Bush in the polls: WYSIWYG

Kerry seems to have pulled even in all the tracking polls, and while Bush is at 49% in a couple of them, he is under 47% (incumbent dead zone) in the others. Either way, Bush will be lucky to actually poll a higher percentage on Election Day, while Kerry, as a challenger, is likely to improve a point or two.

Latest Tracking Polls
ABC News LV: Bush 49, Kerry 48 (10/24-27)
Rasmussen: Bush 49.5, Kerry 47.9 (10/26-28)
TIPP 2-Way: Kerry 46, Bush 46 (10/25-28)
Zogby: Kerry 47, Bush 47 (10/26-28)

There are no Battleground states in which Bush has trended upward this week. I now think Kerry will win all Gore states (including Iowa, Wisconsin, and New Mexico), plus Ohio, Florida, and New Hampshire, for a total of 311 Electoral Votes.

Same prediction is here.
Check out this analysis of OH, PA, FL, and MI here.

You can help GOTV in Battleground states by calling voters on Election Day.

OK, so who’s going to win this thing?

from Jon

This week’s drumbeat of bad news out of Iraq will serve to fire up the Democratic base, turn out new voters, and sway the few remaining undecideds predominantly to Kerry. While the Republicans will do okay on turnout, the final week so far has been pretty demoralizing, and their voter suppression efforts won't be enough to send the election into the courts.

So, I predict Kerry wins nationally 52% to 48%, with 301 EVs.

Kerry wins Gore states – Wisconsin + New Hampshire + Ohio + Florida.

The final week bad from Iraq

from Jon

Here in the last week of the campaign it’s all bad news all the time about Iraq.

1. The massacre of the Iraqi security trainees
2. The missing 380 tons of high-powered explosives
3. Allawi blaming U.S.-led occupation forces for the massacre
4. Pentagon leaking plan to increase U.S. troops in Iraq by 22,000
5. Reports apparently from the Senate Appropriations Committee that Administration is going to ask for another $70 billion for Iraq.

Whew!

It’s a litany of failures. Kerry has been hammering Bush for the explosives, but he ought to be talking about the entire list. In fact, the Administration’s spinning of the explosives story has been masterful, taking advantage of lame media coverage, even though I don’t think it has staved off all the damage.

See the excellent coverage here on the whole explosives story, the coverage of it, and the Bush spin.

Abortion through a different lens

from Jon

An interesting way to respond to pro-lifers. Abortion rates have gone up under George W. Bush. Why? The most common reason given for having an abortion is that the mother is unable to financially support the child. For poor women, economic downturns and lack of affordable health care make it hard to support children; hence, a higher abortion rate over the past four years.

From the cite linked in the headline:

Economic policy and abortion are not separate issues; they form one moral imperative. Rhetoric is hollow without health care, insurance, jobs, child care and a living wage. Pro-life in deed, not merely in word, means we need a president who will do something about jobs, health insurance and support for mothers.

Wisconsin report

from Steve in Madison

VISITS, VISITS, VISITS. Clearly the campaigns' internals tell them that WI will be in-play right down to that last vote. Kerry is in Green Bay today and tomorrow and Madison on Thursday. Edwards in Racine and Dubuque Iowa today. Bush on a western WI swing tonight and tomorrow. (Same heavy traffic applies to Iowa as well). Surrogates for candidates also on impressive pace as are the constant arrivals of volunteers, DC hands, and people whose states are not in play. (In particular we see a lot of IL folks headed north to "make a difference" in southern WI... there was a story in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel on Sunday about the 5 buses full of volunteers for field work).

I'm sure there'll be a big push to make Thursday's Madison rally at the State Capitol square (with the Foo Fighters) to be one of Kerry's biggest crowds. In 2000, we packed in 25,000 on the Friday before the election w/ a Bon Jovi appearance. Then they're doing an early vote trek 2 blocks to the city clerk's office (I'm sure that even though he's a Democrat, the clerk is going to be a wee bit upset with hundreds of people looking to vote on TH afternoon). WI statewide demographics are pretty straightforward.

Madison and Milwaukee cities turn out close to half of the total Democratic vote. The other significant cities (Racine, Kenosha, Janesville, Green Bay, Wausau, LaCrosse, Eau Claire) end up being about 50-50 when their suburbs are taken into account. The Republican base lies in the Milwaukee and Minneapolis suburbs as well as in an arc of German Lutherans in eastern WI.
Ironically, the nordic Lutherans on the western arc of the state are much more Democratic in orientation.

Ultimately this election will come down to places like the battleground cities of Green Bay and Wausau, which are 2 of the 10 biggest markets for political ads this cycle. Speaking of TV, it has been ridiculous in the Madison market, mostly from Bush and Democratic 527s, but Kerry has picked up pace the last 2 weeks as have a couple of Repub 527s. There is virtually no ad traffic outside of political at this point, and I wonder how anyone can consider themselves "undecided" at this point.

On the ground, the Republicans talk a big game and it will be fascinating to see if they really do turn their vols out next weekend. On our side, the September 14th primary showed the kinds of resources that will be brought to the table. ACT had nearly 800 paid staff on the ground doing generic GOTV efforts to promote turnout in African-American portions of Milwaukee, to complement nearly 200 from the victorious congressional candidate. This had the desired impact of increasing African-American turnout there by 25% over the traditional primary vote. I've heard that ACT alone will have double that amount of staff on the ground next weekend. And this does not count the Kerry/Coordinated campaign and all other labor/allied organizations. Nader is on the ballot and may ultimately be a factor if this race is decided in the low 1000's. He got 95,000 votes (or about 2.5%) in 2000 and those came heavily from Madison and Milwaukee. As well all know, most of our Nader friends tell us that they're not making the mistake again this time but surely he'll still hold at least 10,000 votes in WI.

The Polls: Nine days to go

from JFH

Check out Professor Alan Abramowitz' summary of the race. His conclusion: "[B]ased on this analysis of recent polls in the battleground states, if either candidate has a slight edge, it's John Kerry. And that's without even factoring in the expected late movement of undecided voters to Kerry.

RealClearPolitics' Battleground Summary shows Bush leading in averaged recent state-by-state polls. The EC count would be Bush 306-232. But wait! Bush's average lead in both Florida and Ohio is less than one point, and it is exactly one point in Minnesota. (Take away Florida and Minnesota from RCP's count and we get another tie scenario!) Take away all three, given the expected break of undecideds toward Kerry, and Kerry wins 289-249.

According to RCP, Bush leads by three points in Iowa and two in Wisconsin, two Gore states that are still winnable for Kerry. And there was an interesting poll that came out yesterday in Arkansas, showing the candidates tied.

On average, Bush is at 48% or lower in FL, OH, WI, IA, MN, and NM. And the only Battleground state in which Bush hits 50% is Missouri.

These are not good numbers for an incumbent this close to Election Day.

This week's news frame isn't good, either. Bush made another off-message comment about whether we can win the war on terror yesterday, and in Iraq, freshly minted Iraqi security forces were ambushed and executed, and we find that a huge cache of expolosives has fallen into the hands of insurgents and terrorists. The latter is a near-perfect real world symbol in the closing days of the campaign of the Administration's bungling of Iraq AND the war on terror.

Oh and by the way, the Big Dog is going to hit the campaign trail for Kerry today.

