sure is the first piece examining Schwarzenegger’s legacy as governor of California. Since he will actually be governor of California until 2011. No technology known to be disruptive to the space/time continuum was used in its preparation.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND NATIONAL ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. After crashing over $147 for yet another record on July 11th, crude oil closed at $71.85 per barrel on Friday. Energy markets are closed on the weekend
The drop of $76 per barrel since the record high three months ago comes on anticipation of an OPEC production cut to preserve profit margins over the much lower cost per barrel and acknowledgment that the weak US economy will cut future demand and the easing of geopolitical tensions in the Middle East. The Russian war with Georgia, confounding much speculation and reporting to the contrary, actually decreased the geopolitical risk premium in the oil market.
The charming John McCain returned last night in his amusing speech at the Al Smith Dinner in New York.
** ECONOMIC CRISIS LENGTHENS. While crude oil rebounded from its fall yesterday to $67 a barrel at one point to today’s close of $72.05 per barrell – still less than half what it was on July 11th – other indicators continued to point downward, as Bloomberg News points out.
Confidence among Americans fell by the most on record and single-family housing starts hit a 26-year low, posing an increasing threat to consumer spending that accounts for more than two-thirds of the economy.
The Reuters/University of Michigan preliminary index of consumer sentiment fell to 57.5 this month from 70.3 in September. The measure averaged 85.6 last year. Construction of single-family homes dropped 12 percent last month to a 544,000 annual rate, the Commerce Department said in Washington.
Today’s figures show that the tightening credit crunch has spurred a further step down in the three-year real-estate recession. Falling property values, along with the crash in stocks, threaten to cause the first decline in consumer spending since 1991, and put pressure on the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates again this month.
** NORTH DAKOTA POLL: TOSS-UP. The new Research 2000 poll of red state North Dakota shows a toss-up. It’s John McCain 45%, Barack Obama 45%. This confirms two earlier recent polls showing a very close race, one of them with a slight Obama lead. Obama is moving some resources into North Dakota, which has gone Republican approximately forever in presidential politics.
** INSIDE THE “BRADLEY EFFECT.”Barack Obama has won all three presidential debates over John McCain. He has a solid lead in the polls. What could go wrong for him? Well, many say the polls could be wrong, skewed by a hidden racist vote.
The “Bradley effect” — the notion that white voters lie to pollsters when a black candidate is in the race — has become widely known. But what you think you know from the campaign that gave rise to the phrase, then Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley’s ultimately near-miss race for governor of California in 1982, isn’t so.
I was in the middle of that, doing opposition research for Bradley’s campaign. I vividly recall election day that November, as reports from the exit polling done by California’s leading polling organization, the Field Poll, circulated. It seemed that Bradley, the first black mayor of Los Angeles, was headed for a big win as California’s first black governor. … From my new column.
** VIRGINIA POLL: OBAMA BY 6. The new Virginia Poll of this battleground state last carried by a Democratic presidential nominee in 1964 shows Barack Obama leading John McCain, 49% to 43%.
** NATIONAL REPUBLICANS PULLING OUT OF COLORADO SENATE RACE. It looks like the Republican’ Senate campaign committee is pulling out of the race in Colorado, where Congressman Mark Udall – son of the late legendary Arizona Congressman Mo Udall – has a big lead. Obama looks like he has a good chance to take Colorado as well, and this Republican move won’t help John McCain turn out the Republican vote in this lynchpin of the Mountain West.
** MISSOURI POLL: OBAMA BY 6. The new Rasmussen poll of battleground Missouri has Barack Obama leading John McCain, 52% to 46%. Earlier in the week, Obama led by three points. President Bush carried Missouri by seven points in 2004 and three points in 2000.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
Barack Obama is in Roanoke, Virginia.
Joe Biden is in Mesilla, New Mexico and Henderson, Nevada.
John McCain is in Miami and Melbourne, Florida.
Sarah Palin is in West Chester, Ohio and Noblesville, Indiana.
Barack Obama also amused at last night’s Al Smith Dinner in New York.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Florida today for two private fundraisers on behalf of Proposition 11, the redistricting reform initiative. The initiative backed by Common Cause, the League of Women Voters, AARP, and the NAACP is on the air unchallenged with a TV ad criticizing the pols who draw their own districts.
Powerful public employee unions such as the teachers, the service employees, and the firefighters are all neutral this time on the redistricting measure, after helping defeat its counterpart in 2005. Schwarzenegger will participate in a firefighters memorial service Saturday in Capitol Park.
In other news, another powerful public employee union, the prison guards, has dropped it bid to launch a recall of the former action superstar. There was no interest whatsoever from other unions, and the only spark of support it found was on the far right. But even that went nowhere. The prison guards, who long enjoyed unchallenged supremacy in the state’s deeply troubled prison system, have now been working without a contract for two years following failed negotiations with the Schwarzenegger Administration.
** THE “MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE” FANTASY: PARANOIA AND IRONY ABOUND. “He’s … an Arab.” It’s perhaps fitting that last week ended that way for John McCain — face to face, embarrassingly, with an angry supporter sputtering about Barack Obama — given that he began it with a speech playing to the deep swamp of fevered innuendo about Obama as a “Manchurian candidate” out to seize the presidency and take down America. …
The Manchurian candidate ugliness began reaching critical mass over two years ago. That’s when it became apparent that Obama could be the figure of the future in American politics. …
Produced in 1962, The Manchurian Candidate is a darkly satirical view of far right politics in America. It was made with the encouragement of President John F. Kennedy, who was all too aware of the dangers of the paranoid style in American politics, starring his good friend Frank Sinatra, as Sinatra himself recounted in a 1988 documentary on the making of the film. … From my new column.
** WAITING FOR “WHITEY.”I’ve spent a lot of time talking this week with some top Republican pros, in person and on the phone.
