"Liberalism always wins out in the long run"

That is a direct quote from Chris Matthews last evening.

This election was clearly about a lot of things. It was a referendum on Bush’s failed policies. It was about choosing somebody different because people don’t like the direction the country is headed. And it was about a brilliant black candidate who somehow inspired the silent and apathetic progressive majority to show up and vote.

To me, it was definitely about all that stuff. More than anything else, though, this election to me was about economics. It was about people finally deciding that Reaganomics hasn’t worked for them in the least. Looking back at the 20th century, progressivism undeniably brought us most of what is great about this country. It brought us civil rights, worker rights, women’s rights, a vibrant middle class, secure retirement, a strong moral standing in the world, and a relatively fair balance between the interests of people and the interests of corporations. On the other hand, the Reagan revolution has brought us erosion of all of those things plus all-powerful corporations and powerless workers. It has brought us insecure retirement, rampant corporate scandals, and an economic system that systematically funnels wealth upward. The genius of Reagan is that he was able to inspire generations of conservatives to rally for policies that are clearly against their own- and the vast majority of human being’s- best economic interests.

I know I’m just a wacky leftist, but I’m thinking this election was about people finally realizing that true democracy and unregulated capitalism are incompatible. They always have been. Unregulated capitalism by definition leads to wealth concentration and a dwindling middle class. At the end of the day, when votes are more evenly disbursed than wealth you will eventually and inevitably see a backlash; Electing Obama is the personification of that backlash. You can take away the middle class’ wealth but they haven’t figured out how to take away their vote yet. And that is exactly what Chris Matthews was talking about.

Olbermann Must Be Catching On

I love Tina Fey's portrayal of Sarah Palin but I think she overemphasizes the ditziness and fails to capture Palin's arrogance. I also enjoy Armisen and Hammond as Obama and McCain but I think they both fall short of the true essence of the candidates. Hammond's McCain is completely lacking the simmering anger and tense, nervousness of the real McCain. Armisen's Obama is also quite entertaining but he oftens comes off confused or cold when his target is actually the definition of poised and cool.

Allfeck's portrayal of Olbermann, on the other hand, is not only great satire but also nails what is great, and at the same time mockable, about Keith Olbermann. I loved it. Behold:

IBD/TIPP Daily Poll is Useless

We're obviously being buried at the moment with national tracking polls. On Thursday, for example, according to RCP's tracking there were no fewer than eight national polls released purporting to track the current state of the presidential race. All eight of these polls showed Obama to have a lead over McCain, but with the margin of victory for Obama ranged wildly from a high of 13% to a low of 1%. Fort the record, I do not in my wildest dreams think that Obama will win this thing by double digits as shown in the CBS/NY Times and ABC/Washington Post polls. I personally expect the real lead for Obama at the moment is somewhere in the 4 to 7 point range, consistent with five of the eight polls released on Thursday (see this one, that one, here, here and here). I do want to pick on the outlier for a second, the IBD/TIPP daily poll which shows Obama with just a one point lead.

After showing leads for Obama of 6% on Tuesday and 3.7% on Wednesday, the IBD/TIPP poll found a lead of just 1% on Thursday. Why did IBD/TIPP show a big shift in momentum over the past few days when no other pollster did? Well, it may have something to do with their samples being unrepresentative. I'm just guessing here since they don't give you any clue as to the demographic makeup of their sample.

Let's analyze the silliness a little more closely. IBD/TIPP doesn't share what percentage of their sample was between 18 and 24. They do, however, tell you what percentage of that age group voted for McCain vs Obama. The shift in the trend they showed over three days is striking:

Tuesday- Obama +6 points; 18-24 year olds- Obama 46% to 44%

Wednesday- Obama +3.7 points; 18-24 year olds- McCain 53% to 43%

Thursday- Obama +1 point; 18 -24 year olds- McCain 74% to 24%

TIPP touts itself as having been the most accurate pollster of the 2004 election. And, this daily tracking poll gets national attention on a daily basis via the popular RCP site. Yet, they present with a straight face data that shows a 52 point swing over three days in the 18-24 age group. Not to mention they also show a 20 point swing over three days among Catholics in favor of McCain and a 15 point swing among single women in McCain's favor.