October Surprise: The link between Iraq and terrorism

From JFH

As the 1980 campaign was winding to a close, with the one-year anniversary of the Iranian hostage crisis about to coincide with Election Day and the incumbent president stunned by his challenger's recent debate performance, the Carter Administration announced on the Sunday before the election a possible breakthrough in negotiations with the hostage-takers. Alas, it turnout to be a dead end, and only served to remind voters of the inability of Jimmy Carter to deal with the hostage crisis.

Maybe today's piece in the NYT will serve as a similar catalyst in this campaign's final week. It seems that 380 tons of powerful explosives that were known to be under lock and key in Iraq before the war have now gone missing. They've undoubtedly been used in the insurgency and could well be used in a future terrorist attack on the U.S.

So basically, the previous weapons inspection regime had this cache of weapons under lock and key. The Administration knew about its existence before the war. We failed to secure the site after the war, and now its contents have been looted and distributed to insurgents and possibly terrorists. Finally, the Administration has known about this for some time, but has covered it up rather than report it, due to the campaign.

The story encapsulates all the problems and missteps of the Administration's Iraq war. With eight days to go, it will surely become more and more difficult for voters to conclude that they are safer under George W. Bush.

NYT and WaPo: Polls not looking good for W.

From JFH

Sunday's WaPo lede:

President Bush turned his Marine One chopper into a campaign prop Saturday and used it to drop in on huge crowds at three stadiums around Florida, at a time of concern in his campaign about his failure to gain a decisive lead in the most crucial battlegrounds.

GOP officials who talked to Bush-Cheney campaign leaders said the leaders have grown more worried about Ohio, Florida and other key states where Bush lacks a lead with just 10 days until the election. One Republican official described the mood at the top of the campaign as apprehensive. " 'Grim' is too strong," the official said. "If we feel this way a week from now, that will be grim."

The Republican official said polling for Bush showed him in a weaker position than some published polls have indicated, both nationally and in battlegrounds. In many of the key states, the official said, Bush is below 50 percent, and he is ahead or behind within the margin of sampling error -- a statistical tie.

"There's just no place where they're polling outside the margin of error so they can say, 'We have this state,' " the official said. "And they know that an incumbent needs to be outside the margin of error."

The Sunday NYT reports that the campaigns are agreed on the final eleven battleground states; we’ll just call them the Big Ten (get it?).

Bush 2000 States
Florida (27)
Ohio (20)
New Hampshire (4)
Colorado (9)
Nevada (5)

Gore 2000 States
Pennsylvania (21)
Michigan (17)
Minnesota (11)
Wisconsin (10)
Iowa (7)
New Mexico (5)

Ok, so the Times says “analysts and aides to both campaigns say Mr. Kerry has the best chance of winning New Hampshire, Ohio and Florida.” I’ll buy that. Kerry has led in NH most of the year, but its EVs are likely to be inconsequential. He has been in the lead in Ohio since the debates and is neck and neck in Florida. (But if “neck and neck” lasts for another week, the tie will likely go to Kerry on Election Day, because last-minute deciders almost always break for the challenger.)

Of the Gore states, the Times says “analysts and aides said Mr. Bush has the best chance of winning Wisconsin, Iowa, and New Mexico.” OK, for the sake of argument, let’s buy that, too. Bush has led in Iowa and Wisconsin fairly consistently, although very narrowly – and the President, on average, hasn’t polled at the 50% mark in either state. New Mexico hasn’t been polled as extensively, but the candidates have each led in more than one recent poll. I don’t think anyone buys Pennsylvania, Michigan, or Minnesota breaking for Bush. But the Times fails to consider the implications of its analysis: If all turns out the way “analysts and aides” from both campaign currently see it: KERRY WINS 289-249!

Keyes falls to -11 in polls

In an astonishing development that has pollsters here in Illinois scratching their heads, Republican Senate candidate Alan Keyes (R-MD) has fallen into negative territory in the polls, the first time in the history of scientific survey research that a number below zero has been recorded.

A recent Survey Illinois poll of likely voters had Democrat Barak Obama with a commanding 111% to -11% lead over Keyes.

"I know this result isn't logical," said a Survey Illinois spokesperson, "but neither is Alan Keyes' candidacy."

Keyes' numbers are expected to fall further after his strange debate performance last night that prompted one commentator to say that even a trained seal or dolphin could have done better last night than Keyes. Earlier in the week, a Republican mass mailing went out without Keyes' picture on it. One party insider, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that Keyes was present for the photo shoot but his likeness didn't appear on the film, prompting speculation that he actually is some sort of alien from outer space.

Attempts to find the person or persons on the Republican State Committee responsible for actually putting Keyes on the ticket continue to be futile.

The American Conservative endorses Kerry

From JFH

The New Republic has been posting its past presidential endorsements this week and I was reminded when reading that liberal journal's rejection of Jimmy Carter in 1980 (it endorsed John Anderson) just how damning it is when a candidate is rejected by his own ideological compatriots. Now comes the rejection of George W. Bush by the paleocon American Conservative, which I assume has long had it in for the neoconservative foreign policy types that dominate the Bush Administration. Nonetheless, that the magazine would reject Bush for a liberal Democrat is very telling.

Here are some highlights:

Bush has behaved like a caricature of what a right-wing president is supposed to be, and his continuation in office will discredit any sort of conservatism for generations. The launching of an invasion against a country that posed no threat to the U.S., the doling out of war profits and concessions to politically favored corporations, the financing of the war by ballooning the deficit to be passed on to the nation’s children, the ceaseless drive to cut taxes for those outside the middle class and working poor: it is as if Bush sought to resurrect every false 1960s-era left-wing cliché about predatory imperialism and turn it into administration policy.

In Europe and indeed all over the world, he has made the United States despised by people who used to be its friends, by businessmen and the middle classes, by moderate and sensible liberals. Never before have democratic foreign governments needed to demonstrate disdain for Washington to their own electorates in order to survive in office. The poll numbers are shocking. In countries like Norway, Germany, France, and Spain, Bush is liked by about seven percent of the populace. In Egypt, recipient of huge piles of American aid in the past two decades, some 98 percent have an unfavorable view of the United States. It’s the same throughout the Middle East.

Bush has accomplished this by giving the U.S. a novel foreign-policy doctrine under which it arrogates to itself the right to invade any country it wants if it feels threatened. It is an American version of the Brezhnev Doctrine, but the latter was at least confined to Eastern Europe. If the analogy seems extreme, what is an appropriate comparison when a country manufactures falsehoods about a foreign government, disseminates them widely, and invades the country on the basis of those falsehoods? It is not an action that any American president has ever taken before. It is not something that “good” countries do. It is the main reason that people all over the world who used to consider the United States a reliable and
necessary bulwark of world stability now see us as a menace to their own peace and security.

The daily bad from Iraq

From JFH

From today's NYTimes:

Senior American officials are beginning to assemble a new portrait of the insurgency that has continued to inflict casualties on American and Iraqi forces, showing that it has significantly more fighters and far greater financial resources than had been estimated.

When foreign fighters and the network of a Jordanian militant, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, are counted with home-grown insurgents, the hard-core resistance numbers between 8,000 and 12,000 people, a tally that swells to more than 20,000 when active sympathizers or covert accomplices are included, according to the American officials.These estimates contrast sharply with earlier intelligence reports, in which the number of insurgents has varied from as few as 2,000 to a maximum of 7,000.

