A new poll from Capitol Weekly/Probolsky Research takes the temperature of California Republicans:

Former eBay executive Meg Whitman has opened up a wide lead in the Republican race for governor, according to the latest Capitol Weekly/Probolsky Research poll.

About a third of Republicans and decline-to-state voters who said they intend to vote Republican said they favor Whitman, who has a 3-to-1 edge over rival contender Tom Campbell, Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner remains stuck in a distant third, with 5.5 percent of Republican support.

The numbers show a significant increase in recent weeks for Whitman that reflects her prodigious spending. Already, seven months before the primary and full year before the general election, Whitman has spent more than $19 million. The level of spending is remarkable, even in a state accustomed to multimillion-dollar campaigns.

It's nice to have money. It didn't help Corzine, and Bloomberg spent a fortune to win by the smallest of margins, but in these tough economic times, both parties will be on the look-out for plausible, self-financing candidates. The primary is a long way off, but Whitman looks likely to be a formidable opponent, having overcome some controversy over her voting record, or lack thereof, and her YouTube praise of Obama's commie green jobs czar Van Jones. Poizner's campaign hasn't been able to do any damage with those stories, all of which bodes pretty well for Meg.

The Senate approved Tara O’Toole’s nomination as Under Secretary for the Science and Technology Directorate at the Department of Homeland Security via voice vote last night. As we pointed out the day before, this should be of concern to anyone interested in making sure that billions in taxpayer dollars do not get funneled to a bio-security boondoggle brought to you by O’Toole and her close and corrupt ally John Murtha, who is currently under investigation for ethics violations.

Under O’Toole’s jurisdiction now falls the decision concerning the Murtha-supported effort to make the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) “the world’s leading facility for manufacturing vaccines by 2013, potentially a $1 billion venture.”

Mysterious players in private equity, pharmaceutical, and lobbying worlds have been working for years to get to the point where one of their own -- a fellow Murtha supporter and contributor like O’Toole -- can reward them with huge federal contracts. As someone affiliated and closely aligned with the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, the conflict of interest before O’Toole is clear, but will she really be able to resist the pressure to reward Murtha’s cronies with millions upon millions in taxpayer-funded, government contracts?

The Murtha-backed effort surrounding UPMC now has the support of another Pennsylvania Democrat, Arlen Specter. Sources tell THE WEEKLY STANDARD that the Philadelphia Democrat is looking for a way to ingratiate himself with powerbrokers in western Pennsylvania and believes he has found it by supporting the billion-dollar UPMC venture.

Prediction: coming soon to western Pennsylvania with the support of Harry Reid, Arlen Specter and of course, Tara O’Toole, will be the John Murtha Center for Biosecurity to go along with the John Murtha Airport and the John P. Murtha Institute for Homeland Security.

As my piece with Ben Sasse in today's New York Post shows, the real 10-years costs of the Democratic health bills are not $800-900 billion, but roughly double that. In their real first decades, the House bill would cost $1.8 trillion, the Senate bill $1.7 trillion. And the House bill would raise taxes by $1.1 trillion, the Senate bill by $1.0 trillion. That's according to official Congressional Budget Office projections.

And if the Democrats don't follow through on their plans to divert hundreds of billion dollars away from Medicare, CBO projections show that the bills would each raise our deficits by over half a trillion dollars -- the Senate bill by nearly three-quarters of a trillion.

Thankfully, the CBO had the chance to report some more favorable news yesterday. The newly released Republican small bill (which I wrote about yesterday) would cost just $61 billion in its first ten years, wouldn't impose new taxes, and wouldn't funnel any money away from Medicare. Still more impressively, the CBO says that the Republican bill would decrease our deficits by $68 billion. Best of all, the CBO says the Republican bill would lower Americans' insurance premiums in all three insurance categories -- small group (by 7-10 percent), large group (by up to 3 percent), and individual (by 5-8 percent) -- while increasing the number of people who have health insurance.

So, the choice for Americans is clear: $1.7-$1.8 trillion, irresponsible siphoning from Medicare, substantial tax increases, no evidence of lower premiums, and a mounting list of studies suggesting Americans' premiums would rise substantially -- or, $0.06 trillion, no siphoning, no taxes, lower deficits, and lower premiums.

Oh, and the second choice wouldn't hand our health-care system over to the government.

The borders have been pushed east, countries have switched sides, but the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organization's raison d'etre isn't that much different than its Cold War predecessor. That is, to provide a strong military counterweight to NATO and ultimately return the European balance of power to an East-West paradigm.

Back in '02, CSTO was formed as a way of bulwarking the Slavic sphere against NATO expansion. Now, it's back to the future -- as Putin creates a Moscow-dominated security treaty in which member-states march in lock step to a Russian beat. A NATO-style Rapid Reaction Force is being formed, purportedly to help contain spillover chaos from Afghanistan, but will probably end up somewhere within striking distance of NATO's Baltic states. The treaty also gives Moscow a wonderful excuse to squash democratic dissent in allied nations, should a CSTO nation experience a Rose, Tulip, or Orange revolution.

Recently I was chatting up an Army Lt Col -- a West Point grad who started off as an Armor Officer in Cold War Germany and later moved on to Russian linguistics and intelligence. I asked what would have happened if the U.S. was drawn into the Georgian war of '08. "Ten years ago we would have kicked the Russians' ass," he said. "Last year they would have bloodied our nose, but we still would've won. Ten years from now... who knows?"

No one wants to be drawn into conflict with the Russians. But it's useful to remember that time after time, we've extended our hand to Moscow only to have it slapped away. Putin clearly has grand aspirations for his burgeoning CSTO, with Poland shaping up to be the new Germany in another round of US-Russian geo-political chess. If Moscow only understands the stern language of action and resolve, then the Obama administration must atone for shabby treatment of our key Polish allies and move quickly to strengthen defensive ties between our two nations.

Bing West provides footage from combat engagements with the Taliban in Helmand province. "Video shows why coalition and Afghan battalions inflict few Taliban casualties. Causes include terrain, Taliban maneuver, heavy coalition armor and risk aversion to minimize casualties, while doing a professional job and returning in one piece," Bing writes at his Youtube page. The inability to fix and kill the Taliban allows them to continue to threaten the Afghan people and Coalition forces.

Bing has a money quote in that video: "Leaving your enemy intact is not a smart idea in any war." This is highlighted when a Taliban observer is seen watching the Marines through binoculars, but the Marines cannot engage due to the restrictive Rules of Engagement. The Marines "could see people that I would say 95% they were the enemy, and they could not shoot them because they could not confirm 100%, but when you have someone looking at you through binoculars on the battlefield, ordinarily you'd have permission and you would shoot them, but they didn't just on the tiny chance he was just an idiot."

The New Republic has kept up a steady drum beat against President Obama's disgrace of an envoy to Sudan, General Scott Gration. Gration has embarrassed himself and the United States repeatedly with statements on the situation in Darfur that range from the delusional to the merely naive. Now the magazine is calling for the administration to fire Gration:

Scott Gration is an embarrassment. As Barack Obama's special envoy to Sudan, Gration has a dual mission: to help win justice and peace for the nearly three million Darfuris who currently live in camps after being subjected to genocide by Sudan's government; and to prevent that same odious government from initiating another slaughter in southern Sudan, where a 2005 peace agreement is looking more tenuous by the day.

How is he doing? Since taking the job in March, Gration has gone about ingratiating himself to the Sudanese government--an odd choice given that the government is a genocidal one. He seems interested only in offering Khartoum incentives, even though it has provided him basically nothing in return. He has pressed Congress to ease sanctions on Sudan. He has met with an American lobbyist for the Sudanese government. He has endorsed an absurd demand issued by Khartoum concerning an upcoming vote on South Sudanese independence. He has lamented to The Washington Post that many Darfuris distrust the government because of "psychological stuff." Explaining to the Post how he wants to deal with Sudan's rulers, he said: "We've got to think about giving out cookies. Kids, countries--they react to gold stars, smiley faces, handshakes, agreements, talk, engagement." This is both astonishingly offensive (why would one give "cookies" to a government that has recently killed hundreds of thousands of its own people?) and strikingly impractical: Most observers of Sudan agree that Khartoum has historically responded to sticks, while viewing carrots as an invitation to continue orchestrating violence....

The consequences of Gration's approach go beyond Sudan. As Daniel Jonah Goldhagen argued recently in these pages ("Ending Our Age Of Suffering," October 21), the coddling of genocidal dictators sends a message around the world to other leaders contemplating crimes against their own people. The message is clear-cut: As far as the United States is concerned, you can commit genocide--and still get a smiley face.

The New Republic is right. Gration has become the poster boy for the worst tendencies of this administration's foreign policy -- the appeasement and coddling of tyrants who ought to be indicted for war crimes and, in the case of Sudanese strong-man Omar al-Bashir, have been indicted for war crimes. If Gration is allowed to stay on and keep handing out gold stars and smiley faces to a man who murders his own people by the tens of thousands, it will be the surest evidence of this administration's complete indifference to human rights.

A major national ad campaign is set to launch tomorrow tying the Obama administration's failure to provide the flu vaccine on time and in quantity to fears of a government takeover of healthcare. The American Future Fund has produced and plans to put significant money behind the ad that is set to appear on both CNN and Fox News, and to play nationally, starting tomorrow. THE WEEKLY STANDARD understands that the group has plans to buy air time on network television as well to coincide with the Sunday talk shows.

The script for the ad reads:

In July, the government said we would have 120 million doses of H1N1 flu vaccine by October.

But only 27 million doses were available.

The government’s estimates were off by… 77%.

93 million doses short – children, pregnant woman, seniors line up…for nothing.

Ironically, the government planned to give flu shots to detainees at Guantanamo.

If the government can’t run a flu program, can we trust it to run America’s entire health care system?

The fact is that the government still plans to give flu shots to detainees at Guantanamo, statements to the contrary by the White House notwithstanding. Opponents of Obama's health care reform clearly believe that the administration's failure to properly manage the production and distribution of flu vaccine to the American people will resonate with voters as the debate heats up in Congress.

Watch the ad below...

