For the past five months or so, Barack Obama relentlessly harped on a single message: You don't like George W. Bush. John McCain is George W. Bush. So vote for me instead.

In contrast, McCain has careened between at least eight different themes--in the past 48 hours alone. At a national-security roundtable in Tampa, Fla., he questioned Obama's readiness to be commander in chief. At a pair of "Joe the Plumber" events in Ohio, he claimed that Obama wants to "spread the wealth" around. Meanwhile, he managed to remind voters of Obama's past relationships with Bill Ayers, Khalid Rashidi and ACORN; accuse him of planning cut defense spending in Virginia; characterize him as soft on criminals; warn about the dangers of one-party rule; charge that Obama is just "a typical politician"; and slam him for voting in favor of Bush's 2005 energy bill.

All of which, I suppose, was meant to drive one overarching message: that Obama is an unsavory character. Call it the "Choose Your Own Attack" approach to presidential politics.

With that in mind, you can understand why I was a little surprised when McCain's latest national TV ad arrived in my inbox. The title says it all: "Obama Praises McCain." For your viewing pleasure:

I'll leave it to smarter observers to judge whether McCain's mixed messages are hampering his ability to connect with voters on the issues that matter most--i.e., the economy, the economy and also the economy. But I have to admit: I'm thinking of suing for whiplash.

I mean, I get that McCain wants me to be all excited that Obama once praised his "outstanding leadership" on greenhouse-gas emissions. You know, bipartisanship and whatnot. But doesn't this ad make Obama seem at least as bipartisan as McCain? And what about all that talk about Obama being a pro-criminal, anti-military terrorist lover who's conspiring steal the election and transform America into a socialist dystopia? Wouldn't that make his praise sort of offensive--like how a Hamas spokesman said some favorable stuff about Illinois senator and suddenly he was "the candidate of Hamas"? Wait a second. Does this mean that McCain has become... the candidate of Obama? And if so, what does that say about McCain's "character" and "judgment"?

Now, it's not like I care about some washed-up old redistributor. But the people have a right to know.

(Charlie Neibergall / AP)

If you'd fallen asleep on Nov. 2, 2004 and awoken, a la Rip Van Winkle, on Oct. 31, 2008, you'd be forgiven for thinking that Iowa is a battleground state. For starters, it flipped from blue to red in 2004. So you'd assume it could swing again. Then you'd check the papers. "Obama Rallies 25,000 is Des Moines" one headline would read; "McCain Chief Claims Iowa 'Dead-Even,'" would read another. At that point, you'd be crazy not to conclude that the Hawkeye State is, yet again, too close to call.

The only problem? It's not.

Or at least there's not a single shred of scientific evidence that it is. On Jan. 3, the Hawkeye State caucuses catapulted Obama into contention and nearly torpedoed McCain, who committed the cardinal Corn Belt sin of opposing ethanol subsidies. So it's long been clear which candidate Iowans prefer. Since July 10, only four polls--out of nearly 20--have shown Obama leading McCain by less than 10 points. Of those, only one has shown Obama garnering less than 50 percent of the vote. That poll--the Big10 Battleground survey taken from Sept. 14 to Sept. 17--has since been replaced by an Oct. 19-22 sounding from the same firm. It shows Obama clobbering McCain by 13 points, 52 percent to 39 percent. At RealClear Politics, Obama's average lead currently stands at 11 percent--which is larger than McCain's margins in Montana, Georgia, North Dakota, Arizona, Mississippi, South Carolina and West Virginia. The electoral projection site FiveThirtyEight.com gives Obama a 100 percent chance of winning Iowa. Not 90 or 95. One hundred.

Still, McCain campaign manager Rick Davis insisted on a conference call with reporters this morning that "our own data has us dead even in the state of Iowa."

So what gives? Was the last month of public polling off by 10 to 15 points? Is McCain pollster Bill McInturff the only person in the country who knows how to survey Iowa's elusive electorate? My hunch is no. First of all, it's worth noting that losing campaigns always say that their "internal polling" shows a "dead heat" in the days before an election. They also, when pressed, always refuse to share any actual statistics--just like Davis did this morning. The truth is, the battle over Iowa is no longer electoral. It's symbolic.

Notice the timing of Davis's "dead even" assertion: the day that Obama is visiting Iowa for the first time in two months. The point was to frame Obama's trip as a defensive maneuver--an admission that the race is tightening. In fact, Davis even claimed on this morning's conference call that "the Obama campaign's data was also close in Iowa"--even though Obama sources say that their internal polling shows a "double-digit" advantage. In other words, Davis isn't really making a reality-based argument. Instead, he's sending a message meant to mobilize supporters: Don't be discouraged by the public polls. Believe that McCain is tied--even where he's trailing by 11 points. And act (vote, volunteer, etc.) accordingly. He's simply seizing on Obama's presence in Des Moines as proof that, behind the campaign curtain, this is much closer race than it appears. If McCain isn't really losing by double-digits in Iowa, Davis is saying, how can you be sure he's losing anywhere?

