http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2008/10/07/palin-steps-up-tv-interviews/

The McCain campaign has largely sheltered Sarah Palin from the media, but
that’s changing. This week, the campaign is slowing releasing the GOP vice-presidential candidate to local media. On Monday, Palin sat down with NBC affiliate WFLA in Tampa, Fla. On Tuesday, she took questions from another local television station in Jacksonville.

The Monday interview with WFLA will be aired in pieces on several broadcasts this week. But the entire eight minutes of Palin’s interview with Keith Cate is online. In answering the majority of questions, Palin repeated her stump speech. But there were a few new answers, including more comments on the Saturday Night Live skits with Tina Fey poking fun at her.

John McCain’s campaign continues to grant interviews to national outlets strategically. She talked with Greta Van Susteren of Fox News Tuesday morning, the fourth interview she’s granted to Fox in the past two weeks. (Previous Fox interviews include both a television and radio appearance with Sean Hannity and an interview with political reporter Carl Cameron.

I think this is a good strategy and McCain campaign should have done a lot already. Palin needs to bypass the national media and talk to local media directly. Remember, she has garnered $70 million people to watch the debate, I am sure lots of local media will be dying to interview her.

Here’s the link to ‘Keith Cate’’s interview. The local media are generally very good, no gocha questions.

http://www2.tbo.com/video/2008/oct/06/kieth-cate-exclusive-interview-sarah-palin/

*South Carolina Democratic chairwoman Carol Fowler sharply attacked Sarah Palin today, saying John McCain had chosen a running mate ” whose primary qualification seems to be that she hasn’t had an abortion.” *

Ouch… Shed another 5 points from Obama’s column among women voters…

Stop Smearing Sarah
http://stopsmearingsarah.blogspot.com/

Newsweek Exclusive: Top Clinton Supporter John Coale Endorses McCain

John Coale, a prominent Washington lawyer, husband of Fox TV host Greta Van Susteren and a supporter of Sen. Hillary Clinton, announced today that he was supporting John McCain for president. Coale, who traveled with Sen. Clinton, President Clinton and her family through out the primary season, complained of sexism, and said the Democratic Party is “being taken over by the moveon.org types” in an exclusive interview with Newsweek.com’s Tammy Haddad

The McCain campaign raised more than $10 million in the two and a half days after Alaska Governor Sarah Palin was named as the vice presidential running mate, bringing the total raised in the month of August to more than $47 million, campaign officials tell ABC News.

What if maverick chose Romney/Pawleny etc…

Sarah Palin has made a good first impression. Before being named as John McCain’s running mate, 67% of voters didn’t know enough about the Alaska governor to have an opinion. After her debut in Dayton and a rush of media coverage, a new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey finds that 53% now have a favorable opinion of Palin while just 26% offer a less flattering assessment.

*Palin earns positive reviews from 78% of Republicans, 26% of Democrats and 63% of unaffiliated *voters. Obviously, these numbers will be subject to change as voters learn more about her in the coming weeks. Among all voters, 29% have a Very Favorable opinion of Palin while 9% hold a Very Unfavorable view.

By way of comparison, on the day he was selected as Barack Obama’s running mate, Delaware Senator Joseph Biden was viewed favorably by 43% of voters

I’m extremely struck by the fact she made a good impression on the 63% of unaffiliated voters. Right now, the democratic party and MSM are trying to tear her apart, they are doing Republican party a favor by lowering the expectation of her among voters. If she can hold her own, showing her intelligence and toughness in the next few weeks, Sarah Palin can be a great payback for McCain’s gamble.

The daily Rasmussen shows little movement today, Obama still has 4 points lead. I am convinced the rollout of Sarah Palin has diminished Obama’s momentum.

Looks like Obama is getting a bounce already.

Democratic candidate Barack Obama has gained ground in the latest Gallup Poll Daily tracking average from Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and now leads Republican John McCain among registered voters by a 48% to 42% margin.

The latest three-day Gallup Poll Daily tracking average (Aug. 25-27) is directly coincident with the first three days of the Democratic National Convention in Denver, and is no doubt beginning to reflect the typical convention “bounce” that Gallup has observed in most party conventions in recent decades. There is a lag of sorts involved in the daily tracking; interviewing is conducted in most parts of the country before that evening’s high-focus speeches have taken place. Thus, the current three-day average would reflect any impact of Monday night’s speech by Michelle Obama, and Tuesday night’s speech by Hillary Clinton, but would not completely reflect Wednesday night’s lineup of speakers, such as John Kerry, former President Bill Clinton, and vice presidential nominee Joe Biden, nor the appearance on stage at the end of the evening by Barack Obama himself. (To view the complete trend since March 7, 2008, click here.)

First on The Page: New Obama ad distances him from Bill Ayers and hits McCain back on the economy.