The amendment was introduced a month ago and is expected to come to the floor today. The text of the amendment reads,

Purpose: To prohibit the use of funds for the prosecution in Article III courts of the United States of individuals involved in the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. As a lawyer pointed out to us at the time the amendment was introduced, the amendment specifies that it should apply to anyone suspected, not charged, with planning and otherwise abetting the 9/11 attacks.

Graham has also gotten the support of some 170 family members of those killed in the 9/11 attacks. They have signed a letter stating that they "adamantly oppose prosecuting the 9/11 conspirators in Article III courts, which would provide them with the very rights that may make it possible for them to escape the justice which they so richly deserve." The letter goes on,

We support Senate Amendment 2669 (pursuant to H.R. 2847, the Commerce, Justice, Science Appropriations Act of 2010), "prohibiting the use of funds for the prosecution in Article III courts of the United States of individuals involved in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks." We urge its passage by all those members of the United States Senate who stood on the senate floor eight years ago and declared that the perpetrators of these attacks would answer to the American people. The American people will not understand why those same senators now vote to allow our cherished federal courts to be manipulated and used as a stage by the "mastermind of 9/11" and his co-conspirators to condemn this nation and rally their fellow terrorists the world over. As one New York City police detective, who lost 60 fellow officers on 9/11, told members of the Department of Justice's Detainee Policy Task Force at a meeting last June, "You people are out of touch. You need to hear the locker room conversations of the people who patrol your streets and fight your wars."

You can read the full letter after the jump...

Speaker Nancy Pelosi has denied Rep. Bart Stupak (D, Mich.) an up-or-down vote on an amendment to prevent federal funding of elective abortions through the health care bill. Stupak’s amendment reads:

No funds authorized or appropriated by this Act (or an amendment made by this Act) may be used to pay for any abortion or to cover any part of the costs of any health plan that includes coverage of abortion, except in the case where a woman suffers from a physical disorder, physical injury, or physical illness that would, as certified by a physician, place the woman in danger of death unless an abortion is performed, including a life-endangering physical condition caused by or arising from the pregnancy itself, or unless the pregnancy is the result of an act of rape or incest.

While the Stupak amendment would ban federal funding of elective abortions, it would allow people to purchase a separate rider to cover elective abortions.

Without the Stupak Amendment, H.R. 3962 would allow federal funding of all elective abortions for those on the public health insurance plan as well as those purchasing federally subsidized plans. Pelosi will likely allow a vote on phony compromise language introduced by Indiana Democrat Brad Ellsworth in order to give cover to pro-life Democrats to vote for the bill. The Ellsworth Amendment would still allow federal funding for all elective abortions for those on the public plan and federally subsidized plans, but it would require private contractors to handle the money. It reads:

(1) IN GENERAL.—The Secretary shall enter into contracts with private entities, such as administrative contractors described in section 1874A of the Social Security Act, for the purpose of claims processing and other administrative functions (which may include functions described in subsection (a)(4) of such section) with respect to the public health insurance option. Such contracts may be entered into in the same manner as the Secretary enters into contracts under subsection (a)(1) of such section.

Subject to paragraph (2), the Secretary has the same authority with respect to the public health insurance option as the Secretary has under subsections (a)(1) and (b) of such section with respect to title XVIII of such Act. Contracts under this subsection shall not involve the transfer of insurance risk to such entity.

Using private contractors hired by the federal government to handle the money does nothing to keep federal dollars from funding abortions. Imagine if a Republican were to say that “harsh interrogations” performed by Blackwater weren’t federally funded since Blackwater is a private company. Everyone would, rightfully, laugh at that absurd claim.

Pelosi has claimed that abortion is already "out of the health care bill", but that's just not true. President Obama pledged that “no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions” through the health-care bill. So why won’t Obama back the Stupak Amendment to do that?

Update 11:15a.m.: At a press conference that just concluded Speaker Pelosi said that no decisions have been made on what amendments will be allowed, but she sang Ellsworth's praises and seems likely to allow a vote on his amendment.

Clarification: The Ellsworth amendment may not get an up-or-down vote; it may be included by the Rules Committee in the final bill. An Ellsworth spokesman emails: "There are two possibilities I have heard discussed. It could be allowed as a stand-alone amendment on the floor, or it could be incorporated as self-executing language in the Rule. In other words, when the Rule passes, the amendment language is automatically adopted and does not require a separate vote."

You know, if Israel insists on boarding innocent Iranian ships headed for Hezbollah like common pirates, it just puts us further from peace.

Some Dem incumbent governors are looking....Corziney for 2010.

Tea Partiers come to the Hill again for Bachmann's "House Call."

Rove: The GOP is back in the suburbs!

Dana Milbank takes issue with Michael Steele saying, well, exactly the kinds of things Obama says when he wins.

WaPo pretty pumped GOP is not claiming a mandate in its 18-point thrashing of the Post's candidate.

"Republicans won’t find a more conservative candidate than Bob McDonnell if they draw lots from National Review’s subscription list. He didn’t abandon or “moderate” his principles to win the middle. Instead, he complemented them with an optimistic, populist vision of economic success."

The Blue State exodus.

Last night, the White House began to own up to the fact that Democrats performed very badly in Virginia.

Cool: Red-light cameras lose in Ohio and Texas.

Are any of the Obama administration's numbers about so-called "saved or created" jobs accurate?

Yesterday, the Chicago Tribune reported:

More than $4.7 million in federal stimulus aid so far has been funneled to schools in North Chicago, and state and federal officials say that money has saved the jobs of 473 teachers.

Problem is, the district employs only 290 teachers.

"That other number, I don't know where that came from," said Lauri Hakanen, superintendent of North Chicago Community Unit Schools District 187.

The Obama administration last week released the first round of data designed to underpin the worthiness of its economic stimulus plan, which so far has directed $1.25 billion to Illinois schools. That money has helped save or create 14,330 school jobs in the state, the administration claimed.

But those statistics, compiled initially by the Illinois State Board of Education, appear riddled with anomalies that raise questions about their validity, according to a Tribune analysis of district-by-district stimulus spending and other state data. Many local school officials were perplexed by the stimulus data attributed to their districts.

In the official report, Wilmette Public Schools District 39 was credited with 166 jobs saved by stimulus aid. Superintendent Raymond Lechner said the number should be zero.

At Dolton-Riverdale School District 148, stimulus funds were said to have saved the equivalent of 382 full-time teaching jobs -- 142 more than the district actually has.

A similar discrepancy was found in data for Kankakee School District 111, where the stimulus report logged the equivalent of 665 full-time jobs saved. "That's impossible," a top Kankakee school official said, adding that the entire payroll -- full and part time -- is 600 workers.

Some of the mistakes, however, might point in the other direction. According to the government tally, there were no jobs "saved or created" in Chicago public schools, something that seems unlikely after the district received $293 million in stimulus funding. But, as many experts predicted in advance, most of the money went to the state for help on budget shortfalls.

It appears the state treasury -- not students or school districts -- was the prime beneficiary of the education stimulus jackpot in Illinois. In great measure, funds simply were used to replace general aid payments already owed to local districts by the state. That gave Gov. Pat Quinn breathing room in his struggle to rein in a whopping two-year budget deficit of more than $10 billion.

There is more. Today's Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reports:

A stimulus job report that says more than 10,000 jobs were saved or created in Wisconsin is rife with errors, double counting and inflated numbers based more on satisfying federal formulas than creating real jobs, a Journal Sentinel review has found.

In one case, five jobs were mistakenly listed as 50 - and then counted twice. In another, pay raises to workers were listed as saving more than 100 jobs. And in another, jobs were listed as saved even though the money had not been received and no work on the project had begun.

The problems mirror those surfacing around the country, as the federal numbers claiming 640,000 jobs created or saved by stimulus money are being scrutinized.

Among the Journal Sentinel's findings:

Double-counted jobs: About $7.3 million of federal money will flow to the Parkland Sanitary District in Douglas County to replace its sewer system, a project listed as creating or saving 100 jobs even though work won't start until this spring, federal recovery data shows.

But that number is inflated by 95 jobs, Parkland Sanitary District treasurer Eric Shaffer admitted.

When reporting to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's online reporting system, Schaffer meant to type "5" but mistakenly added a zero - and that 50-job figure appears twice in the federal data because it was a combined grant and loan. He tried to correct the error, but was told it was too late for the federal reporting deadline.

"We are volunteers, and we made a mistake," Shaffer said. "It was a simple typographical error, and we tried to fix it. Now that we understand the system, it will be much easier."

A friend e-mails that he came across this Obama quote from the 2004 convention, which seems pertinent in light of his pending Afghanistan decision:

“When we send our young men and women into harm’s way, we have a solemn obligation not to fudge the numbers or shade the truth about whey they are going, to care for their families while they’re gone, to tend to the soldiers upon their return and to never, ever go to war without enough troops to win the war, secure the peace and earn the respect of the world.” (emphasis added)

During a CNN appearance on Wednesday, Charlie Crist said of Obama's stimulus package:

"I didn't endorse it. I didn't even have a vote on the darn thing. ... But I understood that it was gonna pass and I wanted to be able to utilize it for the benefit of my fellow Floridians."

Charlie Crist during a February 23 TV interview on the White House lawn:

Q: You've broken with some in your own party to back this stimulus; tell me why.

CHARLIE CRIST: "Because Florida needs it frankly."

This quote and more on Crist's love for the stimulus package from this Rubio campaign YouTube video:

Oh what a difference eight months and a Republican primary make. In other Crist v. Rubio news, the NRSC announced Wednesday that it won't spend any money on Crist's behalf in the primary.

Europe rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that they provide and then questions the manner in which they provide it.

“Iran’s decision to expand mining and milling at Bandar Abbas seems to validate the suspicions of those who think it was the main uranium site for a covert program,” says...arms control squish Jeffrey G. Lewis?

Iranian protesters to Obama: "Are you with us or with them?" (Answer: He's with "them.")

If Bush had done it: Obama admin buys favorable coverage of Iraq's Anbar province from the Financial Times -- "a hot place to invest in," says FDI magazine, which is owned by the FT.

How Israel destroyed Syria's Al Kibar nuclear reactor.

Obama peace process: Palestinians threaten to unilaterally abandon pursuit of statehood.

Republicans get their 2010 map in Virginia.