Given that Davis's approach relies more on faith than facts, we won't know for sure whether he's wrong or right until the actual results start rolling in. For its part, however, the Obama campaign is spinning the senator's return to Iowa as a sign of confidence, not nervousness. The candidate canceled an earlier Iowa trip so he could visit his ailing grandmother in Hawaii, they say. So we rescheduled for Halloween out of convenience: he's planning to trick-or-treat with his daughters in neighboring Illinois this afternoon. But there's also the explanation--as my colleague Richard Wolffe reports--that Team Obama "savors the symbolism of returning to its roots" (Obama also swung through Des Moines the night he won a majority of Democratic delegates). In that reading, today's visit is a sign that the race is coming to a close--not that McCain is coming back.

Judging by all the available evidence, I'd put more stock in Obama's spin than McCain's. But as always, the only polls that matter are the ones that close on Election Night. Somebody wake me up when it's over.

The end is nigh.

For political junkies, the prospect of going cold turkey on Nov. 4 is terrifying--understandably so. In a new series for NEWSWEEK.com, a group of the magazine's political scribes went on camera to discuss life after Election Day--including yours truly. Whether you're horrified (like me, at least a little) at the prospect of life without Stumper or simply horrified at the sight of my sallow, unshaven visage (the medical term for it is "Blogger's Tan"), I thought I'd post the video here. Consider it my contribution to the All Hallow's (and Election) Eve fright-fest.

Not scary enough for you? Then I'd heartily recommend reading Julia Ioffe's wonderful story over at the New Republic about "what.. covering a two-year campaign do[es] to the soul of a journalist." It's full of post-election speculation from luminaries like Candy Crowley, Ryan Lizza, Hendrik Hertzberg, Ben Smith and, rather incongruously, me. Warning: navel-gazing ahead:

Younger journalists who came of age in this election are anxious for more personal reasons. Andrew Romano came to Newsweek to do long feature pieces but was conscripted as a blogger. "I'm not one of these crazy political junkies," he told me after another long blogging shift, in which he struggled not to say, "Obama is winning today, too." "It's not my life... [So] for a long time I was feeling like, 'I'm looking forward to this being over and going back to writing long-form journalism as opposed to writing multiple stories every day.'" But then a funny thing happened. His blog, long buried on Newsweek's website, started drawing nearly four million hits a month, making Romano the site's most-read author. "It's kind of like, this is who I am now. So the idea of the campaign being over and not doing a politics blog is a little bit like, who am I after this election?"

Spoooooky. Or, you know, not.

Which reminds me. My NEWSWEEK colleague Sarah Kliff has a new story up about other political junkies are preparing for withdrawal. But I'd be interested to hear how you, loyal Stumper readers, are coping. Afraid or relieved? Or a little of both? The comments, as always, are all yours.

Everyone knows that Barack Obama has built an unprecedented Democratic field organization this election cycle. But the big question as Nov. 4 approaches is how well McCain--who trails by massive margins in the money race and has invested far fewer resources in field offices and get-out-the-vote efforts--will be able to mobilize his voters. The answer could potentially decide the contest.

That's why I found today's papers so intriguing--and confusing. Scanning the Wall Street Journal and Washington Post, I stumbled upon a pair of seemingly contradictory reports on the state of McCain's ground game. First the WSJ's Laura Meckler covered the sunny side of the street:

One key to Mr. Bush's re-election was the Republican party's nationwide get-out-the vote effort in the final 72 hours before election day... Heading into the crucial final weekend, Republicans say their operation is even stronger and running ahead of where they were four years ago at this time. They say their targeting is more efficient, their workers more experienced and their technology better. The McCain campaign, using an operation funded by the Republican National Committee, has already made 19.6 million phone calls this year nationwide. That's more than 2004, says Mike DuHaime, Sen. McCain's political director. And 2004, he says, "was the gold standard for turnout." Officials expect to make more than 15 million contacts, including phone calls and door knocks, just in these final days.

Then the Post's Matthew Mosk noticed some storm clouds on the horizon:

The decision to finance a final advertising push is forcing McCain to curtail spending on Election Day ground forces to help usher his supporters to the polls, according to Republican consultants familiar with McCain's strategy. The vaunted, 72-hour plan that President Bush used to mobilize voters in 2000 and 2004 has been scaled back for McCain. He has spent half as much as Obama on staffing and has opened far fewer field offices. This week, a number of veteran GOP operatives who orchestrate door-to-door efforts to get voters to the polls were told they should not expect to receive plane tickets, rental cars or hotel rooms from the campaign.

Of course, this year's version of the "vaunted" "72-Hour Project" can't be "stronger... than four years ago" AND "scaled back for McCain." So what's going on here? My reading is actually pretty simple."Heading into the crucial final weekend," the RNC's phone-banking operation had outpaced 2004. But that was before McCain decided to "finance a final advertising push." As a result, the actual "door-to-door efforts to get voters to the polls"--efforts planned for the weekend--have been "scaled back." DuHaime's calling will likely to continue to set RNC records. But there won't be as many "veteran GOP operatives" on the ground in key swing states as there were "in 2000 and 2004."

Strip away the spin, and it seems that McCain has decided shift the GOP's emphasis from targeting voters in person to targeting them from a distance, via phone calls and TV ads. Whether that's the best way to compete with Obama's massive, in-person army of volunteers and field staffers remains to be seen.

A round-up of this morning's must-read stories.

