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

Here is Obama, speaking in Missouri yesterday:

It's not change when he (McCain) wants to give $200 billion to the biggest corporation or $4 billion to the oil companies when today, Exxon-Mobil announced that it had made the greatest profits of any corporation in the history of the world: $14 billion in one quarter. That's all your money. You are -- you are paying it at the gas station. That's not change when John McCain comes up with a tax plan that doesn't give a penny of relief to more than 100 million middle-class Americans.

Barack, once a person gives his money freely in a voluntary exchange of currency for a commodity, that money does not belong to him anymore. It's not surprising that the Prince of Redistribution does not understand this concept, but it is surprising that he openly talks about it, even in reddish states he'd like to win.

Fishbowl NY has a new online poll: "Both Senator Barack Obama and William Kristol made appearances on the Daily Show this week. Who was better?" As I type, Obama is losing 64 percent to 36 percent.

This is one election I'm sure we can win. Vote here.

John Podhoretz gives 10 reasons why McCain might win.

Krauthammer on the election:

The national security choice in this election is no contest. The domestic policy choice is more equivocal because it is ideological. McCain is the quintessential center-right candidate. Yet the quintessential center-right country is poised to reject him. The hunger for anti-Republican catharsis and the blinding promise of Obamian hope are simply too strong. The reckoning comes in the morning.

Read the whole thing, as they say.

Part one of Krauthammer's case for McCain is here.

Jake Tapper reports that on the stump this week Barack Obama accused McCain and Palin of promoting "selfishness" by opposing tax hikes:

"The reason that we want to do this, change our tax code, is not because I have anything against the rich," Obama said in Sarasota, Florida, yesterday. "I love rich people! I want all of you to be rich. Go for it. That’s the America dream, that’s the American way, that’s terrific.

"The point is, though, that -- and it’s not just charity, it’s not just that I want to help the middle class and working people who are trying to get in the middle class -- it’s that when we actually make sure that everybody’s got a shot – when young people can all go to college, when everybody’s got decent health care, when everybody’s got a little more money at the end of the month – then guess what? Everybody starts spending that money, they decide maybe I can afford a new car, maybe I can afford a computer for my child. They can buy the products and services that businesses are selling and everybody is better off. All boats rise. That’s what happened in the 1990s, that’s what we need to restore. And that’s what I’m gonna do as president of the United States of America.

"John McCain and Sarah Palin they call this socialistic," Obama continued. "You know I don’t know when, when they decided they wanted to make a virtue out of selfishness."

Got that? Obama loves rich people, but he thinks that John McCain and Sarah Palin--and presumably any one else who opposes his tax plan regardless of their income--are promoting "selfishness." In other words, opposition to Obama's tax increases is based on greed rather than a good faith disagreement about what is best for the economy and our country. This isn't the first time the Obama campaign has questioned the motives of those who oppose tax hikes. As you may recall, Joe Biden said that it's "patriotic" for the rich to pay higher taxes (which means that those who oppose tax increases are unpatriotic).

I'd say that these remarks show that Obama's new style of politics is a sham. But from the very beginning the real meaning of Obama's inspirational rhetoric about 'bringing us all together' was that those who opposed Obama and the Democrats were the enemies of "unity" and "hope." In his 2004 convention speech, right after he proclaimed that "we are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes, all of us defending the United States of America," he framed the election between Bush and Kerry as a choice between "a politics of cynicism" and "a politics of hope." It's not very surprising that Obama and his running mate have now called those same cynics unpatriotic and selfish.

I’m sure the thought has crossed your mind: What happens if, just if, Obama loses? It is certainly something that has haunted überfeminist Erica Jong. In an interview in Corriere della Sera, and as noted in the New York Observer, Jong’s fear is that “if Obama loses it will spark the second American Civil War. Blood will run in the streets, believe me. And it's not a coincidence that President Bush recalled soldiers from Iraq for Dick Cheney to lead against American citizens in the streets.” Highlights, provided to the Observer’s Jason Horowitz by Christian Rocca of Il Foglio include:

"My friends Ken Follett and Susan Cheever are extremely worried. Naomi Wolf calls me every day. Yesterday, Jane Fonda sent me an email to tell me that she cried all night and can't cure her ailing back for all the stress that has reduces her to a bundle of nerves."

"My back is also suffering from spasms, so much so that I had to see an acupuncturist and get prescriptions for Valium."

"After having stolen the last two elections, the Republican Mafia…"

"Bush has transformed America into a police state, from torture to the imprisonment of reporters, to the Patriot Act."

Jong also fancies herself and Michael Chabon as the intellectual heirs to Susan Sontag and Norman Mailer.

A scary Halloween indeed!

The McCain campaign’s high command conducted a conference call this morning and communicated a strong, upbeat message.