This week, the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, in releasing its annual global military survey, said perhaps 1,000 Islamic Jihadists have entered Iraq to join the fight, and it estimated that it would take five years for the American military to prepare Iraqi forces to take over fully from the forces of the United States and its allies.

Bush and the Supreme Court

Two Supreme Court justices are over 80 and eight of nine are over 65. SCOTUS is split 5-4, usually tilting conservative. The next president will almost certainly get to appoint one or more justices.

In his first term, Bush’s nominees to the federal bench have been uniformly conservative, usually chosen by the Federalist Society, a conservative legal group. Not a single nominee has ever said anything in support of abortion rights, and most have denounced Roe v. Wade. He has clearly tried to move the federal bench rightward in a way that would please social conservatives at the expense of civil liberties.

Electoral College Tie Scenarios

From JFH

Are flying around the web today. Here, too.

I'd say, the most straightforward are these, in descending order of probability:

1. Kerry wins all the Gore 2000 states, plus New Hampshire and Nevada.
2. Kerry wins all the Gore 2000 states, plus New Hampshire and West Virginia.
3. Kerry wins all the Gore 2000 states, plus Nevada and Colorado ballot measure passes, apportioning the state’s EVs based on popular vote, handing Kerry four of the state’s nine EVs.

That doesn't take away from my longstanding Kerry EV formula:

Gore 2000 states + (Ohio OR Florida) = Kerry wins.

BTW, good news from Ohio today.

New poll says Bush voters Ignore reality

From JFH

Found this on another interesting blog. It is truly mind-boggling for those of us who live in the “reality-based community.” These findings are from a study of the differing perceptions of Bush and Kerry supporters, conducted by the Program on International Policy Attitudes and Knowledge Networks, based on polls conducted in September and October:

Even after the final report of Charles Duelfer to Congress saying that Iraq did not have a significant WMD program, 72% of Bush supporters continue to believe that Iraq had actual WMD (47%) or a major program for developing them (25%). Fifty-six percent assume that most experts believe Iraq had actual WMD and 57% also assume, incorrectly, that Duelfer concluded Iraq had at least a major WMD program. Kerry supporters hold opposite beliefs on all these points.

Similarly, 75% of Bush supporters continue to believe that Iraq was providing substantial support to al Qaeda, and 63% believe that clear evidence of this support has been found. Sixty percent of Bush supporters assume that this is also the conclusion of most experts, and 55% assume, incorrectly, that this was the conclusion of the 9/11 Commission. Here again, large majorities of Kerry supporters have exactly opposite perceptions.

The report outlines numerous other misperceptions of Bush supporters on the president’s foreign policy. Why the resistance to information on the part of Bush supporters? Because they aren’t living in the realm of reality -- the president asserts, they believe. Another link to last Sunday’s NYTimes Magazine piece on W.’s messianic complex.

Arguments for Banning Gay Marriage

from JFH

Found this via my favorite conservative Andrew Sullivan’s excellent blog.

Oregon, which has a state question on the ballot to ban gay marriage, dutifully prepares a handout for its citizens that summarizes arguments for and against state questions. Just click here and read it. That’s all I’m asking.

On second thought, I’m going to just print it out for you:

Argument in Favor
CULTURE WAR!
Traditional values are under attack, and sexual perverts are attempting to strain the definition of marriage far beyond what God has ordained. The Word of the Lord must be legislated as Oregon public policy. In the Holy Bible, Saint Paul says that Christians should remain single and abstain from sex. The New Testament says that people should get married only if they are too weak-willed to abstain from sex:

"It is well for a man not to touch a woman…. It is well … to remain single as I do. But if they cannot exercise self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to be aflame with passion." (I Corinthians 7:1, 8-9)

Marriage is not sacred. Marriage is for wimps and sissies!

Oregon public policy should define marriage in accordance with divinely inspired Scripture. Therefore, marriage licenses should be granted only to those persons who have been certified by professional psychiatric examination to be too weak-willed to abstain from sex.

Oh, by the way, although Jesus never said a single word condemning homosexuality, if heterosexuals can't get married, homosexuals shouldn't be allowed to marry either—well, unless they're too weak-willed to abstain. Sissies!

The sissy institution of marriage must not be perverted by sinners who are capable of abstaining! The sacred union of church and state must prohibit the immoral union of men and women capable of the discipline of sexual abstinence. We are not saved by either faith or good works. We are saved by religious-right legislation!
Freedom of religion and equal treatment under law is simply the special right to sin, because our tradition is the one and only truth! And our tradition (that is, our personal moral opinions) should become law.
AGREE WITH US OR BURN IN HELL!
(This information furnished by M. Dennis Moore, Traditional Prejudices Coalition.)

Argument in Favor
MARRIAGE IS SACRED!
The Bible says that marriage is for procreation. God made Adam and Eve, and Adam and Eve made Cain and Abel, not an empty nest. Marriage is for procreation. If you're not pro-Creation, you're anti-God. And once a marriage has been solemnized, sex is serious business. The solemnity of sex must not be abused for sinful pleasures. Sex is for procreation, not recreation. And marriage is for breeding purposes.

Therefore, it should be Oregon public policy that:
Homosexuals may not marry.
Infertile persons may not marry.
Men with vasectomies may not marry.
Women with hysterectomies may not marry.
Post-menopausal women may not marry.
Persons planning to use birth control may not marry.
Non-virgins may not marry (Deuteronomy 22:13-21).
Inter-racial couples may not marry (Deuteronomy 7:3).

And couples who fail to conceive within two years ought to have their marriage licenses revoked.

Additionally, the Bible says that: Divorced persons may not marry (Luke 16:18).
And if a man dies without leaving a male heir, it is his brother's responsibility to impregnate the widow(Genesis 38:6-10). If he refuses, he shall be fined one shoe (Deuteronomy 25:5-10).
This is the sacred word of the Lord, steadfast and unchanging.

Traditional morality must become Oregon public policy. All of it. And the older the tradition, the better. The separation of church and state be damned. In order to protect the sanctity of marriage and the sacred institution of heterosexual procreation, unequal treatment and discrimination must be legislated consistently against all persons who cannot or will not breed as God intended. It is God's will that we multiply and fill the Earth and finally subdue it when the population explosion self-implodes. Praise God!

Love is not good enough a reason to marry, because marriage is only for
HETEROSEXUALBREEDING.COM

(This information furnished by M. Dennis Moore, Defense of Heterosexual Breeding Coalition.)

Argument in Favor
THE TRADITIONAL FAMILY IS UNDER ATTACK!
Frightening new unprecedented social changes are threatening old traditional values. And these attacks on tradition have been escalating--for millennia!

First there was Original Sin when Eve disobeyed God! Then the Flood! Then Abraham abandoned the traditional practice of human sacrifice! Then Jews instituted the modern covenant of circumcision! Then Moses brought down from Mount Sinai a bunch of new-fangled Laws on stone tablets! And later Jesus abolished them and preached instead the radical new Golden Rule!