WHICH OBAMA WOULD AMERICA GET?
(Stuart Taylor, National Journal)
The first Obama has sometimes seemed eager to engineer what he called "redistribution of wealth" in a 2001 radio interview, along with the more conventional protectionism, job preferences, and other liberal Democratic dogmas featured in his campaign. I worry that he might go beyond judiciously regulating our free enterprise system's all-too-apparent excesses and stifle it under the dead hand of government bureaucracy and lawsuits... The pragmatic, consensus-building, inspirational Obama who has been on display during the general election campaign is a prodigious listener and learner. He can see all sides of every question. He seems suffused with good judgment. His social conscience has been tempered by recognition that well-intentioned liberal prescriptions can have perverse unintended consequences. His tax and health care proposals are much less radical than Republican critics suggest... I do hope that if Obama wins, the enormity of the economic and international crises facing him will accelerate his intellectual evolution and convince him that simply replacing dumb Bush policies with dumb Democratic policies will only drive the country deeper into the ditch. The best thing for the country would be to take on the interest groups and govern from the center.

IN FINAL STRETCH, MCCAIN TO POUR MONEY INTO TV ADS
(Matthew Mosk, Washington Post)
Sen. John McCain and the Republican National Committee will unleash a barrage of spending on television advertising that will allow him to keep pace with Sen. Barack Obama's ad blitz during the campaign's final days, but the expenditures will impact McCain's get-out-the-vote efforts, according to Republican strategists. McCain has faced a severe spending imbalance during most of the fall, but the Republican nominee squirreled away enough funds to pay for a raft of television ads in critical battleground states over the next four days, said Evan Tracey, a political analyst who monitors television spending. The decision to finance a final advertising push is forcing McCain to curtail spending on Election Day ground forces to help usher his supporters to the polls, according to Republican consultants familiar with McCain's strategy. The vaunted, 72-hour plan that President Bush used to mobilize voters in 2000 and 2004 has been scaled back for McCain. He has spent half as much as Obama on staffing and has opened far fewer field offices. This week, a number of veteran GOP operatives who orchestrate door-to-door efforts to get voters to the polls were told they should not expect to receive plane tickets, rental cars or hotel rooms from the campaign.

OBAMA PLANS FOUR-DAY HUNT FOR MORE DEMOCRATIC VOTERS 
(Jeff Zeleny, New York Times) 
Senator Barack Obama is spending the final four days of his campaign mining for votes in places where Democrats have not turned out at full strength in recent presidential races, hoping to offset other areas in swing states where his candidacy may need a lift... His aides say they think the electoral battlegrounds of Pennsylvania and New Hampshire, Wisconsin and New Mexico are trending toward Mr. Obama, though advisers do not rule out a last-minute visit to any place that suddenly looks troublesome. Instead, he will focus his attention on six states that President Bush won four years ago. After a late-night rally on Friday evening in Indiana, Mr. Obama heads Saturday to Henderson, Nev.; Pueblo, Colo.; and Springfield, Mo. He is scheduled to make a three-city fly-around on Sunday. And on Monday, he is set to dash through Florida, North Carolina and back here to Virginia. The breadth of Mr. Obama’s travel underscores the number of Republican-leaning states that his advisers believe remain within his reach. It is a wide path to claiming the 270 electoral votes needed to win the presidency, a strategy intended either to offer a multitude of options to get there or pave the way for a larger margin of victory.

WHAT'S UP WITH STILL-UNDECIDED VOTERS?
(Faye Fiore, Los Angeles Times)
There is little research on undecided voters because they are an ever-changing population -- those who equivocate in one election cycle might not in another. A study of presidential elections at State University of New York at Buffalo found that the last time wafflers made a difference was 1960. But this year, they look to be significant again. A Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll this week shows that this wavering wing of the electorate -- 6% in Florida and 8% in Ohio -- is large enough to make the difference in those battlegrounds. The rest of the nation, minds made up and marching by the thousands to vote early, has begun to wonder: What's up with those people? They are, after all, faced with two starkly different men, from different generations, with different ideas, revealed and vetted in perhaps the longest campaign cycle ever. Raymond and several others surveyed from Florida and Ohio explained their thinking in follow-up interviews this week, revealing an earnest if conflicted lot, deliberative by nature, particularly in decisions of consequence. 

CONTINUED AFTER THE JUMP...
 

From John McCain's rally this morning in Defiance, Ohio:

Where was Joe, you ask? Perhaps he was meeting with his new, Nashville-based manager, Jim Della Croce. Perhaps he was rehearsing tunes for his potential country album. Perhaps he was plotting a run for Congress ("Joe the Congressman '10!"). Perhaps he was auditioning for a Home Depot ad. Perhaps he was sharing his recent epiphany--as a guy who was "undecided" until last week--that President Obama would bring "death to Israel."

Or perhaps he was doing what he's always said he wants to do--that is, "get[ting] on with [his] life and do[ing] [his] job" as a plumber.

On second thought, never mind.

(Stephan Savoia / AP)

Could McCain be--brace yourself, people--coming back?

That's the argument members of hopeful right (and paranoid left) are making this afternoon. Given the latest numbers--and the obvious incentives for both McCain and the mainstream media to characterize the race as "close"--it's not much of a surprise. Over at RealClear Politics, Obama's average national lead has narrowed from eight points on Saturday to 6.1 points today. His average margin in the (more-responsive) tracking polls has fallen further, from 7.8 points to 5.5 points over the same five-day span. Yesterday, McCain pollster Bill McInturff told reporters that, according to his internal polling, “the campaign is functionally tied across the battleground states … with our numbers improving sharply," He added that "the race has moved significantly over the past week, closing to essentially tied." The mood on the Straight Talk Express, say reporters, is "unusually upbeat."