Virtually all of these Republican pros think Barack Obama has it won, most even before Obama won his second debate with John McCain. None of them dislike McCain, or have any bone to pick with Steve Schmidt or Rick Davis. (That’s how you know I didn’t talk to John Weaver, McCain’s former chief strategist who said yesterday that McCain’s events are encouraging “an angry mob mentality.”) At least one of them has voted for Obama absentee. One or two said, wistfully, “What about the Whitey tape, maybe that would change it?”
Of course, there is no Whitey tape. The whole thing was almost certainly lifted from a financial thriller, “The Power Broker,’ by Stephen Frey. Which I read when this nonsense about a a purported tape of Michelle Obama ranting about “whitey” surfaced in June.
When you’re waiting for “Whitey,” you’re in much worse shape than when you’re waiting for Godot. And that sure ain’t a good place to be. I’ll return to the “Whitey” episode in a moment. It’s instructive. … From my Friday column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, which I know as a former DemRussia advisor, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Among them is what I’m sure is the first piece examining Schwarzenegger’s legacy as governor of California. Since he will actually be governor of California until 2011. No technology known to be disruptive to the space/time continuum was used in its preparation.
The drop of $77 per barrel since the record high three months ago comes on acknowledgment that the weak US economy will cut future demand and the easing of geopolitical tensions in the Middle East. The Russian war with Georgia, confounding much speculation and reporting to the contrary, actually decreased the geopolitical risk premium in the oil market.
Barack Obama’s brand-new ad, using footage from last night’s debate, attacks John McCain for backing President Bush on most of his agenda.
** MORE AYERS. John McCain’s face to face attack of Barack Obama for his link to Bill Ayers did not go well in last night’s debate. But the McCain campaign has launched a robocall in battleground states such as Wisconsin, New Mexico, Virginia, Maine, Florida, Missouri, and North Carolina. You can listen to it at the link. I’m not sure the recipients will have much idea who the 40 years-ago Weather Undergrounder is, or what Obama’s actual connection to him means.
** MORE SCHWARZENEGGER. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who cancelled a fundraising event for the Prop 11 redistricting reform initiative today in Austin, Texas due to the fire situation, is off to Florida for two fundraisers for Prop 11 tomorrow.
In addition, he will participate in a Saturday event in Capitol Park with firefighters union officials honoring the state’s firefighters. In 2005, as longtime readers remember, Schwarzenegger got sideways with firefighters due to his ill-fated pension reform initiative which would have, due to a drafting problem, removed benefits for the survivors of firefighters killed in the line of duty.
** SOME GOOD NEWS FOR CALIFORNIA. State Treasurer Bill Lockyer announced this afternoon that the first tranche of revenue anticipation notes for the normal bridge financing of the state’s budget at this time of year was somewhat oversubscribed beyond expectations. The plan had been to sell $4 billion worth. Instead, after retail customers took nearly that yesterday, the total sale went up to $5 billion today when institutional investors were let in. The interest rate is higher than usual, but not wildly so. This will float the state government’s operations – which were about to run out of money at the of October, till January. The state will go into the market again before then for the other $2 billion that seemed unattainable just a few weeks ago when the credit markets were locked down. At the time, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger had contacted Treasurey Secretary Henry Paulson to request a $7 billion federal loan, which now will not be necessary.
** OIL SLUMPS BELOW $70 PER BARREL. After hitting a record of nearly $148 per barrel on July 11th, crude oil closed today at $69.85 per barrel on continuing fears of a deepening economic slump in the US and around the world. This crash of $78 per barrel in just over three months comes on news that US demand is at a nine-year low.
** COMING TOMORROW – INSIDE THE “BRADLEY EFFECT.”
** OBAMA MOVES ON RED STATES. On Friday, Barack Obama launches what the campaign is calling his “red states tour,” hitting Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, and Missouri.
In addition, Obama is going on the air in West Virginia, where he now, shockingly, trails John McCain by a narrow margin, and Georgia, where he also trails by a narrow margin in a longtime solid red state in presidential politics.
** NEW MEXICO POLL: OBAMA BY 13. Barack Obama has taken a big lead over John McCain in battleground New Mexico, according to the new Rasmussen poll. It’s Obama 55%, McCain 42%.
Democrat Tom Udall has a 20-point lead in the race to replace retiring Republican Senator Pete Domenici.
** OKAY, BY POPULAR ACCLAIM, “JOE THE PLUMBER.” A fan of the military and John McCain, but not a veteran. (Naturally.) He does not make anywhere near $250,00 a year. He has no plan to buy his boss’s plumbing business.
He’s also not actually a plumber. And he would definitely get a tax break under the Obama Administration. Yes, I was probably too nice in my assessment of him in the NWN Forum.
The Morning Column: OBAMA WINS DEBATE, AGAIN.
Barack Obama, as I wrote immediately after it ended, won last night’s debate with John McCain, according to all the subsequent polls. This was the third and final debate, and Obama’s third win.
It looked like another Barack Obama win to me. Notice that I said “looked.” The two-shots were devastating to John McCain. He looked perturbed, blinking, grimacing, smirking. Obama looked cool and composed. As a technical matter, McCain was sitting on the wrong side of the table, with the worst of his profiles.
On substance, McCain was very aggressive. He unloaded his negative material on Obama, all the Bill Ayers and Manchurian candidate sort of stuff, except for Jeremiah Wright and Tony Rezko. He got quite a few things wrong, which allowed for Obama to do some effective counter-punching.
Why no Rev. Wright? Because McCain doesn’t want to interject the issue of the black church. And because he’s already said he doesn’t believe Obama shares Wright’s views, and Obama is a fine fellow, and all that.
Why no Rezko? Because Charles Keating was a much bigger pal to McCain than Rezko was to Obama, and Keating was at the center of the savings & loan industry collapse whereas Rezko is a more garden variety developer/influence peddler.