A source tells THE WEEKLY STANDARD that the hold has been lifted on Tara O’Toole's nomination to serve as Under Secretary for the Science and Technology Directorate at the Department of Homeland Security. The nomination could move on the floor as early as tonight, I'm told. Background on O'Toole, who has close ties to scandal-plagued Rep. John Murtha and some questionable, Marxist associations, here and here.

Hillary Clinton has arcked pendulously between Israel and the Arabs, the Arabs and Israel in her various incarnations -- as far back as 1998, with the blood-soaked Arafat at the helm of the PLO, the then-First Lady’s call for a Palestinian state was quickly walked back by the White House, and she was shortly heard, post-kiss, attacking Suha Arafat for "inflammatory rhetoric" -- and most conspicuously so of late, from ice to tepid dishwater and back to frosty again. "Perhaps those of us who work for [the president] and communicate about this issue,” she told Al Jazeera yesterday, after a little taste of Arab ire, “should have made very clear that there was no change in our position, that we were absolutely committed to the end of settlement activity."

Her State Department mouthpiece, P.J. Crowley, explaining the newest Obamic thinking on the Middle East -- now that their sweeping “peace” agenda has turned out to be as valuable as the paper on which it’s written, or, as the Wall Street Journal puts it, “all sides might be forced to accept a lower level of engagement in the talks to guard against a new round of violence in the Palestinian territories” -- was left holding the bag, diplomatically speaking. And a good job he did of it: "There's value in having the process," he said. "If this particular path, we think, can't get us there, we'll look for others."

Whether intentional or not, this is a good game of obfuscation for an administration that badly needs the cover: While Mrs. Clinton was sputtering among the Arabs, the Israeli Navy was unloading hundreds of tons of Iranian weapons onto an Ashdod dock, after commandeering “a commercial vessel operating under the guise of an aid ship, captained by a Pole and flying an Antiguan flag” carrying them en route to Syria. The Syrian foreign minister, Walid al-Moallem, in Tehran for bilateral discussions of “regional issues including Iraq, Lebanon and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” scoffed: "Unfortunately, some pirates sometimes take action in the name of inspection and prevent the sailing of commercial ships."

Could be it is merely by coincidence he is there just as the Iranian tyrants are celebrating the 30th anniversary of the take-over of the U.S. embassy by brutally putting down demonstrators. Who’s to say? We can ask him, though, next time we send high-level U.S. officials to Damascus to have some process with him.

At least when it comes to Iran, German chancellor Angela Merkel seems to be taking a rather tough stand. Addressing a joint session of Congress yesterday, Merkel said:

Tolerance does not mean “anything goes.” There must be zero tolerance towards all those who show no respect for the inalienable rights of the individual and who violate human rights. Zero tolerance must also be shown if, for example, weapons of mass destruction fall into the hands of Iran and possibly threaten our security!

Iran must be aware of this. Iran knows our offer, but Iran also knows where we draw the line: A nuclear bomb in the hands of an Iranian president who denies the Holocaust, threatens Israel, and denies Israel the right to exist, is not acceptable!

For me, Israel’s security will never be open to negotiation. Not only Israel is threatened but the entire free world. Whoever threatens Israel also threatens us!...

Of course she then ended on a plea for the United States to commit to Copenhagen and climate change by December (not likely):

We can already see where this wasteful attitude towards our future leads: In the Arctic icebergs are melting, in Africa people are becoming refugees due to environmental damage [as opposed to the Janjaweed], and global sea levels are rising. I am pleased that you in your work together with President Obama attach such significance to protecting our climate. For we all know: We have no time to lose! We need an agreement at the climate conference in Copenhagen in December. We have to agree on one objective -- global warming must not exceed two degrees Celsius.

But did I mention how tough she sounded on Iran? No surprise, Merkel’s idea of drawing a line is economic sanctions, though as Volker Perthes, director of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, points out, the chancellor is now willing to enact sanctions even if it means only the United States and Europe. Speaking at the American Institute for Contemporary German Studies, Perthes said that while Merkel would obviously prefer going through the Security Council, she has been warning German businesses to prepare for sanctions whether or not China and Russia are on board. Perthes also notes that Merkel is still deeply committed to Afghanistan, and if there is to be a troop increase, we shouldn’t expect one until January at the earliest. She is, however, waiting for Obama to make a decision first.

Changes have quietly been made to the German contingent in Afghanistan: For instance, they no longer have to wait to be attacked before they can engage the Taliban. This might sound silly but there are reasons for this. That Germans are uncomfortable using the term “war” (krieg) or even discussing such matters is the result of, in Perthes’s words, “successful reeducation.” Perthes does think his fellow citizens would better support the Afghan operation if politicians openly talked to them about it and explained clearly why they are there -- something that has yet to happen (in Germany or the United States). But remember the Spiegel article from 2006 in which a British officer told his German counterpart, “We’re sending two coffins home every week, while you Germans hand out crayons and wool blankets”? And the American who told a Merkel adviser that “the Germans have to learn how to kill”? But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Unsurprisingly, Michael Barone has an interesting and incisive roundup of numbers from last night that go deeper than the top-line results. Some nuggets:

• Bergen County, New Jersey, a 56%-42% Corzine constituency in 2005, came within a point or two of voting for Christie.

• Westchester County, New York, voted 58%-42% for a Republican county executive after voting almost exactly the opposite way, in a race involving the same two candidates, four years before.

• The Virginia Board of Elections has results by CD showing that three Dems who captured seats in 2008 by very narrow margins (the 2nd, 5th, and 11th districts) saw their districts go to McDonnell by whopping margins (24 points, 22 points, and 10 points, respectively).

Barone believes this last fact will not be lost on those freshman Democrats.

It's like Battered Wives Syndrome, except President Obama is the bride with the black eye and Ayatollah Khameini is the abusive husband. And Obama keeps coming back for more. Yesterday the Supreme Leader publicly ridiculed Obama's repeated diplomatic overtures, saying that talks with the United States would be “naive and perverted.”

Khamenei said he had responded in March to Obama’s overtures, referring to a speech in which he said he would wait for changes in U.S. policy toward Iran before reassessing ties.

Since then, Khamenei said, “what we have witnessed is completely the opposite of what they have been saying and claiming. On the face of things, they say, ‘Let’s negotiate.’ But alongside this, they threaten us and say that if these negotiations do not achieve a desirable result, they will do this and that. … Whenever they smile at the officials of the Islamic revolution, when we carefully look at the situation, we notice that they are hiding a dagger behind their back,” he said. “They have not changed their intentions.”

So what does the Obama administration do? It puts out a pathetic statement marking the anniversary of the Iran hostage crisis. And read the statement closely. After presenting as evidence of good faith a series of gestures made by this administration to the thugs that rule Iran, the president declares that "We have heard for thirty years what the Iranian government is against; the question, now, is what kind of future it is for."

Does that rhetoric sound familiar? It should -- because it's exactly the formulation that Obama uses to chastise his domestic political opponents. Just two weeks ago, Biden attacked critics of the stimulus in exactly the same language:

People forget we were in a free fall with the economy," he said. "There would be a million more unemployed people without this. But listen to the critics. We know what they're against, but what are they for?"

This administration seems not to comprehend the difference between governing and campaigning, the difference between domestic political opposition and foreign enemies. To treat the mullahs in Iran like they are a bunch of recalcitrant Republicans is further evidence of how dangerously unserious this administration is about the threat we face from that regime.

Update: A smart observer emails:

Meanwhile, the Iranian protesters are starting to ask who President Obama is for. As the NYTimes reports, "a new theme emerged on Wednesday, with many protesters declaring their impatience with President Obama’s policy of dialogue with the Iranian government. Many could be heard chanting: ‘Obama, Obama -- either you’re with them or you’re with us,’ witnesses said.”

Unfortunately, Obama's statement today gave them no encouragement. The fact is, President Obama and his administration remain objectively on the side of the Tehran government in its pitched battle with the opposition.

Via John McCormack, who's still on the road back from NY-23, comes this quote from pro-life Bart Stupak (D-Mich.):

“I am disappointed the manager’s amendment introduced Tuesday night does nothing to change, let alone improve, the inadequate language on federal funding for abortion currently in the health care bill. I will continue to oppose, and will continue whipping my colleagues to oppose, bringing the bill to the floor for a vote until there is satisfactory language to prevent public funding for abortion.”

The abortion issue was already bothering enough Democrats on Tuesday to give Pelosi a problem on the floor.

House leaders were still negotiating Monday with the bloc of Democrats concerned about abortion provisions in the legislation, saying that they could lead to public funding of the procedure. After an evening meeting of top House Democrats, Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (Md.) said, "We are making progress," but added that they had not reached an agreement.

The outcome of those talks could be crucial in deciding the fate of the health-care bill. Democrats need the vast majority of their caucus to back the bill, since nearly all congressional Republicans have said they will oppose the legislation.

"I will continue whipping my colleagues to oppose bringing the bill to the floor for a vote until a clean vote against public funding for abortion is allowed," Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) said Monday in a statement. He said last week that 40 Democrats could vote with him to oppose the legislation -- enough to derail the bill.

Earlier:
House Rules Cmte. Chairwoman Won't Say If She'll Allow Floor Vote to Strip Abortion Coverage from Obamacare
Dem. Rep. Bart Stupak: Obama Either "Misleading People" Or Uninformed on Abortion in Health-Care Bill
Senate Panel Keeps Subsidized Abortion Coverage in Health Care Bill
Gibbs Misleads on Abortion Funding in Health-Care Bills
Taxpayer-Funding of Abortion Doesn't Send Thrill up Chris Matthews's Leg

After advocating massive influxes of taxpayer money into blackholes like stimulus, bailouts for failed corporations, and universal health care, the New York Times editorial board is suddenly on a big fiscal responsibility kick:

Presidents, and those aspiring to be presidents, routinely promise to reform the defense procurement process. And defense contractors, their lobbyists and the military services routinely ensure that never happens.

This year has been refreshingly different. President Obama and his defense secretary, Robert Gates, have made a compelling case for ending weapons programs that significantly exceed their budgets or use limited tax dollars to buy more capability than the nation needs.

Russia simulates nuclear attacks against a key NATO ally, China declares their intention to weaponize space, Iran holds massive rallies outside the US embassy threatening to annihilate the Great Satan, North Korea announces that they'll be constructing more nuclear bombs, while the Taliban continue to make strong gains in rural Afghanistan. "More capability than the nation needs" indeed.