Campaign manager Rick Davis kicked things off by predicting we’ll see “the greatest comeback since John McCain won the New Hampshire primary.”

Davis saw “gains in all the battleground states,” and “the best polling results since the convention.”

Pollster Bill McInturf emphasized a closing gap in party identification. He said historically Republicans lag Democrats by 3%-5% in party ID in exit polls. Their polls now see the race closing to that range. McInturff added that “McCain’s pattern of running ahead of his party means this will be very tight race.”

McInturff cautioned that any poll that shows a double digit Republican deficit on party ID is just wrong. He said the assumptions about underlying party ID spreads explains some of the variation we see in recent polling

He also mentioned that all of his research reveals unprecedented levels of interest in the campaign – and not just among Obama supporters. He said 2008 might witness 130-135 million total votes. McInturff said the campaign is very comfortable with McCain supporters’ level on interest as measured by his surveys.

Mike DuHame, the McCain’s political director ran through a number of voter contact metrics demonstrating the campaign’s success in that area as well. For example, he said the Bush campaign conducted 1.9 million voter contacts this week in 2004, while the McCain campaign made 5.3 million contacts during the same week in 2008. Deputy campaign manager Christian Ferry mentioned the campaign’s also meeting its objectives and targets on absentee ballots requested, returned and early voting.

Davis indicated the campaign’s research indicates Obama’s Wednesday night infomercial didn’t have much impact on undecided voters. He also added McCain is doing well in some surprising places – like Iowa, where despite the public polling the campaign numbers show the race a dead heat.

Finally, Davis wrapped up the call by announcing McCain would actually outspend Obama by $10 million in the last several days of the campaign – an impressive statistic given the Democrats’ much vaunted money advantage. He announced McCain would conclude the campaign with a stop in New Hampshire on Sunday night, followed by a seven state tour on Monday to wrap things up, arriving in Arizona late Monday night or early Tuesday morning.

While many have written McCain’s obituary, the conference call participants and their message suggest the McCain and his campaign are still alive and kicking.

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

Well, the central bank has now raised the interest rate--to 18 percent. This was done to secure a $2 billion emergency loan from the IMF.

The interest rate in Iceland went from 15.5 to 12 to 18 percent in the span of two weeks. This does not inspire confidence in the krona, and every scenario for recovery in Iceland depends upon the krona being traded at a "reasonable" rate of something like 150 krona to the euro.

The New York Times editorial board makes the case against extending the bailout to Detroit - before supporting exactly that:

The specific request by General Motors and Cerberus Capital Management, the private equity firm that controls Chrysler, is preposterous: billions to help pay for a merger of dubious value. Neither automaker has been able to produce cars that consumers want to buy. Both are losing money hand over fist. Gluing them together would not change this dynamic.

Detroit made its own problems. The auto companies have refused to change their product models even as consumers reject those models again and again. The autos signed over-the-top benefits packages with the United Auto Workers that cripple productivity and efficiency (a sign of what could happen, writ large, if Congress passes and a President Obama signs card-check next year). As their market share diminishes, the autos rely heavily on political connections to sustain their enterprises. It's corporate welfare at its worst.

The Times gives two arguments in support of using bailout money to prop up Detroit. Neither argument holds water. The first is that "it is not unreasonable to believe that they might survive as self-sustaining companies if government money can get them over the credit crunch and deep recession that is expected in 2009." Why is it "not unreasonable" to believe this? Because

In 2010, they are expected to offload responsibility for their retirees’ health care onto a new fund. It would cost them some $40 billion but would get the problem off their books and stop the hemorrhaging of money. They have negotiated new contracts with the auto workers’ union that eliminate retiree health care and allow for lower wages for new hires. They are slashing the production of gas-guzzlers. Some analysts believe they finally have a promising lineup of fuel-efficient cars.

But if this is the case, then why do the autos need the money to begin with? Couldn't they simply speed up offloading their pension commitments into the "new fund"? If they are going to make cars that people will want to buy, can't they rush those product lines? "Some analysts" may believe Detroit could pull through with only a few more billion from the federal government. This analyst is doubtful.

The other argument the Times offers is that the government should help Detroit tread water for a year or so, because "the economy and the job market will have their hands full" during this time. The additional responsibility of picking through the wreckage of the big auto companies would prove too much. For whom? The market? Surely there are vulture capitalists who are ready to take over the autos, re-size them, and turn them into leaner, better companies. The government? It's already on the hook.

This is economic reasoning on stilts. The economy is probably in recession. But the sooner we hit bottom, the sooner we'll begin to recover. Government intervention to keep failing enterprises afloat may keep us from hitting bottom. But it will also keep us from recovering. Extending the bailout to Detroit is a bad idea.