Polygamy fell out of favor! Women were no longer mere pieces of property belonging to men! Next these uppity women demanded the right to vote! Families could no longer own slaves! Prohibition saved the family from destruction by Demon Rum! The nineteenth-century extended families on American farms were destroyed by the 1950s social engineering of the "Leave It to Beaver" suburban cookie-cutter nuclear families! Blacks refused to ride in the back of the bus! Women demanded equal pay for equal work! Single parents demanded respect! Gays and lesbians demanded an end to hatred and oppression! Flower children protested traditional mass-murder warfare and genocide! Divorce skyrocketed! The silence surrounding child abuse was broken!

Frightening social changes continued! And then the religious right began a righteous backlash! First they accused gays and lesbians of being promiscuous! And when this failed, they began accusing them of having long-term committed monogamous relationships and wanting to get married!

Where will it all end? After 6,000-some years of frightening attacks on old traditional values, will history never cease to unfold? Will God never stop throwing all of these radical social changes at us?
My friends, there is a simple answer. All you have to do is VOTE TO TURN THE CLOCK BACK!
It's really that simple!
Now, which one of these radical social changes will this measure turn the clock back to? Oh, come on, let's just
LEAVE IT TO BEAVER!
(This information furnished by M. Dennis Moore, The Beaver State Defense of Beaver Coalition.)

OK, so the thing of it is, this satire actually was published alongside all the other arguments in favor of banning gay marriage and when you read them one after another, there really isn't much distortion in the satire. Fabulous.

Bush and Iraq

From JFH

Apparently, there are those who do believe we need to fight an all-out "holy?" war to stop Islamic fascism, so, they would argue, the Administration's latest rationale for going to Iraq (to spread democracy and freedom throughout the region) makes sense.

(Aside: Actually, this was the neocons' argument all along, even before 9/11, for taking out Saddam, but American and world public opinion would never have supported an invasion solely for that purpose. Then 9/11 came along and the Administration tried to link Saddam with Al Qaeda and all of the sudden gave far more creedence to intelligence reports about WMDs than it had before.)

For the sake of argument, let's assume we DO need to fight an all-out war to stop Islamic fascism. What on earth makes anyone think that this Administration can do that effectively, given its record so far?

CLEARLY, the Bush administration was woefully and dangerously unprepared to do so when it went blustering into Iraq with not enough troops, no plan for what to do after Bahgdad fell, and certainly with no serious long-range plan to "win" that kind of war.

These people literally -- and I remain incredulous of this -- thought that Ahmed Chalabi would solve it all for them -- Iraqis would bow down to him and the U.S. and a democracy would magically materialize that would then be the beacon of freedom for the entire region. And we have a president who proudly doesn't bother himself to learn anything about any of this, but who thinks he has been touched by God and so therefore makes decisions based on his "gut" rather than any kind of reason, and so he charges us into this mess.

There have been several good articles that have come out in the past week that are definitely worth a read for anyone interested in this question of what is going on in Iraq right now and what the prospects for success are.

But to really get the context of Bush's messianic self-image, read the Suskind article from the New York Times Magazine first:

Without a Doubt


Then there is this three-part series by Michael Gordan:

The Strategy to Secure Iraq Did Not Foresee a 2nd War

Poor Intelligence Misled Troops About Risk of Drawn-Out War

Debate Lingering on Decision to Dissolve Iraqi Military


Then from the Knight-Ridder newspaper team that has done some excellent reporting from Iraq comes this series; the link is to the Miami Herald, which you have to subscribe to, but it's free (and you might as well arrange your Florida election news source early!)

Iraq reconstruction efforts overcome by ongoing violence

Iraq's future path uncertain because of insurgency

Post-war planning non-existent

The question of whether Kerry would have gone into Iraq in the first place is moot; the real question is does a new reality-based foreign policy team have a better chance of getting this thing back on track than the bunch that fucked it up in the first place? And even if the answer to that question is that Kerry has no chance to salvage it because it is FUBAR, should we "reward" this president with another term of office for doing this?

Kerry endorsements

from JFH

Check out Kerry endorsements/indictments of Bush record from The New York Times and The New Republic.

Bush's shifting rationale for war implies even longer stay for U.S.

by JFH

In today’s LA Times, Ronald Brownstein and Kathleen Hennessey examine the Administration’s shifting rationale for war in Iraq, and include a useful list of quotes at the end. I guess potential Bush voters can select the ones they like the best.

But the Administration’s latest principal rationale for going into Iraq seems to be to bring democracy to the country in the hope that a democratic Iraq will tilt the region away from extremism by encouraging the spread of freedom.

That would seem to require a plan!

And not just a plan for the next few months, but a long-term plan, because no one thinks Iraq will become a functional democracy any time soon, and especially not if the U.S. hands over security quickly and high-tails it out of there. Yet the Administration’s current “plan” appears to be to somehow secure the country in time for January elections and, at the same time, “train” enough Iraqi forces to hand over security relatively soon thereafter.

How exactly is that going to work? It isn’t.

This from Knight-Ridder’s excellent series on the morass that Iraq has become:

After nearly 19 months of combat, more than 1,000 American soldiers dead and $119 billion spent, the central question about Iraq isn't whether it will become a beacon of democracy in the Middle East but whether the United States can prevent it from becoming a black hole of instability. The answer may depend on whether Americans are willing to stomach what many military analysts believe will be a guerrilla war for years to come.

"Crossfire" host announces that he's clueless

Here’s what dweeby “Crossfire” host Tucker Carlson said yesterday about Jon Stewart’s appearance on the show Friday,

"I thought that he looked ridiculous and I think the tape makes that clear."

Huh? Check it out for yourself.

First of all, I can’t stand watching political debate shows on TV, so I haven’t watched “Crossfire” since the 1980s, but I watched the tape and Jon Stewart has it exactly right: Shows like “Crossfire” are to political debate what WWF is to real sports. And it is the utter idiocy of shows like “Crossfire” that have led to the popularity of shows like Stewart’s and Bill Maher’s, both of which accidently convey more relevant information than the likes of “Crossfire.”

Keyes says incest awaits kids of gays

From today's Sun-Times:

U.S. Senate candidate Alan Keyes told a rally Saturday that incest was "inevitable" for children raised by gay couples because the children might not know both biological parents.
"If we do not know who the mother is, who the father is, without knowing all the brothers and sisters, incest becomes inevitable," Keyes told the Marquette Park rally held to oppose same-sex marriages

Polls, polls, polls

I still think the formula for Kerry is: Gore states + 10, and Kerry gets the ten by winning Ohio OR Florida OR some combination of New Hampshire, Nevada, Colorado, and Arkansas.

After the debates, Kerry appears to be on his way to holding the Gore states. Pennsylvania and Minnesota appear to have moved back to Kerry, while Iowa and Wisconsin are about to get back to blue. In the latter two, Kerry is either tied or two points behind in most polls, and that's a trend in his direction over the last couple of weeks.

At this point, Bush is either trailing in the states that Kerry needs to take away, or not far enough ahead to be a likely winner on election day in any of them. If an incumbent is two points or less ahead among likely voters in the final pre-election polls, (s)he is in trouble on election day, as undecideds typically break against incumbents decisively. If turnout is heavy, meaning more "unlikely" voters go to the polls, the Democrat typically does better. All indications are that turnout will be heavy this year.

