October 2008

In the Wall Street Journal, Frederick W. Kagan argues that national security should be the deciding issue in this election.

Here is Obama, speaking in Missouri yesterday: It's not change when he (McCain) wants to give $200 billion to the biggest corporation or $4 billion to the oil companies when today, Exxon-Mobil announced that it had made the greatest profits of any corporation in the history of the world: $14…

For the past 20 years, it has been a given that many conservatives are deeply embedded in Reagan Nostalgia, longing for a return in new guise of their erstwhile leader, the unassailable image of noble perfection, against whom all other men must fall short. But the revolt of a coterie on the right…

Fishbowl NY has a new online poll: "Both Senator Barack Obama and William Kristol made appearances on the Daily Show this week. Who was better?" As I type, Obama is losing 64 percent to 36 percent. This is one election I'm sure we can win. Vote here.

Regardless of who wins Tuesday's election, the next great argument in Washington is whether there will be a second 'stimulus bill' (ie, bailout). Constituencies are already lining up. House leaders have heard from mayors, governors and state transportation officials, looking to Washington to save…

John Podhoretz gives 10 reasons why McCain might win.

Krauthammer on the election: The national security choice in this election is no contest. The domestic policy choice is more equivocal because it is ideological. McCain is the quintessential center-right candidate. Yet the quintessential center-right country is poised to reject him. The hunger for…

Jake Tapper reports that on the stump this week Barack Obama accused McCain and Palin of promoting "selfishness" by opposing tax hikes: "The reason that we want to do this, change our tax code, is not because I have anything against the rich," Obama said in Sarasota, Florida, yesterday. "I love…

I'm sure the thought has crossed your mind: What happens if, just if, Obama loses? It is certainly something that has haunted überfeminist Erica Jong. In an interview in Corriere della Sera, and as noted in the New York Observer, Jong's fear is that "if Obama loses it will spark the second…

The McCain campaign's high command conducted a conference call this morning and communicated a strong, upbeat message. Campaign manager Rick Davis kicked things off by predicting we'll see "the greatest comeback since John McCain won the New Hampshire primary." Davis saw "gains in all the…

In a piece on the economic crisis in Iceland in this week's magazine I noted how the government's inept response to the troubles made a bad situation much, much worse. One of the obvious mistakes the Icelandic central bank made was to lower the interest rate from 15.5 percent to 12 percent, after…

The New York Times editorial board makes the case against extending the bailout to Detroit - before supporting exactly that: The specific request by General Motors and Cerberus Capital Management, the private equity firm that controls Chrysler, is preposterous: billions to help pay for a merger of…

Wise words from David Brooks today on the problems with "economic stimulus packages": The Federal Reserve can effectively stimulate the economy. There are certain automatic government programs, like unemployment insurance, which also do it. But the history of the past century suggests that…

The Drudge Report is running a story about three newspapers having been kicked off the Obama campaign plane for the last 72 hours of the race- the Dallas Morning News, the NY Post, and the Washington Times, all of which endorsed McCain on their editorial pages. The NY POST, WASHINGTON TIMES and…

Iowahawk comes through again: "As a Conservative, I Must Say I Do Quite Like the Cut of this Obama Fellow's Jib" by T. Coddington Van Voorhees VII.

While the U.S. economy's declining, national polling is a growth industry. Karl Rove noted on last week's Fox News Sunday that the number of national polls released in October 2008 compared to the same month in 2004 grew by 300 percent (55 national polls were release October 1-23, 2004, compared to…

When it comes to al Qaeda, Syria gets it coming and going. This past Sunday, U.S. helicopters targeted an al Qaeda operative on Syrian territory who shuttled terrorists into Iraq. Syria condemned the strike as a violation of its sovereignty and a "serious aggression." Earlier in October, a massive…

November was much celebrated by investors in 1954. On the 23rd of that month the Dow Jones average of shares of industrial companies for the first time closed above the level it had reached at its peak on Sept. 3, 1929. Are we in for another 25-year wait before share prices match their October 9,…

One reason nobody takes Democrats seriously on matters of national security are statements like those of Representative Barney Frank (D-Mass.) to the effect that he wants to cut the Defense budget by a mind-numbing 25 percent in order to reduce the deficit and to pay for programs he and his…

The evangelical left, still stung by 70-75 percent evangelical support for George W. Bush in 2004, has been insisting that more evangelicals will vote Democrat if steered away from same-sex marriage and abortion and towards Global Warming and poverty. Leading the charge for this redirection has…

This space is not usually reserved for confession, but I have a secret vice to reveal: I close my office door here at THE WEEKLY STANDARD, direct my computer to the YouTube site, and bathe in the sights and sounds of Barack Obama music. Specifically, I have found myself addicted to four videos in…

Barack Obama's running mate, Joe the Gaffe Machine, recently predicted that an international crisis will occur sometime during a President Obama's first year in office. What will it be? Trouble in Iraq? Tension between China and Taiwan? State collapse in North Korea? Crisis in the Straits of…

The morning after Obama's $3-million appeal to people who'd rather be watching "Knight Rider," he hit me up for a couple bucks. This is perhaps a preview of the administration: Mary -- The next 6 days are going to be the toughest we've seen, and I need your support to reach as many voters as…

Robert Kagan on American declinism: [T]he evidence of American decline is weak. Yes, as Zakaria notes, the world's largest Ferris wheel is in Singapore and the largest casino in Macau. But by more serious measures of power, the United States is not in decline, not even relative to other powers. Its…

The Democratic Party of Idaho has been criticized this week for publishing the social security numbers of GOP Rep. Bill Sali and his wife. The numbers were printed in a Democratic campaign mailer highlighting the Sali's difficulty paying off debts in the 1980s. The Idaho GOP released a statement…

Unlike the John Mayer endorsement of Obama, this comes from the counterintuitive celebrity endorsements file. Joe Perry on McCain: "I've been a hardcore Republican my whole life," he told the Herald. "My mother and father drilled into me from the very start that if you work hard and be positive,…

The "don't vote" joke wasn't funny the first time they told it for five minutes, so they're back again with another five minutes of embarrassingly bad self-referential civic humor. Remember, these people are paid millions upon millions to entertain. At least when Obama presents a prime-time…

Germany's demographic troubles are well known: Fewer and fewer women are having babies; and even if they do have kids, it often doesn't happen before they are already well into their 30s. The long-term economic, social, and political consequences of this unprecedented demographic meltdown in…

NBC news reports that the Justice Department has begun an investigation into whether Countrywide Financial Corp used the 'Friends of Angelo (Mozilo)' program to buy influence with Senators Chris Dodd (D-CT), Kent Conrad (D-ND), and others. According to a senior Countrywide official who handled its…

Last night's episode of The Barack Obama Show was blog-worthy in several respects. And it raised many important questions, such as, Will it be picked up for a full season? (We find out next Tuesday.) One thing that struck you as you watched the show was how downbeat it was. All the families Obama…

For the last few months I've been reading that the Reagan era is about to end, or is in the process of ending, or has ended already. Now it's true that the people who have been arguing this have made the same argument, again and again, since the Reagan era began in 1980. But in recent months…

The Hill gives a preview of the congressional Democrat agenda once the election is behind them: hundreds of billions in new spending (with more and more governors calling for a state bailout), an end to secret ballots for union organizing, and tax increases: A certain starting point for Democrats…

Gore to close for Obama in Florida. Well, his track record there is so good. In addition to losing the state for Obama, he'll probably make it snow as he rails about global warming. I'm super serial. Perhaps this is the reason for Obama's positively Kerry-esque numbers in Florida early voting:…

Two new polls in closely watched Senate races deserve note. First, in Alaska, Rasmussen released its first results post conviction in the Stevens/Begich race. Stevens now trails by 8 points. The shift merits mention because, yesterday--before adding this poll into the mix--the Real Clear Politics…

This has got to worry Team Obama: After several weeks of John McCain's campaign attacks on Barack Obama's tax plan and idea of "spreading the wealth around", the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds voters trust McCain more than Obama on taxes, 47% to 45%. Two weeks ago, Obama…

They're not showing up in Nevada -- at least not yet: Analysts have predicted that new voters, young voters and Hispanic voters will turn out in record numbers in this election. But as Nevadans continue to flock to the polls, turnout among those three groups is lagging, at least in the early going.…

Sitting through the Very Special Episode of Obama for President tonight felt awfully familiar. It's like one of those required assemblies from middle school: hectoring, tedious, and transparently silly. But it did have one unexpected effect on me. Never before have I noticed how wonderful…

From Nielsen: "Overall, between Oct. 6 and Oct. 27, Obama placed 153% more ad units (64,917 vs. 25,630) than McCain in ... seven key battleground states."

The LA Times's Andrew Malcolm reports that the FBI caught Massachusetts Democratic state senator Dianne Wilkerson "on videotape stuffing numerous $100 bills into her bra as alleged bribe payments during a meeting in a fancy Boston restaurant." diannewilkersonusatyap.jpg You know, it's 2008. Isn't…

TEXT Alabama's Republican senator Richard Shelby, has defeated his opponent by about 30 points in each of the past three elections, sits on top of the largest war chest in the Senate, with 13.X million in cash. His next closest

One additional note on that state official in Ohio who snooped through Joe the Plumber's records: She gave Barack Obama $2,500. Will Obama keep the money?

Funny how no one is talking about the election being bought by rich Republicans. That's probably because John McCain is not the candidate who has raised more than $600 million this year. That would be Barack Obama, who is now planning a final blitz, including a 30-minute infomercial on major…

The Hill suggests that Harry Reid is preparing to do what he's been expected to do for months: Lieberman, a former Democrat who supports Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) for president, is likely to lose his gavel on the Homeland Security Committee he has chaired since January 2007, say the sources who…

The Heritage Foundation has written to the Obama campaign and asked them to withdraw an ad that erroneously claims the think tank's support for his tax plan: The print ad on your Website as well as your ad entitled "Try This" reference a quote from policy analyst Rea Hederman. In fact, Mr. Hederman…

Rasmussen and Gallup show Obama leading by three points.

Good stuff on the Washington Post op-ed page today. Alan D. Viard, Alex Brill, and Arthur C. Brooks detail the problems in Obama's tax plan: While a few of Obama's proposals may be sensible, the overall package would be bad for the economy. Unlike rate cuts for high incomes or reductions in…

Can Democrats reach a filibuster-proof majority in the U.S. Senate? State level polling averages reported in this morning's Real Clear Politics (RCP) reveal that the road to sixty votes--while not impossible--looks pretty tough for the Democrats. But the numbers also show little margin of error for…

Obama's new ad attacking Palin provides an opportunity for the McCain-Palin campaign. Palin should hold a press conference today to respond, and do TV, radio and print interviews. In them, she should take on the Obama campaign on economic policy--the topic on which the Obama ad ridicules Palin's…

The great Ken Levine has a collection of notes on the American scene that's well worth your time. My favorite: "The 82 game NBA pre-season has begun. They play four months to eliminate the Clippers and one other team then start seven rounds of playoffs."

Last week, the Columbus Dispatch reported that it appeared that employees of state and local government agencies improperly delved into Joe Wurzelbacher's personal records after his name was brought up during the last presidential debate: Public records requested by The Dispatch disclose that…

The LA Times refuses to release a tape in its possession showing Barack Obama at a party for Rashid Khalidi. The Times is keeping this potentially damaging video of Obama under lock and key because of an agreement with the source who provided the tape, but Jennifer Rubin suggests at the very least…

Vets for Freedom will run this ad throughout the week in Pennsylvania's 12th congressional district, where Congressman Murtha is facing a serious challenge from Bill Russell: From the VFF press release: "Representative Murtha has said time and again that our Marines ‘killed innocent civilians in…

According to Roll Call, Rangel hasn't yet hired the forensic auditor he promised 6 weeks ago, and there's no assurance from Democratic leaders that they'll renew the ethics investigation next year: An attorney for House Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel (N.Y.) acknowledged Monday that more…

In addition to the obituary linked to below, the Boston Globe published this death notice, which includes information some readers have requested: BARNETT, Dean M. Age 41, of Belmont, on Monday, Oct. 27, 2008. Loving husband of Kirstan Brooks Barnett. Cherished son of Karen (Daniels) Barnett of…

Dean Barnett's friend Thomas Cotton writes: Thanks for your fitting tribute to Dean. I learned about Dean's death early this morning (local time) before going on my first really long patrol here. We drove about 8 hours round trip, so I had lots of time to think. Like you, what struck me most about…

The tributes of my colleagues and of his fellow bloggers to Dean Barnett are a balm in this time of loss. Of the writers I have worked with over the years, none was sweeter, more cheerful, and less self-pitying than Dean. Like his other friends and correspondents, I cherished his emails and phone…

A long-time correspondent of Dean's writes: I didn't know Dean very well on a personal level, but I considered him my friend, as I am sure he was a friend to a great many of you out there. I came to know Dean originally from his first blog, www.dbsoxblog.blogspot.com, after Mickey Kaus gave him his…

Dean Barnett began contributing to the online and print editions of THE WEEKLY STANDARD in early 2005. In less than four years, he became a favorite of our discerning readers--and of other writers. He wrote witty and penetrating essays and blog items on such diverse topics as presidential politics,…

Forget Fannie and Freddie, Alan Greenspan, collateralized debt obligations and other mortgage-backed securities, and credit default swaps. Who's really responsible for the global economic meltdown? The Guardian notes that the rock band AC/DC always seems to prosper during financial panics: Those…

Our first web editor, Jonathan V. Last, tells the intriguing tale of how Dean came to our attention here at THE WEEKLY STANDARD. Read the whole thing. It's another chapter in the continuing story of how the web has democratized journalism. Dean was trained as a lawyer and then started a headhunting…

The Globe offers a write-up of Beantown's own "well-known conservative columnist, author, and blogger," which includes some wonderful thoughts from Dean's brother, Keith: "All his life he's been aware that he had this terminal disease but it never stopped him from doing everything and enjoying life…

I met Dean Barnett in 2006. By that time we'd been friends for almost five years.