Wise words from David Brooks today on the problems with "economic stimulus packages":

The Federal Reserve can effectively stimulate the economy. There are certain automatic government programs, like unemployment insurance, which also do it. But the history of the past century suggests that politically designed, ad hoc stimulus packages rarely work.

Often they get the timing wrong; they come too late to do any real good. Often they get the pressure points wrong; the economy is simply too complicated for lawmakers to know where to apply the stimulus patch. Almost always, they get psychology wrong. When you give people a chunk of money in the midst of economic turmoil, they don’t spend most of it. They save it.

Even so, Brooks argues in favor of "a long-term investment in the country’s infrastructure":

Create a base-closings-like commission to organize federal priorities (Congress has forfeited its right to micromanage). Streamline the regulations that can now delay project approval by five years. Explore all the new ideas that are burgeoning in the transportation world — congestion pricing, smart highways, rescue plans for shrinking Midwestern cities, new rail and airplane technologies. When you look into this sector, you see we are on the cusp of another transportation revolution.

Sign me up! Small problem, though: What guarantee is there that federal spending on infrastructure will actually be spent on new roads and highways? Isn't it just as likely that the folks in charge of Brooks's commission, or Obama's national infrastructure bank, will funnel the money to "light rail" and other transportation projects that nobody uses? Environmentalists and NIMBY activists will oppose government spending on pavement. But they'll support additional spending on mass transit systems that will do little to lighten the burden on suburban and exurban commuters. The pro-pavement constituency is, sadly, small in comparison.

Congress could write-in guarantees to spend the money on new road construction and bring in private companies to build new toll roads and highways. But if you think that's likely to happen without a major fight, I have a bridge I'd like you to help me build in Brooklyn.

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

The NY POST, WASHINGTON TIMES and DALLAS MORNING NEWS have all been told to move out by Sunday to make room for network bigwigs -- and possibly for the inclusion of reporters from two black magazines, ESSENCE and JET, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.

Despite pleas from top editors of the three newspapers that have covered the campaign for months at extraordinary cost, the Obama campaign says their reporters -- and possibly others -- will have to vacate their coveted seats so more power players can document the final days of Sen. Barack Obama's historic campaign to become the first black American president.

Some told the DRUDGE REPORT that the reporters are being ousted to bring on documentary film-makers to record the final days; others expect to see on board more sympathetic members of the media, including the NY TIMES' Maureen Dowd, who once complained that she was barred from McCain's Straight Talk Express airplane.

After a week of quiet but desperate behind-the-scenes negotiations, the reporters of the three papers heard last night that they were definitely off for the final swing.

The Washington Times formally protested the move, citing multiple occasions on which the Democratic nominee has used information from Times investigations and interviews in ads and speeches throughout the campaign. Times reporter Christina Bellantoni, after traveling with the campaign since 2007, is being asked to consider traveling on Sen. Biden's plane for the homestretch of the election, where there is of course, plenty of room.

In defending its decision, the Obama campaign said it respected Ms. Bellantoni's reporting and simply ran out of seats on the campaign plane for the finale because of high demand. It also noted that the Obama campaign is allowing some news media critical of the Democrat to travel, including Fox News.

"Unfortunately, demand for seats on the plane during this final weekend has far exceeded supply, and because of logistical issues we made the decision not to add a second plane. This means we've had to make hard and unpleasant for all concerned decisions about limiting some news organizations and in some cases not being in a position to offer space to news organizations altogether," wrote Obama campaign Senior Advisor and Chief Communications Officer Anita Dunn in an e-mail.

This is not the first incident in which critical reporters and columnists have lost their campaign plane seats during this race, but it's certainly the most high profile. Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker was ousted this summer after a critical piece Obama's Chicago political rise. The NYT's Maureen Dowd was left by the McCain campaign in Pennsylvania earlier this year.

In the waning days of this campaign, Obama seems to be succumbing to his worst tendencies. Lofty, presumptuous infomercials. Snarky campaign commercials that take aim at a female opponent in a condescending manner. And, now, the unceremonious dumping of longtime pool reporters. After reading Peter Nicholas' account of life in the robo-candidate's pool, it's not all that surprising that he cuts ties at such a crucial moment with not so much as a second thought:

I've watched Obama demonstrate a soccer kick to his daughter in Chicago; devour a cheesesteak in Philly; navigate a roller rink in Indiana; drive a bumper car; and catapult 125 feet in the air on an amusement-park ride called "Big Ben." He's done it all with dogged professionalism, but with little show of spontaneity. After all this time with him, I still can't say with certainty who he is...

First Clinton, then John McCain made the argument that Obama is someone we don't really know. Obama's supporters counter that we have his record in the U.S. and Illinois senates, two memoirs that reveal his inner thinking and a vast trove of public speaking. Ironically, those of us who were sent out to take his measure in person can't offer much help in answering who he is, or if he is ready. The barriers set in place between us and him were just too great.

