Lowry on the Palin Smears

Rich at NRO spoke with Steve Biegun, former bush NSC aid who has now debunked the Sarah Palin myths: 

He says there’s no way she didn’t know Africa was a continent, and whoever is saying she didn’t must be distorting “a fumble of words.” He talked to her about all manner of issues relating to Africa, from failed states to the Sudan. She was aware from the beginning of the conflict in Darfur, which is followed closely in evangelical churches, and was aware of Clinton’s AIDS initiative. That basically makes it impossible that she thought all of Africa was a country.

On not knowing what countries are in NAFTA, Biegun was part of the conversation that led to  that accusation and it convinces him “somebody is acting with a high degree of maliciousness.” He was briefing Palin before a Univision interview, and talking to her about trade issues. He rolled through NAFTA, CAFTA, and the Colombia FTA. As he talked, people were coming in and out of the room, handing Palin things, etc. She was distracted from what Biegun was saying, and said, roughly, “Ok, who’s in NAFTA, what’s the deal with CAFTA, what’s up the FTA?”—her way, Biegun says, of saying “rack them and stack them,” begin again from the start. “Somebody is taking a conversation and twisting it maliciously,” he says.

In general, according to Beigun, Palin had a steep learning curve on foreign issues, about what you would expect from a governor. But she has “great instincts and great core values,” and is “an instinctive internationalist.” The stories against her are being “fed by an unnamed source who is allowed by the press to make ad hominem attacks on background.” Biegun, who spent dozens and dozens of hours briefing Palin on these issues, is happy to defend her, on the record, under his own name.

We knew that this was just blather being spit out, but she wasn’t ready for the national scene yet. While ridiculously eloquent on energy issues and a speaker approaching a Reaganesque level, she just did not have enough media interaction beforehand. She has four years of being the party’s biggest fundraiser and could announce her run as early as two years from now and can start touring the states.  Remember, Palin has a 91% favorability rating among Republicans. The anti-Palin contingent of the party will not sideline her next campaign.

McCain Cronies Trying To Throw Gov. Palin Under the Bus

And Erick Erickson is naming names with his Operation Leper:

Initial list:

1. Nichole Wallace
2. Steve Schmidt
3. Mark McKinnon

Michelle has the details of what appears to be an attempt by McCain loyalists to pin the blame on the epic fail on Gov. Palin. They are trying to preserve their Washington careers and looking to throw someone under the bus.

Sarah Palin worked her heart out. She energized tens of thousands to come out who would have otherwise stayed home. She touched countless families. I didn’t agree with everything she said on the campaign trail. But two fundamental conservative stands she took mattered greatly to me: She vigorously defended the Second Amendment and the sanctity of life more eloquently in practice than any of the educated conservative aristocracy.

And she did it all with a tirelessness and infectious optimism that defied the shameless, bottomless attempts by elites in both parties to bring her and her family down.

Shame on the smearers who don’t have the balls to show their faces.

Good job MM, you tell ’em

and from CNN:

Randy Scheunemann, a senior foreign policy adviser to John McCain, was fired from the Arizona senator’s campaign last week for what one aide called “trashing” the campaign staff, three senior McCain advisers tell CNN.

One of the aides tells CNN that campaign manager Rick Davis fired Scheunemann after determining that he had been in direct contact with journalists spreading “disinformation” about campaign aides, including Nicolle Wallace and other officials.

“He was positioning himself with Palin at the expense of John McCain’s campaign message,” said one of the aides.

Governor Palin responded with class and dignity:

Palin arrives in Anchorage after a long trip home from Alaska. She holds a press conference. Refuses to comment on gossip spread by unnamed sources and “small, bitter” people saying “foolish things”…on relationship with McCain: No tension. “I love him…I honor him.”

Responding to a question on whether she has any “hurt feelings,” Palin laughs cheerfully. “This is politics! Of course not. It’s rough and tumble and you’ve got to have a thick skin just like I’ve got.”

Palin expresses “disappointment in the media — don’t take it personally.”

