The California Prison Guards Union is seeking to recall Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

It sounds like the guards want a pay raise. Gov. Arnie isn't fazed:

"I'm not going to get intimidated by those guys," Schwarzenegger told reporters in the Capitol on Monday after a ceremony honoring California's Olympic medalists. "The state should not spend more money than we take in, and their intimidation tactics will not make me change my mind whatsoever, because I happen to not represent the CCPOA. I represent the people of California."

The guards need a million signatures to get the recall on the ballot.

Another segment of Bill O'Reilly's interview with Sen. Barack Obama will air tonight on Fox. Over at MSNBC, Keith Olbermann will interview Obama.

If you watch either one, let us know what you think, not just of Obama, but of the questions and interviewing techniques of O'Reilly and Olbermann.

Did either interview give you any new insights?

I have a transcript of the Obama-Olbermann interview but it's embargoed until 8:30 pm ET and I always honor embargoes.

The media headlines are all about Bush reducing troops in Iraq. Of course troop reduction in Iraq is a good thing.

But, he also announced that he's increasing troops to Afghanistan due to "renewed resistance from the Taliban."

....the president says that a Marine battalion will be on its way there in November -- instead of going to Iraq. And an Army combat brigade will follow in January.

....Bush's plan to instead shift forces to Afghanistan may give ammunition to the argument of his critics: that while focusing on Iraq, the president paid too little attention to the resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan.

Moving troops from one country to another is neither an end to war nor a success. Bringing all our troops home is what's needed.

In line with other polls released today (see, e.g, today's CBS poll, which has McCain 46-44), the ABC/WaPo poll shows a tight race, McCain 49-47. The highlight however is the big move among white women:

White women have moved from 50-42 percent in Obama's favor before the conventions to 53-41 percent for McCain now, a 20-point shift in the margin that's one of the single biggest post-convention changes in voter preferences. The other, also to McCain's advantage, is in the battleground Midwest, where he's moved from a 19-point deficit to a 7-point edge.

In essence, Obama opened the door by not picking Hillary Clinton and McCain walked through it. McCain's Palin gamble clearly has worked. He is in the game. And he would not have been if he had not chosen Palin. And McCain would not have chosen Palin if Obama had picked Clinton.

By Big Tent Democrat, speaking for me only

You may have to turn the volume up or double click on the video to get to You Tube where you can click the "watch in high quality" button. It's Don Henley singing "Dirty Laundry" at the 1993 MTV Inaugural Ball which he most appropriately dedicates to "President and Mrs. Clinton." I made the video from the VHS tape I recorded of the gala in 1993.

Media bias against the Clintons is nothing new.

This is an open thread as I'm still at work.

Sarah Palin said:

[T]he Republican vice presidential nominee claimed that lending giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac had "gotten too big and too expensive to the taxpayers." The companies, as McClatchy reported, "aren't taxpayer funded but operate as private companies. The takeover may result in a taxpayer bailout during reorganization."

(Emphasis supplied.) Palin issued standard issue Republican nonsensical cant (See Curve, Laffer) on matters economic - which, as usual, is utter nonsense. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will NOW become "too expensive for taxpayers" because the government is going to bail them out. That said, the bailout plan is probably a good idea, as Krugman explains.

Is this the great gaffe of the century? Not really. To me it is standard issue GOP BS. Which seems the stronger political point to me. McCain-Palin = Bush's Third Term.

By Big Tent Democrat, speaking for me only

What a surprise for me to log on this morning and see all the venom directed at MSNBC and Keith Olbermann. And, for the second time in a week, liberals at odds with liberals in the blogosphere.

I will make one attempt to redirect the conversation and then I'm going back to work.

I do not think Keith Olbermann is a "hack," partisan or otherwise. I do not think MSNBC relieved him and Chris Matthews of anchoring duties at upcoming debates and election night due to pressure from conservatives or politicians.

I think the removal action was the result of pressure from journalists, other media professionals and quite possibly advertisers who convinced MSNBC that the partisan coverage of live news events was tarnishing not just MSNBC's, but also NBC's reputation as a credible news organization. The issue, as I said in my earlier post, is the distinction between anchoring of live news events and talk shows. [More...]

Like the Ras poll, the CNN poll shows a tied race:

A new national poll taken entirely after the end of the Republican convention suggests the race for the White House between John McCain and Barack Obama is dead even. A CNN/Opinion Research Corporation Poll out Monday afternoon has McCain and Obama tied at 48 percent each among registered voters questioned. Three percent of voters are undecided in the survey, which was conducted Friday through Sunday.

This is where we are at now. Obama will likely slide a few points ahead by the end of the week as the GOP Convention bounce fades. It remains Obama's race to lose imo.

By Big Tent Democrat, speaking for me only

Yes, you have read it here, but Howard Wolfson is right:

Democrats are running against John McCain, not Sarah Palin. Running against Gov. Palin instead of Senator McCain would be a mistake -- ultimately voters will make their assessments based on the strength and weaknesses of the top of the tickets. If anything, Democrats should be talking about McCain-Bush, not McCain-Palin. Every day we are focused on Palin is a day we are not amplifying the Obama campaign's message that Senator McCain simply represents four more years of President Bush.

By Big Tent Democrat, speaking for me only

Sorry to keep harping on this but it bothers me when even the usually clear eyed Glenn Greenwald gets into the Olbermann is God act. Greenwald writes:

The irrefutable fact is that nothing attracts ratings for MSNBC -- and nothing has attracted ratings in the entire history of that channel -- the way that Olbermann does. Yet here is MSNBC removing him from the anchor position . . . That is extraordinary for a media company to publicly embarrass, diminish and tarnish its own principal asset.

It is extraordinary . . . and RIGHT! Here's why, in Glenn's own words:

Contra to Jeralyn's excellent take, over at Daily Kos, BarbinMD is upset that NBC dumped Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews as news anchors for MSNBC's political coverage (Olbermann of course will continue his opinion show Countdown, going head to head against his right wing counterpart, Fox's Bill O'Reilly, and will be correctly labelled as a pundit in MSNBC's political coverage.)

This goes to an ongoing tension I see in the so-called Media criticism in the Left blogs, or rather lack thereof. We ALL know Keith Olbermann is a partisan hack. No one in their right mind would deny it. Which is fine as far as it goes. But let's not pretend he is a journalist. He NEVER should have been anchoring MSNBC's political coverage. He should have been in the pundits' slots. As should Chris Matthews (and Matthews was terrible LONG BEFORE this election. He was terrible in the 2000 and 2004 elections as well, but against Democrats then.) These two men are not journalists. It is that simple.

More . . .

Ras' first full post GOP convention poll is out:

In the first national polling results based entirely on interviews conducted after the Republican National Convention, McCain attracts 47% of the vote while Obama earns 46%. When "leaners" are included, it’s McCain 48% and Obama 47%.

Ras weights his polls by party ID so he takes out the "voter enthusiasm" variable that Gallup LV polls are plagued with (Gallup polls swing as wildly as any you will find.) McCain by 1 seems about right to me right now. By midweek, Obama will push in front narrowly imo.