Obama's distance, even from those who cover him every day, allows him to coldly calculate about who will be more valuable to him in the final days on the trail. Unsurprisingly, he stuffs the plane with hagiographers over skeptical reporters. Because the thumping he'll receive from the press for this move will be relatively minor compared with the one a Republican candidate might get, the calculation is likely a good one. If one ever has trouble pegging the real Obama, "opportunist" is usually a safe guess.

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

While the U.S. economy’s declining, national polling is a growth industry. Karl Rove noted on last week’s Fox News Sunday that the number of national polls released in October 2008 compared to the same month in 2004 grew by 300 percent (55 national polls were release October 1-23, 2004, compared to 177 during the same period this year).

Examinations into the accuracy of these surveys have already started. This paper paper by professors Leonard Adelman and Mark Schilling argues that broadcast and cable network polling (ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN and Fox) all tilt more pro-Obama in their results than Gallup and Rasmussen. Adelman and Shilling write this:

We compared polls produced by major television networks with those produced by Gallup and Rasmussen. We found that, taken as a whole, polls produced by the networks were significantly to the left of those produced by Gallup and Rasmussen.

We used the available data to provide a tentative ordering of the major television networks’ polls from right to left. Our order (right to left) was: FOX, CNN, NBC (which partners with the Wall Street Journal), ABC (which partners with the Washington Post), CBS (which partners with the New York Times). These results appear to comport well with the commonly held informal perceptions of the political leanings of these agencies.

It’s important to note the authors make no claims about which polls are more accurate. They simply observe--based on surveys from different outlets that come out the same day--the networks consistently show a more pro-Obama bias (with FOX showing the least Obama tilt and CBS showing the most) compared to Gallup and Rasmussen.

No one from the networks has responded yet. I assume they will wait until after the election. If the networks were right, they’ll claim vindication. If wrong? You probably won’t hear much about it.

HT: Andrew Gelman

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

Specifically, I have found myself addicted to four videos in particular. The first, which was produced by rapper will.i.am during the primary season, is called "Yes, We Can" and features Mr. am's fellow celebrities--John Legend, Scarlett Johanssen, and others--lip-synching to Obama boilerplate about the magical phrase "Yes, we can," which (according to Senator Obama) seems to have circulated throughout the populace at choice moments in history.

Then there is a second video, also produced by will.i.am, called "We Are the Ones"--taken from the famous Obamian formula that "we are the ones we've been waiting for"--which also features selected celebrities (Jessica Alba, among others) describing the kind of world they would like to inhabit once Obama is elected.

The third video is the brainchild of a rocker named Dave Stewart and is called "My American Prayer"--although, as the singer renders the phrase, it sounds more like "my 'merican prayer." This, too, is a vehicle for familiar faces (Forrest Whittaker, Seinfeld's Jason Alexander) to move their lips in harmony with Mr. Stewart's lyrics or Senator Obama's oratory.

The final video is not a video per se, but a performance by Little Stevie Wonder at a rally for Obama at UCLA where he exhorts the audience to "remember this melody" and then, singing up and down the scale, repeats "Barack Obama" in a slow rhythmic chant, clapping with the audience, and invoking "Barack Obama" over and over again.

I confess that Little Stevie Wonder's performance has something like a hypnotic effect on me. His grating, high-pitched voice, which was never particularly comfortable to listen to, has a kind of screeching quality which, combined with the endless incantation of "Barack Obama," is very difficult to dislodge from memory. I also admit that the other three videos appeal to me largely for their considerable quotient of kitsch: There is slow-motion imagery of pregnant women, blissful Gray Panthers, solemn dreadlocked hipsters, earnest Young Hollywood, and multitudes of the sort of people you would expect to see shopping at Whole Fields in, say, Cambridge, Massachusetts or Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Yet what is most striking about these sounds and images is their extraordinary solemnity. There is an overarching theme of sadness, melancholy, misfortune, loss, even reproachfulness: The beautiful young things gaze balefully into the cameras, warbling in slow, mournful tempos, swaying and staggering instead of dancing; they appear at times to be on the verge of tears. It is as if they are moaning their way out of Stalingrad, or expect the viewer to crush the dreams they describe. This is as far from 'Happy Days are Here Again' or 'hope' as one could imagine. Even the Obama musical video--"Choose to Unite"--is suffused with candlelight vigils and progressives in pain.

What does this mean? Perhaps the inference is that the United States, after eight years of George W. Bush, is so far down the road to perdition that even the dying words of Martin Luther King (featured in 'My American Prayer') cannot redeem it. Or maybe these long, self-indulgent eulogies are largely a reflection of the copious piety, insufferable self-absorption, and mutual admiration of Senator Obama and his acolytes? Either way, they generate bouts of helpless laughter and genuine astonishment in one viewer, at least.