She is right. For all his shortcomings, McCain is a good man that did an admirable job. The actions of his aides should not be attributed to him. Rest assured my friends, Gov. Palin will be around for a very long time. Consider the next four years to be a montage scene where Gov. Palin prepares herself for the national stage. In 2012, she will have been a six year governor and the top fundraiser for the GOP. Like Steve Rogers after he takes the Super-Soldier Serum.

What Will Happen To Sen. Stevens’ Seat

As you know (being informed readers of this site), Sen. Stevens in the span of a month has both been convicted and reelected. The Senate Republicans are not allowing him back in. So what happens? Prof. Rick Hasen at Election Law Blog has the answer:

There’s a bit of a dispute over which rules apply. The old rules (see here) provided for the governor to fill a vacancy and then to call a special election afterwards, if the term would expire in more than 30 months. A controversy over the last Alaskan governor appointing his daughter to a vacant Senate seat led Alaska voters to pass an initiative changing the law. Under the new law, the governor still may appoint a temporary person to the seat, who sits only until a special election is called in 60-90 days after the vacancy occurs. Because Senator Stevens’ term would expire in more than 30 months, there’s not much difference between these old and new laws, except as to the timing of the special election.

There’s a constitutional question under the 17th Amendment whether [a change by voter initiative] to the means for filling Senate vacancies are constitutional. Vik Amar thinks it is. I’m not so sure (I address a similar, but not identical, issue in this paper).

So, either way, the governor will have the power to fill a vacancy at least for the short time 

The Road Map

Alright, indulge me for a moment as I get on this megaphone and lay a framework for what happens next. 

1. Accept It – we lost. we lost bad. Just because we saved Mitch McConnell and may have saved Stevens’ seat (temporarily) as well as Chambliss’ and Coleman’s, we lost. The map has changed. For two cycles we had Michael Moore’s erroneous designation of Jesusland and they had the coasts (consequentially where I live). The map has been redrawn and the rules are now changed. Several things have become apparent from this election that we need to come to grips with.

2. Abortion is approached incorrectly – Conservatism lost in Colorado and South Dakota. An amendment to ban abortion lost by 10% in South Dakota If it is going to pass anywhere, it is going to pass in South Dakota. That is a referendum on our agenda. I am not saying that we are wrong about abortion and the value for human life, but the approach is wrong. I believe that issues of choice and life are the wrong way to couch the issue because the other side will not listen when the catch word is released. Abortion should be couched in a two tier Robert George/ Peter SInger right/left analysis. First, are you willing to acknowledge that a fetus is a human? Second, are you willing to extinguish a life for the economic welfare of society? That is the question. Let’s remove women’s rights and religion from it and take it for what it is, a Constitutional right that some are willing to take away from the least of us. Twenty-three pairs of chromosomes is twenty-three pairs of chromosomes no matter which way you toss them. This leads us into 

3. The Rural Vote – the failure of the abortion amendment in San Francisco as well as the turn in the states (especially ethanol voting Iowa) tells us that the “redneck” (as Murtha would couch it) vote does not belong to us. We have taken the redneck vote for granted as much as the Democrats have used the African-American people.  I am not calling the Republican party the party of greed or saying that we have not done enough for the middle class. I am saying that we can’t win the middle class vote unless we explain to them that we are catering to them.  What is the best way to do so? Connect with them. The secret to the Republican Revolution of 2004 was that the new congress was the middle class vote. Pollster Frank Luntz gave each Republican running for the positions a football. At the rallies, the candidates would throw the football at someone in the audience who, when they had possession, would be able to air their thoughts and grievances. Those are our Joe the Plumbers. If we listen, we can help them. Next, we have the non-rural blue collars

3. The Union Vote – I have posted about this before and have gotten crap for this and will likely get more in the future, but our best bet for victory is to abandon Wal-Mart or find a fine balance. First, before I get into this, Wal-Mart is the best friend of the middle class there is. If you live in a rural area, Wal-Mart keeps your gas low and their prices low by providing everything in one place. Wal-Mart can allow a middle or lower class individual to live like an upper middle class individual. Wal-Mart is the biggest Republican donor. The problem is that the union leaders are anti Wal-Mart. We have the perfect opportunity right now to take the union vote. President Elect [ ] and the Liberal Congress are ready to institute card check. This will impair union members individual freedoms to vote the way they want to, especially in one state…

