If Biden Was A Jerk

He could have said "Every time Sarah Palin opens her mouth, all you
hear is a noun and a noun and an 'also'."

Saturday Night Live Preview

Sounds like Tina will be back, because they're doing a VP Debate skit with Gwen Ifill being played by...

...Queen Latifah.

Judging from last night, Queen Latifah may have been a better choice to moderate the real thing.

Schlep Wars!

A week after Sarah Silverman released her amazing "Great Schlep" video, the McCain campaign responds with...Jackie Mason?!

Something tells me Sweet Johnny Mac should ask his good friend Rudy Giuliani why Mason might not be the best surrogate on this issue:

September 28, 1989:

Rudolph W. Giuliani said yesterday that the comedian Jackie Mason would no longer have a role in his mayoral campaign, after a newspaper quoted Mr. Mason as making racially charged remarks about blacks and Jews.

[...]

''There is a sick Jewish problem of voting for a black man no matter how unfit he is for the job,'' Mr. Mason said. ''All you have to do is to be black and don't curse the Jews directly and the Jew will vote for a black in a second. Jews are sick with complexes.''

Was Michael Richards just not available?

In other news, Jackie Mason is still alive?!

The Hagelian Imperative

After reading this tidbit from Marc Ambinder:

Obama Adds Field Office In Nebraska

Some evidence that the Obama campaign is heavily targeting the state's second congressional district: they've just opened another field office in Omaha.

It just reminded me: where is Chuck Hagel's endorsement?

You have to think that would play insanely well in Nebraska's 2nd.

Homer Votes

Much was made of Obama's weakness in the primaries with "hardly working, yellow, Animated-Americans" who broke for Hillary Clinton decisively in each state that Springfield is rumored to be in.

Judging from this, Obama has clearly made the sale.

Noonan Crashes

No one has squandered their credibility boost from this year's primaries more quickly or sharply than Peggy Noonan.

After getting caught speaking her mind when she thought no one was looking, on the same day she espoused the opposite position in her Wall Street Journal, Peggy Noonan has been in full damage control mode, trying to get back in favor with her conservative puppet-masters.

Today's column is a pretty pathetic continuation of this rehabilitation:

She killed. She had him at "Nice to meet you. Hey, can I call you Joe?" She was the star. He was the second male lead, the good-natured best friend of the leading man. She was not petrified but peppy.

Three months ago, I thought Peggy Noonan could have earned a spot in the American Political Pantheon by crossing party lines and crafting Barack Obama's version of "Morning in America."

Now she is continues to reveal herself to be nothing more than another partisan hack. One who hypocritically attacks Democrats for being elitists through a op-ed column humbly titled "Declarations."

Closet Minmei Fan?

It's really odd that Letterman uses twenty-five year old incidental music from Robotech in his comedy sketches.

Mark Halperin is back to being an idiot

Biden and Palin both get B's? Give me a break. He cleaned her clock.

Joe Biden takes the Kobayashi Maru

Everyone I know is worried. "She's won the expectations game. She's going to win this debate. Ugh!"

Guess what? They're probably right.

Biden is screwed. If he's too mean, he's a jerk. If he's too nice, he's condescending.

If he ignores her attacks, he cedes her 90 minutes to run up his negatives unchecked.

If he knows too much, he's a know-it-all.

He's going to gaffe. Everyone knows that.

He's probably going to try to cop a feel--and that's just how he'll treat Gwen Ifill.

Guess what?

It. Does. Not. Matter.

Sure Sarah can staunch the bleeding. She may even get an hour and a half of folksy charm masking snotty attacks.

But at the end of the day, Sarah Palin is not going to win this election for John McCain. Maybe she will acquit herself and her future political reputation. Maybe McCain will even bounce in the polls.

But if any of you want to give me even money that Palin is going to somehow remain gaffe-free for the next 33 days, I will gladly eat your money.

Any takers?

The Very Best of Sarah Palin

Thanks, Talking Points Memo!

Diagramming Palin

Palin's sentences. Diagrammed.

Gwen Strikes Back

This is promising.

"I've got a pretty long track record covering politics and news," [Ifill] said. "so I'm not particularly worried that one-day blog chatter is going to destroy my reputation. The proof is in the pudding. They can watch the debate tomorrow night and make their own decisions about whether or not I've done my job."

Hopefully, she has the integrity to live up to this.

Failing that, hopefully she looks at the polls and realizes there's no profit in kowtowing to right-wing bullies.

Now it can be told

We now know why John McCain suspended his campaign.


Watch CBS Videos Online

It's actually worse than I thought.

On Saturday, when Tina Fey does this bit, I hope she whips out a flute.

This counts as five, ok..?

Obama's Poll Bonaza

I haven't been posting much polling data here, but today warrants an exception.

Things got kicked off this morning by Quinnipiac which showed the following:

FLORIDA: Obama 51, McCain 43
OHIO: Obama 50, McCain 42
PENNSYLVANIA: Obama 54, McCain 39

Staggering numbers to be sure. The McCain campaign panicked about these numbers and attempted to laugh them off.

"These polls are laughable. We hope Obama thinks they’re true. The national tracking is clear: Some polls have us down 2 percent, some 4, some as high as 6. How could you have national numbers like that, but have those kinds of numbers in three of the largest, most competitive states in the country?"

But then, CNN/Time Magazine laid down the smackdown:

FLORIDA: Obama 51, McCain 47
MINNESOTA: Obama 54, McCain 43
MISSOURI: Obama 49, McCain 48
NEVADA: Obama 51, McCain 47
VIRGINIA: Obama 53, McCain 44

These are staggering, staggering numbers. Assuming Obama wins all of John Kerry's states (and really at this point, the only question mark is New Hampshire's 4 Electoral Votes) and Iowa and New Mexico, which everyone assumes he wins, as well as Colorado where he is leading, we're talking about 349 Electoral Votes...

