Archives for October 2008

Why do this?

Perhaps they have a little too much money - or perhaps they feel they have secured all the votes they can in Pennsylvania and Ohio.

Or (more likely) they want to create a news story that further drowns out John McCain's "redistributionist-in-chief" effort.

But will a few adverts become a "surprise" Obama trip to Arizona over the weekend.

Downside: it's the arrogance, stupid.

Upside: a huge news story that dominates the free media final cycle and stymies Mr McCain's effort to tell a tale of come-backs and last ditch stands...

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• - What's this?

The Truman camp - as they should be called - deserve a better hearing. Here is the case for McCain confounding "all the smarties" as Louis Mencken (I think it was him) called the pundits in 1948.

Dine with Mover and Shaker Democrats right now and the refrain is always the same: "Can this just be over?" The concentration on the McCain camp post-mortems leads me to wonder what the fall-out would be were Obama to lose. A friend shows me an email - vituperative bordering on barmy - from a prominent Hillary Clinton person on the subject of Obama and his fraudulent victory (over Hillary, not McCain) won in caucus votes that were fixed and aided by a media fuelled by misogyny and the desire for a new story. Should the famously bad finisher finish famously badly next Tuesday there will be scenes of mayhem - not just on the streets but in the salons as well; in fact the latter will be bloodier.

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• - What's this?

We took some time in Pennsylvania to slip away from the rallies and inspect the bridges: some nice people from the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation took us under the I-95 highway to see the mess the underbelly of modern America is in. It is truly horrible. There are holes you can put your hand into. As a metaphor for the whole infrastructure situation it could not be better: cars getting by on the top (with occasional delays and even a closure earlier this year) but underneath the whole thing falling apart. Over the last year or so there has been sporadic coverage of this fundamental issue though much of it not in the mainstream press. This from Thomas Friedman was an exception. Obama has talked admiringly of the Chinese approach (does he really want to steamroller the poor?) but the money is not going to be there. Nor would President McCain provide it. Perhaps this solution suggested by a Democratic governor is the most practical way forward - if, that is, the money is still there.

UPDATE:

And a few minutes ago the organisers of this conference got in touch to point out that the infrastructure issue - in particular how to pay - is a live topic among Americans seriously committed to the future good of the nation.

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• - What's this?

This quotes a McCain advisor as suggesting that the race for some of the battleground states might be a bit closer than it seems. The McCain team is telling anyone who will listen that all is not lost.

I spent today in Pennsylvania where McCain's people are suggesting that a kind of subterranean surge is taking place. It's invisible to those of us who pal around with the mainstream pollsters but apparently it's showing up in their internal data.

Having attended a McCain rally tonight in Pottsville, Pennsylvania - loads of enthusiasm and a sharp eye kept on the press (one woman challenged me for yawning before the rally began and seemed pretty sceptical when I claimed it was genuine fatigue) - I'm certainly happy to concede to the McCain people that they have a firm base in Pennsylvania but at some stage, the private information is surely going to have to show up in the public polls.

One thing everyone agrees on is that McCain really needs Pennsylvania's 21 electoral votes and the public polls show him well behind at the moment.

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• - What's this?

Around Appalachia this morning people are waking bleary-eyed and opening their FTs with their diner-served egg muffins and expostulating: "Holy Cow! Britain's premier business paper has come out for Obama..."

I thought the FT's point about the need for a president to be good with crowds, eloquent and persuasive and charismatic, was a good one. Reagan had it of course and so did Clinton and - let me be controversial here - so did W in his own funny way.

I saw him wow people in 2004 - speeches with good lines well delivered. The last time I saw McCain, he was pedestrian - the biggest cheers came for Sarah Palin.

Is a way with verbiage "a priceless asset" as the FT claims, or a meaningless even sinister non-virtue as the McCain people claim? You do need to make a case convincingly, particularly abroad. This Obama would do.

There is more to come in the Appalachia-rocking endorsements, I can reveal: the Economist newspaper will be next. Being a fair-minded chap, the Economist editor - the decider - appointed two senior journalists to make the cases for Obama and McCain. At the time of writing, the white smoke has not yet appeared but McCain has less hope being chosen by the Economist than Sarah Palin has becoming an honorary citizen of Paris. Paris France that is...