“With all our problems, why is John McCain talking about the sixties, trying to link Barack Obama to radical Bill Ayers?”

“McCain knows Obama denounced Ayers’ crimes, committed when Obama was just eight years old.”
…

Spot airing in Ohio and perhaps elsewhere starting Monday.

CNN poll: Post-Biden poll shows dead heat

It’s a dead heat in the race for the White House. The first national poll conducted entirely after Barack Obama publicly named Joe Biden as his running mate suggests that battle for the presidency between the Illinois senator and Republican rival John McCain is all tied up.

In a new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll out Sunday night, 47 percent of those questioned are backing Obama with an equal amount supporting the Arizona senator.

“This looks like a step backward for Obama, who had a 51 to 44 percent advantage last month,” says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland.

“Even last week, just before his choice of Joe Biden as his running mate became known, most polls tended to show Obama with a single-digit advantage over McCain,” adds Holland.

So what’s the difference now?

It may be supporters of Hillary Clinton, who still would prefer the Senator from New York as the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee.

Sixty-six percent of Clinton supporters, registered Democrats who want Clinton as the nominee, are now backing Obama. That’s down from 75 percent in the end of June. Twenty-seven percent of them now say they’ll support McCain, up from 16 percent in late June.

“The number of Clinton Democrats who say they would vote for McCain has gone up 11 points since June, enough to account for most although not all of the support McCain has gained in that time,” says Holland.

No sooner had Barack Obama publicly announced his new running mate had John McCain’s campaign produced an attack ad asking: Why not Hillary?

“Passed Over” will hit the airwaves at (you guessed it) 3 a.m. Sunday. The timing is a reference to Hillary Clinton’s national security ad during the Democratic primary and the same time the Obama campaign sent out its text message announcing Delaware Sen. Joseph Biden as the vice-presidential nominee.

“She won millions of votes. But isn’t on his ticket. Why?” an announcer says in the 30-second spot.

The answer? “For speaking the truth.”

The ad, which has not yet been released, then ticks off a litany of criticism Clinton used against Obama in the prolonged primary, according to a transcript sent to reporters.

“You never hear the specifics,” Clinton says.

“On the Rezko scandal,” the voice says.

“We still don’t have a lot of answers about Senator Obama,” Clinton says in footage from the primaries.

“Senator Obama’s campaign has become increasingly negative,” Clinton says in another scene.

The announcer closes by saying “The truth hurt. And Obama didn’t like it.”

“Set aside that Obama said she’d be on anybody’s short list, set aside anybody’s feelings on whether she was deliberately snubbed and the pros and cons of whether it should be her,” a former Clinton strategist told CNN’s Candy Crowley. “Focus on the politics of it and you have about a quarter of Clinton loyalists still not joining the caravan…for God’s sake, not to even make a show of taking her seriously is flatly stupid.”

A top Clinton advisor also told CNN they were “outraged,” over how the process was conducted.

“You can’t put [Obama VP vetters] Eric Holder and Carolyn Kennedy on an hour plane ride to Chappaqua just to check the box? They should have done it just for the optics,” this person said. “Barack never even said to her, ‘Here’s how I envision the job’– not one discussion with her about [the position].”

“They thought her supporters were mad before? They are really mad now,” this person also said. We knew it was never going to happen but you would have thought they might at least make a show of it.”

Sarah Palin, please!!

LENEXA, Kan. — After weeks of speculation and days of intense rumors, the answer to who Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama would name as his running mate may have come down to a bumper sticker printed in Lenexa.

KMBC’s Micheal Mahoney reported that the company, which specializes in political literature, has been printing Obama-Bayh material. That’s Bayh as in U.S. Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana. Word leaked out about the material as it was being printed up by Gill Studios of Lenexa. The Obama campaign had said it would make the announcement by text message on Friday.

Gill Studios, would not confirm information about the material. They would not deny it either. The company president would not comment when asked by Mahoney about the reports. But at least three sources close to the plant’s operations reported the Obama-Bayh material was being produced.

Bayh, what a dud…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PetxaA42OuE

http://www.thenextright.com/soren-dayton/bipartisan-vp-thoughts

Really only one thought on the Dems:

Perhaps Patrick was right. A very good source is telling me that multiple DNC members have told him that Hillary is the person. While not immediately intuitive, Clinton is the candidate who one can easily imagine helping with Barack Obama’s numbers. Which seem to be … in bad shape? Who else would fundamentally shift the numbers? You could see her bringing Democrats back home, etc., in a way that none of the other candidates could.

According to the latest NBC/WSJ poll:

Barack Obama’s lead in the presidential race has nearly disappeared, a combination of news from abroad, Republican attacks at home and Hillary Clinton voters who have not rallied behind Sen. Obama.