John McCain’s brand-new ad acknowledges that the Bush years haven’t worked, attacks Obama as a tax-raiser, and lays out his vision for his possible administration.
McCain managed to get a number of things wrong in his attacks. Obama, as he coolly informed the Vietnam War hero, did not launch his political career in Bill Ayers’ house. “Health” is not a bogus concern for women with regard to abortion rights. Transplants are not a sign of a “gold-plated” health care plan. “Safety” is not merely a concern of “extreme environmentalists” with regard to nuclear power. (That got a big grin out of Obama.) Obama is not for single-payer health care. Actually, his plan is more conservative than Hillary Clinton’s. McCain said he is not for litmus tests for Supreme Court appointees – but anyone who supports Roe v. Wade is unqualified. And so on.
Obama usually did not correct McCain, mindful of how the negativity comes off with swing voters.
The debate was on the economy, but moderator Bob Schieffer did not succeed in getting either candidate to explain how he would go about reviving the American economy. Instead, it was the usual litany of obvious questions, a laundry list approach rather than a stimulating discussion and debate about what to do and how to get things done.
Obama stayed in his comfort zone, looking and sounding cool and presidential, while connecting with a certain empathy for economic worries.
McCain was combative and looked tense. I suspect he played better on radio. But on TV, it wasn’t much of a contest. He was not a calming, authoritative presence.
As I mentioned last night, and at the top today, he was seated on the wrong side of the table, presenting his most scarred side to the camera. I’ve been involved in a number of debate negotiations, and these things are important. As a result, he looked a bit misshapen compared to Obama. Adding that to his frequently irritated state does not yield a winning look.
** THE “MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE” FANTASY: PARANOIA AND IRONY ABOUND. “He’s … an Arab.” It’s perhaps fitting that last week ended that way for John McCain — face to face, embarrassingly, with an angry supporter sputtering about Barack Obama — given that he began it with a speech playing to the deep swamp of fevered innuendo about Obama as a “Manchurian candidate” out to seize the presidency and take down America. …
The Manchurian candidate ugliness began reaching critical mass over two years ago. That’s when it became apparent that Obama could be the figure of the future in American politics. …
Produced in 1962, The Manchurian Candidate is a darkly satirical view of far right politics in America. It was made with the encouragement of President John F. Kennedy, who was all too aware of the dangers of the paranoid style in American politics, starring his good friend Frank Sinatra, as Sinatra himself recounted in a 1988 documentary on the making of the film. … From my new column.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
Barack Obama is in New York City, Londonderry, New Hampshire and New York City. He has a fundraising breakfast in Manhattan, a community meeting in New Hampshire, addresses the annual Al Smith Dinner in Manhattan along with John McCain, and has a fundraising concert in Manhattan.
Joe Biden is off the campaign trail.
John McCain is in Downingtown, Pennsylvania and New York City.
Sarah Palin is in Bangor, Maine and Elon and Greensboro, North Carolina.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger tours the fire situation in the San Fernando Valley. He has declared a state of emergency in Los Angeles, Ventura, and San Bernardino Counties.
Schwarzenegger cancelled his planned trip to Austin, Texas today for a big fundraiser on behalf of Propostion 11, the redistricting reform initiative.
** WAITING FOR “WHITEY.”I’ve spent a lot of time talking this week with some top Republican pros, in person and on the phone.
Virtually all of these Republican pros think Barack Obama has it won, most even before Obama won his second debate with John McCain. None of them dislike McCain, or have any bone to pick with Steve Schmidt or Rick Davis. (That’s how you know I didn’t talk to John Weaver, McCain’s former chief strategist who said yesterday that McCain’s events are encouraging “an angry mob mentality.”) At least one of them has voted for Obama absentee. One or two said, wistfully, “What about the Whitey tape, maybe that would change it?”
Of course, there is no Whitey tape. The whole thing was almost certainly lifted from a financial thriller, “The Power Broker,’ by Stephen Frey. Which I read when this nonsense about a a purported tape of Michelle Obama ranting about “whitey” surfaced in June.
When you’re waiting for “Whitey,” you’re in much worse shape than when you’re waiting for Godot. And that sure ain’t a good place to be. I’ll return to the “Whitey” episode in a moment. It’s instructive. … From my Friday column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, which I know as a former DemRussia advisor, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Among them is what I’m sure is the first piece examining Schwarzenegger’s legacy as governor of California. Since he will actually be governor of California until 2011. No technology known to be disruptive to the space/time continuum was used in its preparation.
The drop of $77 per barrel since the record high three months ago comes on acknowledgment that the weak US economy will cut future demand and the easing of geopolitical tensions in the Middle East. The Russian war with Georgia, confounding much speculation and reporting to the contrary, actually decreased the geopolitical risk premium in the oil market.
Oh, how they did? It looked like another Barack Obama win to me. Notice that I said “looked.” The two-shots were devastating to John McCain. He looked perturbed, blinking, grimacing, smirking. Obama looked cool and composed. As a technical matter, McCain was sitting on the wrong side of the table, with the worst of his profiles. I’ll get into all this more tomorrow.
On substance, McCain was very aggressive. He unloaded his negative material on Obama, except for Jeremiah Wright and Tony Rezko. He got quite a few things wrong, which allowed for Obama to do some effective counter-punching.
Again, more tomorrow …
MISSING TEXT AND VIDEOS.
The Morning Column: WITH CHARACTER ATTACKS FAILING, THE FINAL DEBATE …
With Barack Obama poised on the verge of a landslide election as president of the United States, he and John McCain hold their final debate tonight.
Obama leads in all national polls, mostly by significant and growing margins. He is doing very well in the battleground states as well, as readers know from seeing the constant poll results here from those states. Obama is now moving his staff from Michigan – once a top target of Team McCain – to Indiana, a state which last went Democratic during Lyndon Johnson’s landslide defeat of Barry Goldwater, who held Arizona’s senior seat in the Senate prior to McCain, in 1964.