And a postscript here, from an eagle-eyed British reporter - fascinating and illuminating that McCain is paying Obama supporters to work for him.

Mind you I suppose they could point out that mercenary armies in European conflicts in days of yore used to be rather successful...

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• - What's this?

My BBC colleague Jeff Overs took this rather fine shot outside a political memorabilia shop - seems to sum up the whole election at the moment. He's getting the love; they are looking untogether.

To Duhbuh and others who complain about coverage of Sarah Palin, I would say the party must take responsibility for not having the confidence to let her be herself. The interviews have been awful: that's not media bias, it's incompetence, hers to an extent but the party's for letting it happen.

And someone else points out that she does have policies - views - that are at odds with McCain's, but also - bluntly - at odds with the rest of the nation, or at least the direction the nation is following. That is why she is a disaster. Unless of course they win. This is the case for McCain/Palin put with passion and vigour

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• - What's this?

It's the anecdotals, stupid!.

The point is that Obama could lose Florida and Pennsylvania and Ohio and still win. John McCain and Sarah Palin need to find a crack somewhere else and work on it before returning to those big states in the final days. I can see why they are in Iowa even if local Republicans cannot.

This account of the Republican candidates' body language rings true - their joint appearances seem oddly unwarm.

I thought at first that it was the age difference - even at the Republican Convention they seemed not to be able to smile at each other on stage - but Mr McCain is awkward with her: she looks beyond him, literally and perhaps metaphorically as well...

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• - What's this?

McCain is now accused of palling around with dictators.

I cannot see this swinging votes to Obama in Indiana or Virginia or Iowa or anywhere else where he needs to close the deal BUT it does allow the conversation in these crucial last days to be dominated, at least in some areas, by unhelpful messages and defence rather than offence.

The Palin-McCain team made an effort to change the conversation with Joe the Plumber - but again and again, as here (from Kansas no less!), the thrust of the coverage has been unhelpful.

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• - What's this?

Back on the horserace - has it really tightened as AP suggests?

A pollster tells me the reason AP's figures are different from most other polls is that they take a very strict view on the subject of who counts as a "likely voter". The list of questions that they ask to determine likely voting includes whether you have voted in the past. Aha. So quite a few Obama people get missed out. Some other polls just assume all registered voters are likely voters - equally suspect in reasoning. So AP is a useful corrective but not quite the shock tightening of the race that Matt Drudge hopes it is...

Meanwhile, I missed this when it was first published, but it supports my argument that McCain might be the prefered outcome for those who hate America. Actually Palin would be number one: she pals around with people who believe in witches - opening up the possibility of the kind of clash on religious grounds of which the terrorists dream. True, Obama seems keen to bomb the caves on the Pakistan Afghan border but does anyone really believe he'd do it...?

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• - What's this?

As well as the horse race I thought we'd take a look at some of the issues in the final days.

Health: in Wichita, Kansas I have just met Amy Clarke who was diagnosed with Crohn's Disease in her early twenties before she had even thought of getting insurance.

She is not feckless and the cost to society of her getting seriously ill is huge (she is bringing up three young children) and yet in the richest nation on earth she cannot afford to go to a specialist ...

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• - What's this?

The post mortems are way too early (I agree McCain will lose the popular vote but he can certainly still win the electoral college) but still fascinating and this in particular suggests that the weekend will bring some revelations about the McCain mess-up on the VP choice Bloomberg? The party would have rebelled.

This meanwhile from Politico might shed some light on a psychological blow represented by the Powell endorsement:

"POWELL = McCAIN'S "FAVORITE LIVING HERO" -- Politico's Roger Simon brings it: "The scene is the Straight Talk Express, the old Straight Talk Express, in 1999 -- the one stuffed with reporters asking John McCain question after question and getting answer after answer, hour after hour. McCain is enjoying himself, even when the reporters, having exhausted all serious topics, turn goofy and play 'favorites' with him, asking him his favorite tree (cottonwood), favorite breakfast cereal (Raisin Bran) and favorite toothpaste (Colgate). And then there is this exchange that I recorded for history: Favorite word, a reporter asks. 'Principle,' McCain says. Favorite dead hero. 'Uh, Julius Caesar,' McCain says. Favorite dead hero within the last 2,000 years. 'OK, off the top of my head, Lincoln,' McCain says. 'Although the more I read and study, the more intrigued I am by Teddy Roosevelt.' Favorite living hero. 'Colin Powell,' McCain says instantly. 'Served his country. A wonderful man.'"