So, is the race really tightening like IBD/TIP is claiming or is Obama's mid single digit lead holding pretty steady like just about every other pollster says? Given IBD/TIPP's apparently odd samples, I will guess that the latter is the case.

Colin Powell Endorses Obama

This is obviously an important endorsement for Obama. I still hold a bit of a grudge against Powell for his role in pushing us into the Iraq War. That said, he remains one of the most respected and accomplished military minds in the world. If he believes Obama is ready to be commander in chief, that should hold a whole lot of weight with voters.

LA Times Endorses Obama

The LA Times today joined the growing list of major publications to endorse Barack Obama for president.

Here are a few of my favorite snippets from their endorsement:

He is no lone rider. He is a consensus builder, a leader.

He has won the backing of some on Wall Street not because he's one of them, but because they recognize his talent for extracting from a broad range of proposals a coherent and workable program.

But for all the excitement of his own candidacy, Obama has offered more competence than drama.

In closing, the op-ed neatly and succinctly summarizes the broad appeal of Senator Obama:

Obama is educated and eloquent, sober and exciting, steady and mature. He represents the nation as it is, and as it aspires to be.

Washington Post Endorses Obama

In the op-ed page of today's issue of the Washington Post, the prominent newspaper formally endorsed Barack Obama for President.

But Mr. Obama's temperament is unlike anything we've seen on the national stage in many years. He is deliberate but not indecisive; eloquent but a master of substance and detail; preternaturally confident but eager to hear opposing points of view. He has inspired millions of voters of diverse ages and races, no small thing in our often divided and cynical country. We think he is the right man for a perilous moment.

In my humble opinion, this is well deserved praise for a great Democratic candidate.

The essence of last night's debate...

...captured in a single photo.

Third and Final Debate Cacaphony

Senator McCain certainly came out swinging last night. Even knowing that his recent wallowing in negativity did nothing to halt, and perhaps even aided, a dramatic rise in the polls for Senator Obama, McCain still attempted to bombard Obama with every smear he could think of. McCain breathlessly invoked Obama's so-called shadowy associations with William Ayers and ACORN just to have Sentor Obama bat away each charge like so many pesky mosquitoes. I was shocked, frankly, that McCain didn't trot out Reverend Jeremiah Wright's name just one last time.

The tattered Republican playbook tactic of turning a phrase or a name into something nefarious sounding- see "liberal", "George Soros", "ACLU" et al.- by simply repeating it over and over on Sean Hannity's show and in 527 ads, finally seems to have fallen on deaf ears during this election cycle. Could it be that Americans have wised up to the tactic? I doubt it. The ineffectiveness of the tactic this time around is more likely the result of the Democrats actually putting up an extremely strong and well-financed candidate for a change. And, more importantly, the Republicans put up a candidate who can't hide from his long, long history of being a free market ideologue and for having constantly pushing for deregulation. McCain would have been a flawed candidate- too angry, too inconsistent, too old- regardless of when he was running for president but it's particularly hard for him to resonate with voters with a crashing economy and an extremely unpopular Republican president casting a long, dark shadow over his campaign.

In short, I thought Obama dominated the debate. He remained calm and carefully and thoughtfully addressed every bit of random, scatter shot nonsense hurled at him by McCain. Senator McCain seemed to have decided that going negative was his only option left at this point. The result of doing so was simply to make McCain seem unpleasant and small and extremely unpresidential. Given Obama's current lead in the polls, McCain needed to crush him in this final debate; He failed miserably in his attempt to do so. In fact, I thought it was by far McCain's worst debate performance of the three.

Surely, everyone saw the same thing I saw last night. Right? Of course not! Just as with the first two debates, the reaction was all over the spectrum. Behold:

Sam Youngman: Aggressive McCain, Cool Obama

Roger Simon: McCain Fails to rattle Obama

Harold Meyerson: McCain as Angry White Man

Anne Barrowclough: The Winner? Joe the Plumber.