So should Obamans be worried? Perhaps--but not for the reasons they might think. 

There's no need, for example, to obsess over the national numbers. First, the national movement--one or two percentage points on the margin--is "well within the usual range of sampling noise," according to Pollster's Mark Blumenthal. In other words, the decline in Obama's lead isn't large enough (at this point) to qualify as statistically significant.

Second, much of the shift is attributable to a slight rise in McCain's level of support (from about 42.5 percent to about 44 percent); Obama's support, meanwhile, has hovered steadily around 50 percent or so. What this means is that a small percentage of the people who were "undecided" at the end of last week--disgruntled, economically-stressed former Bush supporters, for the most part--now say they back McCain. Such movement is inevitable--and it's the reason the gap between Obama and McCain may continue to close before Election Day. McIntuff, for one, has claimed that when "undecided/refuse to respond voters" break, they "will add a net three plus points to our margins." But the fact is, unless Obama's numbers slip firmly below 50 percent, McCain can't overtake him--even if he wins over every single undecided.

Which brings us to point number three: McCain won't win every single undecided--nor will he win enough to net three or more percentage points. Over the past 24 hours, two of the nation's most respected pollsters--Andy Kohut of Pew and Charles Franklin of the University of Wisconsin--conducted extensive analyses of the latest polling data and came to the same conclusion: that Obama and McCain will roughly split the five to six percent of the electorate that remains uncommitted.

Franklin's methodology was pretty simple. First, he examined the " raw, respondent-level data from more than 3,449 interviews conducted from Oct. 1 to Oct. 22 for the Diageo/Hotline poll" and discovered that "roughly 6 percent of the respondents were initially undecided, but split almost evenly (47 percent for Obama, 53 percent for McCain) when pushed for how they 'lean.'" Then he compared these leaners to the remaining undecideds for "every variable that seems predictive of vote preference--including party identification, age, race, gender, education, frequency of church attendance and geographic region." His finding? That the remaining undecideds should split about 54 percent for Obama and 46 percent for McCain.

Kohut's conclusion, as reported this morning on the Politico, was almost identical: "undecided voters [are] likely to split about equally between McCain and Obama." If Kohut and Franklin are correct, Obama should beat McCain 52 percent to 46 percent on Nov.4. So the only way McCain can catch up is by prying some support away from his opponent--not by relying on a landslide among undecideds. As Kohut put it, "there is likely no hidden life raft in the undecided vote for John McCain." [UPDATE: A third pollster, Stan Greenberg, concurs: "To get a 3-point net gain, the undecided would have to break 5 to 2 for McCain. There is no evidence to indicate such an impending break against Obama. Instead, the undecided could push Obama's vote up at least another point.")

So why should Obamans worry? One word: Pennsylvania. (Maybe.)

As you know, the presidency isn't decided by a national vote. So the national polls aren't particularly relevant at this point--unless they detect an emerging trend before it trickles down into the swing states. So far, Obama's standing throughout much of the battleground has showed no sign of slippage. As Noam Scheiber points out, "McCain's socialist/redistributionist attack may be getting him a lot of media coverage nationally" and "tightening the national numbers." But Obama has the "key battleground states... wired with paid staff and volunteers and is flooding them non-stop with ads"--so his support there is more "robust." Ultimately, Obama doesn't need to swing Ohio and Florida and Virginia to win the election; he just needs to add Iowa, New Mexico and Colorado--where his wide leads and 50-percent-plus poll numbers haven't changed an iota since Saturday--to John Kerry's 2004 map. A win in any one of the rest of the red states currently leaning Democratic--Florida, Missouri, Ohio, Nevada, North Carolina and Virginia--would simply be icing on the cake.

Unless, that is, McCain can battle back in Pennsylvania. Until today, there was no evidence that McCain's recent increases in stumping and spending were having any effect on the Keystone State. The last 14 polls had shown Obama clearing the 50 percent mark and leading by an average of 12 points. But this morning, the respected Mason-Dixon firm released a survey suggesting that Obama's support had slipped below 50 percent--and that his lead had shrunk to a mere four percentage points (47-43*).

The Mason-Dixon poll may be an outlier--or, as the only sounding that doesn't include data from last week, it may be ahead of the curve. We'll have to wait and see. But without Pennsylvania, McCain can't possibly compensate for likely losses in Iowa, New Mexico and Colorado--or mount a realistic comeback. So instead of watching the marginal, irrelevant fluctuations in the national numbers, I'll be watching the Keystone State instead.

UPDATE, Oct. 31:  Another poll--albeit from a Republican polling organization--shows McCain within striking distance in Pennsylvania. According to the latest stats from Strategic Vision, it's 49 percent for Obama to 44 percent for McCain. The margin between the two candidates may still be larger than five points. That said, the Oct. 8 Strategic Vision poll showed Obama ahead by 14, so McCain may also have real momentum. We need more numbers before we can say for sure.

*Typo fixed; used to read 43.

Over at Sprint to the Oval, my NEWSWEEK colleague Holly Bailey has some ominous color from the McCain caravan. Sign of trouble? Or mere coincidence? We report, you decide:

When Ross Perot pioneered the half-hour presidential-campaign infomercial back in 1992, he used pie charts to make his points. Last night, Barack Obama relied on apple pie instead.

