Has McCain actually already LOST?(Yes he has)

[TC Pilot]

Nice job McCain/Palin, you just made me to give my first donation to Obama.

[General Zod]

Tonight isn't a debate, it's a farce.

This is meant to be a real debate?

Of course not. McSame knows he can barely hold his own in a real debate, so he has to get it rigged in his favor as much as possible somehow. At the very least to make it so that he doesn't embarrass himself too badly.

[SirNitram]

In case you wonder why the Zogby and Hotline polls suddenly seem to get much closer:
These sneaks manipulated the weighting in favor of the GOP, of course without telling anyone. (Fact is that the GOP has far less weight than implied in these two polls).

However, what I fear is, that McCains racial slurs and dirty tactics actually will work, since my confidence in the common man isn't that great.

Zogby's behavior this year in political polling is frankly insulting. It's unprofessional. Their consistant 'weight' fiddling to reach results they want is against, oh, all polling's basic standards. But instead, they have decided that things are somehow better if you pretend a 'close race' exists.

[RedImperator]

In case you wonder why the Zogby and Hotline polls suddenly seem to get much closer:
These sneaks manipulated the weighting in favor of the GOP, of course without telling anyone. (Fact is that the GOP has far less weight than implied in these two polls).

However, what I fear is, that McCains racial slurs and dirty tactics actually will work, since my confidence in the common man isn't that great.

Zogby's behavior this year in political polling is frankly insulting. It's unprofessional. Their consistant 'weight' fiddling to reach results they want is against, oh, all polling's basic standards. But instead, they have decided that things are somehow better if you pretend a 'close race' exists.

To be fair, everybody is fiddling with their weighing because 1) the Democrats have registered enormous numbers of people this year, and 2) nobody knows how many of them will actually vote. It should be noted that the polls that are weighing responses are weighing Democrats more heavily, because of their registration advantage. The big debate is over how much, and frankly, nobody has any idea. Zogby's not a partisan shop and gets paid the same no matter what the outcome is, so I don't see what motive they would have for deliberately manipulating the numbers.

[irishmick79]

In case you wonder why the Zogby and Hotline polls suddenly seem to get much closer:
These sneaks manipulated the weighting in favor of the GOP, of course without telling anyone. (Fact is that the GOP has far less weight than implied in these two polls).

However, what I fear is, that McCains racial slurs and dirty tactics actually will work, since my confidence in the common man isn't that great.

I think McCain might be able to tighten the race a little bit, but I don't think he's offering enough of an alternative at this point to really turn the tables on Obama. He has a very small margin of error for these attacks, especially in the debates. He's definitely in danger of coming off as an angry old man if he's not careful, and that can't be good for his campaign. If he misfires with one of his attacks at all, he's done.

Still, I fully expect the media to eagerly report a McCain surge, no matter how realisticly insignificant it is. Obama has taken clear control of the election, and the media would rather have a closer race generating more "interesting" stories. I think ultimately McCain will turn off just as many voters as he draws in, and he'll still lose.

[Tribun]

I still have this nighmare vision that McCain wins by running his campaign of hate 24/7 for the ramaining 27 days.

I'm not that knowledgeable with American society, so please tell me, if the constant dirt will be really dangerous or not.

[General Zod]

I still have this nighmare vision that McCain wins by running his campaign of hate 24/7 for the ramaining 27 days.

I'm not that knowledgeable with American society, so please tell me, if the constant dirt will be really dangerous or not.

It's only dangerous if he manages to make any of it stick. That's the tricky part, really. Unless he happens to come across something solid that doesn't need to be flagrantly distorted (good luck), then McSame's attacks will most likely evaporate and be forgotten about by the next week.

[Qwerty 42]

RCP is reporting that Missouri has jumped ship to Obama for the first time, although it's still a "toss-up state." The tide may turn, but McCain has a lot of work to do in the next four weeks.

[Ender]

I still have this nighmare vision that McCain wins by running his campaign of hate 24/7 for the ramaining 27 days.