Mitt Romney writes: I remember meeting the Barnett brothers. It was 1994 and I was running against Ted Kennedy. Keith, now a lawyer in Boston, was jovial and enthusiastic. Dean was more laid-back. He had a knowing smile--like he hadn't caught the canary yet, but he had it locked in a room. Over…

Really, anything with the short "i" sound in it will do. After all, it's muddled crowd noise on a CNN feed, and if you're a race-obsessed partisan who is just dying to think the worst of conservatives, you'll hear the n-word or "kill him" in whatever you're listening to. You'll then post video of…

"Mike Thompson has been a bad boy," said the female voice, "...for backing the bailout."

House Republican Leader John Boehner circulated a memo to all Republican House members and candidates this weekend urging them to get behind a new economic recovery plan he will unveil today. Boehner writes this in the memo: Pelosi has declared that Congress will pass a $300 billion "stimulus"…

Someone should send this to the candidate himself, who is talking about "righteous winds," planning his Election Night bash, and unveiling an unorthodox new plan to deal with an economic downturn by asking roughly 50 percent of the nation not to work for a day. That'll do wonders for productivity.…

The Obama-Biden campaign's definition of middle-class keeps on dropping.

Some of my favorite writers have been hard at work lately. Be sure to check them out: David Brooks on behavioral economics. Jack Shafer on the coming Obama rapture. Mike Murphy on campaign hobgoblins. Robert Kagan gives a wide-ranging interview to Der Spiegel. Enjoy.

Noah Pollak notes the apparent contradiction between Obama's support for fighting al Qaeda in Pakistan and his silence on the U.S. cross-border attack into Syria on al Qaeda: Obama says that the United States should strike at al Qaeda in Pakistan without the consent of the Pakistani government. So,…

Yes, even some liberals can't stand Keith Olbermann. It sounds like MSNBC could learn a lot if it listened to Linda Bloodworth-Thomason, famed creator of "Designing Women": Olbermann was criticized by many who attended Monday's luncheon sponsored by the Caucus for Producers, Writers & Directors at…

John McCain released a statement this morning calling for Alaska senator Ted Stevens to resign: Yesterday, Senator Ted Stevens was found guilty of corruption. It is a sign of the health of our democracy that the people continue to hold their representatives to account for improper or illegal…

Aristotle says somewhere that courage is the first of the virtues, because it makes the other virtues possible. Dean Barnett was brave--to a degree that perhaps only his beloved wife, Kirstan, and others in his immediate family were able to appreciate. Dean rarely talked about what he had done over…

Our friend Dean Barnett died today. In reading tributes to him--dozens of them--it's clear that considering Dean a friend was easy, whether one had met him online or in person. Even without meeting him, knowing him to be a good and good-humored man required only reading his writing. His passing is…

Dean Barnett, who passed away today, touched the lives of so many with his kindness, courage, wit, and good humor. The outpouring of tributes to Dean and condolences to his family, friends, and colleagues has already been tremendous. Here are just a few from his many friends and admirers. Hugh…

It's my sad duty to report that our good friend and valued contributor Dean Barnett passed away today. He was a remarkable man--principled, witty, and to all of us, a model of grace and courage. We mourn his passing and cherish his memory.

It's my sad duty to report that our good friend and valued contributor Dean Barnett passed away today. He was a remarkable man--principled, witty, and to all of us, a model of grace and courage. We mourn his passing and cherish his memory. --William Kristol

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I found this article by Shailagh Murray in the Sunday Washington Post curious. It argues the number of people who say they want the same party to control both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue has reached "new highs." Murray writes: The percentage of Americans saying they preferred that the same party…

In response to Barack Obama's web ad calling the attack on his votes against the born alive infants protection act a "despicable lie," BornAliveTruth.org is spending about $100,000 to air this ad on TV in Cleveland, and Focus on the Family is dropping $500,000 on a radio version of this spot in…

This is disgusting. Via Ed Morrissey.

At a rally in Tampa, Florida, yesterday Sarah Palin addressed the RNC's purchase of expensive clothes and accessories for her: "Those clothes, they are not my property. Just like the lighting and the staging and everything else that the RNC purchased, I'm not taking them with me. I am back to…

Via Hot Air, SNL's opening sketch lampooned Joe Biden for his prophecy that Obama's election would lead to an international crisis and mocked Jack Murtha for his recent statements that his constituents are racists/rednecks: And this skit, in which Obama turns his 30 minute televised national…

Three lawsuits--against Dartmouth College and Duke and Princeton universities--may be the best things to happen to higher education in decades. The Dartmouth suit, though recently withdrawn, focused attention on the role of alumni in college affairs. The Duke case raises the question of the extent…

A Rip Van Winkle waking up from a 30-year nap on a college campus today would notice a strange change in the student body. Most of the students walking past him would be women.

CAR SEAT REGULATION

Pour yourself a Johnnie Walker Black and remember. The presidential campaign was going to be about sex--the sex of the inevitable winning candidate. Then it was going to be about race. We dreamed we would atone for slavery and the Berlin Airlift, impress Europe and charm the Arab world. But the…

It's time to face facts. In-your-face liberalism is about to make a comeback. And this time it will be on steroids.

If the pundit class is right, Americans are in for another era of big government: the New Deal on steroids. In presidential debates, hundreds of billions of dollars in proposed spending were tossed around the way mere billions once were. Within a year of our first half-trillion-dollar deficit, we…

With just two weeks left before the election, John McCain faces a difficult test in overcoming the lead established by Barack Obama over the past month. An ever-growing number of national polls showed Obama with a lead last week of somewhere between 3 and 14 points--though few people outside the…

Campaigning for President

The liberal women I know--and most of the women I seem to know are liberal--loathe Sarah Palin. They don't merely dislike her, the way one tends to dislike politicians whose views are not one's own, they actively detest her. When her name comes up--and it is they who tend to bring it up--their…

The division of Europe into "old" and "new" parallels the blue and red state split of American electoral politics. In the Old Europe--synonymous with Western--defense and foreign policy thinkers and officials tend to see Barack Obama as a ray of hope for an America that reaches out in benevolent…

W.

Katherine Anne Porter

Denver

Elon, North Carolina

The Somnambulist

Shriver vs. Begala? Just You Wait.

Former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan recently suggested that an increase in the influx of skilled immigrants would help arrest the steep decline in housing prices in the last two quarters. Since skilled immigrants tend to form new households relatively rapidly, their arrival in growing…

Raleigh, N.C.

Big Lake, Alaska

Lincoln at Peoria

This summer, in the unlikely pages of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, two astronomers made a grand literary announcement. It was precisely April 16, 1178 B.C., they declared, when crafty Odysseus, peerless and bold, threw off his beggar's rags, slew the hungry suitors infesting…

As Election Day draws near, people are wondering if the presidential race will tighten. Will the undecideds swing to McCain, or will Obama continue to maintain his 4 to 11 point lead?

The liberal lion Ted Kennedy still pushing for socialized medicine. From his sickbed, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy has secretly been orchestrating meetings with lobbyists and lawmakers from both parties to craft legislation that would greet the new president with a plan to provide affordable medical…

Years before Barack Obama enraptured the nation by pronouncing at the 2004 Democratic National Convention that "there is not a Black America and a White America and Latino America and Asian America -- there's the United States of America," he compared the oppression of minorities in Los Angeles to…

The McCain supporter who claimed she was attacked by an assailant at a Pittsburgh ATM, who then became enraged by her McCain-Palin sticker and carved a "B" into her face, has admitted the incident was a hoax. Ashley Todd, a College Republicans volunteer, reported to police that she was assaulted by…

The McCain campaign issues a statement about Chris Matthews's latest mockery of Sarah Palin: "Earlier this week Chris Matthews exhibited such a stunning combination of bias and ignorance that we feel compelled to set the record straight. "Matthews mocked Governor Palin for telling a third grader…

Don't be fooled. Something more than a coordinated effort to contain the current credit and economic crises is going on. That's why French president Nicolas Sarkozy was so eager to persuade President Bush to convene the international talk shop, to be held in Washington shortly after the election.…

Early voting has been on the rise. Gallup released a new report today that notes 11% of registered voters have already cast their ballots, with another 19% saying they still plan to vote before Election Day. If 30% vote early it will represent a 7-point increase over the 22% who cast early ballots…

A few years ago, the LOL cat was born. Yes, that's right, as in "Laugh Out Loud" cat. In case you don't know what a LOL cat is, check out this website. It's chock full of oddball photos of cats--fat cats, fluffy cats, scary cats, behatted cats--paired with oddball pidgin-English phrases. You either…

Via The Hill's Michael O'Brien, Barney Frank tells us how he plans to pay for all of Obama's new government programs: Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) said Democrats will push for a stimulus package after the November election, and called for a package reducing defense spending by 25 percent while…

The Gormogons point us to this fantastic bit of parody: What it would look like if John Woo, Kevin Smith, and Wes Anderson directed attack ads for McCain. Really top-notch stuff.

Why is it that, without fail, the worst, most tedious, too-long political ads of the season have come from people who are paid exclusively to make films? One would think that entertainment professionals could at least manage to, well, entertain during a short political ad. But nope. Leonardo…

We could have built 1,000 monuments to Obama with all of this money: The 2008 election for president and Congress is not only one of the most closely watched U.S. elections in years; it's also the most expensive in history. The nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics estimates that more than…

From Politico: Offered a chance to respond to the suggestion that the McCain campaign is awash in defeatism, a McCain official delivered a decidedly measured appraisal: "We have a real chance in Pennsylvania. We are in trouble in Colorado, Nevada and Virginia. We have lost Iowa and New Mexico. We…

Those who dismiss concerns about Barack Obama and his decision to launch his political career from Bill Ayers' living room would have us believe that Ayers involvement with the Weather Underground was more a 'youthful indiscretion' than anything else. The truth is that Ayers was a traitor who…

Charles Krauthammer: The case for McCain is straightforward. The financial crisis has made us forget, or just blindly deny, how dangerous the world out there is. We have a generations-long struggle with Islamic jihadism. An apocalyptic, soon-to-be-nuclear Iran. A nuclear-armed Pakistan in danger of…

Fast forward to a little past the three minute mark in this clip of Chris Matthews's exchange with Nancy Pfotenhauer of the McCain campaign. Matthews goes on quite a tear about Sarah Palin's explanation of what the role of the vice president is: Pfotenhauer says Palin was merely trying to explain…

Script For "Ladies And Gentlemen" (TV :30) ANNCR: Listen to Joe Biden. Talking about what electing Barack Obama will mean. JOE BIDEN: Mark my words. It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama. The world is looking. We're going to have an international crisis ... to test the…

"We are suffering just now from a bad attack of pessimism. It is common to hear people say that the epoch of enormous economic progress is over; that the rapid improvement in the standard of life is now going to slow down ; that a decline in prosperity is more likely than an improvement in the…

While President Bush's legacy with regards to U.S. efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan is uncertain and his approval rating stands at about 28 percent, his administration's Africa policy was celebrated this week in Washington. At the White House Summit on International Development, the president was…

Yesterday I wrote that the Democratic National Convention Committee spent $140,000 on podium "production"--which I thought seemed to include the cost of of Obama's Greek-columned stage (aka the Barackopolis) at Invesco Field where he delivered his acceptance speech. DNCC spokeswoman Jenni…

Today, the NRSC released an ad in North Carolina that argued Democrats would have a "blank check" if Liddy Dole's opponent Kay Hagan is elected. Obviously this ad is based on the idea that "...in the Senate the other -- the opposition can filibuster. And if you have 60 votes you can basically tell…

As the presidential campaign winds down, an important question toward predicting the outcome is how undecided voters break. For years now, the conventional wisdom has held that these voters are unhappy with the incumbent (or his party) and most will vote for the challenger when they enter the…

Politico reports: Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), a watchdog group, has filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission against Sarah Palin and the Republican National Committee claiming the RNC violated campaign finance laws when it paid for $150,000 for clothes…

Obama at a press conference yesterday: In 2002 I said we should focus on finishing the fight against Osama Bin Laden. Throughout this campaign I've argued that we need more troops and more resources to win the war in Iraq. But we also need a new strategy that deals with Pakistan that deals with…

According to Chuck Todd, John McCain and Sarah Palin had no chemistry while they were interviewed by Brian Williams yesterday, but it seems to me that they had a pretty strong showing. They hammered Biden on his warning that Obama's election would "guarantee" an "international crisis," and McCain's…

Good video--except for this line: "We are close to making that $250,000 mark, and we shouldn't be punished for succeeding." Is the McCain campaign conceding that Obama won't raise taxes on any one making under $250K? What happened to the argument that, based on Obama's record and his spending…

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A new web ad from McCain, as he embarks on the "Joe the Plumber" tour through Florida:

Given the hype of the Obama candidacy and his campaign's massive mobilization effort, will America's youth deliver for "The One?" Millennial voters certainly have a lot of encouragement this year. As Tom Edmunds points out in this recent piece in Politics magazine: Judging from all the hype, you'd…

CNN fact-checks Sarah Palin's statement that Obama only had 300 days of experience in the Senate before officially announcing his bid for the presidency. This statement is "misleading," according to CNN, because Palin was only counting the days the Senate was in session: But lawmakers also work…

When Sarah Palin spoke in Grand Junction, Colorado the other day, a group of protesters tried to block her motorcade. CNN caught the incident on camera: Embedded video from CNN Video Here's a pretty pathetic video put up by the protesters, hoping to catch an example of the police abusing them. That…

Politico's Charles Mahtesian assesses McCain's chances of winning Pennsylvania. Rich Lowry thinks it would be smarter to forget the Keystone state and focus on winning red states.