Carrying a cool $5 million price tag and airing on NBC, CBS, FOX and the major cable-news networks, Wednesday's much anticipated "Obamamercial" wasn't particularly surprising. As a preview of an Obama presidency it was undeniably precise: glossy, humorless, focused and, at times, moving (often against one's will). Much of the broadcast consisted of testimonials by besotted pols and shots of Obama seducing massive crowds seamlessly studded with imagery swiped straight from the Chevy truck playbook: shimmering fields of wheat; smiling, multiracial faces; children holding American flags; veterans on parade. I expected Bob Seger to start singing, "like Barack, oh-oh, like Barack" at any moment.

But despite the astronomical pabulum factor, the Obamamercial was (above all else) effective. Why? Because it had a very simple objective—making undecided voters comfortable with the experience of a President Obama—and was very savvy about accomplishing it.

Content-wise, the heart of the show was a quartet of mini-documentaries about the "folks" Obama has met in his travels, each of which was narrated by the candidate himself and followed by a clip of him rattling off his pertinent proposals (laid out, as he telegraphed, in "specific detail"). The important thing here wasn't Juanita Stuart's rheumatoid arthritis or Obama's health-care plan—I doubt many viewers will remember either tomorrow. It was Obama's underlying argument about what sort of president he would be—that is, the sort who absorbs the "specific details" of your problems and produces specific, detailed policies to deal with them. He listens, he deliberates and then he acts. The implied contrast, of course, was with George W. Bush and John McCain—men known for shooting first and asking questions later. Even though Obama never mentioned the latter by name.

Ultimately, the entire Obamamercial was designed to provide voters with a preview of what it will feel like to welcome Obama in their living rooms for the next four years.  The presidency is the most personal of America's elective offices, and it is through the TV set, in the privacy of our own homes, that the relationship between the president and the people develops. More than the convention, or the debates, or any 30-second spot, the Obamamercial simulated how the country would interact with Obama if he were elected president—with him on one side of the screen, perched at a large, flag-framed desk, and us on the other, slumped on the couch. It was almost as if the election was already over, Obama was speaking from the Oval Office--and the country hadn't become a Communist caliphate. And that was the point.

Will the gambit work? Well, the latest polls show the Illinois senator cresting 50 percent; about 7 percent of the population is still undecided. If last night's broadcast convinced even a handful of undecideds (and perhaps a few of Obama's softest supporters) that he's not the socialistic, terrorist-sympathizing cipher of Republican caricature but rather someone they already feel comfortable seeing in a presidential setting, then it was a resounding success. At the very least, the show gobbled up two news cycles. With only five to go, McCain can't afford to lose many more.

A round-up of this morning's must-read stories.

DEMOCRATS VIE TO SHAPE AN OBAMA LEGISLATIVE AGENDA
(Jonathan Weisman, Wall Street Journal)
Democrats inside Sen. Barack Obama's circle of advisers and on Capitol Hill are jockeying even before Election Day to shape an Obama administration's legislative agenda and define "Obamanomics," a concept he himself has left vague over the campaign. Sen. Obama has been able to win support by convincing voters he could simultaneously be a populist and a fiscal disciplinarian, that he could invest in education, energy and health care and adhere to rules that say additional spending must be more than offset by cuts or tax increases. He attacks greed and excess in Wall Street, yet reaches out to assure financial leaders he understands markets' needs. But if Sen. Obama wins on Tuesday and Democrats expand their congressional majority, the party in power will quickly have to reconcile these seeming contradictions into a legislative strategy.

HOW OBAMA CAN WALK THE POSTPARTISAN TALK
(Bob Kerrey, New York Daily News)
Joe Biden was right. If elected, Barack Obama's mettle will be tested. Not by Al Qaeda or other enemies of the United States - that possibility is actually much less likely with a President Obama--but by the Democratic Congress. This election is not over. But it's not too soon to envision the dangers and opportunities should Obama win. My worry is not with increased threats from abroad. I am convinced those threats will be reduced with Obama's election and the beginning of a much more sensible and trustworthy American foreign policy. By my lights, the primary threat to the success of a President Obama will come from some Democrats who, emboldened by the size of their congressional majority, may try to kill trade agreements, raise taxes in ways that will destroy jobs, repeal the Patriot Act and spend and regulate to high heaven. This is where Obama's persona is invaluable. He can withstand the arguments and pressure of the liberal wing in the Democratic caucus if, once elected, he is guided by the best instincts he has displayed on the campaign trail.

DON'T WORRY, BE HAPPY
(John Dickerson, Slate)
With only five days left until Election Day, John McCain's campaign aides seem happier than they have been in a while. For the last few days, the campaign has been increasingly buoyed by what it says has been improvement in its internal polling of 14 battleground states. Aides see a tightening race in states that are crucial to their long-shot march to 270 votes and victory. Even McCain himself is upbeat. "He's been happy for the last few days," says one aide. "That's a change."... Still, the landscape looks pretty bleak... How do McCain aides get around this dire picture without the aid of strong drink? Let's just say that McCain's campaign now relies on hope more than Obama's does. They hope that the Obama organization isn't as impressive as signs suggest it is. They hope that the greater enthusiasm apparent among Democrats turns out to be less than advertised on Election Day. They hope that the public polls that show a big Obama lead are poorly designed, overstating participation by young voters and African-Americans. They hope undecided voters will all break to McCain in the end. 