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• - What's this?

Colin Powell, yesterday:

"Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer's no, that's not America.

"Is there something wrong with some seven-year-old Muslim-American kid believing that he or she could be president? Yet, I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion - 'he's a Muslim and he might be associated with terrorists'. This is not the way we should be doing it in America."

He said other things that caught the headlines and may or may not have changed the election game, but nothing he said was better said than those words; after all America has a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant story to tell when it comes to religious liberty and tolerance and togetherness. Second to no other nation on earth in fact.

The posts at the end of this documentary report tell a story in themselves...

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• - What's this?

Hats off to my colleague Jon Kelly who has made it to New York on the BBC bus and left with this spot-on set of observations about Americans and America.

We have a private plane for the DC office so we get to see much less of the place but boy, the champagne is good...and we can see Kansas if we squint out of the side windows...

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• - What's this?

She's not funny and she's not clever. And it is time to say clearly that she has probably lost this contest for McCain.

Sarah Palin is indeed a disaster for the presidential ambitions of John McCain. This is not opinion: it is fact. During the height of Palin mania - with some in the British press suggesting she was the new Margaret Thatcher - I wrote this piece for The Times suggesting that she was on the ticket "to serve a purpose but not to serve in office" and that social conservatism could not and would not drive the nation this year.

Well, the trouble for McCain is that the nation will not buy the idea that she can - Quayle-like - just serve quietly in the shadows. She might become president. That is what has driven thinking Republicans to despair this season. Now this. If Lieberman were the choice, or even Romney, I wonder if Powell would have stayed quiet?

Anyway it is probably too late now. I notice even in Arizona - McCain's home state - the latest poll suggests a less than double digit lead for the Republican candidate. This Obama strength in the oddest of places is a sign of his power but also a hint of a crisis if McCain were to pull off a win in the electoral college: McCain cannot win the popular vote, can he? Obama can only lose by messing up in Ohio and Florida and Pennsylvania. And that mess-up would be precipitate a full-scale political crisis...

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• - What's this?

There is something slightly sinister about John McCain's latest method of campaigning. It is well worth listening to the "robo-calls" here.

The messages are nothing like as aggressive as some we have heard in the past (and were used against Mr McCain himself by George W Bush in 2000) but telephone campaigning is a bit like email flirting (I am told!) - there is a sense of being able to get away with more than you would in face to face contact...

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• - What's this?

Almost everyone agrees that the polls will tighten. There is also the chance of a terrorist attack. Some of the newly registered voters (not just Mickey Mouse) may well not turn up. And not all lefties are as cuddly as the main man.

As Obama himself said - New Hampshire!

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• - What's this?

It is becoming obvious that there is a divide on the debate outcome that rivals the Kennedy-Nixon verdict (those who heard the 1960 presidential debate on the radio thought Nixon had won, those who watched the sweaty demeanour of the VP on TV knew he had lost).

This time, the division is between those who watched the debate on a single screen and those who watched the network coverage which, in some cases at least, split the screen and had a single tight shot of the person NOT speaking throughout the encounter.

Mr McCain looked alright to me in the full version - I saw him attack but never saw him reacting to Mr Obama's contributions.

But the reaction shots make him look pretty awful - angry at best, at worst something odder than angry.

Hence this.

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• - What's this?

Here is the extent of the task for McCain.

Here is the best overview I have seen of how well McCain did last night (note particularly the last line).

Here is why the debate may be blown out of the water within hours (or days).

And here's why it matters.

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• - What's this?

LONG ISLAND, NEW YORK: Greetings from Hofstra University.

2058: The talk in the food tent is all about McCain and what he has to do. My friends, the answer is clear: be quite astoundingly nice! Be charming. Be witty. Be informed. Be just a little condescending in order to keep that theme alive. Be viable in other words. Be worth a second look ...

2105: John McCain sets out his economic plan with energy - but then rejects the opportunity to ask a question of his opponent and goes on the attack in what looks like a planned - almost memorized - speil about Joe the plumber and how Obama's tax plans penalise him. Obama is smooth in response.

