In an earlier post I wrote about Saturday's McCain-Palin rally in Colorado Springs, and how the candidates and speakers, while stressing the importance of Colorado and El Paso County in particular this November, failed to give even a passing nod to the evangelical social agenda. That brings to mind a larger question.

Is El Paso County, with its high concentration of evangelical and military-oriented voters, enough to push McCain to victory in Colorado in November? Taking a look at various numbers, I would say it's a close question, but unlikely. [More...]

Received by e-mail from the Catholic Democrats Communnications PAC:

An independent nationwide survey run the week of September 1, 2008, by the Catholic Democrats Communications Political Action Committee shows that nearly all the Catholic voters who voted for Sen. Hillary Clinton will now cast the vote for Sen. Barack Obama. Nearly 500 Catholics responded to the survey.

It is clear that the alleged defection of Clinton voters to McCain is not happening, " said Bill Roth, President of the PAC. "Nearly 95% of the Clinton voters now intend to vote for Sen. Obama. This repudiates the idea that Gov. Palin should somehow appeal to the Clinton voter." [More...]

Somerby reports on Olbermann:

THIS FELLOW JUST CAN’T STOP: Some “men” are born to behave this way. One fellow clearly can’t stop:

MADDOW (9/8/08): And so, you think [Obama’s] confidence is about what comes next in the campaign, not necessarily an undue confidence about where his tactics thus far have gotten him.

OLBERMANN: Well, look what he’s—he’s fought off this. He’s fought off this, you know—we found somebody at Schwab’s Drugstore in Hollywood and give her a screen test and now she’s Liza Minnelli and a star is born and we’re making her the vice president of the United States or at least the candidate on the ticket.

In this way, this fellow adorned the first few moments of Rachel Maddow’s first program! But then, some “men” are born to insult women; they keep it up to the day they die. KeithO seems to be such a guy. He’ll never stop gender-trashing Palin, even if it puts her consort safely inside the White House.

Speaking for me only

UPI editor Martin Sieff displays a surprising amount of journalistic honesty when he writes:

The cynical old adage about Vietnam is being played out in Iraq: Pull out the troops and call it victory.

That is certainly one way to look at President George W. Bush's decision, to be announced Tuesday, to pull 8,000 U.S. troops out of Iraq.

As Sieff points out, the current level of troop commitment would be unsustainable even if Iraq's nascent government hadn't insisted on a troop withdrawal. His verdict: [more ...]

In a post yesterday, I disagreed with Glenn Greenwald's post about Keith Olbermann. Today, Greenwald writes about the obligations of journalists. Greenwald writes:

[If] you posit that journalists have no obligation to do anything other than advance their self-interest, then all media criticism becomes incoherent. So what if journalists pass along McCain's lies without pointing out that they're false? So what if Judy Miller gets herself on the front page by disseminating the false war-fueling claims of unreliable sources? . . . . According to [Matt] Yglesias (and many others), they have no duty or obligation to do anything else. Their only consideration is advancement of their self-interest, and that's how it should be.

More . . .

Congressional-aide-turned-lobbyist Kevin Ring has been indicted for his alleged role in Jack Abramoff's scheme to trade financial benefits for political favors. Ring worked as an aide for Rep. John Doolittle, who is not seeking reelection.

Authorities accused Ring of arranging campaign contributions for Doolittle ... and of lying to investigators hired by Ring's former employer about his knowledge of a lucrative consulting job that lobbyists had arranged for the lawmaker's wife, Julie. Ring and Abramoff treated Doolittle's staff members to rock concerts, football games and meals at pricey restaurants, prosecutors say.

In October 2000, Ring wrote Abramoff an e-mail describing Doolittle as "such a good soldier, doing everything we asked of him. ... I know you are great about making sure he gets his fair share of contributions, but if [client] is feeling generous, this would be a very opportune time to get something" to him, according to the indictment. Abramoff and Ring hosted fundraisers for Doolittle at the Capital Grille, a D.C. steakhouse, and arranged for Doolittle's wife to be paid $96,000 for fundraising and bookkeeping services, the indictment alleges.

[more ...]

GOP blogger Patrick Ruffini argues that:

[W]hen the apolitical Republican base intensifies, usually in September (and as late as late October in the losing '92 and '96 races), they usually leave the media scratching their heads about where the previous 16 months of self-delusion went. In every election in the last 20 years save for 2000, the Democrat looked better in June than they did on Election Day. And it's looking like that will be the case again in 2008.

Is that accurate? Not really. David Paul Kuhn of Politico looked at Gallup polling in July in Presidential elections of the last 20 years and found that the results show a mixed bag:

Some good lines from Hillary Clinton in her campaigning in Florida for Barack Obama. The NYTimes reports:

In Orlando, Mrs. Clinton appeared at a convention of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, which was one of the first unions to endorse her for president and which has yet to endorse a candidate in the general election. Drawing cheers and applause from the 1,600 people in the room, Mrs. Clinton said that “we must work as hard as we possibly can” to elect Mr. Obama, and suggested that her supporters needed to put aside personal loyalty to her former candidacy and embrace him as the best hope for their interests.

“Who are you for?” Mrs. Clinton said. “That’s the wrong question. It should be: Who is for you? Who will fight for you?” Shortly afterward, the union workers made Mrs. Clinton an honorary member, and she replied by asking them for an endorsement of Mr. Obama. “Aye!” they cheered.

(Emphasis supplied.) More . . .

When Barack Obama decided to forego the public finance system in the general election, it was with the expectation that his campaign's fundraising prowess would give Obama a decided advantage over the McCain campaign, which opted in to the public finance system. McCain received $84 million this month from the public finance system, while continuing to raise funds for the RNC and state GOP parties. And the NYTimes reports Obama's campaign is dissatisfied with its fundraising:

[T]he [Obama] campaign is struggling to meet ambitious fund-raising goals it set for the campaign and the party. It collected in June and July far less from Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s donors than originally projected. Moreover, Mr. McCain, unlike Mr. Obama, will have the luxury of concentrating almost entirely on campaigning instead of raising money, as Mr. Obama must do.

More . . .

At a campaign rally Monday night, Sen. Barack Obama explained his views on why we need habeas corpus for everyone, even those suspected of terrorism:

"Habeas corpus ... is the foundation of Anglo-American law, which says very simply, if the government grabs you, then you have the right to at least ask, `Why was I grabbed?' and say, `Maybe, you've got the wrong person.'

"The reason we have that safeguard is we don't always have the right person. We don't always catch the right person. "We may think this is Muhammad the terrorist. It might be Muhammad the cab driver. You may think it's Barack the bomb-thrower. But it might be Barack, the guy running for president."

As to Gov. Sarah Palin's "reading their rights" slam of him during her acceptance speech, he responded: [More...]

More information showing Ethics Reformer and Cost Cutter may be misnomers when applied to Gov. Sarah Palin -- The Washington Post reports:

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has billed taxpayers for 312 nights spent in her own home during her first 19 months in office, charging a "per diem" allowance intended to cover meals and incidental expenses while traveling on state business.

The governor also has charged the state for travel expenses to take her children on official out-of-town missions. And her husband, Todd, has billed the state for expenses and a daily allowance for trips he makes on official business for his wife.

It's all seems legal, although there are some questionable items, but it doesn't fit too well with the image of her as one who is focused on cost cutting and savings to Alaskans: [More...]

I'm working on my latest theory, that the only thing that still matters in this election is whether there are more evangelicals and right wing extremists in the big swing states or more of everyone else.

Did anyone else see Weeds? It was intense, to say the least.

This is an open thread.