The two latest Florida polls have Kerry leading in one that's from a non-partisan firm, and Bush leading in one that's from a Republican firm. Both are polls of likely voters. Because of the hurricanes, likely voters may be the better group to look at, because many registered voters may end up not turning out because they are attending to more immediate concerns. Still, Bush is, at best, only a couple of points ahead, and that's if you believe only the Republican pollster.

In Ohio, more mixed results over the past few days, but even the Republican poll that shows the biggest Bush lead of six points among likely voters, also shows a trend toward Kerry; Bush's lead was ten points prior to the debates. Another non-partisan (but push-button phone) poll has Bush up by only two at 49%, while a third non-partisan poll done for the Chicago Tribune has Kerry up four.

Kerry probably has New Hampshire's four EVs, as he either leads or is tied with Bush in all four polls taken since October 4. Polling ties go to Kerry, based on the undecideds rule.

In two polls taken in October in Nevada, each candidate leads one.

By themselves, no one cares about New Hampshire and Nevada because the two states only total 9 EVs, so Kerry would need another Bush state, such as Colorado, with 9 EVs. Gallup and Zogby both show the candidates neck and neck, although the push-button phone pollster Survey USA has Bush up eight. If that's true, Bush should hold Colorado, but lots of evidence there that Kerry is doing well, as is Senate candidate Ken Salazar in his race against Peter Coors.

[Of course, Kerry could win by losing Colorado if the state question there passes requiring Colorado to apportion its EVs based on popular vote. That would hand Kerry 4 EVs and possibly the election, at least until SCOTUS gets involved.]

Arkansas seems to be either tied or Bush up by six, with most observers believing the latter. But with a popular Democrat up for reelection in the Senate and the possibility that the Big Dog might come to the state if his heart heals up in time, there is hope here for Kerry.

OK, that may not seem like a lot for Kerry to hang his hat on, beyond Ohio and Florida, so let's put Missouri back on the board. Bush had opened up a consistent six point lead there before the debates, and it looked like the Dems might concede the state, but two recent polls show Bush leading by only about two points, back in the danger zone for an incumbent.

On the other hand, Charlie Cook argues that we should be looking at national polls, and if one candidate wins by more than a percentage point nationally, chances are that candidate will with the Electoral College. However, if the candidates are within a percentage point, the outcome will basically be left to chance, and all this prognosticating about this state or that is a waste of time:

If the margin in this race is more than one percentage point, the Electoral College vote won't matter, if it is inside of one percent, then there are too many states that are too close and the state level polling, even the good ones, won't be of much use, much less these three-dollar state polls that are flying over the internet.

"Did you hear what Kerry said that about Mary Cheney?" -- Some possible responses

(1) "I know! I guess the Republicans just don't know how to take a complement!"
(2) "No, but I did hear that 10 more soldiers died this week in Iraq."
(3) "Yes, and did you hear what the President said? He said Mary Cheney should have fewer rights than me and you... unless, of course... are you gay too?"
(4) "You know what? I think it took Mary Cheney as much courage to come out of the closet publicly as it took John Kerry to face bullets in Vietnam. And I bet he admires that in her. In fact, I know he does, cause he said so at the debate!"
(5) "If you're gonna tell me you're offended... let me tell you something, at least John Kerry didn't lie about her war record and denigrate her service to the country. He simply stated something Dick Cheney already told us, and he complemented her for it."
(6) "Mary Cheney? Isn't she Dick Cheney's LESBIAN daughter?"
(7) "I didn't watch the debates because I was busy trying to figure out how to pay for the increase in my medical insurance."
(8) "I sure CAN believe John Kerry would point out that Mary Cheney is a person, who didn't choose to be gay just to piss off her dad, but is gay because she was born that way. And if Lynn Cheney has a problem with that, she has a serious problem."
(9) "So what's so bad about being a lesbian?"
(10) "Abso-fucking-lutely. It's about time we had a president who isn't afraid to be politically incorrect! It's about time we had someone who'll call a spade a spade, a liar a liar, a tax cut for the rich a tax cut for the rich, and a lesbian a lesbian!"

There's something (relevant) about (mentioning) Mary

And on the subject of Mary Cheney. The Republicans are claiming that Kerry's mention that Mary is a lesbian was somehow a low blow in the debate. I disagree completely. Here's Andrew Sullivan, gay conservative, on the subject:

All Kerry did was invoke the veep's daughter to point out that obviously homosexuality isn't a choice, in any meaningful sense. The only way you can believe that citing Mary Cheney amounts to "victimization" is if you believe someone's sexual orientation is something shameful.

In many speeches on marriage rights, I cite Mary Cheney. Why? Because it exposes the rank hypocrisy of people like president Bush and Dick and Lynne Cheney who don't believe gays are anti-family demons but want to win the votes of people who do. I'm not outing any gay person. I'm outing the double standards of straight ones. They've had it every which way for decades, when gay people were invisible. Now they have to choose.

The Debates: Winner-Take-All

I think Kerry won last night’s debate, hands down, despite the fact that Bush turned in his best performance. Unfortunately for the president, that's not saying much.

Inexplicably reprising Al Gore’s “three faces” debate performance from 2000, Bush tried on an odd “just keep grinnin’” persona that worked only marginally better than his strange “charge around the stage and yell” persona from the town hall debate. Both, of course, were far superior to the president’s disastrous and troubling first-debate "furious George" persona. Kerry, by contrast, was solid on all three occasions. Calm and collected, much warmer than expected, in command of facts, and generally, far more presidential than the president.

An observer who is neutral on the issues can now look at Kerry and say, “I can believe this guy as President,” while looking at Bush and saying, “I can’t believe this guy is the President!”

After the debates, Kerry seems a much warmer, likeable, albeit serious, person than I had thought of him before, and also compared with Bush. I did not see warm and likeable. I saw cold and strange. Anyway, there have been three winning challengers in the era of presidential debates (Carter 1976, Reagan 1980, Clinton 1992), and all three helped themselves in the debates by being seen alongside the president and measuring up against the incumbent. But none of those three so clearly "out-presidentialed" the president the way Kerry did.

Substantively, Bush didn’t really lay a glove on Kerry where it mattered, which was tagging him with the liberal label, which is apparently going to be the president’s stretch-run strategy. So the caricature he will draw of Kerry the liberal will not have much resonance with those who saw the real Kerry during the debates. I think Kerry goes on to victory from here. It just doesn’t seem credible to me that undecideds will not break his way and that the GOP GOTV machine will outwork the Democrats. Oh, and P.S. -- I've always thought Karl Rove was overrated.

Here are some snippets from around the blogosphere:

Noam Scheiber: I've never thought the chances of John Kerry winning this fall were very good, since it's become clear these last four years that George W. Bush and his advisers are more cynical and ruthless than pretty much any group of politicos in the country's history. I figured that even if the race got close--or, God forbid, Kerry surged to a late lead--Rove et al. would pull some dirty trick and that would be that. This may still happen--the forthcoming anti-Kerry "documentary" being exhibit A in this brief. But, after last night, I'm not sure it matters. Kerry won so decisively I don't see many ways for Bush to recover.

Tom Schaller on Bush’s three faces:
Bush Version 1 was The Pouter;
Bush Version 2 was The Shouter; and
Bush Version 3 was The Doubter.

