But, when you dig into the details, it's apparent that McCain is not leading among veterans as much as he should be.
McCain is up 56-34 among military veterans, with 10 percent undecided. Assuming that the undecideds break 50-50, that would be a roughly 60-40 split for McCain.
How does that compare with 2004?
[In] Gallup's final pre-election poll in 2004, 55% of registered voters who had served in the military backed George W. Bush, compared with 39% who supported John Kerry. It is notable, then, that McCain is doing only about as well among military veterans as Bush did in 2004, despite the two Republican candidates' varying military backgrounds.
One additional fact Gallup leaves out: in 2004, the Democrats were running a Vietnam veteran. Even with the swiftboat attacks, Kerry had a natural advantage among veterans, which Obama is matching.
The conventional wisdom is that Obama will be going with Joe Biden, Tim Kaine, Evan Bayh, or potentially Kathleen Sebelius.
One name that has managed to drop off the radar screen is Jack Reed. Of course, Reed had a Sherman Statement in July following his trip with Obama to the Middle East and Europe. But Joe Biden also said, on MTP, that he was "not interested" in the Vice Presidency.
College basketball is probably my favorite sport. There are very few games that I wouldn't watch start to finish, no matter who was playing. Of course powerhouse games - Duke/UNC, UCLA/Arizona, Georgetown/Pitt are fun.
But the underdogs - they are my secret love. It's probably why I got on board with the Obama campaign way back in January of 2007.
And that's why I'll be rooting for Oregon State this year, even though they'll be playing my beloved UW Huskies twice. Oregon State, you see, didn't win a single PAC 10 game last year. And they hired someone they thought could turn the program around. Craig Robinson - a man who happens to be Barack Obama's brother-in-law.
It's being written about - on page 14. But at least they're writing about the man who called himself President - before the election:
Standing behind a lectern in Michigan this week, with two trusted senators ready to do his bidding, John McCain seemed to forget for a moment that he was only running for president.
Asked about his tough rhetoric on the ongoing conflict in Georgia, McCain began: "If I may be so bold, there was another president . . ." He caught himself and started again: "At one time, there was a president named Ronald Reagan who spoke very strongly about America's advocacy for democracy and freedom."
Of course, the real story is the fact that McCain is interfering in US Foreign policy by sending his own "team" to Georgia. But at least the media's comparing this to the old "Obama is presumptuous" attacks.
Anyone who still thinks this election will be a matter of polls, attack ads, vice-presidential selections, or whatever, needs to read this:
As Barack Obama tries to draw hundreds of thousands of new voters to the polls, Republicans are beginning to scrutinize registrants' eligibility as both sides draw a major battle line over voting rights...
Republicans said they are particularly worried about prospects for fraud in Virginia and Pennsylvania, and are beginning to comb thousands of new registrations in those states for ineligible applicants. In some cases the huge numbers threaten to swamp their efforts -- and those of state and local governments to verify and process applications.
This is their plan. They know that, if this election is fair, they will lose. So they will try to keep as many of "them" from voting as possible.
In the aftermath of the biggest news story of the week (sorry, JRE, but your dilly-dallying takes back seat to an actual war), we can sit back and judge how Presidential John McCain and Barack Obama really are when it comes to a moment of crisis. And it's not even close:
While Obama offered a response largely in line with statements issued by democratically elected world leaders...first calling on both sides to negotiate, John McCain took a remarkably—and uniquely—more aggressive stance, siding clearly with Georgia’s pro-Western leaders and placing the blame for the conflict entirely on Russia...
Obama’s statement put him in line with the White House, the European Union, NATO, and a series of European powers, while McCain’s initial statement—which he delivered in Iowa and ran on a blog on his Web site under the title "McCain Statement on Russian Invasion of Georgia," —put him more closely in line with the moral clarity and American exceptionalism projected by President Bush’s first term.
Media Matters is breaking the story that CBS hacked up Bill Clinton's response to the Is Barack Obama ready question. The bold part is what actually aired, but check out the entirety of Clinton's answer:
SNOW: Is he ready to be president?
CLINTON: Well, in the -- you could argue that no one is ever ready to be president. I mean, I certainly learned a lot about the job in my first year. He's shown a keen strategic sense and his ability to run an effective campaign. He clearly can inspire people and motivate people and energize them, which is a very important part of being president, and he's smart as a whip so there's nothing he can't learn.
Of course, Bill Clinton should have known better than to give a long, thoughtful answer to any question from a reporter. But this really takes the cake.
