Heh, gotta love articles without a single attributed source. :D

Wolfson, Davis or Penn?

dola


Chaffee's no surprise, but I didn't see Leach endorsing Obama.

I'm not an actor, but here's my advice to both candidates.

Obama: Don't associate with celebrities.
McCain: Don't talk about your naps or Wheel of Fortune

Normally, I'd agree. But this information shouldn't be surprising to most people that have followed the Obama campaign. The relationship described in this article fits perfectly with what we know about Clooney's fundraiser for Obama that's being held in Europe. It's long been known that Clooney is hosting that fundraiser overseas in the hopes that it won't draw the Hollywood relationship attention that Clooney is trying to avoid at all costs. If Clooney were smart, he'd back off in a big hurry to avoid any collateral damage to Obama.

Do you think it's not true? As an Obama supporter, do you want him anywhere NEAR Oprah or Clooney?

Leach voted against the Iraq war and he was for campaign finance reform. He still went down in '06 with the other Republicans and I was surprised that he lost.

The article paints a picture, with unattributed quotes, of Clooney acting as one of Obama's closest advisors on a very wide range of topics, including foreign policy.

I find that pretty hard to believe.

There's no doubt that Clooney is supporting Obama and they may well be friends. The implication, however, that Clooney is directing much of Obama's foreign policy is ridiculous. There's just enough truth in the article, but the overall message is still dubious at best.

I didn't read it making that bold a statement that he was actually "directing" foreign policy, but even if that's a perception, Obama has to distance himself from it as much as possible. Hollywood's involvement was a net loss for Kerry in '04.

It's also clearly a guy that isn't a supporter of Obama. The "first black President" quote, in that context, would never come from someone supporting Obama. This is a story driven by someone with an ax to grind who isn't brave enough to put his name to his quotes. Forgive me if I'm skeptical of his claims.

I feel confident that the Obama campaign can utilize the support of the Hollywood set far more effectively than what was quite possibly the most anemic Democratic presidential campaign since the 1980s.

The conservative base is likely hoping that Obama has the same belief as you. There's nothing that could screw up an otherwise solid campaign quicker than a Hollywood intervention in any form. It just doesn't make any sense to go down that path when you don't even need to do so.

lol, seriously?

Well, inasmuch as I think the Obama campaign can do anything more effectively than Kerry's disasterous 2004 campaign.

LOL......that's like saying that McCain will be a more effective president that George W. Bush. It's probably true, but is that really saying all that much?

That was kinda my point.

If someone wants to say "Hollywood's involvement was a net loss for Kerry in '04" then basically my response is that given how poorly Kerry did in pretty much every aspect of that campaign, I'm sure Obama's campaign can handle this particular aspect better than Kerry's.

It's not as funny when I have to explain the joke, though. ;)

I know, I know. I'm a blatant partisan yadda yadda. I still stand by this statement:

Virginia Governor Tim Kaine appears to be a colossal tool. This is what he had to say on Fox today.


A) There is no ceasefire currently in place, despite what Medvedev might say.

B) Does anybody really think that Obama or McCain's statements are making an iota of difference in how the Russians are reacting? To try and claim that his Obamaness was able to achieve a ceasefire just by asking for it is eye-rollingly stupid.

I actually had requested a ceasefire before Obama did.

It's stupid, but certainly no more stupid than McCain supporters that have written the Russians attacked because they knew Obama was an appeaser.

I haven't seen that, but you're right... that's awfully dumb. Has anyone the level of Tim Kaine said something like that?

The funny part is that I'm not necessarily sure that he can. I'm sure Obama would do fine on his end, but I'd never limit the ability of the Hollywood crew to screw up a candidate's chances. As mentioned before, the quicker the Democrats figure out that Hollywood is not an ally that they want on their side, the quicker they can start beating average Republican candidates in landslide numbers rather than just squeaking by or losing in the case of the last election.

So, now that all doubt has been removed as to who the leading Obama VP candidate is..........

Hannity with the pitch, Colmes with the swing...

Wowzzorz - Alan Colmes growing a pair of balls and standing up Hannity? Whodathunkit x 2

The Obama camp seems to think McCain is just as influential:

McCain too bellicose on Georgia? - 2008 Presidential Campaign Blog - Political Intelligence - Boston.com

"Democratic rival Barack Obama has been more measured, and on Tuesday night, his chief foreign policy adviser suggested that McCain had made the situation on the ground worse.

"Barack Obama, the administration and the NATO allies took a measured, reasoned approach," Obama adviser Susan Rice said on MSNBC. "We were dealing with the facts as we knew them. John McCain shot from the hip, very aggressive, belligerent statement. He may or may not have complicated the situation."

Wait until Obama's close ties with EA Sports come out...

I do remember that not so long ago it was near criminal for Obama to take a public stand that was in contrast to the administration's foreign policy.

