That fact does not prevent me from wanting one, however.     :)

"This is nothing compared to how Putin rigged Eurovision."

And the WaPo isn't even a national paper.  It's a local paper that gets some attention from the national press purely because of its location and its history with Watergate.

The only truly national papers in the states are the NYT and the WSJ.  USAToday, too, I guess, but only because they give it away in every hotel in the country.  It's a liteweight.

The important traditional press movers are the network news broadcasts that run at 6.30PM every evening on NBC, CBS and ABC.  (Fox, thankfully, doesn't have one on its main station.)  McCain's people resigning over their Burma connections is getting a good bit of play, and Howard Dean's "100 Years" ad has been getting a lot of attention from the press.  And McCain has been taking a hit over his gas-tax pander, as well as for trying to call Obama the candidate of Hamas.

Where's your motherf*%&ing flag pin?

There had been a pretty incendiary thread on dKos where a lot of this stuff got aired and I was able to do a lot of tracking back to real sources from it.

It turns out that the women allegedly mishandled weren't aware of it, the most you could say is that Bill's "charm" can be misread but, judging by what I remember of it, he did not do anything inappropriate.

Also it was obvious that the people (some miffed local dems) who were churning this rumour had personal grudges against him.

The rumours were/are common knowledge around NM and nobody will touch them. Not even the Repugs. If Drudge or Fox thought they could stand it up, they'd have tried before now.

keep to the Fen Causeway

Clinton's Hard Negatives (percentage of people who say they would never vote for her) started in the 40%'s.  Several weeks ago, on - take it for what it is worth - Kos someone posted those had risen into the 50 percentile range.  I accept that because I think she has alienated the AA population with her and hubbies racist remarks about Obama.  YMMV.

I'll let Drew monster-mash through the statistics.

Och nu den svenska kocken bakar en Alaskan älg jägare. Bork! Bork! Bork!

This is before any active campaigning from Obama.

I'd like to be more optimistic, because these polls won't include new voter registrations, which should be giving the Dems some extra tail wind.

Also, I think McCain is more likely to implode than Obama is. He's such a pile of useless flesh that it's only going to take one slip to kill his campaign.

The chances of him getting to the end of the campaign without saying something cravenly stupid or spectacularly dishonest are not good.

Also, state-by-state polling data tends to lag the national polls, if I'm not mistaken.  You'll see a candidate start to tick up in national polls, because his/her support is growing and hardening in base states while undecideds are growing in swing states before shifting to that candidate.

Obama's big pick-ups, based on my read of things, are the following: Iowa, New Mexico, Colorado, and Virginia.  Those are the first-tier opportunities, and I think the chances are going to be better than 50/50, and probably a good bit better than that.  Next would be Nevada, Montana, North Carolina, and Missouri.  I think we could divide those states evenly if the campaign is managed properly.

The third tier would include Texas (much closer than expected and a majority-minority state), the Dakotas, and maybe Georgia.

Ohio will be close, but I wouldn't bet on it because of the Appalachia factor.  It could flip, but you'd need huge turnout from black folks and white suburbanites in Cleveland, Cinci and Columbus.  Possible.  Very doable.  It's close there now, but Ohio is closer to static than other states, in my opinion, so it'd be an uphill battle.

Where's your motherf*%&ing flag pin?

But earthquakes are just gonna happen.

keep to the Fen Causeway

I wish I had enough perspective to know if this is a sign the earth is freaking out on us, or just routine weather disasters.

Heh. Did you miss this morning chatter?