The fact is, the Times editorial board has little idea of how much defensive capability we need, as they've never been a credible or knowledgeable exponent of national security matters. In one breath they argue that cutting the F-22 was justified because the plane hasn't seen combat in Iraq or Afghanistan, in the next, they can barely contain their giddiness at the prospect of killing the V-22 Osprey, a valuable tilt-rotor aircraft that has been absolutely indispensable to quick-reaction Marine forces in both theaters of war. They say that military planners don't want more C-17 cargo jets, a mere month after Air Force officials laid out a very clear and convincing case for additional military airlift resources to support landlocked Afghanistan. They even go so far as to bring out the big guns, plucking lines directly from Obama's stump speeches in their support of killing "unproven" missile defense technologies.

This isn't a serious editorial. It's a dogmatic reiteration of the President's damaging proposals to drastically cut the military. Taking strategic cues from the New York Times would be like General Petraeus giving the Old Grey Lady journalistic advice . . . with the caveat that Petraeus is actually good at his craft.

Even if you're not generally a fan of the winning-by-losing theory, Republicans and conservatives really should be glad that conservative Doug Hoffman chased liberal Republican Dede Scozzafava from the field in New York's 23rd congressional district. Why's that?

First, Scozzafava couldn't have won in a two-way race anyway. She was a terrible candidate and more liberal than the Democrat. She would have depressed Republican turnout, and Owens would have won.

Second, Doug Hoffman's getting 45 percent of the vote while buried on the conservative party line of the ballot shows that Republicans could have won this race had the county chairs selected anyone--Hoffman included--who's acceptable to the Republican mainstream. Hoffman and the independent conservative groups backing him ran a good campaign to go from nothing to nearly winning. Hoffman still could have won this race on the conservative line had Scozzafava not endorsed Owens.

Third, ignore my first point and just imagine some crazy scenario in which Scozzafava had won this seat. What would have happened then? Her liberal record would have certainly prompted a bitter 2010 GOP primary that would have crippled the NRCC's and the RNC's ability to raise money. When it became apparent that she would lose, Scozzafava would almost certainly have pulled a Specter, as we had predicted a few weeks ago. A candidate willing to endorse a Democrat is more than capable of becoming a Democrat.

So thank Doug Hoffman for showing the GOP establishment that a conservative can win in upstate New York and for saving us from the disaster of Dede Scozzafava.

The White House followed CNN's cue today:

If you’re a foreign aid worker with twenty bucks to blow in Gaza City -- something, by the way, few Gazans can do on account of their being totally immiserated by Hamas -- you can buy this commemorative Richard Goldstone keffiyeh at the President Arafat souvenir shop. But you better act fast -- there are only fifty of them. Collectors’ items.

Remember that time in '08 when Brit Hume signed off in a huff and went home because Obama and Dems were destroying Republicans at the polls? Yeah, me neither.

But then, Fox isn't a "real" news organization, so no wonder MSNBC does things differently.

From the Los Angeles Times:

Democrats score congressional victories in California, New York
The GOP fares better in Virginia and New Jersey as both states elect Republican governors.

Almost everybody. Only three Republicans voted against the resolution, introduced by Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) and Howard Berman (D-CA). One of them, of course, was Ron Paul. But there were 33 members of the Democratic caucus who voted against the resolution condemning the anti-Israel, UN report. Another 22 members voted 'present.' Of those votes, 20 were Democrats and just two were Republicans. All told 53 Democrats refused to condemn the report and they were joined by just five Republicans. In other words, more than 92 percent of the anti-Israel, pro-Goldstone vote came from Democrats.

The roll call available here.

Feel free to have the New Jersey one made into a poster for your office door, a wallpaper for your computer, or a giant applique for your golf bag (the shape lends itself). I will not judge you. The Virginia one is more suitable for toaster cozies and rear-window graphics for your truck.

But the real fun is going to the interactive Washington Post map, and sliding that marker from '05 to '09 or '08 to '09, and watching the state get redder, especially in and around Hampton Roads and Northern Virginia. Click the map to go to the Post and give it a try. I improved the red in the version below to heighten your experience because the Post is begrudging us real red in favor of a muted color edging dangerously close to dusky rose. I have corrected that for you.

CNN is helpful for the White House this morning, offering this banner on its Politics page:

One CNN prominent analysis is, "This time, all politics was local" by left-leaning pollster Nate Silver. He leads with the Conservative Party loss in NY-23 (the fault of conservative activists for not understanding the moderate needs of the distirct, he says), moves on to New Jersey (solely the fault of Corzine for being lame), and finally comes to Virginia (Hmm, maybe there's a case that an 18-point win for a Republican in a state Obama carried a year after his election has something to do with Obama.)

Silver's a smart guy who's right about a lot of things, but leading with a Congressional race that speaks to an internal GOP struggle in a race of extenuating circumstances rather than two huge gubernatorial wins (one of them almost entirely unexpected in deep-blue New Jersey where Obama has been campaigning aggressively) betrays his bias. I think he's right about Owens' grasp of local issues over Hoffman's, but Scozzafava was not the responsible moderate alternative the media says she is.

But even the New York Times is having trouble papering over the implications. Conclusion: the magic is gone.

The results in the New Jersey and Virginia races underscored the difficulties Mr. Obama is having transforming his historic victory a year ago into either a sustained electoral advantage for Democrats or a commanding ideological position over conservatives in legislative battles.

The coalition that swept him into the White House was absent on Tuesday night, with evidence that the young, African-American and first-time voters who supported Mr. Obama failed to turn out to help the Democrats Mr. Obama had campaigned for: Gov. Jon S. Corzine in New Jersey and R. Creigh Deeds in Virginia. (There are no exit polls in the upstate Congressional race to provide demographic information on the electoral outcome.)

Independent voters who had flocked to Mr. Obama in Virginia and New Jersey last year shifted on Tuesday to the Republican candidates in both states, Christopher J. Christie in New Jersey and Robert F. McDonnell in Virginia, according to exit polls in both states. That is a swing that will certainly be noted by moderate Congressional Democrats facing re-election next year, who may now be more reluctant to support Mr. Obama on tough votes in Congress.

Let's take a minute to recall whether the Democratic campaigns in New Jersey and Virginia wanted voters to think they had anything to do with Obama. Those flashbacks to '08 are brought to you by the Democratic Party.

But DNC head Tim Kaine has this to say about those races that had absolutely nothing to do with Obama:

Kaine said that both Democratic hopefuls, Creigh Deeds and Jon Corzine, were strong candidates, but faced uphill battles. Both states tend to vote for the party that is not in power in the White House in their off-year gubernatorial elections. "It would have been historic if not unprecedented to win one or both of these races given historical trends,'' he said.

Kaine downplayed the notion that these races were a referendum on President Obama.
"These races turned on local and state issues and circumstances and on the candidates in each race - and despite what some will certainly claim - the results are not predictive of the future or reflective of the national mood or political environment,'' he said.

Indeed, a Republican winning statewide election in New Jersey for the first time in 12 years was utterly expected, Gov. Kaine.

The Washington Post also inexplicably finds an Obama angle on this election that had nothing to do with Obama. The front-page online headline: "GOP wins reveal cracks in Obama coalition":

Off-year elections can be notoriously unreliable as predictors of the future, but as a window on how the political landscape may have changed in the year since President Obama won the White House, Tuesday's Republican victories in Virginia and New Jersey delivered clear warnings for the Democrats.

Neither gubernatorial election amounted to a referendum on the president, but the changing shape of the electorates in both states and the shifts among key constituencies revealed cracks in the Obama 2008 coalition and demonstrated that, at this point, Republicans have the more energized constituency heading into next year's midterm elections.

The most significant change came among independent voters, who solidly backed Democrats in 2006 and 2008 but moved decisively to the Republicans on Tuesday, according to exit polls.

The AP is more upfront:

Voters nervous about the economy and fed up with the political establishment dominated the off-year elections, sending a strong message to President Barack Obama, who won the White House as a change agent but has himself become the face of political power and incumbency.

So, even though voters did not overwhelmingly identify Obama himself as the reason they voted for Republicans, Obama's first year in office has created a national environment wherein Independents he won overwhelmingly in '08 are voting Republican in even Northern Virginia and New Jersey. A year after the Republican party had allegedly become a rump, regional party of the Southeast, it's back to winning Loudoun County (which Obama carried with 60 percent) and New Jersey. The momentum from such wins in quintessentially purple Virginia is carrying down-ticket candidates to victories, thereby strengthening the GOP's hold on the state legislature by five or six seats, which will in turn ensure McDonnell's legislative agenda gets passed and Republicans redistrict in their best interests.

When you've got all that, who needs a referendum? Moderates in Congress will still look at the results, see the Democratic Party bleeding Independents, see that Obama's charm will not be able to save them from electoral disaster, and be nudged closer to opposing something like a gigantic, risky health-care reform package written by Nancy Pelosi.

More reax below the fold, including DCCC head Chris Van Hollen predictably finding lots of import in NY-23 and none in New Jersey or Virginia.

Update: CBS' Schieffer compared conservatives to McGovern. Larry King lauds the "defeat of the far right."

New Jersey and Virginia Follow Historical Trend, Democrat Captures NY 23 for First Time in More Than 100 Years after GOP Civil War Erupts Between Moderates and Conservatives

That's the headline on the statement from current Virginia governor and DNC chief Tim Kaine. It will also be the narrative the media pushes today, because if there's one historical trend that didn't change with yesterday's election it's the mindmeld between the Democratic party and the Washington press corps. But the McDonnell win is going to scare the heck out of the moderate Democrats in the South and Mountain West -- the same Democrats who gave that party its current majority. How could Democrats not look at radical right-wing extremist (see the Washington Post's 37 articles on his thesis) Bob McDonnell's crushing victory without feeling a sense of fear and impending doom.

The race in New Jersey is the real stunner, though. Corzine was a unpopular, but Chris Christie was no dream candidate. Yes, there are historical trends that helped Christie, but the 1994 Republican Revolution is part of that history, too. New Jersey is deep blue, and still a plausible Republican candidate was able to beat a weak Democratic incumbent. How many 2010 races will see a plausible Republican face off against a weak Dem incumbent? A whole bunch. Republicans are no longer toxic. This is change we can believe in.

