A round-up of this morning's must-read stories--by guest Filterer Brian No. 

Political Meme of the Day #1: Obama is on the defensive over energy policy and drilling, and he flip-flops and says the United States should tap its oil reserves. The McCain campaign continues to make fun of Obama’s tire gauge comment, even though Obama’s right.

BARACK OBAMA SHIFTS ON TAPPING NATIONAL OIL RESERVES
(Peter Nicholas and Janet Hook, Los Angeles Times)
Obama's reversal on tapping the national stockpile of crude oil comes just days after he said, for the first time, that he would agree to some offshore drilling as part of a broader energy-policy compromise with Republicans, including John McCain, who has supported additional drilling. Those shifts by Obama are indicative of the pressure that politicians of both parties -- but especially Democrats -- are under to develop specific, short-term energy proposals in the face of rising costs.

THE TIRE-GAUGE SOLUTION: NO JOKE
(Michael Grunwald, Time)
But who's really out of touch? The Bush Administration estimates that expanded offshore drilling could increase oil production by 200,000 bbl. per day by 2030. We use about 20 million bbl. per day, so that would meet about 1% of our demand two decades from now. Meanwhile, efficiency experts say that keeping tires inflated can improve gas mileage 3%, and regular maintenance can add another 4%. Many drivers already follow their advice, but if everyone did, we could immediately reduce demand several percentage points. In other words: Obama is right.

DRILL, DRILL, DRILL IS WORKING
(Lawrence Kudlow, RealClearPolitics.com)
The question of offshore drilling, along with expanded domestic energy production, has suddenly become the biggest political and economic wedge issue of this election. Is there a Republican tsunami in the making?

Political Meme of the Day #2: Obama’s race and identity are still an issue in the election.

THE UNAVOIDABLE ISSUE
(E.J. Dionne, Washington Post)
There is no doubt that two keys to this election are: How many white and Latino votes will Obama lose because of his race that a white Democrat would have won? And how much will African American turnout grow, given the opportunity to elect our nation's first black president?

WHO’S RAISING RACE?
(Eugene Robinson, Washington Post)
[Sen. Lindsay] Graham said on "Fox News Sunday" that "there's no doubt in my mind that what Senator Obama is trying to suggest -- that he's a victim of something." Graham later added: "We're not going to run a campaign like he did in the primary. Every time somebody brings up a challenge to who you are and what you believe, 'You're a racist.' That's not going to happen in this campaign." The key words are "victim" and "racist" -- which Obama did not say. Graham puts them in Obama's mouth because of their power to alienate.

WHERE’S THE LANDSLIDE?
(David Brooks, New York Times)
There is a sense that because of his unique background and temperament, Obama lives apart. He put one foot in the institutions he rose through on his journey but never fully engaged. As a result, voters have trouble placing him in his context, understanding the roots and values in which he is ineluctably embedded.

Political Meme of the Day #3: Let McCain be McCain?

CHANGING LANES
(Elizabeth Kolbert, New Yorker)
How important is it for candidates to tell the truth? Throughout his long career in politics, McCain, who called his PAC Straight Talk America, has presented frankness as his fundamental virtue. The past few weeks have seen a change in McCain. He has hired new advisers, and with them he seems to have worked out a new approach. He is no longer telling the sorts of hard truths that people would prefer not to confront, or even half-truths that they might find vaguely discomfiting. Instead, he’s opted out of truth altogether.

MCCAIN’S PROBLEM ISN’T BUSH
(William McGurn, Wall Street Journal)
Allowing himself to look afraid of being in the president's company hurts him in two large ways. For one thing, it cuts against Mr. McCain's most attractive trait: his fearlessness. This is a man running as someone who stood up to his captors in Hanoi, who stood up to his own party, and who, as president, would be willing to stand up to America's enemies. For such a man to fear photo ops with the president broadcasts an insecurity that will only feed into the Obama campaign. And the press smells it.

From this week’s issue of the print NEWSWEEK:
WHERE HAVE YOU GONE, JOHN?
(Jonathan Alter, Newsweek)
McCain's zesty Theodore Roosevelt-style attacks on corporate greed and inspiring plans for expanding national service are gone, replaced by Karl Rove's playbook.

Miscellaneous Must-Reads:
G.O.P. DROPS IN VOTING ROLLS IN MANY STATES
(Jennifer Steinhauer, New York Times)
While the implications of the changing landscape for Mr. Obama and Mr. McCain are far from clear, voting experts say the registration numbers may signal the beginning of a move away from Republicans that could affect local, state and national politics over several election cycles. Already, there has been a sharp reversal for Republicans in many statehouses and governors’ mansions.

ALASKANS FOR OBAMA: A RARE DEMOCRATIC PUSH IN THE LAST FRONTIER
(Karl Vick, Washington Post)
Conservative and quirky, Alaska last went for a Democratic presidential candidate 44 years ago. No nominee from either party has even visited since Richard Nixon's journey to glad-hand in Anchorage on the last weekend of the 1960 campaign, a stop that some argue cost him the razor-thin election. Obama, who often boasts of having visited the other 49 states, has yet to commit to a stop here. But his vibrant campaign operation here is stoking expectations and mounting the most prodigious presidential effort Alaska has seen.