Version 1 and 2 have been thoroughly discussed, so let me clarify the third label by reminding people to go back and look at how Kerry hammered him on assault weapons and on employment. Bush reflexively started incongruously talking about No Child Left Behind in response to the latter; heck, I'm surprised he didn't try to work in NCLB as somehow a solution to the assault weapons problem. A giant, unfunded federal mandate for testing, but not resourcing our children's schools - it's the panacea to all America's problems! He has serious doubts about almost all of his policies, and it shows. That's why he's only comfortable talking about himself and how great a leader he is, in the abstract. When he looks more carefully, even he doubts the claims he's been trotted out there to make. (Eye dart, semi-wink, phony smile.)

Matthew Yglesias: A clear win for John Kerry. The reason, I think, is that even though both sides won some rounds, Kerry won the important rounds, on health care and jobs. Especially on jobs. It's easy for the professional media to overlook the extent to which jobs overshadow talk about, say, the deficit since, by definition, media professionals are not unemployed. Nor do media professionals live in the areas of the country that are afflicted by job losses. But in Ohio, West Virginia, and elsewhere that stuff's a huge deal and all Bush said to people who are hurting is that they should go back to school. It's pretty insulting for a president (especially this president) to suggest that the reason folks are struggling is that they're too dumb.

From the American Prospect's Tapped: BOTOX? Curiously, George W. Bush's trademark smirk was replaced by a half-frown tonight during the debate. If you looked closely, the right corner of Bush's mouth turned down, as though the muscles had gone slack. Bush's trademark smirk was replaced by a half-frown tonight during the debate. If you looked closely, the right corner of Bush's mouth turned down, as though the muscles had gone slack....Could it be that the Prez got a hit of Botox to freeze his "sneer muscle" before the debate? Just curious.

Kerry wins on points but can't get the KO

My take on Friday's debate is that Kerry blew a great opportunity to knock George W. Bush out of the ring. Will Saleton outlines it in painful detail here, as does John Judis here. I couldn't believe that Kerry let Bush get away with the ridiculous argument that the Duelfer report in any way bolsters the administration's rationale for going to war in Iraq. Nor did Kerry mention Paul Bremer's remarks from last week, nor did he mention Friday's dismal jobs report. He also let the rightward leanings of the women who asked questions about stem cell research and abortion throw him off, resulting in muddled answers on issues where his position is clearly favored.

But both ABC and CNN post-debate polls showed narrow Kerry wins among debate viewers, and the latter poll had more Republicans in it than Democrats. Perhaps those polls suggest not so much that Kerry won the debate, Judis argues, but that he is actually winning the race.

Can Kerry close the deal on Wednesday? The original conventional wisdom on the debates was that domestic policy was Kerry's strength, but it turns out that foreign policy is where this election is being fought and it's where the President is the most defensive. Bush seemed to do better in the domestic portion of Friday's debate -- ironic, since he really has no domestic policy -- but seemingly relieved to be off the subject of Iraq and into an area where he can fall back on liberal-baiting. I think Kerry has his work cut out for him on Wednesday.

W's week from hell: a summary

Excellent summary of Bush's week from hell:

BAD WEEK....It's been a bad week for the White House. I think it's worth summarizing just how bad:
Thursday:
George Bush gets his butt kicked by John Kerry in the first presidential debate.
Saturday:
Partly due to Bush's dismal debate performance, polls indicate that Kerry is catching up. Bush's lead appears to have been reduced to 2-3 points.
Monday:
Donald Rumsfeld admits that Saddam Hussein didn't have any substantial ties to al-Qaeda. "To my knowledge, I have not seen any strong, hard evidence that links the two." After his statement is reported, he tries unsucessfully to claim that he was "misunderstood."
Later Monday:
The CIA agrees with Rumsfeld. The linchpin of the administration's case for collaboration between Saddam and al-Qaeda has been Saddam's alleged "harboring" of terrorist mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, but a CIA report concludes that it probably didn't happen. "The evidence is that Saddam never gave Zarqawi anything," said an official who read the report.
Tuesday:
Paul Bremer admits that the administration made a big mistake by not having enough troops in Iraq. "The single most important change -- the one thing that would have improved the situation -- would have been having more troops in Iraq at the beginning and throughout" the occupation. When his statement becomes public, Bremer complains that his remarks were "off the record." For its part, the Bush administration tries to claim that Bremer was lying, but is forced to backtrack almost immediately when it becomes apparent that Bremer did ask for more troops as far back as July 2003.
Later Tuesday: Dick Cheney initially appears to fight John Edwards to a near draw in the vice presidential debate, but before long attention shifts to Cheney's numerous and obvious lies during the debate. This is likely to be the consensus post-debate talking point.
Wednesday:
Weapons inspector Charles Duelfer releases his final report. He says that
Saddam Hussein destroyed all his WMD after 1991, had no WMD programs in place after that, and that his capacity to build WMD was actually deteriorating after 1998, not increasing.
Thursday:
Polls show that Bush has lost nearly his entire lead. The race is now a dead heat. AP/Ipsos actually shows Kerry ahead.

That's a bad week. I wonder how George Bush will be feeling when he takes the stage tomorrow? A little bit nervous, perhaps?

Add to that today's disappointing jobs report. -- jh

And now this on the so-called link between Saddam and al Qaeda

Just happened across this State Dept. list posted Nov. 10, 2001:


Countries Where al Qaeda Has Operated:

Albania, Algeria, Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Australia, Austria, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belgium Bosnia, Egypt, Eritrea, France, Germany, India, Iran, Ireland, Italy, Jordan, Kenya, Kosovo, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Mauritania, Netherlands, Pakistan, Philippines, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, South Africa, Sudan, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Uzbekistan, Yemen


There is, of course, one glaring omission.

The Polls: Hotline sees definite Kerry trend

The Hotline's state-by-state polling analysis has Kerry in the lead for the first time in quite a while, primarily because a new American Research Group poll of Ohio voters shows Kerry's first lead in the state in two months.

Remember, Kerry needs to win all the Gore states (260 electoral votes), plus pick up ten electoral votes from the Bush-2000 states. With Pennsylvania back in the fold according to the latest polls, and Wisconsin and Iowa trending that way, Kerry appears poised to keep the Gore states. That leaves Florida OR Ohio as the key Bush-2000 states Kerry needs to carry to put him over the top, and he certainly seems to be trending in the right direction in both states. (Kerry seems likely to carry New Hampshire, which narrowly went to Bush in 2000, but it has only four electoral votes.)

OHIO
An American Research Group poll conducted 10/4-6 surveyed 600 likely voters. Margin of error +/- 4% (release, 10/7). For this poll, the likely voter sample was made up of 38%R, 38%D, 24%I/Other. In '00, the state's electorate broke down 37%R, 38%D, 26%I/Other.

Likely Voters
Kerry 48%
Bush 47%
Nader 1%
Undecided 4%

Independent likely voters
Kerry 51%
Bush 43%
Nader 2%
Und 4%

Previous poll 9/20
Kerry 46%
Bush 48%
Nader 1%
Und 5%

WISCONSIN
A Dem poll for Kerry and a GOP poll for Bush, but both show a tighter race.

A Lake Snell Perry (D) poll conducted 10/3-5 for ACT surveyed 600 likely voters. Margin of error +/- 4% (Hotline sources).