2112: McCain comes back with the decent attack - class warfare, "spread the wealth around" is the phrase Obama used. Sounds like socialism. Redistribution. It's a draw so far - McCain is snappy, Obama is professorial.

2114: Already this is a far better debate - on tax policy there is a genuine difference and they engage it with vigour, not soundbites from the campaign. Joe the plumber started out odd but turned out to be a good line of attack for McCain.

2117: Yippee! Schieffer actually interrupted Obama to point out that he had to answer the question - not sure he did answer it but it was a brave effort. He did it again with McCain. He's already earned his 1000000000 billion dollar salary.

2120: McCain now does answer the question - a hatchet to the budget. Pressed: he will eliminate billions by stopping support for ethenol. Makes little sense, but at least he came up with a list of projects for the chop.

2122: Big McCain line - Senator Obama, I am not President Bush! If you wanted to run against President Bush you should have run four years ago!

2124: Obama has got a well rehearsed answer ready this time for the attack line that he has never stood up to his party - he comes out with a convincing-sounding list.

2130: Great question from Schieffer on the toughness of the campaign message - McCain says he regrets the negative aspects of both campaigns. But then launches an attack on Obama accusing him of leading the way in all of it. Good line on Obama's change of heart on accepting public funding. Obama seems rather unwilling to hit back - this is a strategy plainly - he turns it back to the economic crisis.

2134: Interesting this - McCain is playing the role of the injured party. Obama has been palling around with terrorists so much that they have infected his adverts.

2139: Now Senator McCain attacks on Bill Ayers and Acorn (the group accused of forging voter registrations). Obama defends himself in great detail - too much detail?

2141: McCain understands the dangers of this line and ends by suggesting that actually he is really campaigning on the economy. Unconvincing when he has just taken the subject off the economy.

2145: John McCain's suggestion that Sarah Palin is "a role model to women" is true in some respects, but to most American women I suspect she is something less than that.

2147: Obama is polite about Palin - McCain is aggressive about Biden. Again, McCain seems harsher, but is this not what debating is all about?

2148: Hilarious - Shieffer calls climate change "climate control!" He thinks the subject is air conditioning...

2153: Obama has a populist line on trade agreements that damage Americans - and McCain on drilling for oil off the coast of the US. McCain refuses to be thrown off the free trade and makes a pitch for a new one with Columbia. Dangerous ground. Who is this attracting? This cannot be the right approach for McCain in the debate.

2156: Do Obama's laughs work? He has several times appeared in the wide shot openly amused at McCain's attacks.

2159: Obama is measured and steady. McCain is cross (sometimes) amused (sometimes) upset (sometimes) - he is less steady. He suggests physical fitness as (part of) the solution to the health crisis - it sounds cheap.

2205: Big win for Obama on the subject of health - McCain asks him what he wants to fine Joe the Plumber if he doesn't provide health insurance and Obama replies: zero (small business people will not be fined, it seems). To real-life Joes, I suspect that the McCain line works when he talks about the increased costs of Obama's plan and the choices available under McCain - but for a wider worried public it cannot be convincing.

2211: At one stage McCain made a disparaging comment about the "English" health system. Fact: English people spend roughly half what Americans do (per capita) on health. Are they half as healthy? Half as free? "English" health has its problems, but is it so ghastly?

2216: On abortion, Obama has a chance to explain himself and does so with some vigour - he will not convince those who call him a baby killer (as a woman told me he was last week) but he looks much more comfortable than he did weeks ago at Saddleback Church.

2229: So John McCain has been angry - but not over-the-top angry. He didn't take my advice to shock everyone with sunny cheeriness. So does his performance change anything ...

Not really, I suspect. Again his closing statement is his biggest strength... though his hands (in the shot in the close up) look old - very old.

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• - What's this?

So will tonight's debate moderator, Bob Schieffer, rescue US broadcasters from the woeful depths? I see no great hope in this piece, but the hopeless, incompetent, lazy, cringe-inducing performance of the "anchors" so far will not be difficult to improve tonight.

At least those crazy, prinked-up, self-obsessed ninnies who shout all the time on cable TV would get a reaction from the candidates and might see whether they can manage complete sentences they have not previously memorized.

