If the election were held today, Senator Obama would win easily.
The election will not be held today and there are still two major events to come.
However, the melt down on Wall Street and the unpopular bail out plan upset the best laid plans of the McCain campaign. McCain could only have caught up immediately by opposing the unpopular plan . . . but he thinks it in the nation’s best interest. You know what he will do in that case!*
The debate, where McCain did very well, was swallowed up in the overall reaction to Wall Street. Senator Obama was solid in that part of the debate, which was good news for him, because the foreign policy segment went badly for him.
That Senator Obama has not broken the fifty percent mark . . . he is stuck with the Kerry 49/50% is the only good news for McCain from last week.
McCain’s support has dropped, but Obama is not soaring. If Obama begins to poll in the 52/53 range consistently, the the election is over.
This weeks Vice-Presidential debate is as much about the future of Governor Palin on the national stage as it is this election. I don’t think it is fair, but Palin is about to be forever Quayled as an airhead.
If she blows the debate, her national career is not totally over, but it will be hard for her to recover.
If she comes back from the Couric performance to shine (as she did at the Convention), then those who jumped ship on her too quickly on the right will have the decency to admit it. Governor Palin will have helped the ticket . . . and given the low expectations going in (on the left people anticipate her total meltdown), she will have become a favorite on the right in 2012 regardless of the winner in 2008.
For Palin, everything rides on this debate. She has been set up perfectly (like at the RNC) to win at this debate and now must press her advantage. Every speaker dreams of such a chance . . . and though the pressure is high . . . it is not unfair since the rewards of turning conventional wisdom upside down will be so great.
From the start, I have said that this is a Democratic year and that major events (an economic meltdown was one suggested) could change everything. Bad news aids the Democrats (not their fault, they are not the party in power). Good news in Iraq helped Republicans, but Iraq is no longer the major issue of the campaign.
Senator Obama was helped by events and is running a good campaign again. McCain needs a game changer to get back in the election.
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*What do I think of the plan? As a small government person, I hate it, but all the alternatives seem worse. If I were in Congress, I would vote for it as if supporting high risk new surgicial procedures for a very sick friend . . . with little, but some, hope.