The vote preserving marriage in Maine sends a clear message: Democrats will repeal DADT at their own peril.

In NY-23, it's a shame that Republicans, or conservatives, allowed expectations to get so out of hand. It's a tough loss. But then again, the Republican party couldn't have botched things any worse all the way from the local level where party hacks picked Scozzafava, to the national level where the NRCC and the RNC spent a small fortune on an atrocious candidate that the rank and file loathed. How many races can the party botch this badly in 2010? Certainly not more than few.

Republicans are in surprisingly good shape heading into 2010 and the Obama-Pelosi agenda is looking surprisingly shaky. The media and the Democrats can try to spin this any which way, but the bottom line is that Republicans have been able to capitalize on Democratic failures and pick themselves up off the floor after the twin massacres of 2006 and 2008. We're back, and we're every bit as extremely right-wing as we ever were!

Saranac Lake, N.Y.
With 92 percent of precincts reporting, Democrat Bill Owens claimed victory over conservative Doug Hoffman by a 49 percent to 45 percent margin. Republican Dede Scozzafava got six percent of the vote. Her name remained on the ballot though she dropped out of the race and endorsed the Democrat over the weekend--a move that may have been the decisive event that denied Hoffman a stunning upset Tuesday night. "The one you've got to credit with this win for Owens is [New York Democratic Party executive director] June O'Neill," says Watertown mayor and Hoffman supporter Jeff Graham. "She brokered the deal to get [Scozzafava] out and then made her into a victim--got all her endorsements and labor stuff. It probably made the difference in the end."

The county-by-county election returns seem to support Graham's take. John McCain won Jefferson county in 2008 despite losing the entire congressional district by 5 points, but Hoffman lost the county--represented by Scozzafava in the state assembly--49 percent to 46 percent. According to the Cook Political Report's David Wasserman, Hoffman's performance in this county and another represented by Scozzafava "demonstrated that Dede Scozzafava's base of supporters turned to Owens in sizeable numbers." He added: "It helped that the local paper, the Watertown Daily Times, embarked on a crusade against Hoffman late in the race."

Another factor that contributed to Hoffman's loss was that his name was buried on the ballot (see here). Watertown's Mayor Graham says that "coming off line D, it became increasingly difficult to get out of the 40s"--i.e. in the forty-percent range. "When you think about it, when you go from nothing--a guy on the street--to 46 on a minor party line is pretty good in a way, but making a statement doesn't really compare to winning."

David Wasserman noted that the factor "probably the most overlooked by Washington, was that scores of competitive local races drove turnout in town after town across the district. The voters who showed up to vote for town council, county sheriff, or highway supervisor weren't the energized base of Hoffman believers that pollsters saw." These voters were much more likely to vote for a major party candidate.

And so Doug Hoffman came up short--at least for now. A couple weeks ago, he told me that that regardless of tonight's outcome: "I will run in the Republican primary" in 2010. It remains to be seen if Hoffman is up for another intense 12 months of running for office, but he would probably have a better shot of winning if he runs on both the Republican and conservative party lines.

During his concession speech, he certainly sounded like he wasn't going to let this loss be his only foray into electoral politics. "This one was worth the fight," he told his supporters. "And it’s only one fight in the battle, and we have to keep fighting."

With 87 percent of precincts reporting, Maine voters are rejecting the legislature's enactment of gay marriage by a 53 percent to 47 percent margin.

Saranac Lake, N.Y.
With 19 percent of precincts reporting, Democrat Bill Owens is leading conservative Doug Hoffman 51 percent to 44 percent.

NewzJunky.com has links to county by county election returns. It's way too early to call, and we don't know what particular wards in each county are reporting, but if Owens maintains his current county-by-county margins, he should pull off a victory.

The Cook Political Report's David Wasserman, who's sitting here at the Hotel Saranac, observes that the mood among Hoffman's supporters has shifted from "popping corks to popping pills."

Update: Doug Hoffman just conceded and Bill Owens is delivering his victory speech. More on why Hoffman lost later.

Politico and AP are calling it for Christie, 49-43.

The final tally on the House resolution condemning the report by Judge Richard Goldstone alleging war crimes by Israeli forces in Gaza is a lopsided 344 to 36 -- as it should be. Normally nothing much would be made of these numbers, but this vote, coming so quickly on the heels of J Street's inaugural conference, was seen as something of a test for the group, which is about the only Jewish organization on the planet that has refused to condemn Goldstone and which put out a statement opposing the resolution in the House. (One of J Street's founders went so far as to help Goldstone write a letter of protest to members of Congresss.)

Ultimately, J Street was able to get more members of Congress to show up at the group's gala dinner last week than to actually support its ludicrous positions on the Arab-Israeli conflict. Friends of Israel can take heart in the fact that J Street has no ability to move votes in Congress. And yet the group sent out a fundraising pitch today headlined "We are winning." Winning what, supporters of the group might ask.

Republicans can be pleased that the bulk of the 36 votes against came from Democrats -- only three Republicans voted against the resolution, which is two more than J Street could turn out for their conference.

Nothing on the big picture, but the internals are fair game.

In Virginia and New Jersey, the No. 1 issue is unsurprisingly economy and jobs:

The economy and jobs are the number on issue on the minds of voters in Virginia, according to data from CNN exit polls Tuesday.

Forty-six percent of Virginian voting Tuesday, as Republican Bob McDonnell and Democrat Creigh Deeds faced off for the governor's mansion, say that the economy and jobs are the most important issue to their vote. One in four indicate that health care reform is their most pressing issue, 14 percent said taxes were upmost on their minds, and 8 percent suggest that transportation woes were most pressing.

New Jersey:

Nearly a third of the voters heading to the polls in this off-year election pitting Democratic Gov. John Corzine against Republican Chris Christie, 31 percent, said the economy was the most important issue, while 26 percent said property taxes, 20 percent indicated corruption and 18 percent identified health care.

Soaring property taxes and a high profile corruption sting that snared state and local officials have been important issues in this year's election.

Both New Jersey and Virginia polls suggest Obama is less of a factor than he was expected to be:

The early exit polls in Virginia and New Jersey are in (out?) and the most striking thing to us in the data is that a majority of voters in both states said that President Barack Obama was not a factor in their vote and in each state the chief executive's job approval rating was above 50 percent.

While these are early returns -- we CAN'T emphasize that strongly enough -- they do suggest that Obama's role in determining the outcome of either race (for good or bad) may have been overstated (gasp!) in the run-up to today's vote.

It'll certainly help the White House out with a talking point.

By all accounts, things are very close in New Jersey, to the point that Democratic strategist Pat Caddell wonders, "Will Christie's lead be steal-proof?"

Mike Murphy on N.J. exits: "Early, and totally incomplete, NJ exits show Christie's issues big. Good sign."

Gibbs says no vaccine for detainees.

Pentagon to Gibbs: You lie!

Bear kills two militants in Kashmir.

DC cabbies are backing McChrystal.

Obama administration now actively appeasing the Burmese junta.

J Street poet: "I am not a Zionist"

Harvard boasts the largest number of MoH recipients outside of the service academies.

Good piece in the New York Times (!) on ROTC at the Ivies.

Fred Barnes, in the Wall Street Journal today, laments the Obamacare push for sweeping change of the health-care industry, which is happening despite wide and vociferous public opposition and in spite of Washington tradition. Passing it won't stop the opposition, he said:

Opposition to ObamaCare is not limited to conservatives and Republicans. Independents have increasingly turned against liberal-style health reform. On Oct. 8, Gallup reported "one of the largest declines in support" for ObamaCare was among independents, falling in one month from 37% to 26%. On Oct. 21, Gallup said that by nearly 2 to 1 (36% to 19%) independents predicted they'd oppose the final health-care reform bill to come out of Congress. Even the undecided are skeptical. "In general, Americans who are undecided on health care legislation predict it is more likely to make their own situations worse rather than better, especially in terms of cost," Gallup said on Oct. 22...

Only once in recent decades has Congress inadvertently prompted a protest so formidable that it had to reverse itself almost overnight. In 1988, it passed the Medicare Catastrophic Coverage Act to protect seniors against ruinous medical costs. Fees paid by middle- and upper-income seniors were to finance the program.

Seniors rebelled because they were required to pay too much, on a means-tested basis, for coverage that would disproportionately help others and because it didn't have what they actually wanted, long-term health-care benefits. The following year the law was repealed.

The furious reaction to unwanted Medicare coverage, which included seniors climbing on the car of then-House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dan Rostenkowski, is a preview of the eruption of public outrage that would greet the signing of ObamaCare into law...

This is a situation where the longstanding rule of waiting for popular support and bipartisan backing should apply.

Watertown, N.Y.
At a local municipal building in downtown Watertown, a steady stream of voters trickles in throughout the lunch hour. An election worker tells me that voter turnout is “excellent” for a non-presidential year. Outside the building, retired nurse Bette Hartzel is bundled up in a purple parka and pink gloves on this blustery, sunny day, clutching a plastic grocery bag filled with Doug Hoffman campaign literature.

"I liked him immediately," Hartzel says of her first meeting with Hoffman two months ago at a campaign event. "He's awkward, but he is sincere, and there are so few sincere people in politics." Indeed, Hoffman doesn’t come across as a smooth politician, which is a big part of his appeal. When he tries to crack a joke or two on the stump—see the end of this video of last night’s event—he’s a little awkward yet very endearing.

A certified public accountant, Hoffman talks about how he had never thought of running for office until he became “fed up” with Obama’s agenda in Washington. "We have a long tradition in this country of people coming out of the fields, out of the stores, saying I haven't run for anything. I don't like the direction my country's going in,” Fred Thompson said at last night’s rally. That "spirit is personified in this man," Thompson continued.

Hoffman speaks softly and chooses his words carefully. Though he campaigns as a conservative opposed to Obamacare, rising taxes, and runaway spending, Hoffman doesn’t want to cancel the stimulus entirely, but he does want to redirect some funds to “job credits.” He hardly fits the DNC-MSNBC caricature of the angry ideologue.