Which, frankly, ought not to be the greatest achievement for the next leader of the free world.

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• - What's this?

Pugnacious John McCain is about to walk into yet another trap with this suicidal declaration into which he seems to have been goaded by his opponent. He needs to act steady, not flailing. Flailing didn't work. I see meanwhile that the amiable Fred Barnes must have been reading the last post (and replies) on the subject of McCain's best final appeal: don't elect a left wing dictatorship. As I say, slightly early for this to function as an argument but in a week or two it'll be big big big...

There is something deeply desperate about the fraudulent fraud "issue" (even if it adds up to something it screams out technicality) but here is a quick guide to what the problem seems to be and why it doesn't matter.

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• - What's this?

This is the extent of the problem for McCain - and the key phrase is this:

"Powered chiefly by the public's economic concerns, Obama leads John McCain by 10 points among likely voters, 53%-43%, in this ABC News/Washington Post poll. Though every race is different, no presidential candidate has come back from an October deficit this large in pre-election polls dating to 1936."

So here is how he does it:

1 the markets begin to recover (apparently done)

2 he has a good debate on Wednesday

3 the nation wakes up to the fact that Democrats are about to be in control of Congress (no serious person thinks the Republicans can take back either house) and the White House. This is a slow burner for the last week or so of the campaign but I think it's worth 2 or 3 percent for McCain.

It is straight talk: "OK - you don't like me much, but do you seriously want the nation to be run, unchecked, by Obama and his left-wing pals?"

I wonder whether it might bring Virginia back on board - or Ohio.

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• - What's this?

Following this now infamous mess up I am still thinking about the various thoughts expressed on the blog on McCain people and their legitimate and less legitimate views. As is so often the case, I see religious folk are stepping in to soothe feelings.

Meanwhile I am fascinated by the claim repeated here that McCain was a bad pilot - telling metaphor or what?

This is the week he needs to pull out of a tailspin. And where does that leave Mrs Arab? Where did she hear it? What does she mean by it? She is probably not a bad person -- just misinformed. For whom will she vote?

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• - What's this?

The anger of the Republican troops is focused on Obama right now but you have to wonder, if things don't improve for them soon, if it begins to focus on McCain for letting Obama in.

In Strongsville, Ohio this week I talked to some pretty angry people - almost all of them polite to the BBC because Americans tend to be polite towards guests - but really tough on Obama and on the media generally for taking his side. He's a baby killer, one woman said (referring to Obama's acceptance of abortion rights, of course) and she was by no means the most extreme. My colleagues on the BBC's US TV news programme (World News America) decided not to use the clip on grounds of taste, and because it seemed to suggest that opponents of Obama always had such extreme views. They may well have been right on both counts but this is what is being said at heartland rallies every day. You cannot wish it away or ignore it. Perhaps you can exaggerate it but the fact remains that some Republicans despise Obama in a way few Democrats despise McCain.

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• - What's this?

On the subject of McCain winning - here, according to Byron York of the conservative magazine the National Review, is how he does it...

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• - What's this?

STRONGSVILLE, OHIO: Exclusive: the ticket has already flipped. There was some loose talk recently about Palin McCain replacing McCain Palin but here in Strongsville, Ohio the (very large and very enthusiastic) crowds out to see the two of them were only really interested in one of them. They chant her name in the hall but more importantly outside - when asked what it is about the Republican case that gets them going this year - almost everyone mentions her.

She is, it seems to me, doing the party great good and great harm at the same time. The Republicans could not hope to win without the backing of the people I watched lining up in British style weather behind the Target car park. And yet the Palin world-view - essentially ignorant, unable to name a single paper read - is not the view that a nation facing an economic catastrophe, complex and international and baffling to most minds, is likely to choose.

But having lost - if that is what happens - what then? Does Palin become the future? This is what David Brooks is getting at in a warning that will come to haunt the Republicans, who have after all been the party of ideas for most of the last 30 years. To hear Palin screeching on about Reagan must be painful to many Republicans who knew him. Reagan knew what papers he read.

But will they lose? Not necessarily and Dan's Balz's piece sets out why not - Sarah Palin again. McCain is currently adrift in Ohio (where Balz and I were today) by about four percentage points. FOUR! Same in some other of the key states. This is not locked up.