And now, it IS seeping into the mainstream that, not only was Barack right, but that the Republicans are constantly proving themselves to be out of touch. The latest? Turns out that the pre-Newt Gingrich, pre-Karl Rove, pre-George W Republican party was in favor of asking Americans to drive on properly inflated tires:
In Florida, the cars were spray painted with words like "Oboma [sic] smokes crack"
And "Oboma [sic] is a Nigger"
In Indiana, the windows were broken, more hateful words were scrawled, and an American Flag was stolen.
So what they're going to try to do is make you scared of me. You know, he's not patriotic enough, he's got a funny name, you know, he doesn't look like all those other presidents on the dollar bills."
Cindy McCain kicked off the meeting by describing her recent visit to Rwanda, saying that she was amazed by women there who have recovered from being raped during the nation's genocidal war in the 1990s.
"These women are far stronger than I could even hope to be," she said, adding that they reminded her of her husband, who was held in captivity in the Vietnam War. "He suffered and overcame what happened to him. My husband, like the Rwandan women are the essence of hope, the essence of strength and the essence of courage."
OK, let me first say that I have no idea or ability to comprehend what happened to John McCain in the Hanoi Hilton.
That said, McCain was a prisoner of war, not a victim of genocide. To compare what he went through to what the Rwandan survivors went through is apples and oranges. Where does the analogy end? Is McCain like a Holocaust survivor? Is he like a black family in the south that survived Jim Crow?
"It doesn't mean that I have to e-mail people," he said. "Now, I read e-mails," he added, saying his staff is "constantly showing them to me as the news breaks during the day."
Serious question here: Does John McCain know how to check his email? Shouldn't we have a president who can check his email? Please?
"I use a computer almost every day. I go on different web sites ... ours and the various media," he said.
Shouldn't we have a President who uses a computer EVERY DAY? What would have happened if Franklin Roosevelt didn't use a phone because he preferred the old telegraph machines? What would have happened if Lincoln declined telegraphs - trusting his communications to handwritten notes delivered by horseback?
According to his advisers, John McCain's flip-flop on offshore drilling was a recognition of "a great crisis in energy.".
Turns out, they weren't talking about the kind of energy that powers American homes and businesses. They were talking about the fuel that makes Republican campaigns tick: oil money.
Campaign contributions from oil industry executives to Sen. John McCain rose dramatically in the last half of June, after the senator from Arizona made a high-profile split with environmentalists and reversed his opposition to the federal ban on offshore drilling.
Oil and gas industry executives and employees donated $1.1 million to McCain last month -- three-quarters of which came after his June 16 speech calling for an end to the ban -- compared with $116,000 in March, $283,000 in April and $208,000 in May.
Raw Story, via MSNBC, has caught Fox News trying their damndest to make John McCain look younger. How much younger?
Over a "Beat the Press: Fox Anti-Aging Fix" graphic, Abrams urged, "Take a good look at the senator and the video they use." He then showed a clip in which Fox ran video of a strangely youthful and vigorous-looking McCain at a campaign rally to accompany a story about McCain's current campaign schedule. However, the video also prominently features a sign reading "www.mccain2000.com," which at one point is even waved in front of McCain's face.
"Fox is actually using eight year old video to discuss today's activities," Abrams marveled. He concluded cheerfully, "They report -- you decide."
Vague on issues? You wanted him to get into a domestic policy speech in Berlin? When Ronald Reagan said "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall" was he being too vague about the wall he was referring to? Was he wrong not to give Gorbachev a twelve-point plan for tearing down the wall?
When John Kennedy said "Ich bin ein Berliner", was he being too vague? Should he have referred to the particular street he lived on in Berlin? Should he have mentioned his neighbors, the Schmidts?
Barack Obama quietly raised more money in Arizona last month for his presidential campaign than John McCain did, and the Illinois Democrat dominates the overall fundraising map in 43 states and Washington, D.C., records show.
Only seven states managed to raise more money for John McCain last year. Seven. This is what an enthusiasm gap will give you. Arizona has to particularly sting for McSame, though.
CBS is in defense mode over its cut-and-paste McCain interview, where different answers were substituted for different questions.
"As all news organizations do with extended interviews, last night’s Obama and McCain interviews were edited to fit the available time and to give viewers a fair expression of the candidates' major differences," CBS spokeswoman Jennifer Farley emailed. "The full transcript and video were and still are available at cbsnews.com."
The problem is, of course, that they didn't simply edit the response, they cut in an entirely different answer. They lied. And they presented this lie to the American people as fact.