Harry Reid says he's "not going to be bound by any time-lines," when asked if health care reform can be completed by Christmas. Depending on the results tonight, Blue Dogs may get a frightful glimpse of what their own races will look like in 2010, and the polling on health care reform -- the numbers are tanking. Per a release from McConnell's office:

Interesting CNN poll out today (taken October 30-Nov. 1; MoE is 3). It shows that, in the CNN poll at least, the numbers are back where there were in August -- particularly on health care -- at the height of the town hall season.

The President is upside-down on his handling of health care, the economy, Iraq, Afghanistan, taxes, immigration, unemployment, and the deficit.

• 42 percent approve of his handling of health care (a nine-point drop since September) while a record 57 percent disapprove (up 10 since September’s poll)

• These numbers are even worse than where they were in August (44-53)

• 47 percent support his handling of Medicare, tied with his August rating of 46

• His job approval rating (54-45) is tied with his August low of 53-45 in the CNN poll

Because I'm a cynic (at least about New Jersey), I tend to think New Jersey will either go to Democrats today, or be close enough to steal (especially considering they're already amassing emergency ballots). Nonetheless, let's look at the bright side for a moment. It's that kind of day.

Jim Geraghty has turn-out numbers in morning voting that look better for Christie than Corzine:

A trusted source tells me that as of noon, total turnout in the GOP the swing districts in NJ is significantly outpacing turnout in Democrat districts. The turnout ratio is not quite two to one, but it's not that far from it.

Now, this should NOT be interpreted as ipso facto evidence that Chris Christie is going to win. Democratic districts may have more voters show up later in the day. This isn't an exit poll, and we have no idea how the folks in any of these districts are voting; we just know that they're showing up and voting.

More specifics, but while promising, the trend doesn't hold across the whole state:

The two heaviest turnout counties are Hunterdon, which McCain carried by 13.3 percent over Barack Obama, and Morris County, which McCain carried by 8.1 percent.

Incidentally, turn-out is the No. 1 thing to look for in New Jersey today, per Politico:

Both campaigns and independent observers expect turnout statewide to be about 48 percent to 49 percent. That means at or just above 2.3 million votes.

If it’s less than that, Corzine could be in trouble as it will most likely mean unhappy, or just plain uninterested, Democrats are staying home.

“If turnout dips below 47 percent, it’s minorities not showing up,” said Monmouth University pollster Patrick Murray.

To win, Corzine also needs to push the percentage of the electorate that is made up of minority groups above 20 percent.

NJ.com confirms the morning trend, but the after-work crowd is still to come:

"All the feedback I've gotten so far is that not only is it not like last year, but even with the gubernatorial election, we're not getting a big turnout," said Jerry Midgette, the administrator for the Somerset County Board of Elections.

Daggett's unfortunate ballot placement will make him a less-formidable third-party candidate than he might have been. If he's going to siphon off right-leaning votes, those voters are gonna have to search for him:

In Somerset County, his name is on the far right-hand side of the ballot in the first row of the seventh column.

In Morris County, he’s just a little to the left — in the first row of column six.

Middlesex has him more in the middle on the first row of Column D.

On a Hunterdon County ballot, he’s third from the bottom in Column 1, Row 10.

And in Essex, you’ll find him in the fourth row of the second column.

Bottom line is this: Anyone who wants to vote for independent gubernatorial candidate Christopher Daggett in Tuesday’s election is going to have to rummage through a crowded ballot to find him.

The trade markets, however, are going 52 percent for Corzine. Intrade also has Hoffman at 81, which seems a bit overblown to me, and McDonnell at 99.

The Eurasia Daily Monitor reports:

The French government and, apparently, the Élysée Palace are moving fast to sell at least one Mistral-class helicopter carrier to Russia, possibly for deployment in the Black Sea. Such a sale would endow Russia with a modern naval and amphibious warfare capability that Russia currently lacks. The Mistral is by definition a power-projection capability and it can be deployed for intimidating effect on Russia’s maritime neighbors.

Less than two months ago the Russian Navy's Commander-in-Chief, Admiral Vladimir Vysotskiy, had announced Moscow’s intention to buy a Mistral-class helicopter carrier from France and the license to build several ships of this class in Russia. He also hinted at possible Russian deployment of this capability to meet contingencies in the Black Sea: “In the conflict in August last year [against Georgia], a ship like that would have allowed [Russia’s] Black Sea Fleet to accomplish its mission in 40 minutes, not 26 hours which is how long it took us [to land the troops ashore].”...

French authorities ignore warnings such as that of Sorbonne professor Francoise Thom: “Is it wise to arm a country that has just dismembered a neighboring state, Georgia, and no longer conceals its intentions to restore, by force if necessary, its hegemony in the ex-Soviet space? Is France, in the name of its ‘strategic partnership’ with Russia, closing its eyes to Russian preparations for future wars of aggression, which will become possible once Russia’s military reform, launched in September 2008, will have borne fruit? We must not be deluded into selling offensive armaments to Russia."

As Noonan explained earlier today, "This is how Putin operates. He messages with force." And by the way, the geniuses behind our new missile defense posture have traded missile sites in Poland, a NATO member, for sea-based missile defense that will be heavily dependent on access to the Black Sea. So, it's more than a little troubling that the Russians are now moving to rapidly upgrade their capabilities in the very same region. And our friends in Georgia must be delighted that the Russians plan to put additional assets along a shoreline that is starting to look like the powderkeg equivalent of Belgrade in 1913.

Is this the smart power dividend? Paris and the Kremlin working in perfect harmony to threaten U.S. interests?

Tara O’Toole is a name most Americans have never heard before, but on Capitol Hill, she's causing a lot of problems for Jack Murtha and Harry Reid.

O’Toole has been nominated for a senior post at the Department of Homeland Security, specifically the Under Secretary for the Science and Technology Directorate. In the bio-security field this is a critically important job that has a huge impact on the people who manufacture, store, and distribute the vaccines that would protect us from a bio-attack (and hopefully these people are more competent than the administration officials overseeing the distribution of H1N1 vaccines). Of course, given this administration's track record, one can hardly assume that the person nominated for this job was thoroughly vetted to ensure she is both qualified and free from any conflict of interest.

O'Toole has conflict of interest in spades. She has close connections to the scandal plagued and ethically challenged John Murtha. As the Washington Post recently reported, “Nearly half the members of a powerful House subcommittee in control of Pentagon spending are under scrutiny by ethics investigators in Congress, who have trained their lens on the relationships between seven panel members and an influential lobbying firm founded by a former Capitol Hill aide. The investigations by two separate ethics offices include an examination of the chairman of the Appropriations subcommittee on defense, John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), as well as others who helped steer federal funds to clients of the PMA Group.”

According to DHS’s press release announcing the O’Toole nomination, she is “founder of the Center for Biosecurity at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, where she currently serves [as] CEO and Director.” Murtha has taken a special interest in the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center or UPMC, as the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reports,

“University of Pittsburgh Medical Center CEO Jeffrey Romoff is expected to propose that his health system create and run the world's leading facility for manufacturing vaccines by 2013, potentially a $1 billion venture … UPMC worked on its proposal for a public-private partnership for several years, according to Rep. John Murtha's office. Murtha, D-Johnstown, chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, held hearings and consulted with UPMC on the need to increase vaccine capacity in the United States. At a hearing Murtha called in Washington last year, officials testified a public-private partnership, possibly with an academic institution, could be a viable option that likely would cost several billion dollars.”

But the connections don’t end there. Not only is the Center for Biosecurity run by O’Toole and a handful of Murtha cronies, but the same day O’Toole made a generous contribution to . . . you guessed it, Jack Murtha, so did a bunch of other folks at UPMC totaling more than $30,000.00.

This ought to raise some red flags. We have a nominee for a national security job tied to a congressman who is very interested in the institution she’s involved in, while that same institution is positioning itself for “billions” in government contracts. And the folks at that same institution are closely tied to this same ethically-challenged Member of Congress and have given him significant sums of money.

But that isn’t even the whole story. According to a report in the Washington Times,

“President Obama’s nominee at the Department of Homeland Security overseeing bioterrorism defense has served as a key adviser for a lobbying group funded by the pharmaceutical industry that has asked the government to spend more money for anthrax vaccines and biodefense research. But Dr. Tara O'Toole, whose confirmation as undersecretary of science and technology is pending, never reported her involvement with the lobbying group called the Alliance for Biosecurity in a recent government ethics filing.”

Seriously? So, in addition to being tied to a corrupt Congressman she failed to report lobbying the very industry she is now going to have a significant amount of sway over?

The Obama administration is, understandably, getting a little anxious to see their ethically-challenged nominee confirmed, so who do they lean on? The Senate Majority Leader, of course. Last week Reid went out and complained that the “President nominated someone highly experienced” and Republicans are “stalling President Obama’s nominees for months on end.”

Oh, and one more thing: this highly regarded nominee happened to have been a member of a group that “described itself as Marxist.” So if O'Toole doesn't get confirmed, she at least has all the qualifications for a czar position.

Update: A few months back the Danger Room provided more background on why O'Toole is such an atrocious pick.

The Virginia governor's race has a history of going to the candidate of the party out of power, so a McDonnell win there is not as big a win as a Christie win in New Jersey would be, but the sheer dominance of McDonnell in this race— in almost all demographic groups, on almost all issues, and on energy, tone, and style, where the Obama influence should have lifted Deeds—utterly refute the idea that Obama was able to move the state from red to blue for the long haul. And further, that smart Republican candidates are learning lessons from 2008, and adopting practices to capitalize on the political climate.

In a reversal of last year, it will be the energy of the Republican electorate, right-leaning Independents, and McDonnell's campaign this year that likely will lift Republican down-ticket candidates to wins. PPP reported numbers that portend a sweep for Republicans in the gubernatorial, Lt. Governor (Bill Bolling), and Attorney General (Ken Cuccinelli) races.

Given all that, it's not surprising the Obama White House has been going to great lengths to distance itself from the Deeds campaign even as Obama was doing a rally in Norfolk for the Bath Democrat.

For his part, Deeds says he didn't push the president away:

Virginia Democratic gubernatorial nominee Creigh Deeds said Monday that he hadn’t distanced himself from President Obama, even as senior Democrats in the state complained about the difficult political winds blowing in from across the Potomac River.

“I absolutely did not push the president away,” Deeds said before addressing a vote-rich retirement community in the northern Virginia suburb of Springfield.