As for the debates - everyone hates them. Inside the Beltway and out.

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• - What's this?

NASHVILLE: These were my thoughts on the second McCain-Obama debate, jotted down as it unfolded:

2132: On verbiage - as S Palin would put it - Obama leads for sure; he repeated less and had some good lines. McCain seems angry and repeats lines from previous debates. So no disasters for either candidate but Obama edges it - I cannot see how the McCain performance enthuses the middle ground.

2129: A couple of general points about body-language: I thought McCain looked pretty good once he stopped prowling. He is lean and responsive. Obama is cool and tall but not so quickly responsive. Neither really engaged with the audience, partly because the rules did not allow it. McCain is back on whatever drugs lead you to say "my friend" every two minutes. They will be confiscated before next week. Obama cannot seem to begin an answer with a snappy yes or no or maybe - he has to change gears.

2119: Obama is getting McCain cross now - with another jab at his bomb bomb bomb Iran song. McCain tries a defence - it was a joke with a friend. He knows how to get Osama Bin Laden but he won't tell us how.

2116: Brilliant question from the audience on Pakistan - to pursue or not to pursue. Obama says he would. McCain, oddly, is making a different case. He may well be right (Obama seems not to realise what would happen in Pakistan) but it is dangerous for him. He sounds soft on terrorists, frankly. God knows what will happen if Sarah Palin finds out.

2111: Obama ignores a question about the effects of the economic downturn on US military power and hits McCain on Iraq. Brokaw asks a good question on the use of force when there are no national security issues at stake. Obama makes the case for intervention. But then unmakes it - the allies must do it as well. McCain agrees, pretty much.

2100: Interesting debate now on health with the fundamental issue of government intrusion. McCain is still in the anti-government mold, but Obama points out where he believes regulation works - in respect of insurance companies, for instance. I wonder whether recent events will affect the balance of view on this among viewers and voters...

2059: McCain does not answer either. The answer is that healthcare in America is a mess. Obama now says health is a right - McCain says it's a responsibility.

2054: To the question "Do you believe health care should be treated as a commodity" Obama fails miserably to connect. He does not say yes or no. He merely wanders into a stump speech take on his proposals. He is no Bill Clinton. He is no George Bush, frankly. YES OR NO!!

2053: Bush and Cheney! McCain mentions them with contempt. Contempt he must truly feel.

2047: The reply to the question about how to create new energy technology gives Obama a good line - that for 30 years Washington has done nothing. For 26 McCain has been there. Not really fair - he has tried, but quite a good line.

2046: McCain does repeat himself - he is on about Reagan and Tip O'Neil for the second time. He manages to avoid the appalling "Miss Congeniality" joke. But his basic message on tax is tough - he looks like a cutter but Obama not so much.

2043: Obama is on the attack on tax now - defending his tax proposals. Clinton (Bill) would have done a touchy-feely job here - who among you earns over 250 grand? etc. Obama prefers to lecture.

2040: McCain sounds angry - as some thought he had to. He talks of Senator Obama's tax secret that you don't know! But the tax issue is important and I suspect he is convincing to some - Obama also senses it and tries to come back but is steamrollered by Brokaw.

2038: Obama has a good line with McCain's tax cuts benefiting CEOs - who have gone from heroes to zeros in modern US iconography.

2033: Obama knows how much petrol (gas) is in Nashville. Interesting that he puts energy above health as a priority - he would not have done that before gas got so pricey.

2032: To the question: "What will you sacrifice?" McCain talks about cutting government programmes and Obama talks about cutting energy use. This is a clear difference and comes to the fore because the question was sharply focused.

2029: McCain is on the attack again - does this work? He is listing Obama's faults. Including millions of dollars for an overhead projector for an Illinois project! Convincing to those who don't think much of Obama, but I am not sure this gets to floating voters....

2026: I think McCain may be getting too close. He has a tendency to go up to the audience and prowl like a lion.

2021: McCain is on a Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac attack - suggesting Obama and the Democrats let the two institutions go on a spending spree. This is a reasonable line, I think - it points out that much of the deregulation objected to by the Democrats (now) was actually supported by them at the time. Obama hits back with the deregulation on Wall St - and McCain's backing for it. And a good line - you're not interested in politicians pointing fingers.