Peter Canellos: Intensity May Help McCain

John Dickerson: McCain did well, but not well enough

Dick Morris: Debate May be turning point for McCain

Quin Hillyer: Solid Win for McCain

Marc Ambinder: McCain surrenders debate to his frustrations

Taegan Goddard: McCain's best debate

Although opinions did vary, this time around the overwhelming majority of coverage seemed to believe that either Obama won or McCain won, but that it wasn't a big enough victory for him to stem the losing tide of his campaign.

Say What You Feel, Eugene

In a cathartic and dead nuts on article today over at Real Clear Politics, Eugene Robinson tells it like it is:

The GOP is a mess and a Fraud

The whole article is quote-worthy but I found a few passages particularly juicy. His take on the GOP's Milton Friedman disciples suddenly embracing willy nilly government intervention is one such passage:

It's pathetic to hear right-wing talk radio blowhards try to associate Barack Obama with "radical" or "socialist" views when a Republican administration is tossing aside "Atlas Shrugged" and speed-reading "Das Kapital."

After documenting some of the Right's many governing misdeeds, Robinson closes with a call to exile Republicans to minority status:

When a political party reaches the point of lurching incoherence, the most effective cure is a good, long spell in the wilderness. Americans should help Republicans out by sending them home to get their act together.

Even after receiving what I hope will be a broad rejection of Republicans on November 4, conservatives will undoubtedly miss the point. Whereas I will see it as a wholesale rejection of their corporatist ideology, the Right will no doubt argue that their candidates just weren't conservative enough.

McCain vs. Obama on Energy Policy

The Salt Lake Tribune is running a series of articles comparing McCain and Obama's stances on the issues. Today's article compares McCain and Obama's stances on energy policy.

The key energy policy differences between the two are that while McCain is more heavily devoted to old technology such as oil, coal, and nuclear, Obama focuses his attention more on alternative, renewable sources of energy. As the more devout free market capitalist, McCain wants to drill for more oil, including offshore but not in ANWR, and expects that alternative energies will have to compete with fossil fuels in the free market. Obama clearly believes that the government is going to have to be an active participant in the market to ensure that alternative sources of energy get developed as needed.

Comparing the candidates stances underscores something I've long said about John McCain; Maverick is just another way of saying "inconsistent". Yes, he has a history of bucking his party from time to time. But it's been in sort of a self-serving, scatter shot way. Energy policy is a good example of his inconsistency. After voting against Bush's energy bill back in 2003, he's now claiming to be in favor of the alternative energy measures contained in that bill. After voting against offshore drilling in 2005, McCain is now Mr. "Drill, Baby Drill" on the campaign trail. After voting against 20 solar or renewable energy incentive bills over the years, he now tries to position himself as being a big proponent of alternative energy. The reason a lot of Republicans didn't want McCain as the nominee in the first place was his lack of reliability on conservative issues. Looking at his history when it comes to energy, I can see where these conservatives are coming from.

The Bright Side of the Cratering Economy?

Gas prices are steadily dropping. After peaking at $4.11 in July, the national average price of a gallon of gasoline has fallen over 18% to $3.35 as of October 10, 2008. Industry analysts are projecting that prices at the pump could drop to as low at $2.50 to $2.75 per gallon in the near future.

So, in short, when the economy is relatively strong it looks like we're going to have obnoxiously expensive gasoline for the foreseeable future. If the economy is weak, a time when people have lots more to worry about than just gas prices, gas may well be substantially cheaper. Pick your poison, I suppose.

Weekend Blog Links

• Matt Yglesias blogs about the Pentagon's plans to bully the next president into massive defense spending increases.


• Juan Cole addresses McCain's defense of Obama as a decent man, not an Arab. As if the two things are mutually exclusive...


• Borowitz Report writes about John McCain's casting call for irate white people.


• The Left Coaster writes about one of my favorite topics, Free Market Fundamentalism.


• Tapped has an interesting post on ACORN and the important distinction between voter fraud and registration fraud.


• Same Facts chimes in on the idiocy of Sarah Palin being sent to drop the first puck at a Philadelphia Flyers game.


• The inimitable Jesus' General posts an ad by the group Passionately Credulous Bigots for McCain.


• Over at Alas! blog, a suspected serial killer clears himself. I, too, have been regularly clearing myself of various crimes big and small ever since I learned from the McCain campaign that one can do so.