Just two data points while you're listening to Democrats say this race had absolutely nothing to do with the president. 1) This mailer:

And, this TV ad. Now, let's play a little game called, "Find Creigh Deeds in his own ads:"

Good luck! It may take a while. The bottom line is Deeds and Obama asked Virginia to elect a Democrat just because they did it last year. And, Virginians are probably going to say, "no thanks" three times over.

Update: And, another one for you. "Stand With President Obama" in this election that has nothing to do with Obama.

According to a release this morning from Judicial Watch, the most recent CIA docu-dump regarding its detainee interrogation program turns up a couple of new nuggets showing just how vital this program was to national security. JW highlights the CIA’s official confirmation of what many have known for a long time: "Detainee reporting accounts for more than half of all HUMINT reporting on al-Qa'ida since the program began..."

Further, the newly released June 1, 2005 and the July 12, 2005 reports reached the same conclusion as the previously released June 3, 2005 report:

"One of the gains to detaining the additional terrorists has been the thwarting of a number of al-Qa'ida operations in the United States and overseas."

JW’s president, Tom Fitton succinctly summarizes these findings in his release,

"All of these CIA documents come to the same conclusion: Detainee interrogations are effective and have helped save lives in the United States and overseas,’ said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. ‘The Obama administration initially attempted to conceal the effectiveness of detainee interrogations by cherry picking documents to support its view on the interrogation program. We're pleased we have been able to provide the American people with more of the truth about the effectiveness of terrorist detainee interrogations."

So rock and roll really did save the world.

HT: Keep America Safe

One of two women pleads out in an altercation they started with a 69-year-old pro-life activist:

The case began when the two women approached anti-abortion advocate Johnny Wallace, 69. Wallace had been standing in front of City Hall with a billboard sign espousing his views on abortion.

Witnesses told police that the two women approached Wallace and began to try to take and destroy the sign he was holding. Wallace had to physically restrain the women. Minor injuries were reported.

Oh, and remember the wall-to-wall coverage the media gave the possible political motivations of the shooter who fired at Lou Dobbs' house? And, the imminent destruction of this great country by his ilk? Yeah, I don't either.

But there were some nifty late-night jokes about the politically-motivated shooting of a news anchor's house. Har-dee-har, right? First, the "Lou Dobbs is a RAAAAACIST, so it's funny when he gets shot at" approach:

"Now everybody's fine, but CNN's Lou Dobbs recently had to call the police because someone fired shots at his home. Yeah. Dobbs said he didn't see or hear the shooter, but described him as Hispanic." –Conan O'Brien

Then, the "Come on, isn't he kind of asking for it with his political views" approach:

Fallon:CNNs Lou Dobbs sez shots were fired at his home recently.Good news: Police have narrowed down the suspects to 1 of 50 million Latinos

Ha, almost as funny as a couple of women attacking an elderly man for carrying a sign! Laugh riot, that.

The timing here is beautiful. The exercises reportedly transpired during the 70th anniversary of the Russian invasion of Poland... also the same day that President Obama killed plans for Polish based missile defense.

The [Russian] armed forces are said to have carried out "war games" in which nuclear missiles were fired and troops practised an amphibious landing on the country's coast. Documents obtained by Wprost, one of Poland's leading news magazines, said the exercise was carried out in conjunction with soldiers from Belarus.

Russian general says Poland a nuclear 'target' The manoeuvres are thought to have been held in September and involved about 13,000 Russian and Belarusian troops.

Poland, which has strained relations with both countries, was cast as the "potential aggressor".

Poland is scared, and for good reason. After decades of repressive Soviet occupation, the Poles invested everything in tightened defensive ties with NATO and the United States. Now the Russian Bear is once again pounding down their door, and -- after Poland loyally committed whole battalions to both Afghanistan and Iraq -- America is nowhere to be seen.

This is how Putin operates. He messages with force. These exercises could have been held anywhere in Russia's yawing territorial expanse. Poland was chosen with reason, as it serves as a bulwark of freedom and Western values in an area Russia still considers its own. It's also a response to the recent Georgian-NATO war games that so infuriated Moscow.

Obama must respond. His reset button silliness and his decision to axe missile defense has the Russians drooling at our weakness. We can't afford to allow Putin to bully another ally, like Georgia, into submission -- NATO is weak enough as it is. Now is the time to reaffirm our allegiance to our Polish friends, and nip Moscow's neo-expansionism in the bud. Hold a large scale NATO exercise on Polish territory, move one of our Air Force bases into eastern Poland, up our naval activity in the Baltic Sea -- anything that communicates to Putin that, despite recent fraying, we still take the NATO alliance seriously.

Today the National (UAE) published a story entitled, “Obama betrays hope created by Cairo speech.” As the Arab press turns against Obama, can it safely be concluded that the administration’s first foray into the arena of Israel-Palestine peace-making has failed? Two of the major prongs were the Cairo speech and the demand for a full settlement freeze. These together were designed to paint the current U.S. administration as an even-handed broker and show a sharp departure from the Bush administration. A full settlement freeze, including natural growth and settlement construction in Jerusalem, is something that was never politically feasible in Israel, least of all under the current government. That did not, however, stop Abu Mazen from following the Obama administration and coming out in support of it as a precondition for negotiations. Now, as the administration backtracks Abu Mazen is once again left out in the cold to deal with the harsh realities of Palestinian politics.

The demand for a full settlement freeze also did not stop Israelis from coming to the conclusion that the current administration is not acting in Israel’s interests. President Obama’s poor polling numbers in Israel show that Israelis simply do not trust him. The support of the Israeli public would have been crucial in making progress since any proposal would have required Israel to take risks that might compromise its security.

As we enter Palestinian election season, it has become clear that we are today unfortunately further from peace than we were on January 19th.

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) previews the spin on Fox, when asked about Obama's participation in the Deeds campaign in Virginia:

"Obama wasn't in Virginia this weekend, or even recently."

Except for that time five days ago.

Oops, did we say it was an $800 billion bill? It's $1.2 trillion.

If complaining makes you smarter, no wonder Obama won a Nobel!

Scandal watch at the NYT.

Meet your new health-care disincentives.

Iowa, a year later: "All my Republican friends — and independents — are sitting back saying, ‘Oh, what did we do?”

Video: Fineman to Chris Matthews: "Of course Obama is much smarter than us!"

New White House florist scoops White House announcement with her posting on Facebook.

More hanging with the stars for the Obama administration: "President Barack Obama has tapped a roster of Hollywood headliners for the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities, among them actresses Sarah Jessica Parker, Kerry Washington and Alfre Woodard and actors Edward Norton and Forest Whitaker."

"Translation: Lieberman remains a threat to filibuster the Senate health-care bill, if it contains a public option."

Sesame Street joins war against Fox News.

Awesome: WaPo editor who punched colleague complains newsrooms are full of new-agey liberal wimps. Where was this perspective when the WaPo was hand-wringing about yelling at town halls?

The virtues of ignoring the conventional wisdom.

There's a very interesting Rasmussen poll out today: 49 percent of Americans now blame George W. Bush for our economic troubles, 45 percent blame President Obama.

For the last several months, that number has hovered roughly at 55 percent blaming Bush, 35 percent Obama.

This could be a big moment. The bursting of the housing bubble, the financial meltdown, and the economic recession--all of this constituted by far the heaviest monkey on the GOP's back going into 2009. If voters -- one year after punishing Republicans at the polls in 2008 -- have decided to move on, then the GOP now faces a reasonably even political playing field -- as tonight's results will probably demonstrate.

Election day 1993 marked the end of the first Bush hangover. Election day 2009 could be America's second Bush Bloody Mary moment (so to speak).

And we'd have a new rule of American politics: Bush hangovers last one year.

John Noonan commented that President Obama campaigned on a promise not to "militarize" space, but that was always a specious objective.

Space has been militarized almost from the moment man was able to place objects into space. Ballistic missiles traverse space on their way to their targets. Satellites fulfill a variety of critical military functions from space, including communications, surveillance, early warning, navigation and target acquisition. U.S. and Western military forces are totally reliant upon space-based systems and would be crippled if they were in any way disrupted or destroyed. The effect of losing communications satellites is obvious. Less obvious would be the impact of disrupting the Global Positioning System.

While our aircraft, ships and ground forces could probably revert to terrestrial modes of navigation, the loss of GPS would also disrupt our tactical communications, since both the new Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS) and older SINCGARS radios rely on GPS for signal timing and synchronization. Loss of our surveillance satellites would blind our deployed forces and leave us vulnerable to surprise attack. Even the loss of our meteorological satellites would have serious consequences, not just for the military but for our society in general (compare hurricane death tolls before and after the advent of weather satellites).

Space represents high ground, and high ground has always had inherent military value. The army on the hill can see behind the lines of the enemy in the valley, observe its movements and direct fire against it. The enemy in the valley has only two options, if it wants to prevent that: take the hill, or bring enough fire down on it to make the enemy leave. The same phenomenon occurred when man took to the air. As early as the Civil War, tethered observation balloons were being used by both sides to observe enemy troop movements and map positions; and both sides quickly turned their artillery on the balloons in an attempt to prevent them from doing this. Balloons served a similar function in World War I, and quickly became prime targets in their own right.

The airplane was first used in war as an observation platform. Being self-propelled, they had more flexibility than balloons and could roam all over the battlefield. This prompted some of the first military pilots to take pistols and rifles up in their planes to shoot at the enemy's observation planes. Soon, observation planes on both sides were armed with machine guns for self defense, while specialized "pursuit" aircraft were developed with greater speed and maneuverability to intercept and shoot down observation planes -- which were soon escorted by pursuit planes for their own protection. Thus, warfare came to the skies through an inexorable yet logical cycle of development.

It is foolish to think that space would somehow be exempt from this same process, for space power is simply an extension of air power. In war, our adversaries, knowing our reliance upon space systems, would be foolish not to attempt, right at the beginning of a conflict, to destroy or neutralize our space systems. We, for our part, would be stupid to allow an adversary with military surveillance satellites to peer down at will upon our forces, or to take advantage of secure satellite communications, or to exploit precision satellite navigation systems. The spiral of offense and defense will exert itself, as they attempt to shoot down, blind or jam our satellites, and we attempt to do the same to theirs. Defensive countermeasures would be employed, first on an ad hoc, then on a more systematic basis.