Barack Obama's running mate, Joe the Gaffe Machine, recently predicted that an international crisis will occur sometime during a President Obama's first year in office. What will it be? Trouble in Iraq? Tension between China and Taiwan? State collapse in North Korea? Crisis in the Straits of Hormuz? War in central Africa? There are so many options. How about a Russian invasion of Ukraine?

Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner of France said Tuesday that Moscow had been issuing Russian passports in Crimea, a region in southern Ukraine where Russia’s Black Sea fleet is based. “We all know that they are handing out Russian passports over there,” Mr. Kouchner said in an interview with Kommersant, a Russian online newspaper. The government of Ukraine has said it wants the fleet to leave the Crimean base in Sevastopol when its lease runs out in 2017. But the Russian naval authorities have indicated that they want to retain the base. Mr. Kouchner said Russia might try to make advances in Crimea after the success of its military operations in Georgia in August.

When you talk to Obama supporters, in particular the younger ones, you get the sense that they believe all the world's problems will disappear if Obama becomes president. Newsflash: They won't.

The morning after Obama's $3-million appeal to people who'd rather be watching "Knight Rider," he hit me up for a couple bucks. This is perhaps a preview of the administration:

Mary --

The next 6 days are going to be the toughest we've seen, and I need your support to reach as many voters as possible.

Donate $5 or more today to strengthen this movement for the final push.

This campaign is in your hands.

Thank you for everything you're doing,

Barack

As Andrew Malcolm notes, "Just to relieve himself of that $150 million before the polls open, Obama will have to spend $12.5 million a day," but he's still asking for fivers from his supporters.

You'd think with his website set up to accept multitudes of fraudulent donations, he wouldn't need me:

Faced with a huge influx of donations over the Internet, the campaign has also chosen not to use basic security measures to prevent potentially illegal or anonymous contributions from flowing into its accounts, aides acknowledged. Instead, the campaign is scrutinizing its books for improper donations after the money has been deposited...

In recent weeks, questionable contributions have created headaches for Obama's accounting team as it has tried to explain why campaign finance filings have included itemized donations from individuals using fake names, such as Es Esh or Doodad Pro. Those revelations prompted conservative bloggers to further test Obama's finance vetting by giving money using the kind of prepaid cards that can be bought at a drugstore and cannot be traced to a donor.

The problem with such cards, campaign finance lawyers said, is that they make it impossible to tell whether foreign nationals, donors who have exceeded the limits, government contractors or others who are barred from giving to a federal campaign are making contributions.

We can all rest assured, however, that if a Republican candidate had explicitly promised to take public financing only to change his mind once he had gotten the nomination, then went on to raise more than $600 million dollars, roughly two thirds of which may have been raised through fraud-enabling practices, and outspent his opponent by three-to-one on TV, that'd be cool, too. Right?

Credit goes to Campbell Brown of CNN for calling Obama out for his broken promise, and to John McCain for delivering a decent soundbite on it:

In Palm Beach, Florida, today Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., attacked Sen. Barack Obama's pending 30-minute prime-time address as a "gauzy, feel-good commercial," that was "paid for with broken promises."

Robert Kagan on American declinism:

[T]he evidence of American decline is weak. Yes, as Zakaria notes, the world's largest Ferris wheel is in Singapore and the largest casino in Macau. But by more serious measures of power, the United States is not in decline, not even relative to other powers. Its share of the global economy last year was about 21 percent, compared with about 23 percent in 1990, 22 percent in 1980 and 24 percent in 1960. Although the United States is suffering through a financial crisis, so is every other major economy. If the past is any guide, the adaptable American economy will be the first to come out of recession and may actually find its position in the global economy enhanced.

Meanwhile, American military power is unmatched. While the Chinese and Russian militaries are both growing, America's is growing, too, and continues to outpace them technologically. Russian and Chinese power is growing relative to their neighbors and their regions, which will pose strategic problems, but that is because American allies, especially in Europe, have systematically neglected their defenses.

America's image is certainly damaged, as measured by global polls, but the practical effects of this are far from clear. Is America's image today worse than it was in the 1960s and early 1970s, with the Vietnam War; the Watts riots; the My Lai massacre; the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy; and Watergate? Does anyone recall that millions of anti-American protesters took to the streets in Europe in those years?

Today, despite the polls, President Bush has managed to restore closer relations with allies in Europe and Asia, and the next president will be able to improve them even further. Realist theorists have consistently predicted for the past two decades that the world would "balance" against the United States. But nations such as India are drawing closer to America, and if any balancing is occurring, it is against China, Russia and Iran.