Wow. That almost never happens. What did he drink before going on the show? You can almost see Hannity is amused by it. I do love how they're dismissing McCain's affair as "a long time and it's been vetted..." as if that has anything to do with the question.

And while I don't think any of this stuff is germane to much of anything, that clip was...funny.

It appears Saakashvili is listening to McCain. Having McCain's top foreign policy advisor on the payroll helps.

More proof that Republicans are hypocrites. For a party that is suppose to be about values they really have none.

but NOOP that was so long ago, the values are different and the vetting is different. Edwards cheated on his wife while she was fighting Cancer!! For crying out loud, I mean, had he cheated on her say, while she was critically laid up in the hospital after a horrific car accident we could all understand. Or say he was mentally unstable because he spent 5 and 1 half years being beaten - hanitty, then we could all understand it! Thank god the benchmark is the same for everyone, whooo........trust us, this has been thoroughly vetted, i mean deeply vetted....it's vetted. Edwards has not been vetted!

Let's not judge an entire political philosophy simply because of a few misguided individuals. Goes for both sides.

Sorry I disagree. In principal the Republican ideals are very good ideas, in practice it is the opposite. They pander to the right for votes but cater to the rich once in power.

Of course, Republicans would say the same thing about Democratic economic ideas.

If only there were a party that made practical sense all around......

I am in favor of a new party for moderates myself.

:rolleyes:

Well Saakashvili is hoping McCain wins so he may get more backing. Makes sense for him to half praise him.

McCain's sent Graham and Lieberman to Georgia and is saying he speaks for all Americans. It's a bit presumptuous if you ask me.

Just a tad.

Really an interesting/important time in the world right this second with the Russians, Iran, Iraq, the election.

Bill Kristol is wrong about almost everything, so I don't know if I believe this. It would be a big endorsement, if true.

According to The Politico the Clooney story is more bullshit than any of us thought.

I'm surprised this wasn't posted yet. The upward trend for McCain's campaign continues. The Electoral Vote website ( Electoral-vote.com: President, Senate, House Updated Daily ) now has McCain with slight leads in Nevada, Colorado, and Ohio. In addition, Minnesota and Indiana have been moved from solid Obama to slight Obama leans. Only good change for Obama was that Virginia was moved back to a tie rather than a slight McCain lean.

It's shocking to me to see how similar the polling trends are to the 2004 election. Obama really needs to make a good impact at the convention and pick a great VP to get his numbers moving back in the right direction.

As has been explained above, Electoral Vote just takes the most recent poll and gives the state to the leader. For any number of reasons this doesn't produce a very predictive map. I'd also note that even with the changes Obama is credited with 275 EV.

Pollster.com is much better in that it averages out a number of recent polls. It has the same states as battlegrounds, but instead of giving it to one or the other over one poll, it gives a much clearer picture of where the race may stand.

If you dig into the trend lines at Pollster you'll find that things have been pretty stable for a few weeks now. It appears that for all the money they're both spending, most people aren't paying attention.

For those who might be interested, I did a little research on the most reliable and least reliable bellweather states to watch in the upcoming election. I included all elections since 1912 (the first year there was 48 states). Below are the top 5 and bottom 5 with their percentage accuracy of voting for the winner.


Looking at the bellweather state polls on the various sites provides an interesting perspective at this point.

--Electoral-vote.com has McCain leading in 4 of the 5 top bellweather states (Obama leads in only New Mexico).

--Fivethirtyeight.com has McCain leading in Missouri, Nevada, and Tennesse. Obama leads in New Mexico. Ohio is listed as a toss-up.

--Pollster.com has McCain leading in Tennesse. Obama leads in Ohio and New Mexico. Nevada and Missouri are listed as toss-ups.

So, if we combine the results at this point for these 5 states over the three polling sites, McCain leads in eight states, Obama leads in four states, and three states are considered toss-ups.

Correlation and causation aren't the same thing.

Hawaii was certainly a poor bellweather state in 1912. We now have 50 states, so you may want to look at the 1960 elections onwards.

Alternately, Fighter of Foo is on the money.

To be fair, four of those states are key battleground states. The one that's ridiculous is Tennessee. I don't care how accurate it's been since 1912, it certainly isn't a bellwether state this year. If you take Tennessee out, then McCain's lead across the three polls shrinks to 5-4.

Of course, but correlation at least raises the possibility of a prediction tool (which is different than causation).

Certainly. My point wasn't to say that McCain is somehow ahead. It's just a good measuring stick to see how things progress.

I do think your point about Tennessee not being a bellweather state is a bit faulty. It doesn't have to be a battleground state to be a bellweather state. A bellweather state is a state which usually supports the winner. Also, Tennessee proved to be an extremely accurate bellweather state in the 2000 election when they voted 51-47 in favor of Bush and against Al Gore, the home-state candidate. Bellweather states usually have a good mix of races and urban/rural population that mirrors the overall U.S. Tennessee's last miss was in 1924. That's a pretty impressive track record.