After keeping McCain close to and at times slightly ahead of Obama from early July through the conventions with a series of adroit moves, the wheels began coming off for the McCain campaign with the selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate. As I predicted on the day the pick was made,she has turned into nothing more than a play for the conservative Republican base and something of a sideshow figure in American cultural life.
But McCain might still be in very close contention, despite Palin’s inadequacies in national politics – she still has not done a press conference, which is absolutely unprecedented, and it appears likely that she never will – had the epic financial crisis not erupted with a vengeance.
McCain is still struggling to find an economic message adequate to the occasion. Not that Obama has the answers. But Obama has projected the right temperament, and he is a Democrat, a good partisan default position for most voters in time of economic struggle.
John McCain’s brand-new attack ad says that Obama is “unethical.”
Team McCain and their Republican allies – as well as the loud voices of conservative talk radio and blogosphere – have tried to bring Obama down through personal character attacks. I’ve covered them extensively, and have a column coming on some of the notable oddities of the effort. And McCain is closely tied both to the historically unpopular President Bush on most of the big issues and to the deregulationist philosophy that most voters believe is at the core of the current crisis.
As I predicted, these character attacks against Obama are failing.
So it’s down to the final debate tonight, moderated by longtime CBS newsman Bob Schieffer. The topic is the economy. McCain has no choice but to attack. But on what?
Obama, Joe Biden, and other Democrats have challenged McCain to bring up the Bill Ayers attacks to Obama to his face in tonight’s debate. McCain said in a radio interview yesterday that he will. That could make for some momentary drama.
But most Americans don’t know who Bill Ayers is and probably don’t care even if they find out. The focus is on the issues. How will McCain go after Obama on the economy? And will he present enough of his own positive economic message?
If he can’t succeed in that, the election will probably be over tonight.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
Barack Obama is in Hempstead, New Hampshire for the third and final presidential debate.
Joe Biden is on the second day of his Ohio bus tour, in Athens, Lancaster, and Newark.
John McCain is in Hempstead, New Hampshire for the third and final presidential debate.
Sarah Palin is in Dover and Salem, New Hampshire.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger combines fires and politics today in Southern California.This morning he is in Thousand Oaks for a tour and briefing on both the major fire there and on efforts statewide. Yesterday, Schwarzenegger declared a state of emergency in Los Angeles and Ventura Counties.
The event will be webcast live at 10:40 AM at www.gov.ca.gov.
This afternoon, he is in downtown LA for an event promoting Proposition 11, the redistricting reform initiative on the November ballot. Prop 11 just launched its first broadcast TV ad. Schwarzenegger will be joined by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca, AARP California State President Jeannine English, Common Cause California Executive Director Kathay Feng, League of Women Voters of California President Janis Hirohama, and Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Gary Toebben.
The former action superstar also bought some of California’s revenue anticipation notes just coming to market now. He made international headlines at the beginning of the month when he said that US credit markets were so tight that the state was unable to get its usual bridge financing this time of year and might well have to get a $7 billion loan from the federal government. Things have improved, somewhat, since then, and the state is now in the market for its first $4 billion tranche. I’ll know more about the terms California is getting later.
** WAITING FOR “WHITEY.”I’ve spent a lot of time talking this week with some top Republican pros, in person and on the phone.
Virtually all of these Republican pros think Barack Obama has it won, most even before Obama won his second debate with John McCain. None of them dislike McCain, or have any bone to pick with Steve Schmidt or Rick Davis. (That’s how you know I didn’t talk to John Weaver, McCain’s former chief strategist who said yesterday that McCain’s events are encouraging “an angry mob mentality.”) At least one of them has voted for Obama absentee. One or two said, wistfully, “What about the Whitey tape, maybe that would change it?”
Of course, there is no Whitey tape. The whole thing was almost certainly lifted from a financial thriller, “The Power Broker,’ by Stephen Frey. Which I read when this nonsense about a a purported tape of Michelle Obama ranting about “whitey” surfaced in June.
When you’re waiting for “Whitey,” you’re in much worse shape than when you’re waiting for Godot. And that sure ain’t a good place to be. I’ll return to the “Whitey” episode in a moment. It’s instructive. … From my Friday column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, which I know as a former DemRussia advisor, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Among them is what I’m sure is the first piece examining Schwarzenegger’s legacy as governor of California. Since he will actually be governor of California until 2011. No technology known to be disruptive to the space/time continuum was used in its preparation.
The drop of $67 per barrel since the record high three months ago comes on acknowledgment that the weak US economy will cut future demand and the easing of geopolitical tensions in the Middle East. The Russian war with Georgia, confounding much speculation and reporting to the contrary, actually decreased the geopolitical risk premium in the oil market.
** WASILLA ELECTION RESULTS. The City of Wasilla, Alaska held its municipal election on October 7th. Here are the results. No one won a majority in the race for the office of mayor, formerly held by Republican vice presidential nominee, and there will be a run-off on October 28th. You’ll note that barely more than 900 votes were cast in the election.
** OHIO POLL: OBAMA BY 5. The new Survey USA poll of battleground Ohio has Barack Obama leading John McCain, 50% to 45%. The big movement is amongst moderate voters. Last month, McCain trailed Obama by 9 points with moderates. Now he trails Obama amongst moderate voters by 23 points. Ohio was the decider in President Bush’s 2004 re-election.
** PENNSYLVANIA POLL: OBAMA BY 15. The new Survey USA poll of battleground Pennsylvania has Barack Obama leading John McCain, 55% to 45%. It’s the same 15-point margin as a week earlier. John Kerry and Al Gore both carried Pennsylvania over President Bush, by 2 and 4 points, respectively.