Kagan has been tough on the "realists" lately, in The Return of History and the End of Dreams, and his appraisal of the Bush legacy in Foreign Affairs, and this piece for the Wall Street Journal from a few months back. All this has me thinking that Kagan's next book ought to be a takedown of the new "realism," and an articulation of what a "real realism" looks like.

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

The Idaho GOP released a statement that accuses the state Democratic Party of enabling identity theft.

Jim Hansen, the state Democratic Party chairman, released his own statement today that included an apology of sorts:

It is regrettable that the Tax Commission released all the numbers depicted on the document. And it is regrettable that in the press of print deadlines for multiple campaigns, we did not notice that the Tax Commission failed to black out those numbers. As Executive Director, I take personal responsibility for the oversight. We agree that it would have been better to black out parts of the document even though the public agency that released them did not. As we previously stated, this was a completely unintentional oversight.

But...

Of course, if Bill Sali did not want public documents of his tax delinquencies and his campaign finance delinquencies to be made public by a public agency, he should have paid his taxes on time and filed his reports on time.

Sali is an a surprisingly tough reelection bid, probably due to what Congressional Quarterly calls his "manner" rather than his ideology, which is a decent enough match for his reliably conservative district that includes the western half of the state. Apparently, Idaho's other Republican congressman, Mike Simpson, once got so frustrated by Sali that he threatened to toss him out of a statehouse window when they served as state legislators in Boise. Democratic candidate Walt Minnick, a moderate businessman who ran against Larry Craig six years ago, leads Sali by 6 points according to the latest SurveyUSA poll.

Unlike the John Mayer endorsement of Obama, this comes from the counterintuitive celebrity endorsements file. Joe Perry on McCain:

“I’ve been a hardcore Republican my whole life,” he told the Herald. “My mother and father drilled into me from the very start that if you work hard and be positive, you’ll get what you’re working for. I guess I’m living proof of that.”

Of criticism about McCain’s age, Perry said: “My mother’s in her 80s and she does aerobics. My manager’s 70 and he’s right there. That doesn’t bother me.”

And despite lopsided polls, he urged his fans to get out and vote.

“I’m an optimist. It ain’t over till its over,” he said. “I think that he’s got a chance.”

And, Perry was inexplicably able to express all this without a 5-minute high-production-value, low-impact video.

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

This and John Mayer's cloying Obama endorsement, "Hope is not a buzz word," taken together should have you welcoming the robo-calls that come into your home around dinnertime this weekend. Just a taste:

To those who question whether hope is a tangible product worth building a campaign around, I'd say take a look at despair and how powerful that has been in reshaping how people think and live. I believe the definition of the "hope" that Barack Obama enthuses operates on the unspoken thesis that there has to be a polar opposite to the despair of 9/11. Because if we accept that there's not, the will to live becomes forever altered. To adults who will vote for him, Barack Obama represents a return to prosperity. To the youth, he represents an introduction to it.

Yes, Rudy Giuliani, I would love to hear more about how Barack Obama is soft on crime. What was it you were saying?

Germany’s demographic troubles are well known: Fewer and fewer women are having babies; and even if they do have kids, it often doesn’t happen before they are already well into their 30s. The long-term economic, social, and political consequences of this unprecedented demographic meltdown in Germany and other European countries are staggering. Given the urgency of the situation, it is absolutely shocking to learn that a growing number of German Kindergartens have recently been forced to shut down because nasty neighbors took legal action against what they described as “noise pollution” stemming from playing children.

So far, German courts in major cities such as Berlin, Munich, and Heidelberg have already sided with the plaintiffs. Unfortunately, the judges failed to ask the plaintiffs two obvious yet important questions: First, who exactly do you expect to pay for your costly “pay-as-you-go” retirement benefits in the future? (Hint: maybe the kids playing next door?). And two, why don’t you just move on and relocate to a place that is really quiet (Hint: maybe closer to a retirement community?). In this context, the proliferating legal actions taken against Kindergartens in Germany could certainly hamper Chancellor Merkel’s ambitious new plan to triple the number of Kindergarten/daycare spots for children under the age of 3 to 750,000 by 2013.

NBC news reports that the Justice Department has begun an investigation into whether Countrywide Financial Corp used the 'Friends of Angelo (Mozilo)' program to buy influence with Senators Chris Dodd (D-CT), Kent Conrad (D-ND), and others. According to a senior Countrywide official who handled its VIP program, there was no way Dodd and Conrad could not have known they were getting a special deal:

...Feinberg says part of his job was to hammer home to the V.I.P. clients that they were getting special deals.

"You spoke in a manner that was different than you spoke with a regular customer," said Feinberg. "'Your loan has been specially priced by Angelo.' 'You're getting special discounts because you're in the V.I.P. loan department."

So what would a "Friend of Angelo" get that an average customer would not? According to Feinberg, the possible benefits ran the gamut.