Kerry 48%
Bush 44%
Nader 1%
Undec 7%

A Moore Information (R) poll conducted 10/5-6 for their own consumption surveyed 500 likely voters. Margin of error +/- 4% (release, 10/7). For this poll, the voter sample was made up of 38%R, 39%D, 22%I/Other; In '00, the state's electorate broke down 32%R, 37%D, 31%I/Other.

-----Now
Bush 47%
Kerry 45
Undec/Oth 8

-----9/22
Bush 48%
Kerry 45%
Undec/Oth 7%

FLORIDA
Four new polls. Two with Kerry leading; two with Bush leading.

Mason-Dixon --- 10/4-5 +/-4
Bush 48%
Kerry 44

Quinnipiac --- 10/1-5 +/-3
Bush 51%
Kerry 44%

American Research Group --- 10/2-5 +/-4
Bush 45%
Kerry 47%

Hamilton Beattie (D) --- 10/1-4 +/-3.5
Bush 47%
Kerry 49%

Get some post-debate laughs here

Check out the mp3 called “Hard Work” on Harry Shearer’s site.

Also go to his September 26, 2004 show and click on “John Kerry’s debate prep” to get a clearer understanding of why Kerry did so well in the first debate.

Post-debate polls: Edwards wins

ABC reported that Cheney “won” the debate, 43% to 35%, but its sample was 38% Republican vs. 30% Democrat, and the rest Independent. If you look into the details, you find that Cheney won bigger among Republicans than Edwards did among Democrats, BUT – most importantly – Edwards won among Independents by about 43%-34%, which is just about the same result as CBS’ poll of undecided voters who watched the debate. They went for Edwards 41%-28%. Check out the Chris Bowers and Andrew Sullivan blogs for the details.

Debate reaction -- Edwards "cleaned Cheney's clock"

Conservative commentator Andrew Sullivan thinks Edwards won, hands down.

At Slate, pro-Kerry William Saleton says Edwards cleaned his clock, and Kerry-supporter/hater Micky Kaus calls it a draw.

At The New Republic, Noam Scheiber agrees with Saleton, and Ryan Lizza points out that Bush now suffers by comparison with all three candidates.

Edwards on points

The Republicans were between a rock and a hard place for last night’s debate. Had Cheney performed as poorly as Bush, it would have had a reinforcing effect that would have hurt the ticket and would have put considerably more pressure on the president to perform even better on Friday than he already needs to do. On the other hand, Bush’s vice-president performed so much better than the big guy himself did last Thursday that Bush still suffers by comparison. When is the last time that a vice-president so overshadowed a president in the debates? Now, on Friday, Bush has to outperform both Kerry and Cheney. He can’t just do a little better than last week; he’s got to do a lot better.

As for Edwards, he sat shoulder to shoulder with Cheney, and performed very well. He didn’t look or act like a lightweight and he was more than willing to throw a punch. I thought he was even more appealing sitting down than when he is standing up because it forced him to tone down the act a bit.

Cheney will probably get high marks from relieved Republicans who viewed last night’s debate, and Edwards will likewise get high marks from Democrats worried that he wouldn’t look weighty enough or would be too nice and Lieberman-like.

As for the undecideds – people who clearly don’t like the incumbents or else they would already be committed to them – I would guess Edwards acquitted himself well, going up against a formidable figure, scoring lots of debating points, and coming off as a plausible vice president. Cheney looked tired, drained, and like the president last week, not enthusiastic about being there. He also didn’t answer any of the major charges made by Edwards.

Does Bush really think our allies don't know Iraq was a mistake?

From Noam Scheiber's Daily Journal of Politics at the New Republic:

This has been bugging me since the debate last Thursday. The president keeps insisting there's no way to get more allies helping out in Iraq if you keep insisting the war was a mistake, as John Kerry does. ("I can imagine him walking into the leaders of the world saying, 'We need your help, but Iraq is a mistake,'" the president said yesterday.)

But isn't the reality exactly the opposite? Pretty much every potential ally in the world thinks Iraq was a mistake. As long as that's the case, don't you stand a greater chance of winning them over by acknowledging this rather than treating them like idiots? If I'm France or Russia, I'm going to be much more receptive to a pitch that says, "Look, we know we screwed up, but we need your help so Iraq doesn't become an even bigger problem than it already is." The alternative pitch--"Hey, everything's going great. We'd still do it the same way if we had it to do all over again. Oh, and by the way, would you mind kicking in a few thousand troops?"--doesn't strike me as so compelling.

What did Bremer ask for and when did he ask for it?

And in the news today, L.Paul Bremer, who was the first American administrator in Iraq after our catastrophic military success there, says we were short on troops for the occupation. Well, duh!

This from Matthew Yglesias today:

Paul Bremer says he asked the administration for more troops. The administration says he's lying. It's enough to make you wonder why Bush keeps hiring so many liars -- there's Bremer, his predecessor Jay Garner, Paul O'Neill, Richard Clarke, Rand Beers -- more than enough for a good trend piece. But of course as Atrios points out, Bremer isn't lying at all; the administration is.

As I said before, though, I've got no sympathy for Bremer. As Spencer Ackerman writes, Bremer was more than willing to go on national television and say he had plenty of troops when that's what Bush asked him to do. Frankly, it only clouds the case that the force was undersized to rely on the testimony of a weasel like Bremer. The evidence was -- and always has been -- perfectly clear on this point, Bremer's lame effort to revive his reputation notwithstanding.

Hopelessly confused, Rumsie flip-flops on Al Qaeda-Iraq connection

For God's sake, I can't even keep this straight.

First, Rumsfeld admitted publicly yesterday, rather long-windedly, that there was no credible connection between Al Qaeda and Iraq, and whadya take me for anyway, an intelligence expert? Read the NYTimes story here, or the Nexis transcript here.

Then he issues a press release saying:

"A question I answered today at an appearance before the Council on Foreign Relations regarding ties between Al Qaeda and Iraq regrettably was misunderstood.

"I have acknowledged since September 2002 that there were ties between Al Qaeda and Iraq.

"This assessment was based upon points provided to me by then CIA Director George Tenet to describe the CIA's understanding of the Al Qaeda-Iraq relationship."


So I guess that means Rumsfeld is sticking with the discredited intelligence from two years ago? Or that he was forced back onto the Administration's official talking points? Perhaps because Cheney is going to keep insisting that the connection exists in tonight's debate? But why would they do that? Maybe because their polls show that a lot of people still think there was a connection and that's why we went to war? Come to think of it, that must be it.

Right-wing-nut in Oklahoma may help Dems take Senate

Oh my God, Trilbe! I’ve found a candidate who could be an even bigger wingnut than Alan Keyes! In fact, this guy actually endorsed Alan Keyes for president in 2000. This would be hilarious if not for the fact that former Rep. Tom Coburn, a Republican (obviously) could actually be elected to the Senate in Oklahoma.

Right now, he appears to be running behind Rep. Brad Carson, a Democrat and Rhodes Scholar who has to bend over backwards to convince Oklahoma voters that he isn’t one of those evil “liberal” Democrats found in Blue States. Although Oklahoma Democrats still have some residual advantage in party identification, the state has been effectively dominated by Republicans since 1994, after about twenty years of gradual movement in that direction.