I'm not that knowledgeable with American society, so please tell me, if the constant dirt will be really dangerous or not.

My fear is that McCain is just pushing to keep it close and diebold and other rigged machines will do the rest.

[Tribun]

Better look at this graph...
These numbers are a killer

The comparison with 2004 is, what reveals how bad it now looks for McCain. Bush in his entire 2004 campaign had never faced as dire vote nubers as McCain does now...

[Admiral Valdemar]

Newsnight just now is covering the run-up to the next debate and had Springsteen and some supporters on view, then switched to some redneck in a pick-up with a baseball cap canvassing some rural areas, stating they'll hold the state with such voters.

Went up to some old guy on a porch and said "See Sarah guttin' that moose? That was kinda cool." Old guy nods.

Girl can gut a large mammal. Where's my ballot papers? I need to get her in the White House to lead the nation.

[Haruko]

Cindy McCain: "[Barack Obama has] waged the dirtiest campaign in American history"

Cindy McCain said today that she expects her husband to clear the record at tonight’s debate and let America know where he truly stands.

McCain, who stopped to visit a half-dozen children at the Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt today, said the presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama has "waged the dirtiest campaign in American history,” and her husband Sen. John McCain will use tonight’s debate to correct the distortions.

“What I have found is that it’s necessary to make sure the American people understand what we have to say, what we stand for as a husband and wife, and what we will do for the American people if we’re lucky enough to be elected,” Cindy McCain said.

Cindy McCain, who has said she initially did not want her husband to enter the 2008 race after the contentious primary he lost to President George W. Bush, said this race is even nastier.

In the midst of a deep economic crisis, the potential first lady said, the blame game needs to stop and civility in politics needs to make a comeback.

“The days of Ronald Reagan and Tip O’Neill are what we need to look to: a divided government but a government that needs to agree to disagree,” she said. “We’re now seeing polarizing factions, people politicizing things that should be about what’s best for America. Instead, they’re doing what’s best for themselves.”

[...]

The rest of the article can be read here.

Amusing. And not even 48 hours after the Sarah Palin "He's a terrorist sympathizer!" claim, and all the other stuff detailed here by Elfdart.

[Stormbringer]

I still have this nighmare vision that McCain wins by running his campaign of hate 24/7 for the ramaining 27 days.

I'm not that knowledgeable with American society, so please tell me, if the constant dirt will be really dangerous or not.

Unless McCain actually comes up with a plan American voters can get behind, I highly doubt he'll manage to actually win. People are too focused on the financial crisis to give a whole lot of credence to mudslinging. McCain is going for a desperation strategy of non-stop mudslinging because, as RedImperator put it so well, he really doesn't have any option left. Hell, if anything he picked the wrong mud-slinging strategy! Why he went for Ayers instead of Rezko I don't understand. I can only imagine he's afraid that Obama will throw Charles Keating in face and make the whole a wash a best.

With the way numbers are running now, I think McCain is going to find it extremely difficult to catch up.

My fear is that McCain is just pushing to keep it close and diebold and other rigged machines will do the rest.

I'm skeptical that there even were rigged voting machines. But even if that happens, you can bet Obama and his campaign won't take it lying down. He's got the will to fight and deep pockets to back it up.

[Darth Wong]

I think Cindy McCain thinks Obama has been running a "dirty" campaign because he keeps blaming McCain's economic platform (Reaganomics) for the mess we're in. In short, she thinks it's OK to attack someone for working for a charity that also happens to employ a guy who did bad things 30 years ago, but not OK to attack someone for his economic policies.

[CmdrWilkens]

The thing with dirty campaigns is that they are based on a simple set of precepts:

-If your opponent is ahead or close behind then the object is to stop him/her from talking about message
-If you attack your numbers (in terms of favorability) will go down.
-If you attack your opponents numbers (in terms of favorability) will go down.

