Politicana

There are new numbers out today from Rasmussen and USA Today/Gallup.  Interestingly, they are slightly contradictory:

Continue reading Polling…

A couple of quotes from the person who McCain believes if ready to be one heart attack away from the presidency:

“I’ve been so focused on state government, I haven’t really focused much on the war in Iraq. I heard on the news about the new deployments”

“What is it exactly that the vice president does all day?”

This new pearl of wisdom comes courtesy or Hunter who linked to JLFinch’s diary who linked to a 2006 gubernatorial candidate questionnaire (whew! the chain just goes on and on…):

Q: Are you offended by the phrase “Under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance? Why or why not?

PALIN: Not on your life. If it was good enough for the founding fathers, its good enough for me and I’ll fight in defense of our Pledge of Allegiance

Good enough for the founding fathers…  wow.  How are those public schools in Wassila?

I have added another one, so please check it out and vote!

According to the Gallup daily tracking poll, Obama’s numbers against McCain in the national head-to-head have progressed like this over the course of the Democratic Convention:

Continue reading Bumps & Dumps…

I tend to agree with Mike’s comments in the previous post.  McCain’s choice of Sarah Palin feels like a desperate and very risky move  He will undoubtedly swing some women voters (and will be sure to let us know about every last one of them) but won’t it just look like blatant pandering to most of them?  The choice was so out of left field that I think the whole narrative will be “McCain picked a woman because he needs that demographic” and I think voters don’t like a gimmick and they hate feeling manipulated. 

Continue reading McCain’s Harriet Miers…

As the guy who dreamed, in living color, that Joe Biden had been picked as Obama’s VP nominee the morning before the (late night) announcement, I have to give a shout out to Dr. Blume. He sent an e-mail around a few weeks ago, with the prediction that Sarah Palin would be Grandpa John’s veep choice. We all dismissed it.

I suspect our reaction was a fair bit milder than that of the GOP bigwigs right now.

I just thought I’d briefly share my opinion of the Democratic National Convention thus far, now that the 3rd night is over and all that is left is Obama’s speech.  This is the gist of how I think it went:

1- Teddy Kennedy (the Lion in Winter) opens the convention and sets the tone for the first night.  Sentimental and emotional.

2- Michelle & the kids speak/greet dad.  The purpose of this was to humanize the Obama’s.  They are not strange, unknown, other.  They are an all-American family just like the rest of us.

3- Hillary throws her weight behind Barack, calls for full party unity, and challenges her supporters to defy her (“if you love me, you will vote for Barack”).  She also coins a couple of effective phrases: “No Way. No How. No McCain;” “We can’t afford 4 more years of the last 8 years.”

4- Bill joins his voice to Hillary’s but, more importantly, paints a picture of how the Bush administration has failed economically.  He compares his 8 years to Bush’s and then connects Obama with himself and McCain with Bush.

5- Biden gives what may be the most important speech thus far.  He takes on McCain in the most direct way thus far (of the whole campaign).  More importantly, he doesn’t retread the economic issue, he does what Republican’s have been doing masterfully for years, he attacks McCain on his strengths; he spells out the arguement of why McCain is weak on international and defense issues.  He blasts McCain again and again and shows how Obama is stronger than McCain on these issues.  If this speech sinks home with voters and informs the tactics of the campaign, it will be the most important speech of the convention. 

Of course, we have the big show tomorrow, but, for me so far, this convention has gone as well as could be expected.  The pundits on CNN are wondering if it marks a turning point in race.  Here’s to hoping…

 I just finished an excellent article from the NY Times’s economic staff writer, David Leonhardt, about Obama’s economic plan.  For folks who complain that there is not enought meat in this campaign, this article is a meat-lover’s pizza of economics.

Continue reading Obamas Economic Plan…

I love stuff like this. So I had to make sure you saw it.

I guess my real fear (and pride) is that Obama cannot compete on these terms. That he will have less trouble refuting McCain than bobbing-and-weaving around a press that sees itself as the arbiter of this disgusting, democratic competence.  Can Obama prove to the “white working class” that he is not “an elitist”? Can he be “commander-chief”?  Can he prove he is not “just a celebrity” who “speaks well”?  Can he get people to stop seeing him as black or male or young or brilliant?

Listen for these stupid questions, or variations on them, especially on NPR, the best of the best, and ask yourself if any decent person will ever get elected again.

If Obama did, as Bernard Avishai at TPM suggests, buy TV time in bulk to air town-hall style meetings, or to talk about all the crap that passes for both journalism and entertainment, I, for one, would watch it. And that’s saying something.

According to the NYTimes, viewership of Night 1 of the Dem’s Convention was up– from 18 million in ‘04 to about 24 million in ‘08.  Good news–  the more people that saw Michelle Obama and her children, the better imho.  Listening to her speech, watching her bio video about her working class roots, and seeing her family members, i had a “good, god, could this country really be so dumb as to NOT elect this family over McCain” moment– I’m sure I’ll have many many more.  Especially after McC picks Romney.

Some interesting numbers:

The broadcast networks NBC, ABC and CBS attracted an audience of 12 million, with NBC leading the pack with 4.7 million viewers. (”Deal or No Deal,” at 8 p.m. on NBC, averaged 11 million viewers.) In another sign of the increasing popularity of cable channels for news coverage, CNN attracted more viewers — 4.2 million — than ABC or CBS for the hour. ABC drew 4.17 million and CBS averaged 3.46 million at the same hour.

On cable news, the Fox News Channel had an average of 2.92 million viewers for the hour, while MSNBC averaged 2.1 million. CNN, usually the second place cable network behind Fox News, was also top-rated during the Democratic convention in 2004.

The combined audience was a few million shy of NBC’s prime time average during the Olympics this month.