Coburn, a country doctor who improbably won a House seat in 1994, left voluntarily, as he had said he would, after three terms, and was replaced by Carson. Now, the two are vying for the seat being vacated by longtime Sen. Don Nickles. Coburn won a hard fought primary against the Oklahoma City mayor, thereby demonstrating that a plurality of the state’s Republicans are themselves Keyes-like nut jobs.

But Coburn, who once called Oklahoma legislators “crap heads,” may have made a mistake appearing with Carson yesterday in the august setting of NBC’s Meet the Press, coming off as, well, a bigger wingnut than Alan Keyes. Coburn thinks that doctors who perform abortions should be subject to the death penalty. So it’s not inconsistent enough that a right-to-lifer when it comes to abortion is a supporter of the death penalty – we see that inconsistency all the time – Coburn thinks doctors who perform abortions ought to get the death penalty. There’s a healthy respect for life, for you.

Oklahoma is one of three states where Democrats could take open Republican seats. The others are Colorado and Illinios -- where Obama is a shoo-in against Keyes, who was actually at minus 8% in the last poll I saw. The Democratic candidate is also ahead in Alaska. Meanwhile, several southern Democrats are doing much better than expected defending open Democratic seats. As a result, the Democrats currently have a much better than expected shot at gaining the Senate. If current standings hold, the Dems would have 51 seats after the election, along with moderate Vermont Republican Jim Jeffords, who caucuses with the Democrats. Jeffords, however, could be joined after the election by his collleague, Sen. Lincoln Chaffee of Rhode Island, who is making noises to that effect.

Going Upriver: See it now!

I like a good documentary. I have always been lukewarm about Michael Moore. He takes on topics I generally agree with, and his films are entertaining, but his arguments are often over the top and a little too conspiratorial for my taste. Thus it is refreshing to have another documentary to talk about prior to Election Day. “Going Upriver” chronicles John Kerry’s Vietnam experience and then, primarily, his contribution to the anti-war movement after he got home. It is not a simple campaign bio film; indeed, Kerry’s campaign has largely tried to steer clear of his Vietnam Veterans Against the War days, which is the main emphasis of the film.

That said, the film is the most attractive portrait of John Kerry that I’ve seen, including the portrayal of Kerry at the Democratic convention. Here is a guy who grew up in relative affluence, though not absolute affluence, going to Yale at a time when the responsibility of leadership that to this day seems to be embedded in places like that still included military leadership. Kerry was told so by none other than William Bundy, who was a senior Kennedy-Johnson administration foreign policy advisor.

Here is a young lieutenant who clearly served admirably in extremely dangerous combat situations, being forced to take his swift boat upriver in order to draw hostile fire. Watching it, I was further disgusted by the Swift Boat Vets’ attacks on Kerry. How could people who shared the morass of Vietnam launch such a scurrilous and false attack on fellow veterans? (Answer: Karl Rove, whose signature tactic has been to attack an opponent where he seems the most impregnable. Read this article and tell me that Rove didn’t play a role in the Swift Boat Vet attacks.)

But the film is really about the role played by Kerry in Vietnam Veterans Against the War, a group that Kerry ended up more or less leading. Calmer and more articulate than many of his fellow vets, Kerry helped manage the group’s week-long Washington protest and became something of a media star in the process, appearing on network news programs as a spokesperson for the group, then culminating in an appearance before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Here was a thoughtful, articulate young man expressing to the country what thousands of Vietnam vets were trying to say. It was extremely impressive. If the 60 year-old Kerry is even a shadow of the 27 year-old Kerry, I’m still impressed.

One footnote: the Nixon administration was so impressed and threatened by Kerry that it went out and recruited someone to try to go toe-to-toe with him in the court of public opinion. The guy they came up with was the uptight and clearly not ready for prime time John O’Neill, who spoke on behalf of no one in particular then, just as he doesn’t today as the leader of the Swift Boat Vets group.

The First Debate: Kerry Scores a Big Win

For nearly a month after Kerry endured the Swift Boat Vets attacks and the vicious follow-ups at the GOP convention, the story had been that “the sky is falling” on Kerry. It was an exaggeration from Day One, a typical media overstretch coming from the tendency to focus on the horse race, on incorrect assumptions about national polls, and on the views of campaign insiders.

Bush did take the lead in the polls after the GOP convention, but not by nearly as much as news media conventional wisdom made it seem. On average, Bush went from down two or three points to up by about four points in national polls – hardly a big jump coming after a convention. Moreover, national polls are all but meaningless in a year when we already know how most states will cast their electoral votes. The focus should be on the handful of swing states that will decide the election. In those states, and therefore in the projected Electoral College, Bush also opened a lead, but an extremely narrow one, not even as large as his four-point national lead might imply. In addition, in nearly every battleground state (and in national polls, for that matter), Bush failed to reach the 50% mark, which, for an incumbent, is a better predictor of the vote on Election Day than is the spread between the candidates. (Read this piece for an explanation of why an incumbent who can't break 50% in the polls is in trouble even if he is ahead.)

But campaign insiders started whispering about how poorly the Kerry campaign responded to the Swift Boat Vet attacks and openly worried about its ability to withstand further search-and-destroy missions that were sure to come from Bush’s Gen. Rove. Thus, the story heading into last Thursday’s debate was that it was Kerry’s last chance, which was really a stretch, and had Kerry done poorly in the debate, the whole story could have become a self-fulfilling prophecy, which would have gone down in campaign annals as the Dukakisization of John Kerry.

Alas, it didn’t happen. Kerry won the first debate more decisively than anyone since I can remember – and I have seen every debate since 1976. There are several instances where it was clear after the fact that one candidate had bettered another – Ford’s 1976 comment that there was no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe comes to mind – but Thursday night, on stage, the difference between the two candidates on both style and substance was stunning. Kerry had the demeanor of a president; he commanded the stage. Bush looked small and mean, and acted like he didn’t want to be there. Kerry’s answers were succinct and mostly on point; Bush rambled until he could figure out a way to segue into his basic talking points, which he delivered in rote fashion and repeated until the red light mercifully went off, eliciting an almost visible expression of relief on the President’s sour face.

It was such a boffo performance by Kerry that the president’s spin machine couldn’t get any traction; after all, sixty million people saw the debate and could not have come to any conclusion other than that Kerry won the debate. You can fool millions of people some of the time, but you can’t fool a majority of sixty million people about who won that debate.

So now, voila! Kerry appears to be back up in the polls; Bush remains below 50% nationally and in nearly every battleground state; Democrats are fired up; and this race should be a sprint to the finish. The wild card, however, is the next couple of debates. Can Bush shake the dominant perception that came out of the first one? It hasn’t happened very often in debates past. Bush the Elder never got any better as the 1992 debates went on. Al Gore more or less moved even with Bush in the later 2000 debates, but that didn’t shake the perception that Bush did better in the debates because he won the first one. Maybe the president will do better now that he is back in the underdog role. I doubt it. Kerry may not be as likeable as Bill Clinton, but he is as quick on his feet. Moreover, the first debate was the one the president wanted – on foreign policy and national security. The next two debates – a town meeting free-for-all and a domestic policy debate – would appear to be even more fertile ground for Kerry, although the president may be able to show his folksy side in the town-meeting debate on Friday. He needs to; otherwise, I think he’s a goner.