Now all of this is predicated on the idea that you have at least equal favorability. When, as with McCain, the public ALREADY distrusts you then its easy to see attack ads as a desperate ploy. When the public likes you then you are rightfully challeneging your opponent on his character. So the reason why I'm not TOO worried is that McCain is already behind in favorability AND polling which means the more he tries to drag Obama down the harder he will drag himself down. Even IF he manages to do that its unlikely that he will be able to drag Obama down FASTER than he drags himself down.

Its basically one giant gamble with a national scale version of voter suppresion in an effort to keep folks away from the polls because they no longer actively like their candidate. Again with Obama his base has come home (and come home STRONG), Independents have a negative view of McCain and thus at BEST he is going to just get them to stay home and split the votes of the ones who do show up, and Republicans are outnumbered in registration AND ground organization. Simply put Obama has the public support to weather the attack and even if he doesn't then he has the ground organization which will mobilize his (larger) base so that even in a depressed turnout election he still has the best shot at winning.

[The Yosemite Bear]

yeah you can't blame us for the effects of our actions.

[Anguirus]

I like how the Republican model of bipartisan cooperation is "when Reagan was running things."

Then again, the Reagan-nostalgia long since passed into unreasoning worship.

[Metatwaddle]

I heard some good news yesterday. The Obama campaign is trying to counteract voter disenfranchisement by putting together teams of volunteer lawyers in important states. They're going to be at large polling places, presumably in urban areas, helping people vote. (My uncle joined the group, which is called Lawyers for Obama, and he's going up to New Hampshire from Boston on Election Day.)

[Tribun]

And I have bad news:
McCain's tactic of getting dirty seems to work.
The new numbers aren't encouraging.

[General Zod]

And I have bad news:
McCain's tactic of getting dirty seems to work.
The new numbers aren't encouraging.

Which new numbers?

[Big Phil]

And I have bad news:
McCain's tactic of getting dirty seems to work.
The new numbers aren't encouraging.

Dude, your vague doom and gloom posts with no supporting material is getting annoying, particularly when you ignore Americans who respond directly to you and tell you what they're seeing here on the ground.

Why don't you knock off the pissing and moaning and post something we can actually react to?

[Tribun]

And I have bad news:
McCain's tactic of getting dirty seems to work.
The new numbers aren't encouraging.

Dude, your vague doom and gloom posts with no supporting material is getting annoying, particularly when you ignore Americans who respond directly to you and tell you what they're seeing here on the ground.

Why don't you knock off the pissing and moaning and post something we can actually react to?

If you insist...

Obama 45, McCain 44 (Hotline 10/05-07)
Obama 51, McCain 45 (Rasmussen 10/05-07) (down from +8)
Obama 49, McCain 45 (GWU 10/02, 10/05-07) (down from +7)
Obama 47, McCain 45 (Zogby 10/05-07)

I think I do have reason to be worried.

[McC]

Are those national polls? If so, they're irrelevant. The only numbers that matter are state-by-state polls. If those are state polls, for which state are they?

Electoral Vote shows the current electoral college vote distribution at 349 Obama to 174 McCain (15 "tie") based on the latest polling data.
538 shows the predicted vote distribution to fall 345-193, with an 89% chance that Obama will win the election based on 1000 scenarios simulated.

The numbers overwhelmingly favor Obama right now.

[General Zod]

If you insist...

Obama 45, McCain 44 (Hotline 10/05-07)
Obama 51, McCain 45 (Rasmussen 10/05-07) (down from +8)
Obama 49, McCain 45 (GWU 10/02, 10/05-07) (down from +7)
Obama 47, McCain 45 (Zogby 10/05-07)

I think I do have reason to be worried.

As people have said for the thousandth time, polls are not useful indicators as to who will come out on top on election day. Panicking every single time they drop a point or two does nothing but give you an ulcer.

[Tribun]

They are national polls.
I think it is still concerning. If THIS is the result of only a few days of this dirt, I don't want to know how bad it will look after three weeks.