Wilmington, NC

Well, he's toned it down. And she's toned it down, too. And John McCain is to be congratulated for that--apparently the fact that his rallies were turning into hate-a-thons while his poll numbers dropped caused the good Senator to step back from provocative lines like, "We don't know who Barack Obama really is..." (Crowd response: "He's a terrorist."). Today, he unveiled his new stump speech--and it is not only punchier than his recent efforts, it's also a respectable effort--well within the boundaries of political propriety-- comparing his policies to those of his opponent. (Yesterday, in Ohio, I watched Palin avoid ugliness as well--eschewing her usual red meat ritual of slamming Obama on late-term abortion and instead, beseeching the crowd to "check out [his positions] for yourself.")

This doesn't mean that McCain has suddenly grown wiser. His policy positions, and a few of his distortions, remain the same. He still talks about Obama being prepared to "concede defeat in Iraq." (Palin talks about Obama being unable to use the words "win" or "victory" in Iraq--words that David Petraeus, incidentally, doesn't use either.) But this is a far more worthy speech than McCain has been giving in recent weeks.

If he sticks with it, and the campaign turns around, it will be a victory for civility. If the campaign doesn't turn around--a more likely scenario--McCain will be able to return to the Senate with a few stray threads of dignity intact. We'll see if he sticks with it.

In an effort to measure the impact of Obama's candidacy on the electorate, especially among young and minority voters, Gallup has begun publishing presidential tracking poll results based on two different "likely voter" models. The first is the traditional model, which designates likely voters based on how they answer questions related to both their current intention to vote as well as their past voting behavior. In today's tracking poll, Obama registers a seven point lead over McCain using this model. The second model, Likely Voters II, designates likely voters based solely on their current voting intention, and in this way attempts to account for the intensity of interest, and mass of new voter registrations, among groups that typically do not vote in high numbers, including the young and racial minorities. Using that model, Obama has a 10-point lead.

One of the big unknowns in this cycle has long been what the electorate will look like on Election Day. Gallup deserves credit for trying to apply a model that accounts for the electorate's likely new complexion. It's also understandable why they're hedging their bets by going with two models, because we simply can't be sure who will vote.

Way back in 1999, well before the rest of us got to know Krugman on the op-ed page of the NYT, Justin Fox saw this coming.

UPDATE: Krugman's own blog today.

Wilmington, N.C.

I'm hanging out, waiting to hear John McCain deliver his latest new stump speech--the text seems less toxic than recent efforts--but I couldn't let Bill Kristol's latest advice to the vote-lorn column pass. Last week, you may recall, Kristol wanted McCain to go negative in a big way. As if that would be a departure from the last few months. He even consulted with Sarah Palin about the need to go after Obama's relationship with Jeremiah Wright. (Palin said, youbetcha!)

This week, he wants McCain to fire the staff...for being so negative. McCain needs to be open, accessible and optimistic again. He needs to junk his negative ads. He needs to...well, uh, Kristol gets a bit snagged on what McCain should do that's positive:

McCain should stop unveiling gimmicky proposals every couple of days that pretend to deal with the financial crisis. He should tell the truth — we’re in uncharted waters, no one is certain what to do, and no one knows what the situation will be on Jan. 20, 2009. But what we do know is that we could use someone as president who’s shown in his career the kind of sound judgment and strong leadership we’ll need to make it through the crisis.
McCain can make the substantive case for his broadly centrist conservatism. He can explain that our enemies won’t take a vacation because the markets are down, and that it’s not unimportant that he’s ready to be commander in chief. He can remind voters that even in a recession, the president appoints federal judges — and that his judges won’t legislate from the bench.

Except that some people have a fairly good idea about what to do. The British do, as Nobel laurate--congratulations!--Paul Krugman argues on the same page as Kristol. And Barack Obama unveiled four new proposals today--including a jobs creation tax credit and a good idea proposed by McCain last week, allowing people to raid their 401ks tax free for the rest of this year and 2009 (a good way to hold onto your house until your mortgage is renegotiated--or pay off your maxed-out credit cards).

But, clearly, this is an area neither Kristol nor McCain spend much time thinking about or studying. Can't wait for next week's Kristol column: dump Palin?

Easily one of the best, non-political stories of this election cycle has been the tale of Levi Johnston, an 18-year-old kid from Alaska, who was living his life, going to high school, watching his friends tend to his MySpace page, playing hockey, and hanging out with his girlfriend, Bristol, until everything suddenly changed.

In the course of a few months he found out Bristol was pregnant, that Bristol's mom, Sarah Palin, was a vice presidential nominee, and that he was suddenly world famous. He appeared at the Republican convention, before an audience of about 37 million to hold his girlfriend's hand. He became a political hockey puck, to be knocked around by pundits in every direction--at once, a poster child of responsible fatherhood for proposing to his pregnant girlfriend and a poster child for better sex education in school.