A new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll shows that as Democrats prepare to gather in Denver for their national convention next week, the Obama campaign’s biggest challenge may be attracting Sen. Clinton’s supporters to his campaign. Only half the people who voted for Sen. Clinton in the primaries said they are now supporting Sen. Obama. One in five is supporting Sen. McCain.
Overall, the poll finds the race a statistical dead heat, with 45% favoring Sen. Obama and 42% Sen. McCain. That three-point Obama advantage is down from six points a month ago, a trend found in other national polls as well. The poll’s margin of error is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points

A brother of New York Sen. Hillary Clinton and local Democrats who backed her unsuccessful presidential campaign socialized privately Monday with a top surrogate of the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Arizona Sen. John McCain.)
The private gathering featured Carly Fiorina, Mr. McCain’s top economic adviser, and took place at the Dunmore home of political consultant Jamie Brazil, a longtime friend of Mrs. Clinton’s family who has signed on as paid national director of Mr. McCain’s Citizens for McCain Coalition.

The attendees included Tony Rodham, Mrs. Clinton’s youngest sibling, his wife, Megan, and their two children; attorney Kathleen Granahan Kane, who coordinated Mrs. Clinton’s presidential campaign in Northeast Pennsylvania during the primary election; and Virginia McGregor, sister of Scranton Mayor Chris Doherty.
With the Democratic National Convention less than a week away, the gathering raises questions about the support Illinois Sen. Barack Obama can expect from former local supporters of Mrs. Clinton, who dominated at the polls in the Northeast in the April primary election. Mrs. Clinton won 74 percent of Lackawanna County Democrats to Mr. Obama’s 26 percent.

Ms. Fiorina’s daylong local visit, part of a two-day bus tour of the state, was aimed at talking disenchanted former supporters of Mrs. Clinton into supporting Mr. McCain. The private gathering was not a fundraiser.

“I think there’s going to be a groundswell of support for McCain,” said Lackawanna County District Attorney Andy Jarbola, a Republican and one of the people who attended. “I think a lot of Hillary supporters are going to be for McCain.”

Obama 45, McCain 39 (July: Obama 45, McCain 39)

So Obama has a 6-point lead, and nothing seems to have changed since July. But when you dig into the details, there’s a strange partisan breakdown on page 15.
*
UNWEIGHTED Weighted
Total Respondents 1,034
Registered Voters 906 851
Total Republicans 317 (35%) 284 (33%)
Total Democrats 381 (42%) 406 (48%)
Total Independents 336 (37%) 344 (40%)*

In raw data, the partisan difference between Ds and Rs is 7%, but CBS pollster weighted the numbers and gave a 15% partisan difference. Interesting.

Zogby is a crazy pollster, so take the results with a huge grain of salt. First of all, the trendline.

July 31-Aug 1(July 7-9)
McCain 42 (36)
Obama 41 (46)

Zogby National Survey

The national Associated TV/Zogby International telephone poll of 1,011 voters surveyed July 31-Aug. 1 finds McCain (R-Arizona) leading 42 percent to 41 percent over Obama (D-Ill.), which represents a sudden turnaround from the Reuters/Zogby poll of July 7-9 that showed Obama ahead, 46 to 36 percent in a four-way race with Libertarian Bob Barr of Georgia and liberal independent Ralph Nader. McCain made big gains among some of Obama’s strongest demographic groups – young adults, women and independents.

The McCain camp seems to have turned lemons into lemonade. Huge crowds and mostly favorable press reviews of Obama’s overseas trip have been trumped by McCain’s attacks on Obama,” said pollster John Zogby. “Loss of support for Obama among young voters may also be due to his perceived reversals on issues they care about, such as the war and government eavesdropping.”

The poll suggests McCain is making gains in winning key battleground states. His numbers improved most in the West and Middle America. Obama’s narrow lead in the central U.S. is now a 45 percent to 36 percent McCain lead. In the West, Obama’s 15-point lead has evaporated into a 43-40, McCain advantage

Is Obama’s Hawaii vacation plan still in place? Will DNC page Hillary?

Survey USA Florida

McCain 50
Obama 44

Poor Obama, he has spent over $5 million on ads in this state since primary, and McCain has spent ZERO. Great investment return, and keep it up, Obama.

Other polls are conducted in safe blue and red states, nothing particular interessting except the trendline.

Suffolk Massachusetts

Massachusetts
Obama 47, McCain 38 (June: Obama 53, McCain 30)

John Kerry, keep talking and I’m sure you’ll help your buddy even more.

Rasmussen Arizona

McCain 52, Obama 36 (June: McCain 49, Obama 40)

Rasmussen Alabama

McCain 55, Obama 37(June: McCain 51, Obama 36)

Rasmussen Connecticut

Obama 51, McCain 36(June: Obama 52, McCain 35)