McCain-Obama Dead Even: Gallup

McCain's continued strong performance in the national polls (see above) has positive implications for GOP candidates around the country. Obama has a big lead in three large states -- Illinois, New York, and California, as well as a huge lead in the District of Columbia -- and that suggests McCain is doing well in most of the other 47 states. McCain has a decent chance to win PA, OH, VA, FL, MI, MN, and CO -- all battleground states. (McCain, light green, Obama, dark green

The Aug. 12-14 polling shows a slight dip in Obama's support, which had ranged between 46% and 48% (averaging 47%) in August. McCain has averaged 43% support among registered voters so far in August. Thus, the closer margin seen in today's results is due more to movement away from Obama than toward McCain. Twelve percent of registered voters now say they are undecided or supporting another candidate, which is on the high end of what Gallup has measured this year.

Voter preferences have been closely divided between Obama and McCain in each of the last three individual nights of polling, underscoring the notion that the race has tightened for the moment. This could to some degree reflect Obama's absence from the campaign trail while he vacations in Hawaii. He will return to the spotlight over the next few weeks upon naming his vice presidential running mate and accepting his party's nomination for president at the Democratic national convention, and both events have typically been associated with a bounce in support for a presidential candidate.

On Thursday, the Obama and Hillary Clinton campaigns announced an agreement to put her name into nomination for president at the convention. Given that the race has been tight for the past few days, it is unlikely this announcement is related to any change in Obama's support.Since early June when Obama clinched the nomination, he has averaged a three percentage point advantage over McCain in Gallup Poll Daily tracking. (To view the complete trend since March 7, 2008, click here.) -- Jeff Jones

Note: I urge Ohioans and others to visit my other blogs, including: http://camp2008victorya.blogspot.com/, http://hillarysupportersformccain.blogspot.com/, and

http://pennsylvaniaforjohnmccain.blogspot.com/.

Why Barack Hates Small Towns

Will Manly - Dear Barack: You're wrong about small towns.
Dear Barack: You're wrong about small towns.

By Will Manly of the Hays Daily News, Hays, KS

Dear Barack Obama: I grew to like you over the last year. I've always thought of you as dangerously naive at best. Eloquent, gifted, genuine, yes. But dangerously naive at best.

I couldn't vote for you - but not because of your funny name or your lunatic pastor. I couldn't vote for you because you say we should raise taxes (even on the rich, who I'm convinced already pay too much), and because you say we should abandon Iraq (which I'm convinced would be surrendering a war we must win), and because you don't respect the Second Amendment (which I'm convinced should disqualify any politician from any office).

Still, I've liked your message of unity and your ability to inspire. And, since your rise I've hunted quite frantically, for young conservative leaders with your talent. (To my relief, I found Bobby Jindal.) And I've long said if you beat Hillary Clinton, you will have done your country a tremendous service.

But ever more I'm having a harder and harder time rooting for you. First came your wife's comment about being proud of America for the first time - conveniently, right after you started winning primaries. Then came your own words about your grandmother who is just a "typical white person" - a racist, or at least someone with racist tendencies.

(I'm a "typical white person," I suppose, and I'm no racist. In fact, little makes me angrier than when it's insinuated I am.) Sometimes people say things they don't really mean. But this is a pattern.

Recently, we heard your comments about small-town America. Someone at a San Francisco fund-raiser asked you why it's so hard for Democrats to win in rural areas. You said: "You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. So it's not surprising then that they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them..."

Is that a minority? Hey, Cletus, get the gun! (If only we had a job to go to, some time in the last 25 years). Here's a thought: Maybe gun rights' voters know gun control laws kill people and steal freedom.

Here's a thought: Maybe some of us have moral objections to an immigration system that forces rule-followers to wait decades for legal status and rewards border-violators with amnesty.

Here's a thought: Maybe some Americans cling to their church because their pastor is a nice person, because they find love there, because there they have something they can believe in.

Here's a thought: Maybe, just maybe, us simpletons in small towns findit harder to be bigoted than all o' y'all city folks. Maybe in small towns, where everybody knows your name - and how hard you work, if you pay your taxes, how well you treat your neighbors, how often you volunteer in the community, and whether or not you're a good parent - people see the content of your character, so they don't give a hoot about the color of your skin.

(But I grew up in a small town where about a third of the population is of a different race than me. What do I know?)

And here's my favorite thought of all: Maybe small town folks are - really - capable of thinking. All on our own. You're wrong about why small-town Americans don't vote for Democrats. We don't vote for Democrats because we're self reliant, so we don't like the government trying to "solve" everything for us. And because you tell your rich friends in San Francisco that we're dumb.

And because, each election, whichever one of you is running for president traipses all over the country telling us you have all the answers, that you're the one on our side, that you understand and respect our way of life.

But each time, a little bit here and there slips out - and by the end of the campaign, we can tell what you really think about us. And we manage to learn who you really are.

And we see you're just a horse's ass.

Will the Clintons Denounce Obama?

Sharon Caliendo, formerly from Ohio, now in Oklahoma and a Republican activist there, sent me the following link from YouTube -- it's an Ohio GOP ad, and Sharon says it makes her proud of her home state: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkytVjgn-Uc


Bulletin: There's growing evidence that Bill Clinton is NOT going to back Barack Obama. See my Monday column on: http://hillarysupportersformccain.blogspot.com/. I've titled the column, "Bill, Hillary MUST Denounce Obama." See also the following link: http://purplepeoplevote.com/2008/08/04/clinton-remarks-bolster-mccains-claims-that-the-race-card-was-played/ John McCain has said, "I'd rather lose the presidency than lose a war."