UNDECIDEDS AN UNLIKELY 'LIFE RAFT' FOR  MCCAIN
(David Paul Kuhn, Politico)
The pool of undecided voters on Election Day could be as large as one in 10, but John McCain can hardly rely on them to overtake Barack Obama. According to past election results, undecided voters are unlikely to break decisively for either candidate and dramatically alter Tuesday’s race. In the past eight presidential contests, voters who made up their minds during the last week of the campaign never went for either ticket by large margins of 3-2 or 2-1, which potentially could tip the scales.  “There is likely no hidden life raft in the undecided vote for John McCain,” said Andy Kohut, director of the Pew Research Center. Pew recently conducted an internal analysis of its polls and concluded that undecided voters were likely to split about equally between McCain and Obama on Election Day, meaning the group is more evenly split between the two candidates than the electorate overall, Kohut said. In the coming days, Pew, like the Gallup poll, will finalize its best estimate for how undecided voters will cast their ballots.

CONTINUED AFTER THE JUMP...
 

Posting over at her new Sprint to the Oval blog, my NEWSWEEK colleague Holly Bailey reports on the McCain campaign's outrage du jour--i.e., demanding that the Los Angeles Times release a video (mentioned in its own pages last April) that captures Obama's remarks at a 2003 banquet honoring Rashid Khalidi, a Columbia University professor and Palestinian scholar who has been critical of Israel. I intended to weigh in on the Khalidi "controversy," but Holly beat me to the punch, so I'll just condense the crucial parts of her item into a handy italicized excerpt:

Five months after the story was published, talk of the videotape resurfaced in blogs and subsequently in a McCain campaign release yesterday calling on the paper to release the tape. McCain spokesman Michael Goldfarb accused the paper of “intentionally suppressing information that provide a clearer link” between Obama and Khalidi. “The election is one week away, and it’s unfortunate that the press so obviously favors Barack Obama that this campaign must publicly request that the Los Angeles Times do its job—make information public.”

This morning, McCain took it a step further, telling a radio station in Miami... that the Times was guilty of a double standard for not releasing the tape. “The Los Angeles Times refuses to make that videotape public,” McCain said. “I’m not in the business about talking about media bias but what if there was a tape with John McCain with a neo-Nazi outfit being held by some media outlet. I think the treatment of the issue would be slightly different.”

Less than an hour later, Sarah Palin, at a rally in Ohio, echoed the talking points. “Maybe some politicians would love to have a pet newspaper of their very own,” she said. “In this case we have a newspaper willing to throw aside even the public’s right to know in order to protect a candidate that its own editorial board has endorsed. And if there’s a Pulitzer Prize category for excelling in kowtowing, then the LA Times, you’re winning.

I have a couple of problems with this approach.

The first is journalistic. As the Los Angeles Times revealed today, there's a reason--other than "kowtowing" to Obama--that it hasn't released the tape: "it was provided to us by a confidential source who did so on the condition that we not release it. The Times keeps its promises to sources." In other words, the Times has no choice but to maintain the privacy of the video; to do otherwise would represent a major breach of journalistic ethics. This is simply how journalism works--as the McCain campaign, which has undoubtedly provided information to the Times "off the record or "on background, is well aware. McCain and Palin know that the Times can't release the tape, and they don't expect the paper to cave. They simply want to attach the words "Khalidi" and "Palestinian" to Obama in the press--and hopefully scare a few South Florida Jews (among others) in the process.

That's where my second problem comes in. While many Americans may disagree with Khalidi's views--which is bound to happen in any discussion of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict--there's nothing approaching "neo-Nazi[sm]" in the professor's past. McCain apparently based that hyperbolic comparison on Khalidi's status as--his words--"a PLO spokesman." Unfortunately for the senator, the truth is far more mundane. It's accurate to say that Khalidi closely observed (and even sympathized with) Yasir Arafat's group during his years at the American University at Lebanon, and he occasionally spoke to the press--from a Palestinian perspective--about the ongoing conflicts. But the claim that Khalidi served as a "PLO spokesman"--which Khalidi strenuously denies--is based solely on an "erroneous column by the New York Times’s Tom Friedman [from] 1982." The fact is, he has never advocated violence. On the contrary, reports Harper's Scott Horton:

[Khalidi] is... deeply committed to stemming violence in the Middle East, promoting a culture that embraces human rights as a fundamental notion, and building democratic societies. In a sense, Khalidi’s formula for solving the Middle East crisis has not been radically different from George W. Bush’s: both believe in American values and approaches... [Khalidi] sees education and civic activism as the path to success, and he argues that pervasive military interventionism has historically undermined the Middle East and will continue to do so. Khalidi has also been one of the most articulate critics of the PLO and the Palestinian Authority—calling them repeatedly on their anti-democratic tendencies and their betrayals of their own principles.