He took it all silently, until now. In a story published today, he gives an extended interview with the Associated Press, standing in the driveway of his family home. It turns out he has dropped out of high school to apprentice for a career in the oil fields of Alaska's north slope. Other than that, he is not that fazed by everything.

Of Barack Obama, he says, "I don't know anything about him. He seems like a good guy. I like him." Of Sarah Palin, he says, "I just hope she wins. She's my future mother-in-law. She better win." Of his girlfriend, he says, "We were planning on getting married a long time ago with or without the kid." Of his unborn son, he says, "I'm looking forward to having him. I'm going to take him hunting and fishing. He'll be everywhere with me." Of his appearence at the convention, he says, ""At first, I was nervous. Then I was like, 'Whatever.'"

There is more. Read the story here.

John McCain and Sarah Palin took the stage in Virginia Beach this morning to the theme song from the movie Rocky, a 1977 Billboard #1 hit called "Gonna Fly Now." The song's opening stanza seems especially apt for McCain's current situation: "Trying hard now/ It's so hard now/ Trying hard now"--sung in a funky disco groove.

Absent from the speeches that followed was any hammering on last week's theme, Who is Barack Obama?, with references to William Ayers, abortion votes or big city Chicago corruption. At one point Sarah Palin seemed to nod at the seething "anger" that seemed to overtake the message last week. "Ladies and gentleman, let John McCain turn that anger into action," she called out, in her folksy way, apparently aiming to get everyone back on track.

McCain's new-and-improved stump speech is a much more standard experience-'n-mettle argument: "What America needs now is a fighter; someone who puts all his cards on the table and trusts he judgement of the American people." The speech was distinguished by merging together two different fights--the struggling economy and the struggling McCain campaign--into a single problem with a sole solution, someone with the life experience of McCain. "I know what fear feels like," McCain said, returning to the language of his convention speech. "It's a thief in the night who robs your strength. I know what hopelessness feels like. It's an enemy who defeats your will. I felt those things once before. I will never let them in again. I'm an American and I choose to fight."

As for the state of the campaign, McCain still chooses to see the glass 43 percent full. He garbled the delivery a bit, but here is how his prepared remarks read:

Let me give you the state of the race today. We have 22 days to go. We're 6 points down. The national media has written us off. Senator Obama is measuring the drapes, and planning with Speaker Pelosi and Senator Reid to raise taxes, increase spending, take away your right to vote by secret ballot in labor elections, and concede defeat in Iraq. But they forgot to let you decide. My friends, we've got them just where we want them.

Or as the lady sings in the Rocky theme song, "Getting strong now/ Won't be long now /Getting strong now." Of course, Rocky was a work of fiction. But then McCain has always been heavily invested in fictional mythology. As the New York Times recounts this morning, McCain often turned to characters from fiction and film:

[H]is memoir incorporated some of the defiance of Marlon Brando's outlaws, the self-discovery of W. Somerset Maugham's 'Of Human Bondage'; and the stoicism of Ernest Hemingway's dying hero in 'For Whom the Bell Tolls.' ("You know he is a fictional character?" Mr. Salter said he once asked Mr. McCain, who replied, "I know, but he was influential!")

And though that lady at McCain's Lakeville townhall seemed to think Obama was both, the audio of the event didn't pick up what I thought I heard as McCain took the mic away.

I will add, however, that the woman talked to reporters afterward and seemed pretty keen on the idea of Obama being at terrorist at that time. She read it on the internet.

Sorry for the delay in posting the video.

One of the most opaque, misleading and emotionally-charged attacks on Barack Obama focuses on his votes as a state senator in Illinois on so called "Born Alive" legislation. Late last week, the criticism became an official part of the McCain campaign's regular messaging. From my new Time.com story on the topic:

"As a state senator, Barack Obama wouldn't even stand up for the rights of infants born alive during an abortion," [Sarah] Palin said on Saturday, during a Johnstown, Penn. rally. "These infants, often babies with special needs, are simply left to die." . . .

Two days earlier, during an appearance on the Laura Ingraham radio program, Palin said Obama had voted against providing medical care to babies who are alive after abortions. "It's very appalling," Palin said. "If more Americans could understand how absolutely extreme that position is, there would be a heck of a lot more outrage than we have already seen." Hours later, in Wisconsin, she repeated the charge that Obama had voted against providing "health care for a child who was born alive as a result of a botched abortion."

In each case, Palin's words were carefully chosen for maximum effect, without employing any outright falsehoods. Taken in isolation, however, her statements were also quite misleading, as they suggested Obama supported the death of babies after birth who had a chance of survival. The reality is very different.

Read the whole story here.