2010: Obama gets it - he has no answer (it would be odd to name someone right now for either candidate) but he talks of the qualities the person will need.

2009: Oh gosh a weird answer from McCain to the question - who will your treasury secretary be? Not you, he shoots back. It sounds odd.

2008: Obama is up and running with a smooth riff on the economy - a populist swipe at some executives who have already misbehaved with taxpayer money.

2005: My great hope as the questions begin is that ordinary people are slightly better questioners than the first two utterly hopeless overpaid "moderators".

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I am in Nashville and it's raining. I watched the two debaters arrive - Barack Obama with a jolly wave. Will he engage the audience tonight? Will he be professorial or Clintonesque?

I agree that John McCain has a lot hanging on this but so does Mr Obama - a cool performance (above my pay grade is NOT an acceptable answer to any question) keeps the jury out; a warm one could clinch it.

Chatting to his senior press spokesman Robert Gibbs, it becomes obvious that too much touchy-feely stuff is out of the question though.

He says the organisers have banned the candidates from asking questions of the audience (a real Clinton trick) for fear that it all gets too sentimental and huggy for prime time.

Several people write to say they enjoyed the poetry though it turns out to have been Auden not Larkin. I guess Larkin's view of dying was a tad more acerbic.

Still more point out that freedom and capitalism are not synonymous (how could I have suggested it) and that that there is a view of the current crisis - supported by serious economists - that says deregulation was to blame. This is an example.

The point is that the deregulation was sometimes aimed not at lining the pockets of the rich but at opening home-ownership to the poor. To suggest that it was simply about the rich is to get it (deliberately) wrong.

That Vanity Fair piece is worth looking at for the photo at the top though - a reminder of American imperfection at its most gut-wrenching.

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Are the Democrats getting away with a Big Lie?

The suggestion that deregulation "caused the crisis" is convenient for Democrats in the domestic context and for those who dislike freedom and capitalism worldwide. But is it true?

Simon Cowell is not the only British import to the US who has made a career putting the Yanks right. This fellow - full disclosure, he is a friend of mine - does it as well.

An earlier piece in the UK sets out the same view in more political terms and with a wealth of fascinating detail.

And how about a piece from the distant past when the whole thing was akin to the sound of distant thunder at a summer party (to use Philip Larkin's memorable description of (I think) old age creeping on).

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This is important - much more important than the national polls.

It is not the end for McCain, of course, but Michigan was a real hope at one stage.

The state has long been a Democratic stronghold, but with a different vice-presidential pick (Romney, perhaps, whose Dad was Governor), he could have won it.

Palin may be rallying the base, but those 17 Michigan electoral college votes are votes he does not have. Where does she win them?

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Hi

I'll be live-blogging tonight's vice-presidential debate between Sarah Palin and Joe Biden. I do hope you join me.

Before I start, I cannot resist a thought about Gwen Ifill and her book.

What were they all thinking? Of course she should not be the moderator. She has written a positive book about the political forces that brought one of the main candidates to the fore and she stands to profit from his elevation. Duh?

For a nation stuffed with "professors" of journalism (again, guys, not a serious academic subject in my book) this really does seem to be an elementary mistake...

Now - on to the debate (and please do refresh the page regularly to read my updates).

2005: Palin is on fire! She darts across the stage and wants to know if she can call him Joe! She can! Round one to her.

2006: Biden's first answer on the bail out is nice and dull - just how he wants to keep it.

2009: Thanks to John McCain all is OK, Palin claims. She survives her first answer. Neither answers the question by the way, but apparently no-one cares about that.

2010: She is doing fine but it looks so staged. Will it convince Joe Six Pack?

2011: Well done Gwen! She points out they don't answer the questions - they giggle. So what.

2014: She mentioned Joe (Six Pack) - and managed a good answer about Wall St greed - populist but not shrill. Biden is telling a story about filling a tank of gas. Don't know why.

2017: "I may not answer the questions, but I want to talk straight to the American people," she says! And leaps into a prepared spiel. Gosh yes, let's ditch the questions.

2019: Joe Biden talks about "the people listening to this broadcast" - does he not know TV has been invented? Old codger alert.