Khalidi's views are so firmly within the bounds of mainstream debate, in fact, that McCain himself has supported the scholar's work, as ABC News and others reported today. In 1998 and 1999, the International Republican Institute--the GOP’s congressionally funded international-networking organization--gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Center for Palestine Research and Studies. McCain chaired the IRI at the time; Khalidi founded (and served on the board of) the Palestine Center. The center's goal, according to Horton: "the promotion of civic consciousness and engagement and the development of democratic values in the West Bank." Obama befriended Khalidi at the University of Chicago around the same time. So to claim Khalidi somehow taints Obama without tainting McCain is disingenuous. The truth is, he taints neither of them.

WARNING: Supergeeky content ahead.

Despite all my-blabbering and bloviating about "the latest polls," the only polls that matter are still the ones that close on Election Night.

Just not all of them. 

Why? Because some polls close earlier than others. Thanks to the magic of time zones, there will be a period of seven hours on the evening of Nov. 4 when we'll know some (but not all) of the results. And depending on what happens, "some" might be enough to know who's won.

To help guide you through Election Night, we here at Stumper headquarters have created a handy hour-by-hour "Choose Your Own Adventure" game. (Or quasi-"Choose Your Adventure" game.) NB: We're opearting under the assumption that states where one candidate leads by more than a dozen or so points aren't really up for grabs--Vermont, New York, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Maryland, Delaware, Illinois, New Jersey, Connecticut, California, Michigan, Washington, Oregon, Maine and Hawaii for Obama; Oklahoma, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Kansas, South Dakota, Wyoming, Utah, South Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Texas, Nebraska, Alaska and Idaho for McCain. The result: Obama starts with 207 electoral votes and McCain starts with 127.

Let's play.

(All Times Eastern)

6:00: Most polls close in Indiana. If McCain wins Indiana, wait until 7:00; If Obama wins Indiana, he's probably won the election. That's because Obama's current lead in Ohio (5.8 percent on average) is much larger than his current lead in Indiana (1.4 percent on average).Given their demographic similarities, it's unlikely that Obama would win the latter and lose the former--and without Ohio and Indiana, a McCain comeback is implausible. (OBAMA WIN SCENARIO #1)

Assuming that McCain has already won Indiana... 

7:00: Most polls close in Florida, Virginia and Georgia. If McCain wins all three, wait until 7:30. No one will be surprised if Florida (a true toss-up) and Georgia (a McCain leaner) go red, but the evaporation of Obama's 7.4 percent lead in Virginia would be a sign of trouble to come. If Obama wins only Virginia, he's on the road to victory; McCain would need to retain Iowa, Colorado AND New Mexico--or pick up a blue state--to compensate for the loss. If Obama wins Florida, the cake is probably baked; for McCain, there's no plausible road back to 270 that doesn't involve winning Pennsylvania and another mid-size blue state. And if Obama wins Florida and Virginia, go to bed. It's over. (OBAMA WIN SCENARIO #2)

7:30:  Polls close in Ohio.

Assuming that McCain has already won Florida and Virginia...

If McCain wins Ohio, he has a fighting chance to win the election. At this point, the senator would've overcome sizable Obama leads in both the the Buckeye State and the Old Dominion--an accomplishment that would cast doubt on Obama's similarly sizable leads in Iowa, New Mexico, Colorado and Pennsylvania. Winning all four of those states would be Obama's only (plausible) remaining  path to victory. If Obama wins Ohio, wait until 8:00. The only way McCain could compensate for the loss of 20 electoral votes is with a victory in either Pennsylvania or New Hampshire (or, less plausibly, Minnesota or Wisconsin).

Assuming that Obama has already won either Florida OR Virginia...

If Obama wins Ohio, it's game, set, match. There's no saving McCain. (OBAMA WIN SCENARIO #3). If McCain wins Ohio, on the other hand, he stays alive--but just barely. In the win-Florida-win-Ohio-lose-Virginia scenario, McCain would have to win [Iowa, New Mexico AND Colorado] or [either Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Wisconsin or New Hampshire] to survive; all six of those states show Obama ahead by more than eight points. In the win-Virginia-win-Ohio-lose-Florida scenario, McCain would have to pick up 11 Kerry electoral votes--even if he held every remaining Bush state (i.e.,Iowa, New Mexico, Nevada AND Colorado).

8:00: Polls close in Pennsylvania, New Hampshire and Missouri.

Assuming Obama has already won either Florida, Virginia OR Ohio...

If Obama wins Pennsylvania, McCain is skating on very thin ice. At this point, an Obama one-two punch in [either Florida or Ohio plus Pennsylvania] would effectively knock McCain out. (OBAMA WIN SCENARIO #4). The only survivable blow would be Virginia plus Pennsylvania. To claw his way back, the Republican would have to win Iowa, New Mexico AND Colorado--or either Minnesota or Wisconsin. If McCain wins Pennsylvania, who the heck knows. Simply put, it won't happen. An Obama victory in either Florida, Virginia or Ohio would be a sure sign that the Keystone State won't be flipping.

Assuming McCain has won Florida, Virginia AND Ohio...

