Via Blake Dvorak at RCP, we learn Cindy McCain is the latest member of the McCain team to take a hard negative turn: “Let me tell you just a little something that I was not so happy about. My son, like so many others, and today like the Palin’s son, have served on the front [...]

Nielsen reports 63.2 milion people watched last night’s debate, a big increase from the 52.4 million who watched the first matchup between John McCain and Barack Obama on September 26 (a Friday night, not exactly ideal). But that is still far less than the 69.9 million who tuned in to see Sarah Palin and Joe [...]

A devastatingly clever little bird chirps that it’s a good thing that we’re almost done with this rodeo; McCain is running out of songs to play. A list of the songs whose authors have asked the candidate to stop using them. Foo Fighters’s “My Hero“: “The saddest thing about this is that ‘My Hero’ was [...]

David Brooks’ devastating assessment of Sarah Palin, delivered at an event for The Atlantic in New York on Monday, echoes an email I received from a prominent Republican party professional in response to Gov. Palin’s debate performance last week. His words Here’s the email*: Fascinating. She really is what Bush pretends to be — she [...]

At a McCain-Palin rally earlier today in Bethlehem, PA, a local GOP leader, William Platt, used Barack Obama’s middle name in his opening remarks. Twice. McCain didn’t acknowledge the winking slur, but the campaign did send a statement: “We do not condone this inappropriate rhetoric which distracts from the real questions of judgment, character, and [...]

The various daily tracking polls put Obama’s lead at anywhere from slim to massive. Gallup, the gold standard, tops the list. These polls do not yet account for reaction to last night’s debate. But unless vast numbers of swing voters saw something I missed, the debate won’t change much.

David Samuels, one of America’s finest working nonfiction writers, has a compelling and challenging piece about Barack Obama in the latest New Republic. It is at once a book review, a comparative literature exercise, a rumination on race, a candidate profile, and a magazine feature. Its central idea is that Barack Obama has internalized the [...]

While I recognize the serious criticism buried in this statement (from a Tampa rally today), I have to wonder if someone told Biden to dial back his attacks on Palin: “You know the idea here that somehow these guys are once again injecting fear and loathing into this campaign is … I think it’s mildly [...]

Karen posts Robert Gibbs’ attempt to cut through Sean Hannity’s bluster below without comment. I have a comment… It isn’t just that Hannity is a major-league sumphole, it’s that Alan Colmes is perhaps the lamest human being on any major TV network. Watch him at the end of the clip. I mean, this guy approaches [...]