** FINANCIAL CRISIS – THE PLANS. John McCain laid out his new economic plan this morning in Pennsylvania. It would cost, according to the campaign, $52.5 billion (but may cost a lot more), and consists of capital gains tax cuts, remove taxes on unemployment benefits, lower taxes on senior citizens tapping into their retirement accounts and suspend requirements that some sell in the midst of the present crisis, and accelerate the tax write-off for long-term capital losses.
Obama yesterday proposed a $60 billion plan, that also may cost more, consisting of a corporate tax credit for every job created, a temporary moratorium on home foreclosures, penalty-free withdrawals from retirement accounts, elimination of taxes on unemployment benefits, and a new entity to lend to cash-strapped state and local governments.
Both plans come out of their party’s basic playbooks. McCain is focused mainly on general tax incentives, including capital gains breaks that will affect a tiny minority of Americans. Obama is focused on more specific stimulus measures, that are not terribly interventionist in the direct workings of the economy.
I doubt that either plan is adequate to the occasion.
** QUINNIPIAC POLLS: BIG OBAMA LEADS IN COLORADO, MICHIGAN, MINNESOTA, AND WISCONSIN. The new Quinnipiac polls for the Wall Street Journal show Barack Obama with big leads over John McCain in four key battleground states. In Colorado, it’s 52-43 Obama. In Michigan, it’s 54-38 Obama. In Minnesota, it’s 51-40 Obama. In Wisconsin, it’s 54-37 Obama. In each state, independents are breaking heavily for Obama. Obama is seen as the winner of the debates to date, Sarah Palin is seen as far less plausible than Joe Biden, and the economy is the overwhelming issue.
** WAITING FOR “WHITEY.”I’ve spent a lot of time talking this week with some top Republican pros, in person and on the phone.
Virtually all of these Republican pros think Barack Obama has it won, most even before Obama won his second debate with John McCain. None of them dislike McCain, or have any bone to pick with Steve Schmidt or Rick Davis. (That’s how you know I didn’t talk to John Weaver, McCain’s former chief strategist who said yesterday that McCain’s events are encouraging “an angry mob mentality.”) At least one of them has voted for Obama absentee. One or two said, wistfully, “What about the Whitey tape, maybe that would change it?”
Of course, there is no Whitey tape. The whole thing was almost certainly lifted from a financial thriller, “The Power Broker,’ by Stephen Frey. Which I read when this nonsense about a a purported tape of Michelle Obama ranting about “whitey” surfaced in June.
When you’re waiting for “Whitey,” you’re in much worse shape than when you’re waiting for Godot. And that sure ain’t a good place to be. I’ll return to the “Whitey” episode in a moment. It’s instructive. … From my Friday column.
Former President Bill Clinton campaigning for Barack Obama in Virginia.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
Barack Obama is in Toledo, Ohio in debate prep.
Joe Biden is in Warren, St. Clairsville, and Marietta, Ohio. Biden is on a two-day bus tour of Ohio.
John McCain is in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania and New York City. McCain lays out what is described as his new economic plan in Pennsylvania and hopes for a big Republican fundraiser tonight in the Big Apple.
Sarah Palin is in Scranton, Pennsylvania and New York City.
** SCHWARZENEGGER LIVE WEBCAST THIS MORNING ON FIRES. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger tours fire damage and meets with evacuees from an LA area fire whipped up by the Santa Ana winds.
Despite tension between America and Russia, astronauts from the two countries lifted off from Russia’s Baikonur Cosmodrome Sunday for the International Space Station. With the US space shuttle sidelined, Russia’s Soyuz spacecraft is all that is keeping the space station going.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, which I know as a former DemRussia advisor, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Among them is what I’m sure is the first piece examining Schwarzenegger’s legacy as governor of California. Since he will actually be governor of California until 2011. No technology known to be disruptive to the space/time continuum was used in its preparation.
The drop of $67 per barrel since the record high three months ago comes on acknowledgment that the weak US economy will cut future demand and the easing of geopolitical tensions in the Middle East. The Russian war with Georgia, confounding much speculation and reporting to the contrary, actually decreased the geopolitical risk premium in the oil market.
Former President Bill Clinton campaigned for Barack Obama yesterday in Pennsylvania and Virginia.
** MARKETS RALLY AND OIL UP ON NEWS OF COMING GOVERNMENT OWNERSHIP STAKES IN BANKS. As word emerged that the US government will follow the lead of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and take ownership stakes in a great many banks, the US stock market had its biggest increase since 1933, some 936 points on the Dow. Oil also finished up over $3 a barrel,at $81.19, on this sign that the economy may not slide any further.
More details will emerge tomorrow, but as the Wall Street Journal has just reported, the federal government is going to spend $250 billion on a plan to recapitalize the banking system, taking partial ownership of perhaps thousands of banks across the country. Brown, the longtime Labour finance minister under Tony Blair, came up with the approach last week and is implementing it now in the UK. Other European countries are already following along, and markets are stabilizing.
This sort of quasi-socialist approach would have been unthinkable even for New Labour in Britain prior to this epic crisis. And “unthinkable” does not even begin to apply to the idea of the Bush/Cheney administration doing it. Yet here we are.
** ANOTHER CALIFORNIA COUNTY TURNS BLUE. San Bernardino County, in the heart of Southern California’s “Inland Empire,” has just turned from Republican plurality registration to Democratic plurality registration. Said California Democratic Party chairman Art Torres in a statement: “In a year in which record numbers of Americans have been inspired to participate in the political process, the news that San Bernardino County has flipped red to blue is terrific news but not all surprising. This year alone, Ventura, Stanislaus, and now San Bernardino County have flipped to ‘blue.’”
San Bernardino and Ventura counties are two big Southland counties that have long produced big Republican votes.