If Obama wins Pennsylvania, he could still eke out a victory--provided he scores a straight flush in Iowa, New Mexico AND Colorado. Lose one of the three, however, and he's probably toast. If McCain wins Pennsylvania, he's the next president of the United States. (MCCAIN WIN SCENARIO #1)

Post-8:30: At this point, we'll probably have a pretty clear idea who's inheriting the White House from George W. Bush. If Obama keeps the John Kerry states and adds either Ohio, Florida or Virginia to the Democratic column, chances are he'll seal the deal at either 8:30 (when the polls close in North Carolina) or 9:00 (when the polls close in New Mexico and Colorado). Granted, McCain could still struggle back from a Virginia loss--but not if he loses [Minnesota and Wisconsin] OR [either New Mexico or Colorado] at 9:00. (Or, for that matter, North Carolina at 8:30.) That said, if McCain has already won Virginia--along with Ohio, Florida and Indiana--Obama's only (plausible) remaining path to victory runs through Iowa, New Mexico AND Colorado. If he loses one of the latter two at 9:00, it's curtains. If he wins both, the election will be decided 10:00 p.m.--in Iowa.

And we'd be back where we began.

Necessary caveat: The closer the results, the longer it takes the networks to call a state. So this entire chronology could be pushed back 30-60 minutes (or further) depending on the closeness of the incoming numbers.

Call them the Icing States. The candidates aren't visiting. The reporters aren't calling. And the rest of the country barely knows they exist.

With six days until Nov. 4, the political world is focusing on traditional battlegrounds like Florida, where both Barack Obama and John McCain are campaigning today--and understandably so. But as Obama's edge in the Electoral College has expanded over the past few weeks--the latest RealClear Politics map shows him collecting 311 electoral votes solely from states in which he outpolls McCain by more than five points--a subtler shift has taken place under the radar. Since the start of the month, Obama has quietly, methodically reduced his rival's long-held leads in a quartet of red states--Montana, North Dakota, Georgia and, most surprisingly, Arizona--to the point where they could conceivably flip on Election Day.

Crazy? Only a little. George W. Bush won Montana by 20 points in 2004 and 25 points in 2000; now RCP shows McCain leading by a mere 3.4 percentage points. It's worth noting, however, that the RCP average includes three polls taken before Oct. 16. Restrict your results to surveys released in the last two weeks--Montana State (Obama +4) and NBC/Mason-Dixon (McCain +4)--and you suddenly have a dead heat. That's a dangerous position for McCain in a place where the GOP is in disarray and Democrats Jon Tester, Brian Schweitzer and Max Baucus have a monopoly on statewide office. Which is probably why the RNC just decided to start airing ads on local television.

It's a similar story in neighboring North Dakota, where Bush beat Kerry 63 percent to 36 percent four years ago. RCP shows McCain leading by four points, 47.7 to 43.7. But that's only because they include a Rasmussen sounding from Sept. 8 that gave McCain at 14-point advantage. Limit your sample to polls released since the start of October--Forum/MSUM (Obama +2), North Dakota UTU (Obama +3) and Research 2000 (tie)--and Obama is actually up by 1.67 percent on average. Given that the Sept. 14 Research 2000 poll showed McCain clobbering his opponent by 13 points, this is a sign of real movement.

Neither Georgia nor Arizona appears to be quite as close. But there's been a notable narrowing in recent weeks. A Sept. 29 Rasmussen poll showed McCain winning his home state by 21 points. Now the firm has him ahead by five. Overall, McCain's average Arizona advantage has plummeted from double-digits to about five percentage points--just barely beyond the margin of error. The latest Arizona State survey gives him a mere two-point edge, down from a seven points a month ago and 10 points this summer. In Georgia, McCain's average cushion has sunk from about 15 percent in mid-September to 5.2 percent today, and one pollster--the Atlanta-based Insider Advantage--says it's a one-point race. Add in a 10 percent boost in early voting among blacks, and that's too close for McCain's comfort.

Am I suggesting that Obama will win in Montana, North Dakota, Arizona and Georgia? Hardly. Five points is still a steep climb--especially in Republican strongholds like Arizona and Georgia where undecideds will likely break for McCain--and sparsely populated (and traditionally uncompetitive) states like Montana and North Dakota are notoriously difficult to poll.

That said, it's worth considering--for perspective's sake--how much stronger Obama seems to be in these "reach" states than McCain seems to be in states where he's still said to be competitive. Take Ohio--the king of all battlegrounds. According to RCP, Obama currently leads there by 6.3 percent. Or, say, Virginia, where a Democrat hasn't won since 1964--RCP has Obama up 7.4 percent. Or, for that matter, Pennsylvania--the last blue state on McCain's target list. Obama's latest margin? 10.5 percent--more than double McCain's lead in Georgia. Judging by the most recent polls, in fact, the odds of Obama winning Montana, North Dakota, Arizona or Georgia are better than the odds of McCain winning either Ohio, Virginia, Colorado (Obama +8.3), Nevada (+7.5), Iowa (11.4), New Mexico (8.4) or any single Kerry state. Them's just the numbers. If you want to say that McCain has a shot in Ohio, you have to admit that Obama has a shot in Arizona. And so on.

None of these prizes, of course, will tip the election to Obama. If he wins Georgia, he's already won Virginia and North Carolina; if he wins Montana or North Dakota, he's already won Colorado; and if he wins Arizona, he's already won New Mexico and Nevada. But if Obama succeeds in "expanding the electorate" in Ohio, Florida, Virginia and the rest of the swing states--which, it should be noted, is hardly a sure thing--those gains would undoubtedly extend beyond the battleground's traditional borders. In that case, Arizona, Georgia, Montana and/or North Dakota appear to be the states most likely to boost Obama from a "resounding victory" (say, 375 electorate votes) to a "massive landslide" (more than 400). In other words, they'd be the icing on the cake.