McCain is leading by 2 points, or he's behind by 14 points. TEXT 1,360 Ohio likely voters with a margin of error of +/- 2.7 percent;

According to The Hill: Public safety officials said in interviews with The Hill that the election, which will end with either the nation's first black president or its first female vice president, demanded a stronger police presence. Some worry that if Barack Obama loses and there is suspicion of…

Via Hot Air, French TV has released new, moving footage of John McCain as a POW:

Fox News's Shushannah Walshe reports: GREEN, OHIO -- After some subdued crowds for the top of the ticket at his solo campaign events, John McCain and Sarah Palin joined back up today and were greeted by a boisterous crowd of thousands on a high school football field here. Sarah Palin took the stage…

The Washington Post published a story Thursday about a minor terrorist's ranting on a website about his support for McCain. The McCain campaign points out that the Post didn't find it worth reporting the recent praise Hamas's spokesman has offered for Biden and Obama. The Post also didn't include…

Kirsten Powers explains why Biden's prophesy/mega-gaffe just isn't a big deal for the press.

Everyone is talking about Sarah Palin's $150,000 in clothing and accessories from department stores like Saks and Neiman Marcus. To echo my colleague, Palin is a woman who presumably had few television-worthy outfits (or accessories or makeup or haircuts), nor the personal income to buy them…

Liberals--or I could say Democrats, since the terms are now synonymous--are fun to watch because they're so un-self aware. They switch positions on a dime whenever it serves their political purposes and always consider themselves to be standing on the high moral ground. Of course that's where they…

As uncomfortable with victory at home as abroad, Democrats freak out at the good electoral forecast many are giving them: Obama himself has reacted to the dismal drumbeat of good news. At a fundraising concert in Manhattan last Thursday featuring Bruce Springsteen and Billy Joel, Obama got up and…

ABC News reports that Sarah Palin is much more accessible to the media than Joe Biden. TEXT A couple days ago, Christopher Hitchens griped that he wouldn't be to find out what Sarah Palin thinks about teaching creationism because it appeared TEXT (Hat tip: Ramesh Ponnuru)

With all the hullabaloo surrounding the RNC's expenditures on Sarah Palin's clothes, I thought it would be interesting to find out how much money was spent on Obama's Greek-columned stage at Invesco Field. You remember the Barackopolis--those "styrofoam Greek columns"--don't you? barackopolis.jpg…

The World Series starts tonight. Ken Levine's take is extremely enjoyable. He laments the fact that baseball games seem to be growing longer and longer, while network executives schedule them later and later: "This year's All-Star Game was a thriller. The American League won in a five hour, 15…

Ben Smith reports: Answering questions after a meeting with Biden and national security advisers, Obama insists that Joe Biden intended to say that the next president will be tested by foreign powers, regardless of who is elected. "Joe sometimes engages in rhetorical flourishes, but i think his…

As always, these are polls with margins of error, and this one seems decidedly different from others recently released, but it shows gains with exactly the kind of voters who would find the Joe the Plumber's question, Obama's answer, and McCain's message pertinent: The presidential race tightened…

Well, I think it's safe to say contingent of people pleasantly surprised by Sarah Palin's abilities has grown by at least two since her appearance on "Saturday Night Live" this week. First Lorne Michaels: Q: What do you think Palin gained from her appearance? I think Palin will continue to be…

When John McCain suggested the creation of a bipartisan commission to investigate the reasons behind the recent credit crash, and to recommend a new regulatory regime, Barack Obama said he was passing the buck. Now Barney Frank -- Chairman of the House Banking Committee -- says he believes Congress…

Sarah Palin, to "People" Magazine, in an entertaining interview with the Palins. She also reveals they are done having children now that they have their "starting five," she's reading "The Looming Tower" right now, and the "kill him" myth lives on: "I haven't heard anyone yell 'kill him' at a…

Politico reports that the RNC has spent $150,000 on clothing, accessories, hair care, and makeup for Sarah Palin. McCain-Palin spokeswoman Tracey Schmitt responded to the story, writing in a statement: "With all of the important issues facing the country right now, it's remarkable that we're…

We used to have "tax and spend" liberals. Today we have tax "as" spend politicians. The Tax Foundation argues Washington policymakers increasingly use tax policy instead of direct spending to channel government money to favored groups and causes. Scott A. Hodge of the Foundation writes: Over the…

"Al the Shoesalesman"--if that is his real name--is featured in a new Obama web video showing that Al will save $1,000 under Obama's tax plan: Can't wait for the New York Times's investigation of Al.

Since attempts to silence McCain supporters have escalated from mere boycotts to arson and physical violence, I guess this isn't too shocking.

CNN reported on an inaccurate AP story that said Sarah Palin paid for her kids' travel expenses with state funds in order to bring them along to events to which they weren't officially invited. Anderson Cooper corrects the record here: Now when is CNN going to apologize for this egregious…

Paul Rubin warns Americans to get ready for a new New Deal: But if the coming wave of new regulation from an Obama administration is harmful to the economy, Mr. Obama will take a page from FDR's playbook. He'll blame Republicans for having caused the market crash in the first place, and so escape…

The McCain campaign today introduces an ad I really like: one which captures simply and effectively how Barack Obama's redistributive message conflicts with the aspirations of working Americans: No word yet on where it will run, but given the focus on middle-income workers in Pennsylvania, it seems…

CNN horribly rips a quote out of context to sandbag Sarah Palin in an interview. Update: Allahpundit has the transcript and points out: The freakiest thing about this? Drew Griffin, the reporter, is the same guy who's been doing good work on Ayers and ACORN. Exit question: Blame the researcher, or…

He may appear on SNL Nov. 1, which if it's anything like his last appearance, will feature him expertly standing, smiling, accepting applause, and delivering stump speech lines without nearly enough irony. Truly, it was electrifying. Looking back at all four of the major political cameos on SNL…

In response to Republican demands that Congress investigate how Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae imploded, Barney Frank said today: "In an unusual event, even by this year's standards, House Republicans appear to be demanding a criminal investigation of their failure to legislate," said Frank in a…

"his conduct in that meeting led Krushchev to believe that Kennedy was weak" berlin wall, cuban missile crisis "In foreign policy, it is weakness real or perceived weakness that is provocative. Weakness invites challenge, invites testing, invites attack."

If even Dan Rather thinks you're in the tank...just, wow. "Certainly, if Sarah Palin had said this, it would be above the fold in most newspapers."

A statement from McCain-Palin spokesman Michael Goldfarb: "Joe Biden's commented on Sunday that Barack Obama's election as President would, within six months, result in 'an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy.' Biden further added that the American people would…

Mother Jones has a great video of McCain supporters arguing with David Corn about media bias, taxes, and more: You may have first read about Tito Munoz, the construction worker in the video, in Byron York's excellent write-up of the rally. Curiously, Corn leaves this portion of his conversation…

In her prepared remarks today in Reno, Nevada, Sarah Palin tees off on Joe Biden's prediction that there would be "an international crisis" created to "test" Obama. Video via Hot Air Two weeks from today, Americans will be asked to cast their vote for the next president of the United States.…

From Chicago Business News: The best-funded political campaign in American history says news organizations will have to pay-in some cases almost $2,000 each-if they want to cover Barack Obama's election-night celebration in Chicago. A memo sent to news organizations on Tuesday by the Obama campaign…

Guy Benson, Ed Morrissey and I decided it was time to put together a one-stop shop for legitimate, sober arguments against Obama. At Hot Air, Ed is hosting the finished product, which I encourage you to send to allies to arm them, and skeptics to convince them. We've addressed abortion, taxes,…

Marc Ambinder reports that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has a new anti-Card Check ad, featuring a real life angry union boss (as opposed to fictional ones you might have seen in this ad): Here's another ad the Chamber is running in Minnesota: Bryan O'Keefe wrote a couple weeks back that the McCain…

I still remember when parents worried their kids watched too much TV. Never mind. The Internet solved that problem. Pew released an interesting new report this week called "Networked Families," exploring how technology affects family communications and lifestyles. It looks at how the proliferation…

Hey, there's a card for everything. naralmail1.jpgnaralmail2.jpg Via Jonathan Martin, who reports that "The piece is hitting voters ID'd as pro-abortion rights in Colorado, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia."

The McCain campaign refutes CNN's report that the campaign is abandoning Colorado.

In an interview with Stephen F. Hayes, John McCain strongly criticized the Bush administration's decision to remove North Korea from the list of state sponsors of terrorism: "I don't agree with it, and I think we have basically contradicted Ronald Reagan's great dictum of trust but verify. And…

Factcheck.org calls Obama's TV ads, which say that McCain will cut Medicare benefits, "a rank distortion."

John McCain leaned far back in a tan first-class seat aboard the blue, white, and gold campaign plane with his name emblazoned on the side. His right foot--in a black loafer with a silver buckle--was resting on the armrest of the seat in front of his, and, though his body was slouched, the crease…

John McCain took note Monday of Joe Biden's remarks the day before at a Seattle fundraiser (where Biden apparently didn't realize at first there were media present). But there's more McCain could say. Here's McCain, in Belton, Missouri: Just last night, Senator Biden guaranteed that if Senator…

Christopher Hitchens has a piece up at Slate titled: "Speak Up! Stop covering Palin until she gives a press conference." Hitchens writes that he would like to query the Alaska governor about her views on teaching creationism in school. "There are several other questions I would like to ask her, as,…

The Washington Post reports: "In the week since posting McCain-Palin signs on its front lawn, a Clinton hotel has reported receiving threatening calls but losing little business in predominantly Democratic Prince George's County, according to a hotel manager and the owner's son." Michael…

After watching Penn State cream the Wisconsin Badgers a couple Saturdays ago, I caught the local DC metro newscast (which covers Northern Virginia) for perhaps the first time ever. In the two minutes the program dedicated to the presidential campaign, the news anchor slipped in the critical facts…

Barack Obama is a generous reviewer, if he offered such kind words about a book written by a guy he hardly knew. obama_ayers_review.jpg Obama spokesperson Bill Burton says that Barack Obama "did not write a blurb" about the book. When Obama strategist Robert Gibbs was asked if Obama blurbed Ayers's…

president John F. Kennedy faced. What senator kennedy did was enter into an ill prepared summit meeting with ... Krushchev. Led Kruschev to believe that ... berlin wall, and "weakness real or perceived that is provocative" surge, cut off funding for troops, meet unconditionally with tyrants. ...…

Breaking news from Newsweek's Jon Meacham: "Contrary to caricature, to be conservative is not necessarily to be racist, or retrograde, or close-minded." Whew. Glad we got that cleared up. (Though you gotta love that "not necessarily," don't ya?)