** MISSOURI POLL: OBAMA BY 8. The new Survey USA poll of battleground Missouri has Barack Obama leading John McCain in the Show Me State, 51% to 43%. Three weeks ago, McCain led there by 2 points. President Bush carried Missouri in 2000, by 3.5%, and 2004, by 7%.
** OHIO POLL: OBAMA BY 4. Barack Obama, who has an 8-point lead with registered voters in the new Marist poll of battleground Ohio, leads John McCain amongst likely voters in the Buckeye State, 49% to 45%.
Another big week on tap in presidential politics and in California politics, with the global financial crisis underlying it all. Barack Obama, leading John McCain by 53% to 43% in the new ABC News/Washington Post poll, rolls out what is billed as a major economic speech while McCain takes a different tack in his own speech, seemingly tacking away from the personal character attacks that have marked his campaign of late.
Meanwhile in California politics, we’ll learn a lot more this week about how the anti-gay marriage and redistricting reform initiatives are faring, along with others on energy and infrastructure. There are signs, as former Speaker Willie Brown wrote in his column yesterday, that a new TV ad by gay marriage opponents – featuring San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom (ironically, a Brown protege) roaring that same-sex marriage is here to stay “Whether you like it or not” – is having a big impact.
A positive John McCain web video.
Based on comments yesterday by McCain pal and South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, McCain had been expected to make a major new economic policy speech early in the week. But that’s not happening. Instead, McCain is speaking today in Virginia about the state of the campaign, acknowledging that he is behind, and the country.
While he attacks Obama, it’s on issues – spending, taxes, energy, health care, trade – and experience, not character. He takes some shots at President Bush, as well. Bush, incidentally, has a record high 73% disapproval rating in the new ABC/Post poll.
Obama, meanwhile, will lay out what he calls an “economic rescue plan for the middle class” at a speech in Ohio.
Wednesday night is the final debate of the campaign, at Hofstra University in New York. It’s unclear what tack McCain, who has lost the first two debates to Obama, will take.
The harsh character attacks on Obama – Bill Ayers and all that – are not working.
McCain came face to face Friday night with the risky stuff his campaign has been stirring up by playing into the notion that Obama is some sort of “Manchurian candidate.” Incidentally, the folks who’ve been mixing this witches brew evidently haven’t seen or read The Manchurian Candidate.
At one of his town hall meetings, McCain came face to face with a woman sputtering with anger about Obama. Finally, she blurted it out: “He’s … an Arab!” I don’t think John McCain liked that too much.
** WAITING FOR “WHITEY.”I’ve spent a lot of time talking this week with some top Republican pros, in person and on the phone.
Virtually all of these Republican pros think Barack Obama has it won, most even before Obama won his second debate with John McCain. None of them dislike McCain, or have any bone to pick with Steve Schmidt or Rick Davis. (That’s how you know I didn’t talk to John Weaver, McCain’s former chief strategist who said yesterday that McCain’s events are encouraging “an angry mob mentality.”) At least one of them has voted for Obama absentee. One or two said, wistfully, “What about the Whitey tape, maybe that would change it?”
Of course, there is no Whitey tape. The whole thing was almost certainly lifted from a financial thriller, “The Power Broker,’ by Stephen Frey. Which I read when this nonsense about a a purported tape of Michelle Obama ranting about “whitey” surfaced in June.
When you’re waiting for “Whitey,” you’re in much worse shape than when you’re waiting for Godot. And that sure ain’t a good place to be. I’ll return to the “Whitey” episode in a moment. It’s instructive. … From my Friday column.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
Barack Obama is in Toledo, Ohio.
Joe Biden is in Rochester and Manchester, New Hampshire and Dover, Delaware.
John McCain is in Virginia Beach, Virginia, Wilmington, North Carolina, and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Sarah Palin is in Virginia Beach and McLean, Virginia.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is celebrating Columbus Day with his family.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, which I know as a former DemRussia advisor, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Among them is what I’m sure is the first piece examining Schwarzenegger’s legacy as governor of California. Since he will actually be governor of California until 2011. No technology known to be disruptive to the space/time continuum was used in its preparation.
The drop of $67 per barrel since the record high three months ago comes on acknowledgment that the weak US economy will cut future demand and the easing of geopolitical tensions in the Middle East. The Russian war with Georgia, confounding much speculation and reporting to the contrary, actually decreased the geopolitical risk premium in the oil market.
Body of Lies, opening this weekend, is the latest Terror War thriller to take a shot at the box office, with Russell Crowe and Leonard Di Caprio as agents in this Ridley Scott picture.
** COLORADO POLL: OBAMA BY 10. Barack Obama has opened up a big lead in the new Public Policy Polling survey of battleground Colorado, 52% to 42% over John McCain. Three weeks ago, Obama led amongst Latino voters in the preeminent state of the Rocky Mountains, 57-36. Now his edge over McCain is 71-21. The two candidates split the white vote in Colorado. Democrat Mark Udall has a 10-point lead in the race for Colorado’s US Senate seat.
** THE CLINTONS JOIN THE BIDENS FOR A PENNSYLVANIA RALLY. Bill and Hillary Clinton join Joe and Jill Biden for a rally Sunday afternoon in Scranton, Pennsylvania. John McCain has taken a real run at the Keystone State, but Barack Obama has the lead and the Clintons are arriving to help lock the state down for Obama.
** SUNDAY – WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
Barack Obama is in Oregon, Ohio, off the campaign trail.
Joe Biden is in Scranton, Pennsylvania, his home town.
John McCain is in Washington, DC, off the campaign trail.
Sarah Palin is in Huntington, West Virginia (to try to lock down the Mountaineer State, where Obama has, strangely, been surging), St. Clairsville, Ohio and Norfolk, Virginia.