4. Target Nevada 2010 – After Kerry lost 2004, the nutroots, which I guess we are now, had a game plan to undermine the Bush administration. They targeted important Congressional seats, taking the House and the Senate and torpedoing our presumptive 2008 candidate, George Allen. To get back in power, we need to target Nevada hard starting tomorrow. Someone there needs to step up. My colleague, Reagan21, says to look to Jon Porter and Dean Heller as potential candidates to take Reid down. If you are in Nevada and are pissed, get up and start mobilizing.  But…

5. Other Senate seats – Because of our success in 2002, 2010 is going to be the biggest Senate race we have in the coming decade. We are defending 18 senate seats and they are defending 14 senate seats. Odds are in their favor. It is very likely that McCain’s seat in Arizona will be an open seat as well as Arlen Specter’s in Pennsylvania. The Democrats have numerous seats which they have NO chance of losing including Russ Feingold, Pat Leahy, Chuck Schumer, Evan Bayh, Daniel Inouye, and Barbara Boxer. If you are in Arkansas, target Blanche Lincoln. Libertarians in Colorado, what has Ken Salazar done to reduce government size? Jesse Jackson Jr. will be the Messiah’s replacement and will be in a position of weakness as an appointment. Jack Ryan, would you care to come back to the party and help? We can  take Byron Dorgan out in North Dakota if we organize early. I think that the Patty Murray Washington seat is competitive in light of the Oregon Senatorial race. We stand to lose unless we start acting up and taking care of business form day 1. Obama won, not because he was competent, but because he had an excellent ground game. We need to take that ground game and use it to our advantage, which Ieads us to…

6. The New Republicans Same As The Old –  Obama won by tapping into discontent and supposedly tapping into new voters. I say supposedly because at this point, the vote total is less than it was in 2004. Regardless, if we are losing the rural vote and are unlikely to gain the ignorant college vote, we need to find new voters. Besides the union vote, listed above, who shares values with us, there is another group out there that expands every year that we need to tap into. We need to tap into new Americans. The proudest Americans are those that have fled the oppression of their country to arrive here in the land of opportunity. As soon as they become citizens, we need to explain to them what our ideology is and register them as Republican. These individuals will go back to their communities, likely already socially conservative and become voices for the cause of small government. Although, there reaches a point…

7. Tipping Point – Not Malcolm Gladwell, but the point of no return. My friend and I had dinner tonight and we discussed this point. Under an Obamastration, we may cross the point where the individual making the medium income in America is getting more from the government than he puts in. That will push the tax burden to the one half of the people and that is something that there is no coming back from. There is no way to spread the responsibility for running the country back to all people after you put the burden on the shoulders of the few. If this point happens, look to see a massive realignment of state interests and renewed interest in federalism. We will want our state laws to govern more than the national government unless…

8. Foreign Policy – Joe Biden pretty much said it is inevitable that there will be an attack on the US or on US interests in an Obamastration. Just today, Israel launched missiles into the Gaza, and they responded in kind. Russia moved missiles to the EU border. Russia has been selling tanks to Venezuela. China always looms. Iran’s elections changed nothing. An international crisis is brewing. While FDR was preceded by Coolidge and Hoover who weren’t known for their internationalist tendencies, PE BHO is preceded by W. and Clinton who had a pervasive influence all over the world. He can’t just duck his head in the sand and hide from the harsh reality of what is going on. If he does…

9. Republican Leadership – Contrary to popular belief we have strong leadership in both houses. Blunt and Cantor are running hard and strong as voices of opposition in the House. Pence was one of the strongest proponents of energy reform and Boehner is there. Today we had wonderful essays about conservatism from Reps. Flake and McCotter, neither of whom I was aware of till today. I would also love to see Jeri Thompson (video linked) run for congress in 2010. In the Senate, we are weakened but there is still strength. We will have Mitch McConnell ready to filibuster any judges or the Fairness Doctrine. John Cornyn can take a leadership position. Whoever will replace Ted Stevens needs to be a reformer. Lastly, let’s face facts…