A growing number of Americans now cast their ballots early. In 2004, more than one out of five voters (22.5%) cast ballots either through absentee or some other form of early voting. That number is expected to rise even more in 2008--maybe as high as 25% nationally, and in some states, even higher.…

Update: The McCain campaign hasn't heard anything about the report of a bus being attacked. This makes the following report seem highly unlikely. Neither Raton police nor state police have received reports about such an incident. The blog item below was posted by Mark Williams, former talk-radio…

The New York Post takes a look at why ACORN hands in so many fraudulent registrations: Desperate canvassers sometimes resorted to trading cigarettes, cash and food in exchange for registrations, according to Elder and two other former ACORN workers, Jaymes Sanford, 18, and Selvin Cunningham, 23.…

Michael Tomasky, the liberal editor of Guardian America and a regular contributor to the New York Review, had a fascinating piece in the fortieth anniversary issue of New York magazine last week. It's called "The Day Everything Changed," meaning, the day everything changed for the better in New…

Here's senior Obama military adviser Maj. Gen. Scott Gration (Ret.), to The New Yorker's Nicholas Lemann: Gration was impatient with the idea that conflict is the natural state of the world, to be managed rather than resolved. "People are more alike than their cultures and religions," he said.…

Anger at a McCain-Palin rally, for the press: "Are you going to check my license, too?" he asked me. "Are you going to check my immigration status? I'm ready, I have everything here. Whatever you want, I have it. I have my green card, I have my passport - " I was a little surprised. Did Munoz…

There are a lot of people, apparently, who really, really dislike Sarah Palin. Fine. They are entitled to their opinion. But their visceral distaste obscures the fact that the public remains fascinated with the governor of Alaska. Consider: 1) Palin's speech at the Republican convention was the…

Joe the Plumber has helped give the McCain campaign its closing economic message. Now Joe the Senator has pitched in by helping frame the national security message. And the McCain campaign needs to get the national security issue back front and center--at least close to the front and near the…

ABC News reports that Joe Biden said the following at a fundraiser in Seattle yesterday: "It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy. The world is looking. ... Remember I said it standing here if you don't remember anything else I said. Watch, we're…

Joe Biden warns his supporters: "Mark my words," the Democratic vice presidential nominee warned at the second of his two Seattle fundraisers Sunday. "It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy. The world is looking. We're about to elect a brilliant…

Charles Kesler, editor of the Claremont Review of Books, has a brilliant new piece in the CRB's fall issue outlining Barack Obama's political thought. Kesler explains Obama's estimation of his ability to change the world: Eager to find himself by finding a community to which he could belong, he was…

Barack Obama's short time on the national stage means he offers little in the way of a track record as to how he would govern as president. One of his great successes as a candidate is to be all things to all audiences. As National Journal points out, that's particularly true on school choice. It's…

Cincinnati

I'm not against children's literature, though I'm not exactly for it either. Books make kids smart. Smart kids grow into smart young adults. And smart young adults will eventually compete with us in the workforce, hastening our obsolescence. As I tell young people when they ask me how to get…

Nothing in entertainment history is more shocking than the overnight collapse of the televised cribbage craze. Prime-time cribbage came and went faster than Who Wants To Be a Millionaire? and for the same reason: greed, overexposure, copycat programming, the television industry's constitutional…

Hello and welcome to Advanced Obamanomics at WEEKLY STANDARD U. If you are in this class, you have passed Remedial Rubinomics, Identity and Globalization in the Works of Barack Obama, and Introduction to Contemporary Religion with Professor Jeremiah Wright. Also, your check has cleared.…

At the "town hall" presidential debate last week, moderator Tom Brokaw asked if, in the interest of coming up with alternative forms of energy, we should "fund a Manhattan-like Project .  .  . or 100,000 garages across America, the kind of industry and innovation that developed Silicon Valley."…

Have you noticed how the justices of the Supreme Court are living longer and longer, compiling more and more years of service--far more than they used to? Doubtless the justices tire of seeing their ages mentioned in stories triggered by the presidential race that contemplate who is most likely to…

Maryland's first congressional district doesn't usually generate headlines. It's a reliably Republican district that a moderate, Wayne Gilchrest, has held comfortably for nine terms. Yet Gilchrest lost the Republican primary in February to the staunchly conservative Andy Harris--a three-term state…

On Burchett

On October 19, at the Frankfurt Book Fair, the German-born painter Anselm Kiefer will receive the Peace Prize of the German Publishers and Booksellers Association, Germany's most important award for cultural achievement.

Give Me Liberty

Over the past few weeks, in a series of television ads, in stump speeches, and in the presidential and vice presidential debates, the Obama campaign has sought mightily to attack John McCain's proposal for health care reform. It's vehemence and tenacity have been striking, especially given how…

Discerning Barack Obama's foreign policy in any detail is far from easy. The great majority of his statements on the subject consist of criticism of the Bush administration. Asked during the first presidential debate how he sees "the lessons of Iraq," Obama replied, "I think the first question is…

Religulous

Waukesha, Wisconsin

Maybe you've noticed: These political blogs can be so gabby. Yap yap yap. You go to some website--democretin.com, republicreep.net, whatever--and there will be a new post for you to read, and the blogger goes on for one, two, sometimes three paragraphs, and each paragraph is a huge heap of…

Varieties of Anti-Palinism

A Freewheelin' Time

It's been a dopey campaign. But they usually are. In 1932, Franklin Roosevelt ran on balancing the budget and cutting government spending. In 1940, it was preserving U.S. neutrality in the European war. In 1960, on the cusp of a decade of fundamental change in race relations and the size and scope…

Louisville

Is there something about chilly weather that makes the media jump to conclusions? Does the changing of seasons make pundits eager to pronounce Barack Obama a sure thing? Because fall has finally arrived in Washington, and suddenly it seems like we're back in January.

Speaking to a college audience in Boston, Mass. Friday, "Daily Show" host Jon Stewart used his stand-up routine to respond to Sarah Palin's comments about "pro-America" parts of the country, shedding the profanity restrictions that govern his Comedy Central show. "She said that small towns, that's…

You can tell she's a Republican. They were meaner to her than they have been to other candidates- Alec Baldwin calling her "that horrible woman"- and did little to lift her up aside from Alec Baldwin calling her "way hotter in person." Palin performed very well, though, reacting appropriately to…

By now, everybody must know that Rolling Stone magazine has the hots for Barack Obama. One need only look at the hagiographic articles and iconographic covers of the Anointed One which have graced the pop culture rag over the past two years. No longer content at tossing up puff-piece interviews…

Even before seven-term Republican representative Tom Davis announced his retirement, Keith Fimian was planning to run for his seat in Virginia's eleventh congressional district. It's not that Fimian opposes Davis, it's that he had been expecting him to run for the Senate seat being vacated by John…

In Miami, Fla: You may have noticed -- there was a lot of talk about Senator Obama's tax increases and Joe the Plumber. Last weekend, Senator Obama showed up in Joe's driveway to ask for his vote, and Joe asked Senator Obama a tough question. I'm glad he did; I think Senator Obama could use a few…

Exit the hullabaloo of American politics for five skinny minutes. Why? Well, to see history happen: Across the pond, Queen Elizabeth II just posted her first YouTube video at Google's British headquarters in London. And, of course, someone YouTubed her majesty YouTube-ing. Check it out here. You…

An AP caption describes those pictured in this photo as "Supporters of Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., [who] are dressed as Joe the Plumber": joeplumber.jpg But CBS News reveals that one of the guys is a leader of the College Republicans, and although another is, in…

An ordinary citizen speaks up about how federal policies affect his family and his pocketbook, and bloggers dive into his personal life. His finances, his address, his background and family connections are all splashed all over the Internet as bloggers line up to debate whether the instant…

Barack Obama has improved his standing among a variety of voter subgroups since mid-September based on Gallup's recent polling. I noted his positive move among seniors in a post last week. The latest subgroup analysis released from Gallup reveals another interesting shift: a notable swing toward…

Obama spokesman Bill Burton sends an email to reporters with the subject line: "Just asking: What part of the country isn't pro-America?" Burton writes: From the Washington Post today: …Palin also made a point of mentioning that she loved to visit the "pro-America" areas of the country, of which…

A few weeks ago Congressman Tim Mahoney led his Republican challenger by 7 points, according to the challenger's own polls. Now he trails by 26: A new Republican poll indicates Rep. Tim Mahoney (D-Fla.) is the most endangered incumbent in the country days after a news report showed he paid a former…

In case you missed it, country singer Hank Williams Jr. performed his new song "The McCain-Palin Tradition" at the McCain-Palin rally in Virginia on Monday: Lyrics after the jump:The left wing liberal media have always been a real close knit family But most of the American people don't believe em…

Jonathan Martin reports: Bobby Jindal, the Louisiana governor widely seen as a Republican rising star, will keynote a high-profile Christian conservative fundraising dinner next month in Iowa, his office confirms. Jindal will speak at the Iowa Family Policy Center's "Celebrating the Family" banquet…

Members of the press were quite pleased that their muckracking exposed Joe the Plumber's lack of a plumber's license and unpaid taxes. Turns out Obama's campaign treasurer owes taxes as well. When will the media vet Obama's associates? And Obama?

In his comments at New York's Al Smith Dinner, McCain had the audience in stitches from start to finish. My personal favorite line: "It's gonna be a long, long night at MSNBC if I pull this off." HT: Ace

Politics may make strange bedfellows, but economic crises make even stranger ones. Gordon Brown, free trader, now finds that Nicolas Sarkozy, arch-protectionist, has virtues he had not previously noticed. It seems that they are united by three things. First, they believe, or at least are pretending…

Seven years after 9/11, Washington policymakers remain fundamentally confused about the nature of Islamist extremism, the ideas behind it and the states that manipulate it. In few places is this problem more obvious than in the U.S. relationship with the secular Assad regime in Syria.

Via Ed Morrissey, USA Today has an editorial against Card Check--a provision in the Employee Free Choice Act that would deny workers the right to a secret ballot in elections to establish unions: This misguided measure passed the House shortly after Democrats took the majority in 2007. But it needs…

Via Ross Douthat, read Jay Cost's analysis of the "Palin Effect".

Last week, Michael Barone wrote a column about Obama supporter's various attempts to silence critics titled "The Coming Obama Thugocracy." Sunday's Washington Post carried another example to be added to the list. Last week a hotel in Prince George's County posted a McCain message on its maquee,…

John Murtha has taken some pretty stiff criticism for slandering his constituents as racists -- and deservedly so. But it's worth looking at the rest of his recent interview to get a sense of how he views the credit crunch. Here's how Murtha describes how we got into this financial mess: Six months…

During last night's debate, Obama claimed that all of John McCain's ads have been negative: Obama: And 100 percent, John, of your ads -- 100 percent of them have been negative. McCain: It's not true. Obama: It absolutely is true. And, now, I think the American people are less interested in our hurt…

Ben Smith has an audio recording of a McCain-Palin/RNC robo-call hitting Obama on Bill Ayers. The script: Hello. I'm calling for John McCain and the RNC because you need to know that Barack Obama has worked closely with domestic terrorist Bill Ayres, whose organization bombed the U.S. capitol, the…

I've long thought that Starbucks was an excellent indicator of America's economic health because it was a well-run company whose product is the perfect embodiment of affordable, expendable luxury. If consumers really are anxious about their economic lives, a daily SBUX purchase is the easiest thing…

It seems Barack Obama inspires the desire to make bizarre paeans even among Marxists outside the U.S.: If John McCain wants to win the presidency, he ought to point out that an Obama win is only going to increase the flow of this dreck.

It's more volatile than the stock market! Yesterday, western Pennsylvania was a "racist area" according to its Congressman John Murtha. Today, it's no longer racist. Whew! He issued the following statement today: "I apologize for making the comment that ‘Western Pennsylvania is a racist area.'…

The MLB seems open to pushing back the start of Game 6 of the World Series (assuming the Phillies haven't clinched the championship already) in order to accommodate Barack Obama's giant TV ad. If you ever got the sense that literally the entire world is bending over backwards to help Obama's…

An interesting take from Windsor Mann in the Examiner today. Why is Obama, who spent the first half of 2008 denouncing the politics of fear, all of the sudden trying to scare voters? The candidate of change changed his mind, I suspect, because he decided it was time to face reality. He recognized a…

I have to leave town before Sarah Palin speaks near Greensboro today, at Elon College, which is a shame because she's appearing with Hank Williams, Jr. Her visit will be the third this week from the candidates in what has been a solidly Republican state in presidential elections for decades. John…

Survey USA now reports the number of people who say they have "already voted" in many of its pre-election polls. This is an important tool to gauge how the presidential race is unfolding among those who have already cast their ballots. Nate Silver looks at these results from five states (NC, GA,…

Joe's all over the place today. On "Nightline" last night, he told Terry Moran: "To be honest with you, that infuriates me," plumber Joe Wurzelbacher told Nightline's Terry Moran. "It's not right for someone to decide you made too much---that you've done too good and now we're going to take some of…

The New York Times's Julie Bosman writes: Memo to Barack Obama: It could be dangerous to mess with the national pasttime. Yet that is what Mr. Obama has done in trying to buy a 30-minute block of time on Oct. 29 on three networks - including Fox News, which just happens to be running the World…

I'm not sure, tactically, that it makes sense for the McCain campaign to use the Bill Ayers attacks against Barack Obama. But I do think it's a perfectly legitimate issue and one that has been sidelined by the news media who have refused to ask what I consider to be a pretty obvious question: If…

Hempstead, New York

Hempstead, New York - In a final showdown of an historic election - complete with a perfect storm of voter anger and an economic crisis the likes of which we haven't seen since the Great Depression - John McCain and Barack Obama spent much of their 90-minute debate here looking for a game-changer…

I guess it's heartening that they disagree with me, and totally unexpected: This time, John McCain kept Barack Obama on the defensive. The feisty Republican tried hard to find a lifeline Wednesday night, challenging his Democratic rival at every turn over his truthfulness, associations and record.…

The ignobility of the Nobel Prizes awarded this year by the Swedish and Norwegian Academies, the first for literature and the second for peace, maintains the pattern of recent years. Bereft of inspiration or awareness, they are reduced to honoring nearly-forgotten writers, and do-gooders with…

I don't buy the idea that McCain had to do something phenomenal tonight to pull this race out. Debates, especially this cycle, aren't made for game-changing, and his margin is small enough that slow and steady could conceivably pull him out.

I don't buy the idea that McCain had to do something phenomenal tonight to pull this race out. Debates, especially this cycle, aren't made for game-changing, and his margin is small enough that slow and steady could conceivably pull him out. But a better performance than he gave tonight would have…

Did either candidate want to debate tonight? Obama seemed tired of it all, wandering through his talking points on the economy and listlessly responding to McCain's attacks. And McCain seemed spastic and grouchy, throwing everything he could in Obama's direction: ACORN, Ayers, negative…

"That's for me and a button to know," he said.