"They got a discount on the interest rate," said Feinberg. "They got discounts on their fees. They got a free floatdown option before closing..."

"There were many, many taglines we used to let them know their level of importance to make sure that they understand where they're located," said Feinberg. "And nine times out of ten, once you mention 'V.I.P' the person's gonna ask you 'what am i getting for being in this V.I.P department?' Or 'what am I getting because I know Angelo?' Or 'I talked to Angelo and he said I'm getting this...'"

Feinberg says he's not aware of any discounts linked to favors, but he did see e-mails noting the potential value of the relationships to Countrywide's political and business interests. The e-mails noted one particular client was "of importance to Countrywide." Another encouraged a discount, noting "they are incredibly important to us." Yet another asked that the loan officer, "make an exception" in Countrywide's lending rules, "due to the fact that the borrower is a Senator."

If Dodd and Conrad somehow missed the special treatment they were receiving, Feinberg's testimony suggests that it was only because they chose not to listen. Nevertheless, Dodd is still refusing to release the paperwork related to his loans--information he promised to share weeks ago.

Last night's episode of The Barack Obama Show was blog-worthy in several respects. And it raised many important questions, such as, Will it be picked up for a full season? (We find out next Tuesday.)

One thing that struck you as you watched the show was how downbeat it was. All the families Obama highlighted seemed at the end of their ropes. They have trouble paying bills, worry about the kids' future, wonder if they will have health insurance in a few weeks. They feel like the American dream isn't working out. They remind you of something Michelle Obama once said, about how our country can be "downright mean." Every family profiled last night was looking to the federal government to help them out. To save them.

This is a new understanding of the American electorate with questionable results. Americans have typically understood themselves in terms of self-reliance and self-making. As individuals who can shoulder responsibility and strive and succeed. And politicians, especially presidential candidates, tend to appeal to voters' ideals and optimism about the future. A non-incumbent challenger may highlight what's gone wrong, but they also will almost certainly argue that things can - and will - be better. Obama does argue things can improve, but he doesn't exactly strike you as an optimist. He's a realist. There's no guarantee things will improve, Obama says. What is guaranteed is that he will try to mobilize (and expand) the state to alleviate your suffering. Not exactly "build a bridge to the 21st-century," is it?

As one watches the show, one has a growing sense of cognitive dissonance. The characters may be miserable, but they all have nice homes, drive good cars, have happy families, and certainly aren't starving. Surely most viewers noticed this as well. I wonder whether Obama's strategy - always look on the bad side - may go too far.

For the last few months I've been reading that the Reagan era is about to end, or is in the process of ending, or has ended already. Now it's true that the people who have been arguing this have made the same argument, again and again, since the Reagan era began in 1980. But in recent months they've had some facts to back it up: Bush's dismal popularity, the GOP losses in Congress, the Bush administration's embrace of massive government intervention in the economy as a response to the financial crisis, the likelihood of an Obama victory next Tuesday, etc.

Here's the thing, though. If you watched The Barack Obama Show last night, you saw the Democratic nominee for president campaigning on ... a tax cut; "eliminating" government programs that "don't work" and making those "that do work work better" (meaning, "cheaper," presumably); and expanding the U.S. military and increasing U.S. involvement in Afghanistan.

Yes, Obama wants to "end" the war in Iraq and expand government subsidies for health insurance. Those are both major parts of his agenda. But they are just parts. Other parts, a whole lot of them actually, are center-right. The most liberal senator is running as a centrist candidate. Which sets up plenty of expectations for how President Obama might govern. Expectations that would be politically perilous for Obama to dismiss.

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

A certain starting point for Democrats will be the financial crisis, and a stimulus package could be taken up as early as the November lame-duck session. A landslide win will boost the likelihood that bill will lean heavily toward spending on infrastructure, money for cities and states, an extension of unemployment insurance and additional money for food stamps.

Business leaders are anticipating an early push of union-backed bills. At the top of the list is the so-called Employee Free Choice Act, which would eliminate the right of employers to demand secret-ballot elections before a union can be certified. Instead, a majority of workers could sign petition cards certifying a union — a process known as “card-check.” The bill passed the House in March 2007, but failed three months later in the Senate to get the 60 votes required for controversial legislation...

Tax policy may also come up early as lawmakers look for offsets to pay for expensive programs. Two early possibilities include a tax on the carried interest that hedge funds and other financial firms make in compensation and an effort to close several tax haven loopholes. They were both part of a broad tax proposal pushed in late 2007 by Rep. Charles Rangel (N.Y.), chairman of the Ways and Means Committee.

Is this the agenda that Barack Obama is promising the American people? In 1993, voters were surprised when Bill Clinton forgot his campaign promises of welfare reform and middle class tax cuts to focus on gays in the military, public works spending, and BTU taxes. Now it seems that congressional Democrats are planning a near repeat of what happened back then.