10. Rush is Right – Rush Limbaugh is the leader of the Republican party, not the conservative wing, but THE Republican party. None of us bloggers who are in our 20’s would be around if it was not for Rush. Half our elected congress-folk would not be in office. He taught us civics growing up, he explained federalism and he has not become marginalized. Others, I’m looking at you Ross Douthat, have questioned Rush’s logic during the end-days of the election, but he was completely right. McCain did not bring any Democrats over besides the Hillary people who would have gone to Romney or Huckabee. They voted the way they did because of the way they were treated, not because of a special alignment with McCain. We failed with the conservatism and we need to win it back. Last night, Obama said that America has never been a nation of individuals. This collectivist malarkey is what Rush has been preaching against for the past 20 years. Trust him and trust us to guide you through troubled times. Join a campaign tomorrow. If not, find someone without a drug record you can believe in.  Mobilize my people!

The Outbreak of “Anonymous” Obama Blogger Defectors

Alright, I need to call shenanigans on this right now.  For the past few days, “anonymous” Obama bloggers have been posting as to how close the race really is and have indicated that Florida and several other swing states are not in play and are definitely going to McCain.  Hannity just cited Anonymous14 from redstate, which unfortunately, is having some serious server problems right now.  Our good friends at Hillbuzz (one of the finest sites on the Internet – congrats on being cited by Rush!) have an anonymous blogger named Sarah P who felt the need to come clean on Obama’s dirty Internet tricks:

Sprinkle in mass vote confusion and it becomes bewildering. Most people lose patience and just give up on their support of a candidate and decide to just block out tv, news, websites, etc.

This surprisingly has had a huge suppressing movement and vote turnout issues.

Next, we infiltrate all the blogs and all the youtube videos and overwhelm the voting, the comments, etc. All to continue this appearance of overwhelming world support.

People makes posts to the effect that the world has “gone mad”

Thats the intention. To make you feel stressed and crazy and feel like the world is ending.

We have also had quite a hand in skewing many many polls, some we couldn’t control as much as we would have liked. But many we have spoiled over. Just enough to make real clear politics look scarey to a mccain supporter. Its worked, alough the goal was to appear 13-15 points ahead.

see, the results have been working. People tend to support a winner, go with the flow, become “sheeple”

The polls are roughly 3-5 points in favor of Barack. Thats due to our inflation of the polls and pulling in the sheeple.

Our donors, are the same people who finance the MSM. Their interests are tied, Barack then tends to come across as teflon. Nothing sticks. And trust, there were meetings with Fox news. The goal was to blunt them as much as possible. Watch Bill Oreilly he has become much more diplomatic and “fair and balanced” and soft. Its because he wants to retain the #1 spot on cable news and to do that he has to have access to the Obama campaign and we worked hard at stringing him a long and keeping him soft for an interview swap. It worked and now he is anticipating more access. So he is playing it still soft.

Like Fox Mulder, we want to believe.  I don’t believe either one of these and encourage you to approach any other stories about internal Obama defectors with a grain of salt. They run a tight ship and would not let something like this happen and I really doubt they need to pay people to troll Internet sites. I doubt that our lovely liberal commenters are paid by Obama (they will be soon if he wins and starts redistributin’). They come here because they want to be enlightened and there is a huge chasm between their passion and their logic.

So, who do I think is perpetrating this fraud? It could be an eager but misguided Republican or disaffected Hillary voter who is trying to get our hopes up and encourage voter turnout. On the other hand, these anonymoids might be Obama plants meant to depress election day expectations. Who knows? At the end of the day, unless you trust the source, take all leaks like this with a grain of salt.

-Yossarian

A Good Method of Protecting Your Lawn Signs From Liberals

There has been a slew of stolen McCain/Palin signs across America and it is good to see that one man took steps to prevent this from happening. The Obama brownshirts are trying to suppress other political points of view and we need to send a tingle up their legs if they try to stop us.

Jay Price of newsobserver reports:

After Shawn Turschak saw two sets of McCain-Palin signs disappear from his yard within hours of being planted, he took steps to protect the latest pair.

On Monday, he ran wires from his house and hooked the signs into a power source for an electric pet fence. Then he mounted a surveillance camera in a nearby tree and wired it to a digital recorder.

Tuesday afternoon, the camera saw this: A neighbor trotting up with an Obama-Biden sign, grabbing a handful of volts as he touched a McCain-Palin sign, then fleeing at top 9-year-old boy speed.

A few minutes later, the boy’s father, Andrew Noble, was at Turschak’s door, demanding an explanation from Turschak’s 13-year-old daughter, who called her parents on the phone to say a man was yelling at her. Both families agree on one aspect of the exchange, that Noble chastised her for “electrocuting” his son, then left.

The Turschaks hurried home and received another visitor: an Orange County sheriff’s deputy.

Campaign signs are vandalized or stolen so often that many people don’t report it, and, when they do, law officers often don’t investigate.

This time was different.

Pure awesome

Two Articles on Why McCain WILL Win

I am still a skeptic, but a hopeful skeptic. 

Here is the first from Oct. 25, 2008 from my good friend Steven Warshawsky, a former US Attorney and one of the most brilliant legal minds in America. Talked to him at the Lawyers for McCain event this past Thursday and he is confident. This is from the American Thinker

Despite there being an entire cottage industry devoted to exposing the liberal bias of the mainstream media, Republicans and conservatives continue to allow themselves to be unduly influenced, and even demoralized, by what they read and hear in the big city newspapers and on network television. 

What are they reading and hearing?  That Barack Obama will be the next President of the United States.  It’s inevitable.  It’s his election to lose.  What proof does the media offer? Public opinion polls that supposedly show Obama “winning” the race.  (But see here and here.)  The thousands of devoted supporters who attend Obama’s rallies.  The legions of blacks and young people who are more “inspired” than ever to vote for a candidate who understands their needs and interests.  Etc.  We all know the story by heart by now. 

This is the “narrative” that the mainstream media has been imposing on this year’s presidential campaign almost from the start.  Remember how quickly the MSM jumped off the Hillary Clinton bandwagon and onto Obama’s?  Remember how annoyed and angry they became as Hillary refused to concede the nomination?  The MSM decided that electing the nation’s first black, socialist, anti-American president was politically and historically more important (and, for them, more exciting) than electing the nation’s first female, socialist, patriotic president.  And they are doing everything they can to achieve this goal.

Well, there is another story out there that the MSM refuses to address.  A huge story.  One that could, and I think will, significantly affect the outcome of this race.  I’m referring to the widespread phenomenon of registered Democrats openly supporting John McCain.  There are numerous “Democrats for McCain” type organizations.  There are numerous websites and blogs written by Democrats touting McCain’s candidacy.  There are pro-McCain grassroots efforts being led by Democrats.  And we all know friends or relatives who are Democrats, who voted for John Kerry in 2004, and who are no fans of President Bush – but who are going to vote for John McCain this year. 

Yet, surprise surprise, the mainstream media is not talking about these voters, not talking about the real rift that is occurring within the ranks of the Democratic Party.  Needless to say, if a similar rift were occurring in the Republican Party, it would be treated as the major story that it is.   (Indeed, as such stories about the political fault lines in the Republican Party have been treated in the recent past.)

Who are these pro-McCain Democratic voters?  They overwhelmingly tend to be former Hillary supporters.  Perhaps the most well-known of these voters are the “PUMAs” – which stands for Party Unity My Ass.  These are Hillary supporters who are adamantly opposed to Obama.  Let’s not forget that during the Democratic primaries – real elections, not polls – Hillary crushed Obama among white working-class and middle-class voters in such key states as Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia.  If a meaningful number of these voters end up voting for McCain, as I predict  they will, then Obama’s smooth road to the White House is going to run smack into a brick wall.

Earlier this week, I attended a John McCain campaign event in New York City.  There were several Democrats in attendance.  Not only people who are registered Democrats, but party leaders and workers who had been actively involved in Hillary Clinton’s campaign.  Indeed, the gentlemen who “keynoted” the event was a former publisher of the left-wing Village Voice magazine and a veteran of the Robert Kennedy, George McGovern, and Jimmy Carter campaigns.  Hardly a right-wing conservative.  He gave one of the best stump speeches I have heard why Barack Obama should not be elected president.  (It comes down to not trusting Obama to keep the United States safe and strong in a dangerous world and rejecting Obama’s “government knows best” attitude when it comes to domestic issues.)  Another person I met at the event was a sprightly elderly woman who manned telephones for Hillary for five months, and now is supporting McCain. 

There is nothing remotely similar to this taking place among Republicans.  (No, Christopher Buckley endorsing Obama is not the same thing at all.)

Some more anecdotal evidence of a lack of support for Obama among Democrats:  I live in the Upper West Side neighborhood of New York City.  You cannot find too many places in the country that are more liberal than that.  Walking around my neighborhood during the 2004 presidential campaign, I felt “assaulted” on all sides by Kerry-Edwards buttons, bumper stickers, and posters.  This year, there clearly is not the same level of outward support for Obama.  It is remarkable (and welcome).  Will most of the people in my neighborhood vote for Obama on election day?  Of course.  Will Obama win New York?  Almost certainly.  But the lack of enthusiasm for Obama among these Democrats, who I’m sure would be going gaga for Hillary, speaks volumes about Obama’s true prospects for victory this year.

The point is simple:  Don’t believe the Obama hype coming out of the mainstream media.  If the media were truly objective and unbiased, they would be covering the race much differently.  Instead of trying to browbeat the country into voting for Obama, they would be analyzing the issues and factors that favor and disfavor both candidates.  Instead of focusing on college students and intellectuals, they would be focusing on working-class and middle-class voters, especially “Hillary Democrats.”  These voters may very well determine the election.  Yet this huge story is being ignored by the MSM.   

Furthermore, the media would not so consistently confuse intensity of support for breadth of support.  Granted, Barack Obama’s supporters tend to be more enthusiastic about their candidate than John McCain’s supporters are about him.  Leftists are always looking for their earthly messiah.  But this does not mean that Obama’s supporters, come election day, will outnumber McCain’s.  Whether in support of McCain or in opposition to Obama, I predict these voters will go to the polls.  Contrary to the wishful thinking of Democratic pundits, they are not staying home.  These voters may be unexcited, but they are not apathetic.  And 51% of “unexcited” voters will defeat 49% of even the most “inspired” voters.  Every time.

Of course, we all know what the mainstream media’s “narrative” will be if (I believe, when) John McCain wins the election:  The American people refused to vote for Obama because of the color of his skin (and not because of the content of his politics).  The “right-wing attack machine” scared voters into voting for McCain, even against their own social and economic self-interest.  Black and poor voters were intimidated by Republican thugs and prevented from voting.  We know this story by heart as well.

So be prepared.  In a few more weeks, the political environment in this country is likely to become a heckuva lot nastier.  For there are real signs pointing to a McCain victory this year, whether or not the mainstream media wants to acknowledge them:

Net, I bring you the ever optimistic Dan McLaughlin of Redstate and his Seven Reasons McCaiin and Palin will not only win, but are a LOCK to win.

The first and foremost reason McCain-Palin will win is the absolute arrogance, elitism, condescending, patronizing and in-your-face voter suppression campaign – don’t vote for McCain, he can not win — being conducted by the national media on Senator Obama’s behalf.

[…]

The Gallup poll after Labor Day has historically been a predictor of the winner of the Presidential election. The person leading in that poll wins the Presidency. The Republican convention, pushed onto Labor Day by the Summer Olympics muddied the waters on this historic fact, but the Gallup poll a week later showed McCain ahead of Obama, predicting the McCain victory.

There are six states that since 1972 have voted for the winning Presidential candidate. These are predictor states. They pick winners every time. McCain will win every one of the following six states: Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Ohio and Tennessee.

Elderly and some other Jewish voters were already uncomfortable about voting for Obama, but the recent comments by Farrakhan that when Obama speaks, the Messiah is speaking, or that Obama’s victory will do great things for the Nation of Islam, or the statement by Jesse Jackson that there will be “fundamental change” in America’s foreign policy, especially with regard to Israel – is causing a hemorrhaging of Jewish support.

Women who feel Senator Clinton was treated unfairly by the Democratic Party, by the media and by Senator Obama — who did not even vet Senator Clinton to be his running mate – will remember. This voting block, you will recall, lay in the weeds in the pre-New Hampshire primary polling. The win by Senator Clinton was a shock, undetected by the polling. And these were Democratic Party voters who were undetected – not the other voters Obama will face November 4th. Obama’s youth vote will not post to the polls, they never do. The young think: the media says Obama will win, so why should I vote? But the 40 and 50 and 60 something women voters who voted for Senator Clinton have three alternative plans to make sure they get to the polls, regardless of a hiccup in their work or child care responsibilities. They will vote, and they will vote against Senator Obama.

Today’s unstable world does not bode well for Senator Obama. The instability in the stock market and related job and mortgage fears do not equate with voting for the ING (Inexperienced New Guy.) In an affirmation of Mark Penn’s observation that the strong leader almost always wins the Presidential election, a mid-west hairdresser with no party affiliation told me the country has very serious problems, and that is why she is voting for the strongest leader.

Finally, the reason that the world and the media incorrectly will tag as the reason for McCain’s victory (despite the foregoing six other reasons) will be the Wilder or Bradley effect. Simply put, Asians, Whites and Hispanics have and will lie to pollsters about their intention to vote for Senator Obama. According to the Associated Press, this will cost Obama six points at the polls. The AP estimate could be low. In the case of Bradley and Wilder, the spread between a “lead” in the polls and actual votes cast was in the low double digits.

Another Gender Traitor for Palin

Elaine Lafferty, former EIC of Ms. Magazine and former Hillary supporter comes on board.

It’s difficult not to froth when one reads, as I did again and again this week, doubts about Sarah Palin’s “intelligence,” coming especially from women such as PBS’s Bonnie Erbe, who, as near as I recall, has not herself heretofore been burdened with the Susan Sontag of Journalism moniker. As Fred Barnes—God help me, I’m agreeing with Fred Barnes—suggests in the Weekly Standard, these high toned and authoritative dismissals come from people who have never met or spoken with Sarah Palin. Those who know her, love her or hate her, offer no such criticism. They know what I know, and I learned it from spending just a little time traveling on the cramped campaign plane this week: Sarah Palin is very smart.

I’m a Democrat, but I’ve worked as a consultant with the McCain campaign since shortly after Palin’s nomination. Last week, there was the thought that as a former editor-in-chief of Ms. magazine as well as a feminist activist in my pre-journalism days, I might be helpful in contributing to a speech that Palin had long wanted to give on women’s rights.

Now by “smart,” I don’t refer to a person who is wily or calculating or nimble in the way of certain talented athletes who we admire but suspect don’t really have serious brains in their skulls. I mean, instead, a mind that is thoughtful, curious, with a discernable pattern of associative thinking and insight. Palin asks questions, and probes linkages and logic that bring to mind a quirky law professor I once had. Palin is more than a “quick study”; I’d heard rumors around the campaign of her photographic memory and, frankly, I watched it in action. She sees. She processes. She questions, and only then, she acts. What is often called her “confidence” is actually a rarity in national politics: I saw a woman who knows exactly who she is.

The Pennsylvania Gambit

Since the convention, I have been arguing that Pennsylvania is the key to this election. In recent weeks, my argument has looked a bit ugly if we are to follow RCP. However, it should be noted that each of the RCP polls listed has a sample size of 500-700 and I don’t even know what methodology Morning Call and Susquehanna use.  SurveyUSA has been all over the place this year.  Recently, the McCain/Palin camp has been spending an inordinate amount of time in Pennsylvania. Cynics may see this as the Hail Mary, but I think there is something more to this. The rallies in Pennsylvania have been having marvelous turnout all extremely jazzed for Palin.  In addition, we have good old Jack Murtha calling his constituency racists and rednecks.He does this even though western Pennsylvania voted in favour of a black man, Lynn Swann, in the last gubernatorial race while urban Pennsylvania did not:

However, what Rendell fails to do is actually look at the county-by-county results of the 2006 gubernatorial election where he soundly dispatched of Lynn Swann by a 20-point margin. If Rendell had bothered to actually look at the election results, he would find that the reason Swann lost was because Lynn Swann got absolutely crushed in the Philadelphia region by 80% to 20% ratio, losing the City of Philadelphia by a 90% – 10% margin. That accounts for about 45% of the total statewide vote.

It was with the mostly white, moderate-to-liberal Philadelphia suburban voters (those supposedly enlightened enough to vote for a black candidate) that Rendell racked up the big margin over Mr. Swann that propelled him to victory. Furthermore, in the most liberal part of the state, the “City of Brotherly Love,” black voters voted 95% against the first black gubernatorial nominee in Pennsylvania of a major party.

When we turn our attention to the more rural, conservative areas of the state; we see that in 2006 not only did those areas vote for a black candidate, but that Rendell’s conservative-whites-that-won’t-vote-for-blacks voted for Lynn Swan in a greater numbers than Rick Santorum. In conservative bastions such as Cumberland, Dauphin, Perry and Adams counties Swann ran well ahead of Republican Rick Santorum. This despite the fact Santorum was better funded, better known and, by the way, white. Overall Lynn Swann ran ahead of Rick Santorum in rural central and Western Pennsylvania, where the state’s most conservative voters live.

It seems that there is some validity to my theory here. Ed Rendell has called upon Obama to come back to Pennsylvania for another rally before the election:

Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell has sent two separate memos to the Obama campaign in the past five days requesting that the Democratic Presidential candidate—as well as Hillary and Bill Clinton—return to campaign in Pennsylvania, Rendell told CNN’s Gloria Borger.

Rendell said the McCain campaign is clearly making a push to win Pennsylvania, given the recent visits by the Arizona senator, his wife and his running mate. As a result, he wants Obama to appear in western Pennsylvania, Harrisburg and one more “large rally” in Philadelphia. Democrats generally worry that the race is significantly closer than what recent polls have suggested. According to Rendell, there is also worry among Democrats the McCain campaign has successfully raised the enthusiasm level among Republicans in the state.

Realistically, I don’t know if Pennsylvania is winnable at this point, but I have no idea what McCain’s internal polling is showing.  Conventional wisdom would advise a deployment of Palin to Colorado to court the libertarian west, but hopefully they know something that I don’t.

UPDATE: Fantastic, I finish this post, switch over to Spectator and what do I see, the Other McCain has found that the One has a two point lead in Pennsylvania. R.S. McCain notes that the leak is attributed to an Obama organizer.

Palin Goes After Obama on Abortion

Dan Nephin of the AP reports:

 

Palin said she and Republican presidential candidate John McCain would be “defenders of the culture of life.” She opposes abortion in all cases except where the pregnancy threatens the woman’s life.

Alaska’s governor also touched upon common campaign themes during her speech to about 5,000 supporters in Johnstown, but she focused on children with special needs and then abortion. Palin, whose infant son, Trig, has Down syndrome, said she and McCain would make protecting such children a priority.

“Every child has something to contribute … if we give them that chance,” she said.

[…]

Palin called Obama’s ideas and votes on abortion “radical.”

“In short, Sen. Obama is a politician who has long since left behind even the middle ground on the issue of life. He’s fighting with those who won’t protect a child born alive,” she said.

“A vote for Barack Obama is a vote for activist courts that will continue to smother the open and democratic debate that we deserve and that we need on this issue of life – that’s OK, that debate – at both the state and federal level,” she said.

I love Palin so much. She needs to keep bringing up this issue.  A debate is necessary on the issue of abortion and it should be at the state level. The Roe v. Wade court improperly made this into a federal issue and while we have made significant inroads since then, with the help of Jane Roe among others.