As John Noonan notes, some of these might be passive defenses, such as dispersion of capabilities into "swarms" of low-cost micro-satellites, or maneuvering satellites to avoid interception or -- to make the enemy's task more difficult -- moving satellites into higher orbits.

But all of these options will be expensive and take time to deploy. Satellites in low earth orbit (LEO), such as our imaging surveillance satellites, are the most vulnerable, because they can be intercepted by something as simple as a ballistic missile lofting a keg of nails into its flight path. Maneuvering the satellite would make its orbit less predictable, but every maneuver burns up fuel that is needed to keep the satellite in orbit. Moving the satellites out to geosynchronous orbit (GEO) would offer a number of benefits in addition to enhancing survivability. Present satellites can only observe a given spot on the earth for a few minutes each day, while one in GEO can stare at a given spot 24/7 -- the kind of "persistent" surveillance that is so useful in low intensity warfare. But nothing is free: the resolution of the cameras on surveillance satellites is a factor of altitude and aperture size. Moving our surveillance satellites from LEO to GEO will require the development of very large mirrors which cannot fit inside the satellite (as is presently the case), but which must be unfolded like an umbrella once the satellite is on station. This represents a whole set of technical challenges that will take years to resolve (much of the research is being done under the aegis of NASA's next generation space telescope programs).

For this reason, it will be necessary for the U.S. to continue developing robust offensive space capabilities, such as ASAT interceptors; "fighter" satellites that could protect our vulnerable satellites from enemy ASATs; and ground-based anti-satellite lasers to blind enemy surveillance satellites. Again, this is going to take time and money, but not doing so is to cede the high ground to potential adversaries.

But, before any of this can happen, the U.S. has to get its military satellite programs under control. Practically every new satellite system is years behind schedule and billions over budget. Most of the blame can be ascribed to the loss of experienced space program management personnel who have retired and not been replaced, forcing the military to rely on space system contractors to serve as "lead systems integrators" -- the people who build the satellites are also the ones who manage the program on behalf of the government. The results should have been expected. The military compounded the problem by attempting to inject "competition" and "innovation" into its space programs during the last decade or so. Entrenched incumbents with many years of experience were displaced by newcomers who tended to over-promise on capabilities while low-balling costs. Since nobody remaining on the government side had the experience to provide a sanity check, the disconnect between what was promised and what could be delivered within the schedule and budget was discovered only after the fact, placing the military in the position of either backing off on requirements or pumping more money into the program in the hope that the contractor could fix the problem. But space is an unforgiving environment, in which one learns only by making costly mistakes. Hence, the U.S. will be saddled for years with aging and obsolescent space systems while its new programs play catch-up.

Watertown, N.Y.
On Monday night at the agricultural society exhibition hall in town, former Senator Fred Thompson and conservative congressional candidate Doug Hoffman held a rally that appeared to be at least 50 percent larger than Joe Biden's and Democratic candidate Bill Owens's rally this morning (the New York Times notes the Thompson-Hoffman crowd was "significantly larger" than Biden's). To be fair, Thompson and Hoffman did have the advantage of having popular country singer John Rich at their rally.

The race remains tight according to the latest poll, and the mood among supporters was hopeful. Fred Thompson even got a little cocky at one point. "You know, the vice president's job is to attend funerals," Thompson said of Biden's visit this morning. "Maybe he came a day early."

Hoffman kept his remarks brief, focusing on his message of reining in spending and taxes, supporting the troops and the local Ft. Drum, and stopping Nancy Pelosi's agenda. Hoffman told a local TV channel after the event finished that he's "cautiously optimistic" about his chances of winning.

If you're looking for a reason to be pessimistic, remember that it's very difficult to predict turnout, so the polls might not be all that reliable. And ballot placement won't exactly help the conservative who gets one of the five party lines (see a sample here).

So, the Democrats seem to have decided the best use of at least some of their resources, in a tight race, is to throw some cash into the third-party Daggett campaign. When you're running a dirty-trick robocall, the tagline with the address of the Democratic HQ is a giveaway. Audio:

A New Jersey blog, More Monmouth Musings, also finds:

The calls, which are coming from 866-519-9370, end with a disclosure, "paid for by....a project of the NJSDC."

A Google search of the phone number reveals that it was used for Democratic robo calls by Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley during the days before last year's election.

Update: Democrats now admit it, after having denied it yesterday.

Goldfarb notes that the Chinese are eyeing space supremacy in the same manner that the US and Soviet Union eyed air supremacy post-WWII. China's determination to militarize space has been evident since they shot down an aging satellite in 2007, or at least evident to everyone except President Obama, who has already cut billions of dollars worth of military space systems.

The president pledged during the campaign not to weaponize space. That's a noble enough goal, but he's using it as a pretext to cut defensive space systems in general. Space defense isn't simple enough to be broken down into "weaponized space" or "peaceful space." Space superiority is broken down into three strategic concepts: offensive counterspace, defensive counterspace, and space situational awareness. Obama is obviously referring to offensive doctrines, but what has he done to secure our satellite fleets against foreign threats, i.e defensive counterspace?

There's a myriad of peaceful options at the president's disposal: disperse military communication satellites into a large fleet of triple-redundant birds, build satellites with ASAT detection capabilities and emergency maneuverability options, and -- in one of the cooler proposals I've heard -- convert our old MX missile force into an emergency satellite booster force, able to put a replacement bird in orbit in hours. Unfortunately, like most other 21st century threats, space just isn't something the White House is treating with the proper level of respect (or resourcing).

Unfortunately, this only provides our adversaries with greater incentive to invest their own, more limited resources in the fight for space supremacy.

Not so hot, according to today’s Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Mahmoud Abbas’s official newspaper (translation by Palestinian Media Watch), which asks, among other things, “Why, Mrs. Hillary? How much did the Zionists pay you as a bribe?” and, just in case anybody has any illusions about the beliefs of our Palestinian "partners for peace," the paper prints this cartoon, straight out of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

The PA should rest assured, however, that Hillary's taking it all back in Marrakech, where she's reverted to form:

“The Obama administration position on settlements is clear, unequivocal, it has not changed. As the president has said on many occasions, the United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements."

They just cannot figure out which side it is better to appease.

Which is more uncivil and damaging to the very fabric of the Republic?

Michelle Malkin's politely worded e-mail of inquiry to a pro-Obama activist, which warranted A-1 hand-wringing from the Washington Post?

Or, a newsroom environment where reporters call their editors [expletives that are too dirty to even shorten or suggest on a family blog such as this one] and their editors proceed to tackle them and punch them.

Now, I am someone who believes American newsrooms might actually be better off if they were more often populated by 70-year-old Marines who have thrown and taken a few punches in their lives than exclusively populated by farmers' market-shopping, foodie wunderkind health-bloggers, so I won't judge them too much for one lil' ol' punch. (Although, I will flag the reason for coming to blows, which seems to have been that an old-school editor—Henry Allen— was "seething over the lost art of long-form journalism." Gag.)

But the real problem is the civility police at the Post, who have been fretting over the rather mild protesting of conservatives all year, have no editor for the Motes and Beams Desk. Maybe if they did, he could add this quiz to the Kids Post this week.

Watertown, N.Y.
At rally for Democratic congressional candidate Bill Owens this morning, Vice President Joe Biden attacked conservative Doug Hoffman as the lackey of national conservatives, whom Biden blamed for causing this "God awful recession." It's hard to imagine Hoffman being able "to take issue with any issue Rush Limbaugh took. I'm being serious about this. I'm being deadly honest about it," Biden said. "I surely know what they're against, but I don't know what they're for," he said later of Republicans and Hoffman, "but I suspect I know what they're for because I know what Bush and Cheney were for."

There are signs that Biden may be a toothless attack dog. He was only able to fill a small venue to about 60 percent of its capacity, and a new poll released by Siena college this morning shows that Biden is not popular in the district. The vice president's favorable rating is only +4 (41-37 percent); Hoffman's favorable rating is +14 (47-33 percent).

And then there was the content of the speech itself. The vice president's 35-minute speech meandered through childhood recollections -- such as his lifeguarding on Lake Ontario and watching his father leaving Scranton to look for a job in Wilmington -- and attacks on Republicans.

Biden lit into Republicans for not doing anything about global warming, but one of liberal Republican Dede Scozzafava's few conservative positions was opposition to job-killing cap and trade. And as gas prices have begun to rise, Biden decided to pick a fight with Sarah Palin over drilling for oil. "Sarah Palin thinks the answer to energy was 'Drill, Baby, Drill,'" Biden said. "No, it's a lot more complicated, Sarah," Biden said. Palin fired back on Facebook.

As the unemployment number creeps ever higher, Biden affirmed that the unemployment rate is the key indicator of economic success. Democratic candidate Bill Owens is "not going to measure the success of this government based upon whether or not the GDP is growing," Biden said. "The measure of success is not whether the stock market's up to 16,000," or whether or not "the GDP grows at 6 percent."

At the end of his speech, the vice president offered this, well, Bidenesque endorsement of Owens: "This guy is a good man. As we Irish say, the best compliment you can ever give any man or woman is to say, 'He's a good man.'"

Though Republican Dede Scozzafava recorded robocalls for Owens and campaigned in person with him last night, Owens will need all the help he can get to win as a generic Democrat in a district Barack Obama won by five points last year.

Dr. Eric Novak, a spokesman for "Patients First," a grassroots group opposed to Obamacare, rips the Obama administration on H1N1 and Gitmo.

“Vaccinating Guantanamo Detainees ahead of millions of at-risk Americans should serve as a serious warning about the federal government’s ability to follow through on its health care reform promises,” said Novack. “The government has had more than 6 months to prepare for the H1N1 pandemic, and it’s still completely unprepared to effectively manage this public health crisis. The Obama Administration promised up to 120 million vaccine doses by mid-October, and now there are only 16.5 million available in November. With results like these, why should we trust Washington to take over our entire health care system?”

Either that, or Hillary's going rogue, but I'm betting on the former, since this administration traffics in appeasement. The Secretary of State will be appearing on "not a legitimate news network" at 10 pm tonight for an interview with Greta.

Maybe Hillary is just playing to her base...