Those who don't learn from history...

Gore to close for Obama in Florida. Well, his track record there is so good. In addition to losing the state for Obama, he'll probably make it snow as he rails about global warming. I'm super serial.

Perhaps this is the reason for Obama's positively Kerry-esque numbers in Florida early voting:

Democrats are beaming that their party is outperforming the Republicans in early voting, releasing numbers Wednesday that show registrants of their party ahead 54 percent to 30 percent among the 1.4 million voters who have gone to the polls early.

A Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll gave McCain a 49-45 lead over Democrat Barack Obama among Floridians who have already voted.

And Republicans continued to show a traditional strength, leading 50 percent to the Democrats' 30 percent in the 1.2 million absentee ballots already returned.

Kerry lost Florida by five percent after leading early voting by a decent margin.

Other early voting shows similarly underwhelming results for the alleged flood of first-time voters and young voters Obama is supposed to draw:

But serious pollsters know that the electorate may have changed slightly since 2004, but that massive turnout will still reflect past performance. It will be the same, just much more of it. Consider what’s going on with early voters in swing state Nevada.

According to the Las Vegas Review Journal, a quarter of the state’s electorate had already voted by Sunday. But of those voters, just 20 percent were Hispanic, 14 percent were under 30, and 15 percent didn’t vote in the last three elections.

Early voters this year look pretty much like what we’ve seen in Nevada before. If that’s the case, polls based on a huge shift in the electorate that show Obama with a doughty lead would come up a cropper.

Two new polls in closely watched Senate races deserve note. First, in Alaska, Rasmussen released its first results post conviction in the Stevens/Begich race.

Stevens now trails by 8 points. The shift merits mention because, yesterday--before adding this poll into the mix--the Real Clear Politics average had the Alaska race at a near dead heat. Some speculate Stevens might still win despite his conviction. This survey suggests voters are moving against him due to his legal problems.

In Minnesota, the news is better for Republicans. Incumbent Republican Norm Coleman now leads Democratic challenger Al Franken 43 percent to 39 percent. A week ago Franken, the former Saturday Night Live comedian, held a 41 percent to 37 percent edge. The race also includes a moderately popular independent Dean Barkley who draws about 14 percent of the vote. The independent’s presence in the campaign makes for difficult prognosticating. The polls in this race are more volatile than the recent stock market swings.

Still, Coleman may have the advantage in the end. A Minnesota Republican political expert told me this:

“I think Coleman pulls this out. The state still has a bit of collective embarrassment over its last ‘novelty’ choice when it elected former professional wrestler Jesse Ventura as Governor. Franken’s background is working against him because people don’t want to make the same mistake twice.”

Norm Coleman is a truly talented and dedicated public servant. His defeat would represent a major loss for Minnesota and the U.S. Senate. He deserves reelection.

This has got to worry Team Obama:

After several weeks of John McCain’s campaign attacks on Barack Obama’s tax plan and idea of “spreading the wealth around”, the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds voters trust McCain more than Obama on taxes, 47% to 45%.

Two weeks ago, Obama had a one point-advantage on the issue of taxes and a month ago, he had a three-point edge. The last time McCain had the advantage on this issue was September 14, just before the collapse of Lehman Brothers started the meltdown on Wall Street.

One month ago, Obama was up nine points on this crucial issue. McCain continues to outperform the generic Republican ticket by a longshot, and while Obama leads in six of ten top issues for Americans, Obama led in all 10 last month.

Now that McCain has a resonant message in Joe the Plumber's plight, is finally matching Obama ad-for-ad in battlegrounds, and Biden has just lowered the Obama campaign's "wealthy" mark to $150,000, it's a mighty good time for things to be looking up for him.

More on the moving target that is the $250,000 threshold for the Obama campaign's tax hikes. The Wall Street Journal reminds, "Just as Bill Clinton promised a 'middle-class tax cut' in 1992 only to raise taxes on the middle class in 1993, Mr. Obama will quickly find that his tax-revenue math doesn't add up. Add in the demands on Capitol Hill to spend more and to offset the Alternative Minimum Tax, and our bet is that even $150,000 would soon prove to be a moving tax target. Remember when the AMT was only supposed to hit 21 millionaires? Next year, without relief, it could hit 26 million taxpayers. Tax increases always hit the middle class because that's where the money is."

Voters are rightfully wary.

Sitting through the Very Special Episode of Obama for President tonight felt awfully familiar. It's like one of those required assemblies from middle school: hectoring, tedious, and transparently silly. But it did have one unexpected effect on me. Never before have I noticed how wonderful commercials are. It's not until you're forced to go without the Geico cavemen for 30 straight minutes that you realize how much you appreciate them.