** CALIFORNIA POLL: OBAMA BY 16. The new Rasmussen poll, owned by a conservative Republican who tends to understate Democratic strength in his polls a tad, has Barack Obama leading John McCain in the Golden State, 56% to 40%. Just 1% of California voters say the economy is getting better, while 87% say it is getting worse. Sarah Palin is a drag on the Republican ticket. While President Bush made big noises in both elections about making a play for the state, Al Gore carried California by 11 points in 2000 and John Kerry carried it by 10 points in 2004.
** NATIONAL TRACKING POLLS: OBAMA AT 50% OR BETTER IN ALL. Looking at the four national daily tracking polls, Barack Obama has an average 9.5% lead over John McCain after Friday night’s polling. Obama’s range of support is from 50 to 52. McCain’s range is from 40 to 45.
** GEORGIA POLL: MCCAIN BY 3. The new Insider Advantage poll of Georgia – which has not been considered to be a battleground state – has John McCain barely running ahead of Barack Obama. In the longtime red state, it’s McCain 49%, Obama 46%.
NOTE: The new computer is finally here, up and running, and quite slick. Much faster than the backup laptop I was working on the past week. However, the wireless network is not yet up.
** WAITING FOR “WHITEY.”I’ve spent a lot of time talking this week with some top Republican pros, in person and on the phone.
Virtually all of these Republican pros think Barack Obama has it won, most even before Obama won his second debate with John McCain. None of them dislike McCain, or have any bone to pick with Steve Schmidt or Rick Davis. (That’s how you know I didn’t talk to John Weaver, McCain’s former chief strategist who said yesterday that McCain’s events are encouraging “an angry mob mentality.”) At least one of them has voted for Obama absentee. One or two said, wistfully, “What about the Whitey tape, maybe that would change it?”
Of course, there is no Whitey tape. The whole thing was almost certainly lifted from a financial thriller, “The Power Broker,’ by Stephen Frey. Which I read when this nonsense about a a purported tape of Michelle Obama ranting about “whitey” surfaced in June.
When you’re waiting for “Whitey,” you’re in much worse shape than when you’re waiting for Godot. And that sure ain’t a good place to be. I’ll return to the “Whitey” episode in a moment. It’s instructive. … From my new column.
Oliver Stone’s W, opening next weekend, stars No Country for Old Men star Josh Brolin, the former Mister Sterling, as you-know-who.
** SATURDAY – WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
Barack Obama is in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Joe Biden is in Wilmington, Delaware, off the campaign trail.
John McCain is in Davenport, Iowa and Washington, DC.
Sarah Palin is in Johnstown and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles this weekend for private meetings and conversations. Among other things, he’s monitoring the Santa Ana winds situation, not infrequently a precursor to fires.
** F1 SATURDAY NIGHT. The globe-spanning Formula One racing circuit hits the Fuji Speedway this weekend for the Japanese Grand Prix. With only two races to go after this one, in China and Brazil, the battle for the world race driving title is now a two-man duel between England’s own Lewis Hamilton, first black driver in F1, and Brazilian Felipe Massa of Ferrari. The action starts at 9 PM Pacific tonight on Speed TV.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, which I know as a former DemRussia advisor, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Among them is what I’m sure is the first piece examining Schwarzenegger’s legacy as governor of California. Since he will actually be governor of California until 2011. No technology known to be disruptive to the space/time continuum was used in its preparation.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND NATIONAL ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. After crashing over $147 for yet another record on July 11th, crude oil closed at $77.70 per barrel on Friday. Energy markets are closed on the weekend.
Congressional passage of the massive, pork-laden Wall Street bailout bill hasn’t spurred a sense of economic recovery. Finance ministers of leading industrial nations, including Russia, are meeting this weekend in Washington.
The drop of $70 per barrel since the record high three months ago comes on acknowledgment that the weak US economy will cut future demand and the easing of geopolitical tensions in the Middle East. The Russian war with Georgia, confounding much speculation and reporting to the contrary, actually decreased the geopolitical risk premium in the oil market.
This RNC ad, playing in some battleground states, attacking Barack Obama as product of “The Chicago Way,” ties him tightly to nefarious characters Tony Rezko, Bill Ayers, and Bill Daley. Bill Daley?!
** HAS JOHN MCCAIN DECIDED TO COOL OUT SOME OF HIS SUPPORTERS? At a town hall late today, John McCain found himself face to face with a woman nearly incoherent with rage at Barack Obama. She finally sputtered it out: “He’s … an Arab.” McCain corrected her, calling him a patriotic family man, saying no one should be afraid if he is president, and walked away.
** WAITING FOR “WHITEY.” I’ve spent a lot of time talking this week with some top Republican pros, in person and on the phone.
Virtually all of these Republican pros think Barack Obama has it won, most even before Obama won his second debate with John McCain. None of them dislike McCain, or have any bone to pick with Steve Schmidt or Rick Davis. (That’s how you know I didn’t talk to John Weaver, McCain’s former chief strategist who said yesterday that McCain’s events are encouraging “an angry mob mentality.”) At least one of them has voted for Obama absentee. One or two said, wistfully, “What about the Whitey tape, maybe that would change it?”
Of course, there is no Whitey tape. The whole thing was almost certainly lifted from a financial thriller, “The Power Broker,’ by Stephen Frey. Which I read when this nonsense about a a purported tape of Michelle Obama ranting about “whitey” surfaced in June.
When you’re waiting for “Whitey,” you’re in much worse shape than when you’re waiting for Godot. And that sure ain’t a good place to be. I’ll return to the “Whitey” episode in a moment. It’s instructive. … From my new column.
** VERTIGO. That was quite a moment this morning, watching the New York Stock Exchange open, and the Dow plunge nearly 700 points in the first 11 minutes. Then, later in the day, it was actually in positive territory by about 300 points, only to close down by something over 100 points. I feel dizzy just thinking about it. Maybe 8000 is a floor for this market. Maybe.