...and we're not even factoring Indiana and North Carolina where the polls are deadlocked, if not showing a slight Obama lead.

The most devastating factor of all is, as far as I can tell, these polls are now talking about likely voters--not registered voters. Likely Voters have usually voted in at least the two last elections, which means that they are disproportionately oversampling older voters, and undersampling younger voters and new registrants.

And I'll give you two guesses on who those groups favor.

What this means is: there is a reasonable assumption that as amazing as these poll numbers are today, they could very well be understating Obama's actual support in these states.

I told you this was worth posting.

Attacking Ifill

Just a thought: If things are going badly for Palin tomorrow night, do you think she might change tactics (or is it strategies?) and actually attack Ifill herself for being biased? This seems to be Palin's favorite move in her Couric interview.

I would argue it's a losing strategy, but it certainly would create the dominant story coming out of the debate--and it would be a story that wasn't about Palin's complete lack of knowledge about, well, anything.

The Palin Adventure Is Just Beginning

Wow. Just wow.

And even worse stuff coming today...

The future of Sarah Palin

Hopefully, we will never hear from her again after November 5th. Obviously the Republicans will trot her out to fundraise, but she is such a knucklehead even they can't possibly try and position her again for higher office.

In short, she will become the Geraldine Ferraro of the Republican Party.

Which, I guess, means that someday she will piss off Republican voters by NOT being racist.

The Early Political Life of Sarah Palin

In what alternate universe does anyone believe that Sarah Palin knew who Joe Biden even was in the 2nd grade?

How about the 12th?

How about during college(s)?

How about two years ago?

Bonus fun fact: Sarah Palin has two less alma maters than John McCain has houses.

Brokaw Watch

It continues to trend downward:

In an interview here after Sunday’s broadcast, Mr. Brokaw said that over the summer he had “advocated” within the executive suite of NBC News to modify the anchor duties of the MSNBC hosts Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews on election night and on nights when there were presidential debates.

[...]

Mr. Brokaw said he had also conducted some shuttle diplomacy in recent weeks between NBC and the McCain campaign.

The Newest "Real McCain": The Economy

Robert Greenwald deserves a medal

Martian Snow Days

On a crummy economic day, here's something to cheer you up.

The Mars Phoenix lander just discovered that it actually snows on Mars!

Icy snow falls from high in Mars's atmosphere and may even reach the planet's surface, scientists working with NASA's Phoenix lander reported yesterday.

[...]

"Nothing like this view has ever been seen on Mars," said Jim Whiteway of York University in Toronto, lead scientist for the Canadian-supplied Meteorological Station on Phoenix. "We'll be looking for signs that the snow may even reach the ground."

Democrats Are Irrelevant??

Apparently, even thought Barack Obama now leads in practically every single critical swing state, and per Nate Silver and national polling, is the odds on favorite to win the election, according to Mark Halperin not one of the "5 Most Important People In Politics (Who Aren't Running For President" is even a Democrat.

Um, suuuure.

The Bailout and the Election

Even Republican pundits agree. The House Republicans cooked themselves today:

How any of this could possibly be construed as a positive for either McCain or the Republican Party is beyond me (and I say this as a life-long Republican)? In fact, it would seem much more likely to me that the House Republicans just handed the election to Obama on a silver platter. Blaming the vote on Pelosi’s antagonistic remarks seems especially dumb, and I expect to see Barney Frank-type comments all over the MSM tonight and throughout the week

Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of guys.

McCain needs political Viagra

Paging Bob Dole...

McCain suspends his campaign.
Goes to Washington to wrangle the House Republicans.
Restarts his campaign.
Gets blown out at the debate.
Goes back to Washington to wrangle House Republicans.
Claims credit for putting the bill back together...
And then fails to deliver House Republicans.

John McCain is the leader of his party--how, exactly?

Do the edge pieces first

Who likes Jigsaw puzzles?

Thoughts about the VP Debate

Moderator Gwen Ifill is the key. I think she will work, generally, to the Democrats and Biden's favor, for the following reasons:

1. She is a damn good journalist.
2. She works for PBS and is, I imagine, far less ratings obsessed than an anchor from a broadcast network. Result: less focus on silly tabloid stories and gossip items. A conversation about pigs, lipstick, Track and babies instead of the Fed Bailout, Iraq, Afghanistan and things like, you know, actual policy.
   

There is a reason why Jim Lehrer was roundly praised by debate watchers: no stupid, silly season questions. His employment at PBS was key reason why.

3. She is a contender for the "Meet The Press" job. With David Gregory (mercifully) fading, and no other option clearly manifesting itself (scratch Olbermann and Matthews), one has to think that Ifill's chances are as good as they have ever been. Consider this to be her ultimate audition. Conduct a debate worthy of NBC's Sunday and she makes the strongest case she can. Conduct a debate worthy of Access Hollywood--not so much.

It should be noted that #3 does contradict #2 slightly--obviously the higher ups are going to be looking at how big of a draw Ifil's is. My guess is not that big--but Sarah Palin sure will be.

4. With the sexism card in the air, Sarah Palin in a defensive post-Couric crouch and an expectation that Biden will somehow make an ass of himself towards Palin, the fact that Ifill is not a white man will undercut the "old-boy network Biden and the debate moderator ganged up on poor Sarah" narrative that could easily have emerged from the debate. Biden can still get himself in trouble--but no one likes watching two against one, so he may have dodged a bullet here.

UPDATE:

Ha. The McCain camp is already trying to pressure Ifill: