It's over.
All the polls have swung to McCain. USA Today has McCain up 10% among likely voters, and he has has passed the 50% mark. The Obama campaign has lost its momentum and is now playing defense. Unless something weird happens over the next 57 days, I'd say this election is effectively over. I don't think it will be close, nor should it be.
Obama's biggest mistake was selecting Biden as his running mate, which instantly made a mockery of the "Change" mantra. If you want to shake things up, then a living stereotype of the Washington lifer like Slow Joe is the last person you should be running with. And if Biden plans to use the role of "experienced statesman" to run over Palin in their debate, he needs to do a couple of things. First, he needs to read the account below of Palin's debate performance two years ago. Second, he needs to pray for mass amnesia so nobody will remember his defeatist plan to carve up Iraq, an absurdly wrong-headed idea that sounded dandy to Slow Joe, the innovative foreign policy expert. He can hope that mess is safely down the memory hole, but it will be coming out from under the rug soon, like the smell of a dead mouse.
Byron
Obama's biggest mistake was selecting Biden as his running mate, which instantly made a mockery of the "Change" mantra. If you want to shake things up, then a living stereotype of the Washington lifer like Slow Joe is the last person you should be running with. And if Biden plans to use the role of "experienced statesman" to run over Palin in their debate, he needs to do a couple of things. First, he needs to read the account below of Palin's debate performance two years ago. Second, he needs to pray for mass amnesia so nobody will remember his defeatist plan to carve up Iraq, an absurdly wrong-headed idea that sounded dandy to Slow Joe, the innovative foreign policy expert. He can hope that mess is safely down the memory hole, but it will be coming out from under the rug soon, like the smell of a dead mouse.
Byron
posted by Byron | Monday, September 08, 2008
2 Comments:
Recall, please, that we reside in a representative democracy that elects its presidents via the Electoral College. Even if Big Mac and Saint Sarah (an appellation given her while running for Alaska governor) win the popular vote, it is a stretch at this point to think they will win the electoral vote. God knows I'm voting the Palin-McCain ticket, but I wouldn't put personal money on the outcome just yet.
Two weeks ago, I would have agreed. But the selection of Palin as running mate has two big effects. First, it secures the GOP base, and that largely eliminates any threat to the electoral votes that Bush won in the last election. (Rasmussen now has McCain leading Ohio 51-44 -- and that's before those Russian warships visit Venezuela for joint naval maneuvers.) Second, it frees McCain himself to work the middle, which forces Obama to devote time and money to holding onto states that would otherwise be considered solidly in his column.
The result, I predict, will be an electoral vote spread much wider than the popular vote spread. Any number of unexpected things can happen, of course. But absent some cataclysmic event or series of events, I don't see what Obama do to can regain his momentum. I expect the left-liberals and the young to gradually lose interest from here out. His media allies cannot do any more for him than they've already done; in fact, they've gone so far overboard on his behalf that they've squandered much of their ability to influence public opinion. Obama's act has grown very stale, the magic is gone. He also remains extremely vulnerable on a host of personal issues that are barely on the public radar so far, and which the McCain campaign will use to force him onto the defensive constantly as the election approaches. It will be a miserable October for Obama.
Intrade market odds have strongly favored Obama, but are now falling like a rock. I think we're looking at the possibility of a blow-out.
Byron
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