the new poll numbers are out and predictably panic is setting in amongst democrats...the latest gallup- shockingly- has obama down 10 points among likely voters!...if you don't believe me on panic read this thread were people are actually discussing what country to move to and how to obtain citizenship in the different places... i can't believe someone is actually considering moving to argentina (less chance of nuclear fallout they argue...):
personally i began to panic strongly on thursday and by friday was in full blown panic mode (randy and a cab driver originally from sierra leone, unfortunately for him, can attest to this...)
i actually think a good panic is whats needed.... we can't do what we did in 2000 and 2004 which was basically ignore reality and question the poll methodology....we've seen this before.. why not panic now while we can? as long as it doesn't take us off our game whats the problem? wait a minute we don't have a game! so its not a problem!
it is absolutely insane that in the current economic context democrats aren't up by ten points.....it boggles the mind some of the stuff that republicans are getting away with such as arguing governor palin has more experience (not to mention seemingly turning the election into obama vs. palin) or that they are mavericks and reformers.... the latest obama error is not to have a better answer on the surge...tiffiny who is not by nature a political analyst had far better answers to the questions george stephanopolous was posing to obama this morning than obama did...
obama seems as confident as ever...however..
my personal feeling is that we ought to practice a little rovian politics ourselves... why not go after mccain on his perceived strengths instead of letting him get away with them??? i really had expected joe biden would go after mccain on reckless national security stances etc but this is not happening... in fact we're hearing biden doing a bit too much talking about what a great guy/friend mccain is??? what is up with that?? a perfect missed opportunity which is costing us heavily has been the failure to tie the surge policy to georgia: "our military is stretched so thin due to the surge that we can't offer any sort of deterrent to russia's military expansion!".. this would have had the double impact of going after mccain on his #1 current strength (surge) while demonstrating that mccain's tought talk on georgia was mere bravado... alas no one did tie the surge to russia's expansion... russia's expansion could also have been tied in to our ridiculous policy of attacking iraq....(ie., "we did it so now they can do it and we have no authority to say jack"....
Palin: democrats are flailing on this one.. instead of digging into every little thing and finding some really insignificant stuff lets just find one good meme and hammer that one home.... you go to liberal blog sites like kos and mydd and there is a new "scandal" on palin every 15 minutes but they are not scandals... they are a waste of time and worse: a distraction.... so she didn't sell her plane on ebay maybe.. who cares! so maybe she attended the alaska indepedents convention 20 years ago.. its just not enough.... i'm not sure which is the one to after her: maybe - once again- the strategy should be to go after her strength... what is her strength? is it her "record as a reformer governor"? probably, no?
but more generally: i would advise that Biden be more agressive in going after McCain and Palin...Obama should not directly engage Palin at all....
meanwhile hillary clinton is not helping... republican freakoids at their sick twisted site red state know how to call a spade a spade.. how come we dont'?
Notice what is missing in this story:
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton marched for labor and stumped with Democrats on Saturday, but sidestepped questions about the woman who has taken her place as the nation's most-talked-about female leader.
Clinton brushed aside questions about Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin during appearances at New York City's annual Labor Day parade and later during a stop on Staten Island.
"This election is about issues, and that's what's going to matter to people at the end of the day," she told reporters who asked her about the Alaska governor at a rally for a Democratic congressional candidate at Wagner College.
There was a brief "no way, no how, no McCain, no Palin" comment later on, but it is perfectly clear that Hillary Clinton is not taking Sarah Palin on. And since the Obama campaign desperately wants to take Sarah Palin on and would be benefited by having someone like Hillary Clinton do the taking on--for all of the obvious reasons--one can assume that Hillary Clinton is not exactly being helpful.
It isn't hard for her to be helpful. All she has to do is say something like "we all want women to crack the political glass ceiling and reach the highest political offices in the land, but we don't want just any woman to do that. Rather, we want a woman whose values are commensurate with ours." And then, a segue can be made into a discussion of issues that supposedly matter to women and how Sarah Palin supposedly is bad on those issues.
But of course, that is not happening. Instead, Hillary Clinton is barely mentioning Sarah Palin while the latter is hammering at Barack Obama so effectively that Hillary Clinton can be excused for feeling wistful.
Think maybe that she does not want Obama to win? So do I. I wonder if from time to time, David Axelrod or David Plouffe meet with their counterparts from the Clinton campaign to discuss how best to unify. And I wonder if they bring food and drink tasters with them when they do.
They ought to, at any rate.