Questioned about his vote against the born-alive infants protection act, Obama said: "There was already a law on the books that required lifesaving treatment, which is why ... I voted against it." Obama and his colleagues never cited this law as a reason for opposing the bill in the Illinois…

Raleigh, N.C.- As a fellow Washington veteran running up against a young, fairly inexperienced candidate in a surprisingly close race, I thought Sen. Elizabeth Dole might have some perspective on what John McCain can do to change the game tonight. "I think he's probably got to be a little more…

Yesterday, David Singleton of the Scranton Times-Tribune reported that someone shouted "kill him!" about Barack Obama at a McCain-Palin rally in Scranton, Pennsylvania, while GOP congressional candidate Chris Hackett spoke. But today Andrew M. Seder of the Wilkes-Barre Times Leader reports that not…

Jen Rubin sees a glimmer of hope for conservatives: It is a tough time for many conservatives. But here is a bit of cheery news: Colorado's Amendment 46, which like the successful Michigan Civil Rights Initiative in 2006, would ban use of race and gender preferences in government contracting,…

thumbDi_petzner20081#178609.jpg Following the recent death of Jörg Haider (pictured right), Austria's most famous far-right politician since, well, anyway, the new head of the Alliance for Austria's Future says he no longer wants to be seen as a "bad guy." And indeed, seen here on the left, Stefan…

Gallup released a report today highlighting some of its recent polling on issues and candidate evaluations before tonight's final presidential debate. The stability of certain dimensions of the race is striking, given the big shift in the horserace polling numbers in the last few weeks. For…

A group of concerned squirrels is now spreading the word for the GOP about rampant voter registration fraud and impending voter fraud by ACORN. They showed up at CBS' "Early Show" this morning, crashing Harry Smith's shot. In addition to the savvy guerrilla marketing, the Squirrels have their own…

A primary defense of ACORN against allegations of election fraud is that ACORN's leaders are unable to stop its own workers from submitting fraudulent applications. But ACORN entered into a consent decree in Washington state in 2006 which requires the organization to adhere to a set of guidelines…

Via Ed Morrissey, the LA Times's James Rainey has a devastating takedown of CNN's report on Sarah Palin and the Alaskan Independence Party Rather than deliver a single revelation, the 24-hour cable news channel coughed up a reheated, overwrought and misleading story that seemed designed to yoke…

More evidence why Chief Justice John Roberts is one of the most admirable public servants of our time, courtesy of the Washington Post: The Supreme Court turns down most cases without comment, but yesterday Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. decided that his colleagues' agreement not to hear a…

Via Ben Smith: David Freddoso must be smiling.

The McCain campaign issued this statement by foreign policy adviser Randy Scheunemann: "According to a prominent Democratic supporter of Barack Obama, the 'Zionists who have controlled American policy for decades' will 'lose a great deal of their clout when Barack Obama enters the White House.' It…

Keith Olbermann led off his 'special comment' yesterday with an attack on Sarah Palin for her failure to denounce an audience member who allegedly shouted out 'kill him' during the comments of the local Congressional candidate. What Olbermann failed to mention was that Palin had not yet arrived…

Just in case you had any doubt, the McCain campaign adamantly maintains it will not bring up Jeremiah Wright on the orders of John McCain. But is there any chance that a well-funded outside group will unleash a torrent of Jeremiah Wright ads in the next three weeks? Mike Allen reports With McCain…

Via Fox News's Mosheh Oinounou According to a report in the NY Post today, Jackson told an audience at the World Policy Forum in Evian, France last week that the "Zionists who have controlled American policy for decades" will lose influence under an Obama administration. "Obama is about change,"…

The New York Times has a five stories in today's paper on racism and the presidential campaign. Adam Nagourney leads off Then another Times reporter goes spelunking for racists in the Deep South: For Some, Uncertainty Starts at Racial Identity By ADAM NOSSITER MOBILE, Ala. - The McCain campaign's…

Princeton professor Robert P. George has an excellent essay that spells out just how extreme Obama's position on abortion is. What kind of America do we want our beloved nation to be? Barack Obama's America is one in which being human just isn't enough to warrant care and protection. It is an…

Over at Commentary, Abe Greenwald is incensed by a Newsweek article by Christopher Dickey, John Barry and Owen Matthews, "The Realist Resurgence", that claims "Russia is weaker than it looks, which is why NATO's soft power strategy can still work." Greenwald is particularly irked by the article's…

Over at Commentary, Abe Greenwald is incensed by a Newsweek article by Christopher Dickey, John Barry and Owen Matthews, "The Realist Resurgence", that claims "Russia is weaker than it looks, which is why NATO's soft power strategy can still work." Greenwald is particularly irked by the article's…

When credit-card fraud is out there, too? Steve and Rachel Larman say a strange credit card charge appeared on their statement this month -- a $2300 donation to Barack Obama's presidential campaign. The Larman's say they don't want this to be about their political affiliation, but they say they're…

The New York Times reports on Democratic representative Tim Mahoney, who's Congressional career seems likely to come to an abrupt end after revelations of an affair. He sounds like a wonderful guy: The affair began in 2006, when Mr. Mahoney was running for Congress, Democratic staff members said.…

Tim Mahoney, the Democratic congressman who won Mark Foley's seat in 2006, stands accused of paying off his mistress and giving her a job to keep her quiet, but Noel Shepherd writes that TV news shows appear to find this Democratic sex scandal to be a snoozer: though all three broadcast network…

Marc Ambinder writes: So crazy liberals at Obama-Biden events occasionally make fun of Sarah Palin in crude terms, and at times, a more than a few folks have yelled that McCain is a warmonger and a liar. Obama-Biden campaign rallies can be quite toxic to the POV that McCain's a decent guy. And yet…

John McCain's slip in the polls over the past few weeks is creating a drag for down-ticket Republican House candidates across the country. GOP congressional losses could top twenty or more, depending on how the political environment settles in the next couple of weeks. Jim Ellis, who writes for a…

This rotten: Then there's Lake County, Indiana, which has already found more than 2,100 bogus applications among the 5,000 Acorn dumped right before the deadline. "All the signatures looked exactly the same," said Ruthann Hoagland, of the county election board. Also, we evil Republicans are once…

A look back at the original language used by Palin at the rally in question makes it nearly impossible for the exclamation to be misunderstood as an attack on Obama unless you happen to be a MSM member just dying to think the worst of the Right. Here's the original account from the Washington Post…

Via Ed Morrissey, the Family Research Council cuts an ad about Obama's pledge to sign Freedom of Choice Act as his first act as president--a measure that would overturn the partial-birth abortion ban and would require taxpayers to fund hundreds of thousands of abortions annually.

John McCain trails Barack Obama and shows no signs, at the moment anyway, of propelling himself into the lead. Democrats lead in eight Senate seats currently held by Republicans and are close in three others. In the House, Republicans once thought they'd lose only 5 to 10 seats. Now things look…

John McCain gave a very interesting interview to CNN's Dana Bash today. The most provocative part, in my view, came when McCain refused to engage on a question about Jeremiah Wright and used his answer instead to intensify his critique of William Ayers at a time when many critics believe he should…

A friend emails this parody: Paul Krugman, a professor at Princeton University and an Op-Ed page columnist for The New York Times, was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences on Monday. -- The New York Times, Oct. 13 THE NEW YORK TIMES Krugman Awarded Economics Nobel Prize In…

So reports Chris Cillizza at The Fix. My question: Who are those eight percent and what are they smoking?

Nothing to see here: After McCain's rally here in the Tar Heel State, Barack Obama and McCain supporters engaged in some verbal taunting outside the Cape Fear Community College after one Obama supporter began repeatedly yelling "McCain is a murderer." "He fought for your right to say that," one…

Wilmington, N.C.- The press I'm sitting near is atwitter about a lone sign found outside, leaning against a planter, that mentioned Barack Obama and Osama bin Laden. No such signs made it inside, as far as I could tell, and the rally was standard, patriotic fare, as McCain-Palin fans chanted…

Wilmington, N.C.- John McCain continued to avoid direct attacks on opponent Barack Obama's unsavory associations Monday at a rally, instead focusing on Obama's potential to team with Democratic leaders Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid to raise taxes and enact economic "Hooverism" while portraying…

McCain's remarks on health care in his speech today are worth highlighting: "I will provide every single American family with a $5000 refundable tax credit to help them purchase insurance. Workers who already have health care insurance from their employers will keep it and have more money to cover…

The Wall Street Journal's Elizabeth Holmes reports on John McCain's rally in Virginia Beach today: John McCain delivered a somber speech at a large rally here today, at once seemingly describing both the state of the economy and the state of the race. "We have to act immediately. We have to change…

Time reporter Michael Scherer writes that that Obama supported the death of children born alive after abortions is misleading. State law in Illinois, which Obama supported, has always protected the life of a child born alive after abortions, if doctors believed the child had a reasonable chance of…

Via Jonathan Martin, Gateway Pundit has the details.

In 1989, New York Times Supreme Court reporter Linda Greenhouse was admonished by her editors for marching at an abortion-rights rally. In a recent interview with Radar online, Greenhouse admits, without naming names, that other reporters attended the march as well: I was disappointed in the fact…

Ace notes this report in the Cincinnati Enquirer: Hamilton County [Cincinnati] received more than 160,000 documents this year related to voter registration and change of address. Of the more than 40,000 documents received from ACORN, about 10,000 have been duplicates and many have come back with…

On Friday night Stephen Branchflower, an investigator appointed by Alaska's legislative council, released his report on whether Sarah Palin had acted improperly in firing Walt Monegan, a political appointee who served as her public safety commissioner. Branchflower found that while Monegan's…

The odds are against John McCain and Sarah Palin winning this election. It's not easy to make up a 6-point deficit in the last four weeks. But it can be done.

Bacardi and the Long Fight for Cuba

BORKING BLAME

One More Year

Patronizing the Arts

How is it that we find ourselves unable to dispatch the Taliban seven years after their downfall? Winning in Afghanistan requires us to understand the changed nature of the war we are fighting and to adapt our strategy appropriately. Simply killing militants is not enough.

I have always wanted to go to Crete. And in two weeks, I shall carry my wife there--much as Zeus did the fair princess Europa. But as the day approaches, I find that I am longing not so much for the island ringed with the wine-dark sea, but simply to be outta here. I don't think about the wild…

'New York Sun,' R.I.P

Sarah Palin's scintillating success in last week's vice presidential debate with Joe Biden has made her an enormous asset (again) to John McCain's bid for the presidency. Now McCain must decide how to maximize her role in the campaign. Anything short of bringing her front and center makes no sense.

There is a moment in The Sting, the most popular movie Paul Newman ever made, when his character, the con man Henry Gondorff, wins a pot in a poker game. Gondorff is deliberately trying to get under the skin of his poker rival, a gangster named Lonergan, against whom he is running a complex scam.…

As odd as it may sound, when the California Supreme Court recently declared that prohibitions against homosexual marriage violate the state's constitution, the justices acknowledged, in effect, that relatively little was at stake in the case. As the court said, California's domestic partnership law…

The Art of the Public Grovel

Before the last of Wall Street gets sold off as day-old fish on Fulton Street or washed into the East River altogether it's worth asking, what is Wall Street these days anyway?

Champagne, France

Remember the good old days, when the world economy hummed along and globalization seemed exciting? When President Clinton told Americans to stop what they were doing and help him build a bridge to the 21st century? When famous columnists celebrated the fact that The World Is Flat? Well, those days…

John McCain had two good days late last week. It had been a while. On Thursday, Sarah Palin performed well enough in her debate with Joe Biden to quiet the critics. And, on Friday, the House of Representatives voted in favor of the federal bailout, which the Senate had passed two days earlier.…

As the post-Georgia chill in U.S.-Russian relations con-tinues, the Russian govern-ment has repeatedly declared its readiness to resume a friendly partnership if the United States will reciprocate and abandon its Cold War rhetoric. Yet, at the same time, Moscow has encouraged an orgy of…

New York

Ramallah and Sderot

Jake Tapper writes that Sarah Palin has repeatedly said over the past couple days that she's pleased to have been cleared of "unethical" activity in the "Troopergate" scandal: It's true that there's nothing "unlawful or unethical about replacing a cabinet member" in principle. And the report…

Jake Tapper reports: The Oregonian and KATU-TV report on the arrest of two men over the weekend for trying to burn down with a Molotov cocktail and a makeshift torch a 4' x 8' McCain for President sign in the southeast Portland, Ore., yard of Gene and Karen Scrutton Investigators picked up Leslie…

According this post at the the New York Times hockey blog, Sarah Palin was booed loudly as she dropped the puck at the Philadelphia Flyers-New York Rangers game last night. (H/T Powerline.) And then there was this -- some hard core left-wing anger at McCain supporters who had the temerity to march…

Davenport, Iowa

Today in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, Sarah Palin discussed the importance of defending "every innocent life" and criticized Obama's "unconditional support for unlimited abortions": "In this same spirit, as defenders of the culture of life, John McCain and I believe in the goodness and potential of…

Davenport, Iowa The emerging media narrative on the 2008 presidential campaign is simple, as media narratives always are. Republicans, egged on by the the McCain campaign, are angry. Maybe dangerous. With furrowed brows media big-shots are wondering aloud if John McCain should "tamp down" -- new…

If Barack Obama can't count on the Grey Lady to cover up his campaign's ethical challenges, who is left to trust? An analysis of campaign finance records by The New York Times this week found nearly 3,000 donations to Mr. Obama, the Democratic nominee, from more than a dozen people with apparently…

Minneapolis, Minnesota -- The big news of the presidential election came from here yesterday, when John McCain corrected a voter who claimed Barack Obama was a "Arab" at a town hall in Lakeville. Gayle Quinnell, 75, took the microphone from McCain. "I got to ask you a question," she said. "I don't…

The world's politicians are now running full tilt to get ahead of the markets. So far, the markets are winning, plunging in what to all appearances is a death spiral. Share prices fall, making it nearly impossible for the banks to raise new capital; house prices fall, reducing the value of the…

Via Jonathan Martin, Joe Biden cuts an ad defending Obama against attacks on his associations with Wright, Ayers, Rezko, etc. "And if you want to know what kind of people Barack will consult as president, well, you're looking at him," Biden says as he flashes a smile. Does that mean Obama will pack…

Tina Brown's Daily Beast looks as if it's trying to live up to its legendary namesake. In today's edition, Scott Horton purports to describe how Bill Kristol made Sarah Palin. Horton begins with this telling story: In June 2007, a cruise liner sponsored by the political journal The Weekly Standard…

You can read Matthew Continetti's take on the roller coaster 2008 election here.

On Friday, October 3, all eyes were on Washington, as the House passed the $700 billion bailout bill designed to head off an economic 9/11. Lost in the news that day was the Bush administration's decision to release a new set of attorney general guidelines for the FBI's domestic operations. This…

Via Ace, a new Gallup poll shows: While 6% of voters say they are less likely to vote for Barack Obama because of his race, 9% say they are more likely to vote for him, making the impact of his race a neutral to slightly positive factor when all voters' self-reported attitudes are taken into…

Via Michelle Malkin, Mark Steyn's battle against Canada's human rights tribunal is over. A press release trumpets: MARK STEYN NOT GUILTY OF "FLAGRANT ISLAMOPHOBIA," SAYS TRIBUNAL If only that line were a bit of Steynian parody about the Syrian or Iranian regimes. Sadly, it's not.

The Washington Post's Michael D. Shear reports: Seeking new ways to respond to the frightening economic collapse, Sen. John McCain proposed today that retirees should not be required to cash in the stocks from their retirement accounts when they reach 70-and-a-half years old. Current rules require…

Monkey Waiters v. Monkey Maids

Only a month ago, Minnesota Republican Norm Coleman was starting to pull away in his reelection bid for the U.S. Senate. Democratic comedian-turned-politician Al Franken's edgy humor was being made known to unamused Minnesotans. Aside from the harm the financial crisis has caused nearly all…

Blackfive zeroes in on the suspiciously close links between the Obama campaign and the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a group that bills itself as non-partisan and recently released a scorecard giving Obama and Biden Bs on veterans' issues, while McCain scored a D, resulting in headlines…

The Cleveland Leader reports this morning that Barack Obama is lying about his involvement with the group ACORN, which recently added Missouri to the list of states in which its activities are under investigation. While Obama's site maintains that he never trained ACORN activists -- whose training…

The Connecticut Supreme Court rules that the state constitution guarantees a right to same-sex marriage.

Three big questions about the accuracy of polling regularly resurface during the 2008 campaign, according to Mark Blumenthal at Pollster.com. Expect to hear more about each of these in the weeks ahead. 1. Will the growth of the "cell-phone-only" voter bias polls against Obama? Most surveys sample…

Yves Smith's Naked Capitalism blog is not for the faint of heart. "Temporary full state ownership is only solution" Three Month Dollar Libor Increases (dry title, but read all the way to the bottom) And, if you're not awake yet . . . Roubini warns of Possible Systemic Meltdown, "Severe Global…

Sarah Palin discussed Bill Ayers and Obama's abortion extremism with Laura Ingraham yesterday: Palin's attack on Obama's votes against the born-alive infants protection act is pretty effective, but she says: "It's very appalling and I think if more Americans could understand absolutely how extreme…

Jim Manzi on the stock market's free fall: this is a ferocious bear market, but, so far, it is an almost exact repeat of what happened after the collapse of the .com bubble about 5 years ago. In fact, if we were to repeat that experience, we would see further declines from where we are today: On…

Reason editor Nick Gillespie openly calls for the large portion of uninsured "generally young relatively healthy adults" to choose between their booze money and health insurance: You can read about my own quest for free government health insurance a year ago here.

The Secret Service doesn't call him "Pheonix" for nothin'. Jen Rubin lays out what the American people need to hear from John McCain over the next weeks to convince them to send him to the White House. Aside from all of the arguments, likely well known to every McCain senior advisor and staffer,…

We have detailed in this space many times the Bush administration's thank-you-sir-may-I-have-another diplomacy on North Korea. The more provocative and defiant North Korea acts, the more likely a State Department concession or even reward. And so it goes over the last 48 hours. BBC headline two…

Here's the opening of the New York Times's report today on the investigation into whether Sarah Palin abused her power when she fired her public safety commissioner: The 2007 state fair was days away when Alaska's public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan, took another call about one of his…

February 26, 2008: Chief Obama strategist David Axelrod explains the relationship between Obama and Ayers thusly to the Politico's Ben Smith: "Bill Ayers lives in his neighborhood. Their kids attend the same school," he said. "They're certainly friendly, they know each other, as anyone whose kids…

In last week's vice presidential debate, Joe Biden criticized Dick Cheney's notion that the office of the vice president does not exist wholly within the executive branch of the government, blaming Cheney for "aggrandiz[ing] the power of a unitary executive." This is not the first time Biden has…

Some, but only some, of the damage wreaked by the current turmoil in financial markets is visible. Anyone owning a home knows that it is worth less than it once was. Anyone trying to buy a home knows that mortgages are harder to come by. Anyone out of work knows that the banks' problems are his…

Here. Okay...I use the word "discovered" a bit loosely--the way one might "discover" a Big Mac at McDonald's. But now that I have your attention, the point is that most voters don't have a clue that Obama writes in his memoir that the very first time he attended Trinity United Church, he heard Rev.…

Waukesha, Wisconsin -- One of the highlights of the McCain-Palin rally here today came when Scott Southworth, an Iraq War veteran from Mauston, Wisconsin, stood and told McCain that he was personally offended by Barack Obama's suggestion, recently amplified by the McCain campaign, that the US…

Amidst all the talk about the presidential race, we sometimes forget about the governors--the chief executives in laboratories of democracy, and major players in the post-2010 congressional redistricting. One reason for the lack of attention is the relatively small number of races in '08. This year…

Waukesha, Wisconsin -- In response to a broad question about how Barack Obama "got here" -- presumably got his lead -- John McCain didn't name Bill Ayers but spoke of him directly. McCain said "We don't care about an old washed up terrorist and his wife" who said earlier this decade that he wished…

Republican senator Saxby Chambliss will face a much tougher battle than previously expected in his reelection bid in Georgia, according to recent polls. Chambliss leads former state representative Jim Martin by only three points in a Strategic Vision poll of likely voters taken Oct. 5-7. Three…

Are we sure this isn't one of those situations where, if they're in the same room together, the space-time continuum is disturbed? Someone's hearing rumors... Some key McCain staffers are content with Palin joking about the "SNL" routines on the campaign trail -- as when she scribbled "I'm not Tina…

Ed Morrissey has the latest details on ACORN's fraudulent voter registration activities. I'm sure that fictitious voters like Doodad Pro helped push Indianapolis's voter registration level to 105 percent, but a reader sends along this poster reminding us of the more traditional tactic of…

Yonkers City Councilman and New York State Senate candidate John Murtagh was interviewed this morning regarding Bill Ayers and the ever-changing accounts from Barack Obama about how close the two men were. Murtagh noted that Michelle Obama and Bernadine Dorhn (Ayers' wife and a former Weather…

Many speculated that McCain's internals must have indicated this line of attack wasn't working, or he would have brought it up at the debate. There goes that theory. The way they're selling this tactic is a little odd. Nicolle Wallace, McCain spokesperson, has been on two shows this morning…

After referring to McCain as an "angry man lurching from one position to another," and a dear, dear friend, Joe Biden offered this gem: "You know, the idea here that somehow these guys are once again injecting fear and loathing into this campaign is ... I think it's mildly dangerous," Biden said.…

McCain campaign to "make news" tomorrow morning. Perhaps they'll be handing out official McCain campaign air fresheners to Obama's traveling press corps. Maybe they're holding the introductory speech and press conference for McCain's Homeowner Resurgence plan that they should have held before the…

Turns out traveling with The One can be an uncomfortable, pungent experience. How long before Dean Reynolds gets left behind ala Ryan Lizza? Listen, Dean, no one ever said being an apostle would be easy, but verily I say to you there will be a reward in the administration. Keep in mind that Obama…

The African continent is quickly becoming a proxy battleground for Washington and Beijing, as the latter's appetite for emerging markets and raw materials grows. In July 2008, Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Eric Edelman told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that "China's full court…

When Mitch Daniels took office as Indiana's governor in 2005, he inherited a transportation system in crisis. The state was a whopping $2.8 billion short of resources for its roads.

Since August, Gallup has presented its tracking polls broken down by voter subgroups. With two months of data collected, some interesting trends emerge. One of the most troubling for the McCain campaign is the shift among seniors. McCain supporters had hoped older voters would offset his deficit…

Strongsville, Ohio -- Before a joint rally here this afternoon featuring John McCain and Sarah Palin, the crowd spontaneously broke into chants of "Sa-rah! Sa-rah! Sa-rah!" Lots of random "We Love You Sarah" shouts from the crowd. Many of the women in attendance are sporting large black buttons…

Last night, when Tom Brokaw asked whom he might appoint as secretary of the Treasury, John McCain's answer was Warren Buffett. A couple weeks ago, when CBS correspondent Scott Pelley asked him whom he might appoint as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, McCain's answer was New York…

At 1:06 a.m. this morning Obama spokesman Nick Shapiro sent out an email documenting "JOHN MCCAIN'S 17 LIES" during the debate. At the top of the list of McCain's "lies" was his proposal that the Treasury should be able to purchase bad mortgages. The Obama campaign alleged that McCain "lied" by…

Jim Geraghty points to a story in the Cleveland Plain Dealer about the voter-registration group ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. It seems that in the process of soliciting, collecting, reviewing and turning in registration applications, it really can't do much about…

When McCain cut his gaze over at Obama last night and gruffly called him "that one," I had one wish: that Latin was still with us. You see, there's a silver dollar Latin word McCain could have pulled out of his pocket: the great demonstrative pronoun, iste. It's my favorite word in Latin, second…

For an illuminating snapshot of the progress being made in our long national real estate nightmare, check out this post at the indispensable Calculated Risk blog.

Change is in, as you may have noticed. Last night Barack Obama spoke often about how the United States needs "fundamental change." Newt Gingrich's most recent megaseller was called "Real Change." John McCain felt left out of all this change, so around the Republican convention he began telling…

The McCain campaign just released this statement by John M. Murtagh: "When I was 9 years-old the Weather Underground, the terrorist group founded by Barack Obama's friend William Ayers, firebombed my house. Barack Obama has dismissed concerns about his relationship with Ayers by noting that he was…

It is 20-year-old David Kernell, son of state representive and Memphis Democrat Mike Kernell: David Kernell...was scheduled to be arraigned Wednesday before U.S. Magistrate Judge C. Clifford Shirley, according to a statement from the Justice Department. David Kernell was indicted Tuesday by a…

They'd never stoop to "distracting" the American people with anything other than economic and national security issues.

He's at The Heritage Foundation today, speaking now, and it's streaming here.

devobama2.gif The pride of Akron, Ohio, has weighed in on "the most important election in recent history." Devo is playing a benefit concert in support of Barack Obama: In the final month of this historic presidential race, the band DEVO is making an urgent trip to their native Akron, Ohio to rally…

The narrator says that Barack Obama is the most liberal senator and then asks "When pressed, how does he defend himself?" "They're not telling the truth," Obama says in one shot. "I hate to say that people are lying, but here is a situation where folks are lying," he says in another. Were people…

A presidential debate at its best gives voters a glimpse of a candidate's personality, quick-wittedness, likeability, sense of humor, judgment, basic honesty, knowledge, even character. If the debate is a success, voters get a sense of whether they'd be comfortable with the candidate in the White…

A presidential debate at its best gives voters a glimpse of a candidate's personality, quick-wittedness, likeability, sense of humor, judgment, basic honesty, knowledge, even character. If the debate is a success, voters get a sense of whether they'd be comfortable with the candidate in the White…

As my mother used to say, and she had many occasions to say it, "This room ain't gonna clean itself." Barack Obama ain't gonna make himself unacceptable as a presidential candidate. John McCain has to do it for him. Obama is too skilled a speaker and presenter, his disciplined performance tonight…

Round 1: What's the fastest way to bailout Real People?

John McCain had a very strong debate tonight. It's too bad for him that it came on a night when Barack Obama was nearly flawless.

Round 1: What's the fastest way to bailout Real People?

John McCain had a very strong debate tonight. It's too bad for him that it came on a night when Barack Obama was nearly flawless.

Most of the McCain surrogates I've seen have studiously avoided mentioning him in the list of Obama's associates. Sarah Palin has been the only one I've heard go there. Thompson on Fox: "This has to do with his tolerance level for radicals," he said, mentioning Ayers and the Rev. Wright as his…

This is not a parody: "Barack Obama is gifted in birth by a wonderful smile... John McCain, when he smiles, has a somewhat menacing quality. It may not be purposeful, but when he smiles, you wonder what he's really thinking. Barack Obama, for whatever reason, comes off as debonaire, even under…

Let us get this straight: McCain: Of course we would come to their aid without waiting for the UN. Obama: We would use "all our tools" and "sanctions" and "cost-benefit analysis." So let me get this straight: Obama wants to preemptively attack a country without provocation in Pakistan, but refuses…

I'm pretty sure I could Google all night long and never find a formula that would make Barack Obama's public statements indicate that his administration would represent a "net spending cut." McCain should have just handed Obama a note card and said, "Hey, you put together some back-of-the-envelope…

As I was just saying... the Obama campaign is making this more advantageous than it necessarily should be for camp McCain. Now, how to segue from the Obama camp's arguments into a McCain economic message?

High off of the Redskins' improbable 4-1 start, Daniel Snyder is monkeying around even more with D.C. talk radio. Snyder's company, Red Zebra Broadcasting, owns two news-talk stations in the area, the conservative TNT 570 and the liberal WRC 1260. Now Michael Calderone reports that for the duration…

High off of the Redskins' improbable 4-1 start, Daniel Snyder is monkeying around even more with D.C. talk radio. Snyder's company, Red Zebra Broadcasting, owns two news-talk stations in the area, the conservative TNT 570 and the liberal WRC 1260. Now Michael Calderone reports that for the duration…

The McCain campaign is trying to take the Ayers connection beyond mere association to an issue of judgment and trustworthiness, which is one step closer to whether you can trust Obama on issues like the economy. On the trust issue, the Obama campaign seems willing to oblige McCain. After first…

As I wrote yesterday, opponents of John McCain are misrepresenting his health care plan. Some do so deliberately, like the Obama ads that only tell half the story, as I argued in my post. Others, I assume, are done out of pure ignorance, like this story by Froma Harrop posted on the Rasmussen…

In an ad set to run during the debate tonight, McGovern takes aim at legislation that would deprive potential labor union members of private votes on union organization. The longtime liberal blasts "card check" as tantamount to a "sacrifice of democracy," saying working people deserve a private…

Ed Whelan takes apart Howard Kurtz's fact-check of the McCain ad posted above: Kurtz's topline assertion is that the ad "blatantly distorts Barack Obama's words in an effort to paint him as callous about the role of the military." Specifically, the ad "truncates" a comment that Obama made. Here,…

Ouch. John McCain goes after Obama as an old-style politician more harshly than he has in the past in a new ad, "Hypo:" The problem is it may be enough to be a relatively unknown old-style politician, as long as everyone's talking about the economy, and the unknown is not a Republican. It may have…

The controversial new election law, which allows a week-long window for anyone in the battleground state to register and vote on the same day at the polls without proof of residency, may not have been the fraudulent voting bonanza Republicans were fearing and Democrats were hoping for. Only about…

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F02E1DE1438F932A2575AC0A9679C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=print Now he has written a book, ''Fugitive Days'' (Beacon Press, September). Mr. Ayers, who is 56, calls it a memoir, somewhat coyly perhaps, since he also says some of it is fiction. He writes…

Eight politicians who adopted the Democratic contender's name while running for office Brazil didn't fare so well: "The name Obama definitely helped," said Claudio Henrique dos Anjos, who used it to run for mayor of Belford Roxo on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro. "It opened the doors for me to…

Would Senate Democrats dump Harry Reid if Barack Obama is elected president? That's the question from veteran Senate watcher Kirk Victor, after talking to several Democratic staffers and strategists: Still, when a new administration takes office next year, along with a likely Democratic-controlled…

Via Ed Morrissey, behold a priceless Sarah Barracuda moment:

This is what an actual investigative report of the Obama-Ayers link looks like on TV: CNN's Drew Griffin reports that Obama and Ayers funded niche lefty causes and Jeremiah Wright's church. And a number of sources who attended Obama's coming out party hosted by Ayers in 1995 dispute the Obama…

Joe Nocera reports: "'There is no liquidity anywhere,' one hedge fund manager told me. 'No lending available. No interbank lending available. The fixed-income market is completely shut down. There is no activity going on anywhere.' (He asked me not to use his name because he didn't want to spook…

Variety's Todd McCarthy isn't so much a movie reviewer as a tribune of absolute truth. This morning he's got the verdict on Oliver Stone's W.: Oliver Stone's unusual and inescapably interesting "W." feels like a rough draft of a film it might behoove him to remake in 10 or 15 years.

This video of members of an "Obama Youth" junior fraternity chanting Obama campaign mottos began to make the rounds on the Internet last week: Fox News reports that the middle school teacher who posted the video on YouTube has been suspended. It would be interesting to know whether the teacher…

Stories at Politico and ABC refer to William Ayers as a "former radical," but wouldn't Ayers need to disavow his Sixties extremism to be a "former" radical? He infamously told the New York Times in a story published on September 11, 2001, that he regretted not setting more bombs. As late as April…

You're not misreading the headline. The poll puts Obama up six points, overall, but McCain is inexplicably closing a gap on two key issues: After closing in on Obama's lead yesterday, McCain has now taken the lead on handling of two key issues. The GOP nominee holds 43-42% leads over Obama on both…

John Dowd, the lawyer who successfully defended John McCain during the Senate Ethics Committee investigation of the Keating Five scandal, spoke to reporters on a conference call earlier today. After a nearly two-year investigation, the committee exonerated McCain and Democratic senator John Glenn,…

McCain might break through the media fortress that protects independents from the truth if he'd repeat a small packet of information word-for-word at the end of every single speech. Soon crowds would anticipate these words and reporters would know them by heart, and they'd start making an…

Q: When does NPR get squeamish about an aggressive voter registration and GOTV effort in a swing state targeted at young voters who don't often participate at high rates, which makes it easy for them to get to the polls and even facilitates travel to the polls? A: When the registration is being…

McCain might break through the media fortress that protects independents from the truth if he'd repeat a small packet of information word-for-word at the end of every single speech. Soon crowds would anticipate these words and reporters would know them by heart, and they'd start making an…

In a speech in New Mexico today, John McCain will attack Barack Obama and the Democrats for not supporting regulation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. From McCain's prepared remarks: This crisis started in our housing market in the form of subprime loans that were pushed on people who could not…

With the Obama campaign sending out surrogates and spokesman to make the case that Barack Obama's ties to William Ayers are not important, it worth remembering that less than six weeks ago the Obama campaign sent out an email claiming that ties to Ayers were important. In what remains the funniest…

The gloves are now officially packed away in that back corner of the coat closet, wedged between a crate of Meghan McCain's third-grade artwork and a dust buster. From McCain's remarks in a speech in New Mexico today: Rather than answer his critics, Senator Obama will try to distract you from…

The Obama campaign stepped up its rhetoric against the McCain health care plan over the last week with a new series of ads. But leave it to Paul Krugman at the New York Times to confuse, twist and misrepresent the McCain proposal. In today's column, "Health Care Destruction," Krugman writes: Mr.…

Karl Rove: Biden has 35 years in the Senate, yet his record on national-security issues during that span has been atrocious. He might be able to name Germany's chancellor, but he was wrong in his fierce opposition to Ronald Reagan in the 1980s and to the surge in 2007. Even Democrats don't see…

A new Obama-Biden campaign ad says that, unlike John McCain, "Barack Obama would require insurance companies to cover routine treatments like vaccines and mammograms": Leaving aside the question of whether or not it's a good idea to mandate coverage for particular procedures, Obama's health care…

Ad guru Evan Tracey describes the state of the race with less than a month to go: The reality of this race is that Mr. Obama is in control. His nationwide buys have been climbing a systematic 20% a week since the beginning of September, while Mr. McCain's have flatlined. The Arizona senator's…

The tracking poll shows Obama at 52 percent to McCain's 44. It's the highest level of support for Obama ever, and is the 25th day in a row without a decline for the Democrat. Take the gloves off, says Palin: I pointed out that Obama surely had a closer connection to the Rev. Jeremiah Wright than to…

Via Allahpundit, the latest from SNL:

Richmond

Early this year, the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) announced the completion of an inventory of Islamic books and videos in Muslim chapel libraries in the 105 federal correctional institutions. The bureau had undertaken the inventory at the recommendation of the Justice Department's Office of the…

Like most Americans, I suspect, I will always remember where I was, and what I was doing, when I learned that Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley would cease to be investment banking houses and become traditional bank holding companies.

The Forever War

Body Shopping

Icon of Evil

It's All Our Fault

Brilliant Women

Just over a week ago the collapse in credit markets forced the secretary of the Treasury to assemble a bipartisan group from both houses of Congress to sell a record-setting government-bailout plan of the financial industry. Trouble was no such plan existed at the time of the meeting. He set off a…

The Best of All Possible Worlds

The World Is Curved

One hundred of anything can technically be called a century, according to the American Heritage Dictionary, but when I heard that a one-day, hundred-mile trip on a bicycle was called a century, I took it to mean a really long time. Instead I should have been thinking, a really long distance.

Sibley Memorial Hospital is generally acknowledged as the best place to have a baby in Washington, D.C. Located in the ritzy Palisades neighborhood, Sibley is just a few blocks from the Potomac, surrounded on three sides by trees. The delivery suites, outfitted with dark-wood cabinets and soothing…

Barack Obama is America's first major party presidential candidate to have come of age after the Cultural Revolution of the late 1960s and '70s. Americans who reached adulthood before or during the Cultural Revolution often differ over the big events of recent history. Americans who came of age…

The struggle between the Obama and McCain campaigns over who claims the motto of "Change" in the current election campaign brings to mind one of the brightest moments in my university career.

If you've recently taken a gander at the liberal foreign policy tomes, attended any think tank panels on America's supposed decline, or read the prolific output of today's fashionable foreign affairs thinkers, you've probably heard a lot about the virtues of "soft power." According to its main…

Paris

John McCain, restless and emotional, couldn't resist the temptation to join the battle to rescue our financial markets and save the economy. It was the biggest and most important fight around, bigger and more important than his campaign scrap with Barack Obama. Being engaged in the action--in the…

Pivoting from his customary "distraction" protestations, Obama is now going after McCain's connection to the Keating Five scandal of 1989. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) on Monday will launch a multimedia campaign to draw attention to the involvement of Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) in the "Keating Five"…

Lots of harrumphing this weekend in the media about Sarah Palin's claim that Barack Obama has been "palling around" with terrorist Williams Ayers. There is this asinine "analysis" from someone named Douglass K. Daniel and fact-check style articles from CNN, The Washington Post and The New York…

Well, I think we can safely say Sarah has been freed. Freed to read the New York Times and comment on revelations of a relationship between Barack Obama and an unrepentant domestic terrorist, which the paper has finally seen fit to report upon: Palin told a group of donors at a private airport,…

Jules Crittenden has an excellent post on the AP's latest analysis of Iraq: AP Goes Neo-Con. Ross Douthat and Yuval Levin explain why the Obama-Biden campaign's attack on McCain's health care plan is deceptive. Ed Morrissey has more on Joe Biden's foreign policy brilliance. Stanley Kurtz examines…

There's a clamoring in the blogosphere for the McCain campaign to go after Obama and the Democrats for their successful efforts to block reform of Fannie and Freddie. Mary Katharine wrote about it here, and others are hopeful that McCain will make it a central theme of his campaign. But regardless…

Nice try. Well, it wasn't that nice, but it surely was trying. From mid-day on Friday, August 29, when John McCain picked the hot governor from the cold state, the Axis of Snottiness was in full cry against her, determined to sink her not only as a blow to McCain and his chances of winning, but as…

Nielsen reports: * 69.9 million people watched the debate, tying it for second place among all Presidential and Vice Presidential debates. (The second Bush/Clinton/Perot debate of 1992 also have 69.9 million. The all-time debate leader is the Carter/Reagan debate of 1980.) * This is 17.5 million…

The best chance you'll have to see conservatives on the big screen, barring the unlikely production of an Arthur Branch biopic, is this weekend's release of "An American Carol." It's directed by David Zucker, the self-proclaimed "master of questionable taste," and maker of unquestionable classics…

The National Republican Congressional Committee is hitting the Democrats on Fannie and Freddie: Hat tip: John Henke

On Monday, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates gave another in the remarkable series of speeches of recent months, laying out the course he believes the U.S. armed forces must follow to prepare themselves for the conflicts of the 21st century. Addressing the National Defense University, he again…

I understand that he didn't want to get overly partisan while a delicate measure he thought was necessary was just barely making it through both houses of Congress. But there's no excuse for letting a false narrative lie, and letting Obama and Biden continue to lie about the roots of this crisis.…

He was the best of candidates. She was the worst of candidates. And, usually for doing the same things. The most flexible man in political reporting offers a truly remarkable display of October contortion between judging the presidential debate Sept. 26 and the vice presidential debate Thursday.…

CNN reports that it's "misleading" to say that Barack Obama pledged to meet with Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: "While Obama has said he wouldn't rule out meeting with any foreign leader, he never specifically said he'd meet with the Iranian president." CNN misses what Obama said during a…

Politico breaks down the numbers by party: The GOP promised 80 and delivered 91. Dems promised 140, delivered 172.

On the day Sarah Palin's son Track deployed to Iraq, ABC's Good Morning America ran a segment on Palin may have put her son's life in danger by publicly mentioning his deployment. a story titled "Is Sarah Palin Politicizing Son's Military Service?"