** COMING UP … I’ve spent a lot of time this week talking with top Republican political pros about the presidential election and the political climate, and am prepping a column on that now. Also, Amazon, after losing track of my new computer, has finally located it. It arrives today. Probably very late today. But it’s always fun to get a new computer. I’m very glad I had my six-year old Apple laptop around as back-up when my frontline computer stopped charging — and that is being repaired and will be the new back-up — but it’s been a rickety week. What was pretty fast in 2002 is actually fine for general purposes still, but not for what I do.
** DEMOCRATS UP, REPUBLICANS DOWN IN VOTER REGISTRATION ACROSS THE COUNTRY.Since 2004, Democratic registration is up 5%, while Republican registration is down 2%. Now we’ll see who turns out.
** THAT “RADICAL EDUCATION FOUNDATION.” Like many readers, I was struck by yesterday’s McCain campaign web video attacking Obama for his ties to former clown show terrorist Bill Ayers, now a University of Illinois professor. Among other things, it attacked them for running a “radical education foundation.”
Let me say something about this radical Annenberg outfit. (As I write this, I glance at my plaque as a senior fellow of the USC Annenberg School for Communication.) The Annenberg Foundation is headed by Lenore Annenberg, who is actually a McCain supporter, and was founded by the late Ambassador Walter Annenberg, who was one of Ronald Reagan’s closest friends. A totally mainstream and frequently conservative foundation. Things are getting pretty reckless in the McCain campaign to make this kind of obvious mistake.
John McCain’s new attack ad ties Barack Obama to ’60s bomber-turned-education professor Bill Ayers and blames Obama and congressional Democrats for the financial crisis.
Another extraordinary day, as markets plunge around the world, oil drops to $80 per barrel, and President Bush, who spoke earlier this morning, had little to say of any note. Meanwhile, John McCain’s campaign is going up today with its first broadcast TV ad linking frontrunner Barack Obama to Bill Ayers.
Finance ministers from most of the world’s advanced industrial nations are converging on Washington this weekend to seek a coordinated plan to arrest the world’s slide into a deep global recession. It’s not clear that Washington is the place to look for leadership, as Washington looked on and did nothing while vast markets in derivatives based upon shaky mortgage debt were allowed to flourish before they crashed, bringing the overall system down as well.
General Motors, once the ultimate icon of American industrial prowess, is now worth about what it was in 1950. A buying opportunity, if only the company were sound and had innovated to keep pace with foreign companies in fuel efficiency and design.
Meanwhile, another sign of the times, Iceland has turned to a country which will not be represented in Washington this weekend, Russia, to bail out its economy. Not that Russia is in great shape, either, as its stock exchange opening was postponed. The fall in oil will hit Russia hard, as well as the Gulf states. Nevertheless, they will all continue to make enormous profits. Just not as enormous.
Barack Obama talked about the economic crisis yesterday in Portsmouth, Ohio.
Nevertheless, the meeting might as well be in Washington, even though the current administration has shown no more facility in overseeing financial markets than in anything else.
America is the most innovative and productive country in the world. Even if a lot less wealthy than not long ago.
What are the presidential candidates doing and saying? Well, Obama is trying to channel FDR with his calm and authoritative demeanor, when he’s not hammering McCain for his support of the last two presidential terms. As has been said, a little vagueness goes a long way in this business.
McCain, when he’s not focused on the Iraq surge or Bill Ayers — former McCain chief strategist John Weaver says McCain’s rallies lately encourage “an angry mob mentality” – has gone from being the would-be central figure in the bail-out to reluctant if inevitable participant in the first debate to championing a massive governmental intervention in the housing market. Which if it came from a Democrat, would immediately be labeled socialism. Though when one looks at the details, which emerged slowly after McCain mentioned it Tuesday night, would deeply benefit not only homeowners but the financial institutions that screwed up.
John McCain is in La Crosse, Wisconsin and Lakeville, Minnesota.
Sarah Palin is in Cincinnati and Cleveland, Ohio and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles today for private meetings and conversations. He and his advisors are monitoring financial markets as California goes to the credit markets for the first “tranche” of its customary revenue anticipation notes issued at this time of year. The state government needs $7 billion in advance of revenue flows; it’s going now for $4 billion. The notes will be priced by Wednesday or Thursday of next week. While the market didn’t work when the state made its first effort at the beginning of the month, Schwarzenegger was heartened by the ability of Massachusetts to raise $750 million this week.
Also heartening would have to be situation with his main ballot measure this fall, redistricting reform, Proposition 11 on the November ballot. While it’s not where it needs to be in the polls, its support by an array of good government groups such as the League of Women Voters, Common Cause, AARP, and the NAACP definitely helps. What helps even more is that the yes side is flush, while the no side is in the red. Big public employee unions that have decimated some of Schwarzenegger’s initiatives in the past — the California Teachers Association and the Service Employees — are neutral this time. There’s a big story behind that, which I’ll get to another time.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, which I know as a former DemRussia advisor, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Among them is what I’m sure is the first piece examining Schwarzenegger’s legacy as governor of California. Since he will actually be governor of California until 2011. No technology known to be disruptive to the space/time continuum was used in its preparation.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND NATIONAL ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. After crashing over $147 for yet another record on July 11th, crude oil is trading in the down again in $80 to $81 per barrel range.
Congressional passage of the massive, pork-laden Wall Street bailout bill hasn’t spurred a sense of economic recovery. This has prompted an unprecedented historic coordination of downward interest rate moves by central banks around the world. In addition, Britain has partially nationalized its largest banks. The Bush/Cheney Administration is contemplating a similar move.
The drop of $67 per barrel since the record high less than three months ago comes on acknowledgment that the weak US economy will cut future demand and the easing of geopolitical tensions in the Middle East. The Russian war with Georgia, confounding much speculation and reporting to the contrary, actually decreased the geopolitical risk premium in the oil market.
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