Many independent women are still up for grabs in the last month of the election, making this cohort a critical target group for both campaigns. According to a new Gallup report released today, Obama draws significant support among some in the independent woman subgroup: • those with no religious…

Make room under the bus William Ayers, Jeremiah Wright, Tony Rezko, Fr. Pfleger, and Kwame Kilpatrick! Barack Obama has another friend of dubious moral character in the news. Meet Larry Walsh: Two FBI agents spent more than an hour in the Will County Office Building on Wednesday morning as part of…

I thought Gwen Ifill's most biased question last night was this one: Sen. Biden, we want to talk about taxes, let's talk about taxes. You proposed raising taxes on people who earn over $250,000 a year. The question for you is, why is that not class warfare and the same question for you, Gov. Palin,…

Speaking about the bailout bill, which will likely be voted on around 12:30 p.m.: "We're not going to take a bill to the floor that doesn't have the votes. I'm optimistic we'll be able to take a bill to the floor." Brilliant strategy, Nance. It looks to be gaining momentum, with Rep. James Clyburn…

I thought Joe Biden was surprisingly bright, clean, and articulate during last night's debate with Sarah Palin. Okay, he wasn't always so bright--and his willingness to fudge the facts wasn't exactly the cleanest politics--but he was definitely articulate! So articulate, in fact, I think Biden…

That's the headline on Roger Simon's column. He appeared on the late edition of "Hardball," last night where he argued heatedly for his thesis against the combined boorishness of Chris Matthews and Howard Fineman. Fineman compared Palin to a "wolverine chewing through plywood," (yeah, I don't get…

Come on, you know you want to watch. It's cathartic, and instructive for a certain presidential and VP candidate who need to make this part of their stump speeches (with a slightly more measured tone, perhaps).

The moment when Sarah Palin knew she was winning last night's debate with her vice presidential opponent Joe Biden came after the subject had turned to nuclear weapons. Palin had talked about nukes as a deterrent and said it was important to keep them out of the hands of dictators who are enemies…

The moment when Sarah Palin knew she was winning last night's debate with her vice presidential opponent Joe Biden came after the subject had turned to nuclear weapons. Palin had talked about nukes as a deterrent and said it was important to keep them out of the hands of dictators who are enemies…

After a dreadful three weeks for the McCain-Palin ticket, Sarah Palin came through--big time--Thursday night. She stopped the McCain campaign's slide and set up a rebound...if. If House Republicans follow through Friday by passing the bailout bill. The McCain-Palin ticket's slide over the past…

After a dreadful three weeks for the McCain-Palin ticket, Sarah Palin came through--big time--Thursday night. She stopped the McCain campaign's slide and set up a rebound...if.

Sarah Palin won, though I suspect collegiate debate judges with the American Forensic Association would not have scored it that way.

First question begins at 2 minutes in: Also, Peggy Noonan succinctly sums up Palin's performance: "She killed."

I thought Gwen Ifill's most biased question last night was this one: Sen. Biden, we want to talk about taxes, let's talk about taxes. You proposed raising taxes on people who earn over $250,000 a year. The question for you is, why is that not class warfare and the same question for you, Gov. Palin,…

If you think our current economic difficulties are all about subprime mortgages, securitization, the drying up of credit, falling house prices and the like, think again. That's not how the rest of the world sees it. Yes, all of these problems are on the list. But more important, foreigners see this…

Hey, don't take it from me. Take it from Kos: Sarah Palin won! Actually, she survived, since she had no "deer in headlight" moments. Oddly enough, Sarah Palin was masterful tonight at exactly what she was incapable of doing in the Gibson and Couric interviews. Tonight, she was able to answer…

Round 1: Forget the bailout, what's up with the bailout process?

Well, that's about as real a moment as you're going to get from a candidate, giving a "hello" to her brother's third-grade class, which is watching for extra credit. Jonathan Martin pegs it as a moment her haters will hate, and Ben Smith compares "shout out" to the Gen-X language Obama's been using…

Palin picks up on the talking point I thought McCain should have employed at the debate with Obama: "For a ticket that talks about the future and change, there sure is a lot of finger-pointing into the past." She brings out this pretty devastating quote on Afghanistan from Obama: "We've got to get…

Palin gets a couple good shots in, here, about Iraq and funding for troops. She notes that Biden voted the opposite of Barack Obama the time Obama voted against troop funding. "You even said you'd be honored to be on the same ticket with him. That's an indication of the support I think you had for…

She's looking pretty good, here. She missed an opportunity to go after the Dems on culpability on the financial crisis, but that's the inexplicable tack the McCain campaign is taking. She did point out that McCain supported more regulation for Fannie/Freddie two years ago and was unsupported by…

Earlier in the day, I pointed out how Harry Reid's irresponsible not to mention idiotic comment about an unnamed insurance giant that was teetering on the brink of bankruptcy had caused insurance company stocks to stumble on an industry wide basis. At midday, the damage was only half as grave as it…

There are a couple of stories in the news today that illustrate the main street impact of what many currently view as a Wall Street problem. Does a stunning tightening of credit affect the man in the street? You bet: AT&T this week announced they're feeling the strain of the credit crunch, with…

piperpalin.jpg Piper Palin, seen here taking orders from Republican candidate John McCain, has a history of candy-related scandals in her past, according to sources. For all of you out there who think Gwen Ifill ought to disclose her authorship of her utterly dispassionate examination of "How the…

Women want him; writers for the New Yorker want to be him.

This is the perfect opening for a Joe Biden-esque line of attack tonight so tone-deaf, silly, and sexist as to overshadow the rest of the debate. "You see, this Sarah Palin is nothing but trouble. Her good looks and flagrant skirt-wearing are already the cause of international incidents. How can…

The expectations game has been a complicated one to play this week. Liberals have darted implausibly between highlighting Sarah Palin's super-keen debating skills and creating video mash-ups comparing her to the famously incoherent Miss Teen South Carolina. In much the same way that George W. Bush…

Politico's Josh Breshnahan reports: Judge Emmet Sullivan suspended the corruption trial of Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) today after he found out that federal prosecutors had not turned over all their evidence to Stevens' attorneys. Prosecutors disclosed this morning that they hadn't given defense lawyers…

Via Jonathan Martin "Barack Obama must be the first fellow in the history of presidential politics who thinks that running for president is a qualification for being president." eating snarky reporters for breakfast

In stumping for the needed (though flawed) bailout bill yesterday, Harry Reid warned that an unnamed American insurance firm was teetering on bankruptcy. Those of us who cover Washington for a living have long since learned to ignore Harry Reid's every utterance. Unfortunately everyone can't afford…

Compared to self-identified partisans, independent voters march more to the beat of pop culture and the dominant news narrative. They pay closer attention to Tina Fey's weekly lampooning of Sarah Palin than the speeches or policy positions of the presidential campaigns. Independents are also among…

The Politico reported a couple days ago that the strategy is to go easy on Palin so as to avoid sounding condescending: "If she makes a gaffe, he underplays it," one of the people prepping Biden for his vice presidential debate told me. "At most, he says, ‘I am not sure what Gov. Palin meant…

Round 1: Forget the bailout, what's up with the bailout process?

The Wall Street Journal continues to report on Democratic malfeasance in overseeing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the unrestricted growth of which helped to create today's financial crisis. In their own words: Rep. Barney Frank (D., Mass.): I worry, frankly, that there's a tension here. The more…

So it turns out Gwen Ifill never told the Commission on Presidential Debates about her book Breakthrough: Politics and Race in the Age of Obama, which is to be released on Inauguration Day. When she's asked if her book creates a conflict of interest, Ifill suggests that such concerns might be…

After the Senate passed the bailout bill (+ sweeteners) last night, the House is tentatively set to vote on it again this Friday. Here is the list of senators who voted "no"- 10 Democrats and 15 Republicans. House members, though frustrated by Senate machinations, are expected to pass it: The…

Do you ever get the sense that if North Korea actually used a nuclear weapon in an offensive attack that Chris Hill and the State Department would still be trying to make a deal? In response to the latest provocation from the North Koreans, Hill and his colleagues are proposing a new "choreography"…

IN A FOURTH encounter over two years, American church officials shared an Iftar meal with the visiting Iranian president on September 28 in New York City. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad earlier in the day had delivered his usual rant against Israel and the United States at the United Nations. But hosting…

Two days after George W. Bush criticized Syria as a state sponsor of terror in a speech at the United Nations, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Mouallem in New York. The meeting was first reported in the Syrian state press which noted that it took place at…

Politico's David Rogers reports: Treasury's $700 billion rescue plan for the financial markets passed the Senate Wednesday night, giving the White House new confidence it has turned the corner and can win final approval from Congress by Friday. The 74-25 roll call endorsing the package featured a…

Vice presidential candidates were asked about their views on abortion during the 1992, 1996, and 2000 debates, but PBS's Gwen Ifill broke that streak when she moderated the 2004 Cheney-Edwards debate. That year the flashpoint of the abortion debate was partial-birth abortion, an issue, needless to…

Meta! More pointedly, McCaskill said of Palin's opponent, Sen. Joe Biden, Del., that he "has a tendency to talk forever and sometimes say things that are kind of stupid." "He a regular guy and … he doesn't parse his words and he's not hyper-careful," she said. "He's very authentic." H/t Hot Air.

Jim Treacher has a sneak preview of her potential questions: Mayor Palin, Barack Obama is a handsome, charismatic demigod. How many boxes of Kleenex will you need after your crushing loss?

Roll Call reports that Congressman John Shadegg -- former chairman of the Republican Study Committee -- has signalled that he's likely to support the Senate market rescue bill when it comes to the House for a vote: Rep. John Shadegg (R-Ariz.) signaled Wednesday that changes being discussed for the…

Never did I think there'd come a day when I'd agree with Bill Clinton this often, and yet, here I go again. As I was saying yesterday, Bill Clinton has been perhaps the strongest voice against the Obama-created meme that deregulation and the free market are at fault for a crisis actually caused by…

John McCain fielded some hostile questions from the Des Moines Register editorial board yesterday. Watch a few of his responses here (HT: Marc Ambinder): Good for McCain. I was pleased to see him push back against some stupid and tendentious questions, particularly the notion that his ad about…

From our friends at Reason ...And, you thought you were creeped out yesterday:

Ramesh Ponnuru notes Here's how the Obama campaign responded to a questionaire about funding abortion: Obama does not support the Hyde amendment. He believes that the federal government should not use its dollars to intrude on a poor woman's decision whether to carry to term or to terminate her…

Jay Cost diagnoses McCain's problem: I think McCain has suffered a deterioration in his poll position for a simple reason: he's the Republican. George W. Bush is the President of the United States. He is responsible for the state of the nation. He's not held in good esteem right now, and he's a…

Download all 451 pages of it, here. A preview of some of the yummy pork (see correction below) stuck in it: - Virgin Island and Puerto Rican Rum (Section 308) - American Samoa (Sec. 309) - Mine Rescue Teams (Sec. 310) - Mine Safety Equipment (Sec. 311) - Domestic Production Activities in Puerto…

The New York Times: "Mr. Biden describes himself as blunt." That's one word for it.

Barack Obama yesterday: "I don't think me calling House Republican members would have been that helpful. I tend not to be that persuasive on that side of the aisle" Barack Obama today in Wisconsin: "I've been reaching out to leaders in both parties to do whatever I can to help pass this plan."

Vets for Freedom is spending $2.2 million to broadcast its hardest hitting ad yet. The ad, just released today, focuses on Obama's failure to hold hearings on Afghanistan and his vote to cut off funding for the troops. Vets for Freedom executive director Pete Hegseth will be on the Ed Morrissey…

Jonathan Martin reports the Judicial Confirmation Network will spend $1 million airing this ad in Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania:

Jeff Dobbs over at the excellent Voice in My Head blog makes a great catch. Here was Barack Obama on "60 Minutes" a full nine days ago: KROFT: Why you? I mean, why do you think you would be a good president? OBAMA: Well, I was going to get to that. KROFT: Go ahead. OBAMA: You know, I'm a, I'm a…

North Carolina, a traditional Republican stronghold, took a sharp turn toward Barack Obama in the last several weeks. It's no secret GOP political strategists had sought to lock up the Tar Heel state early--it's voted Republican in 9 out of the past 10 presidential elections (Jimmy Carter, the last…

In response to Joe Biden's exaggerations about being "shot at" in Iraq and having his helicopter forced down in Afghanistan, the McCain campaign released this statement by Michael J. Durant, the Black Hawk helicopter pilot who was shot down in Mogadishu in 1993 and held captive: "Senator Biden…

The latest Washington Post/ABC poll shows Obama leading 50 percent to 46 percent. Tom Bevan of Real Clear Politics notes: According to the poll, McCain has regained the lead among key swing groups: Independents favor McCain by 3 (48-45), white women by 11 (54-43), and white Catholics by one…

You can listen to Sarah Palin on yesterday's Hugh Hewitt show here.

Her debatng history in Alaska reflects some of the seemingly split personality we've seen from Sarah Palin during her first couple of appearances- breezy, smiling and devastating at the RNC and wobbly in later interviews. In Alaska, she'd sometimes falter on policy issues early in her races only to…

Both House and Senate have been at work today to create an alternative bailout bill after the modified Paulson plan went down in a surprising House vote Monday. With both liberal and conservative members (and constituents) rejecting the biggest government bailout of private industry in history,…

AMONG THE LIST of virtues that conservatives believe in are security, efficiency, and the facilitation of private commerce. Although just the name "Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation" is enough to conjure up images of big government, in practice the FDIC provides a function that conservatives…