2023: She does not try to come back to Biden on healthcare, and they are on to the next question.

2025: What promises have you made that you cannot keep? That is the question. It is almost surreal - neither of them even pretend to answer. Maybe Gwen is too busy writing her book to notice...

2027: She is completely at sea when Gwen notices that she hasn't answered and asks her to give it a go. She does not. Insulting, frankly, to any serious viewer.

2030: Oh dear - we have John McCain to thank for too much of what Palin is saying, I suspect, for it to be entirely credible. She describes herself as a Main-Streeter. I wonder about that. You need to be connected to Main Street, but not necessarily from it to run for high office.

2031: Biden is waffling - but, oh dear, she is off again on energy, with no apology for failing even to nod at the question. She is off the reservation.

2032: Palin on the impact of climate change: "I am not one to attribute every activity of man to changes in the climate". Eh?

2035: Biden says climate change is man made - yikes. Not sure there are votes in such certainty, but at least he knows what he thinks.

2036: She is equally committed to drilling for oil - again it's a sensitive one.

2039: They are on to gay rights now - this is an opportunity to show a gentler side and a more inclusive one - very important to middle-ground voters. She says she is tolerant. Hmm - Not of witches...

2041: No support for gay marriage from either candidate. She looks uncomfortable.

2046: He really has destroyed her on the war. She has slogans. He can talk about it.

2049: Can she manage to pick her way through the hills of Pakistan and Afghanistan now? Biden can and does and threatens again to attack Bin Laden in Pakistan. Palin is back to memorised sound bites on Iran.

2056: She has made no mistakes except that she doesn't appear to know much about anything. Is this a problem? Biden is off again on the Middle East - but Joe, there is such a thing as too much detail. Gaza, Lebanon, Hamas, West Bank, East Bank (only kidding).

2057: There have been huge blunders, she says - and now a memorized piece about looking forward not back.

2059: Great riff from Biden on McCain being like Bush in various areas of foreign policy. She has no answer. Literally.

2105: She comes back for the first time - on Afghanistan - with a decent answer. She challenges his interpretation of what the general said about the idea of a surge in Afghanistan. Biden looks surprised.

2106: Cute jab from her on the war - accusing Biden of being for the war before he was against it. Great line that - it still hurts Democrats. Where detailed knowledge is unnecessary she is sparkly and almost convincing.

2108: Oh my: "John McCain knows what Evil is"! This is an argument? Barmy.

2115: Wow - Biden says he would do everything Obama would do, but she veers off and makes it plain she and McCain disagree and she and he are happy with that. This is a positive:- she sounds much more like a proper politician. But also a negative as it draws attention to the fact that she might become president.

2117: Joe Biden just sounding a little full of Joe Biden now. This is the danger for him.

2122: What is your Achilles heel? Palin says she does not have one. She is off on another memorized rant - "shining city on a hill" etc. He is as bad. Oh dear. Someone interrupt them!

2125: Biden almost cries talking about his awful tragic past. Did he plan this? I wonder... "We have got to win the war," she says, before embarking on another rant. ANSWER THE QUESTION.

2126: Biden has done us at least one service tonight anyway - he is off on a "McCain is no maverick" attack. Much better at it than Obama.

2128: The last two questions are idiotic, just allowing the candidates to waffle. And Joe does, with a story about how wonderful he is. Oh no - they may have to over-run.

Conclusion: Again, my overall view of these is that they are rendered dreadful by weak moderation and pathetic questioning. Biden did better tonight, no serious person could deny that he avoided some of the big pitfalls (sexism and bloviating) and scored some bit hits. I thought perhaps that she came over as slightly more amiable - talking about her inclusive family with a variety of views - than she has in the past and that might help her.

But although she can memorise things, she plainly does not know them. Does that matter?

At the end she looks like his daughter ,but what is going on with her voice? It cuts glass.

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Clinton Onside Shock, as the British tabloids would put it - he makes the central case against Sarah Palin with devastating ease.

Fred Thompson makes the opposing case here.

By the way, Bill was on fire today - looking really back in the groove.

He argued in favour of the Rescue Bill with cogency and plain-spoken elegance. If he does this job for the next few weeks he will surely win some for Barack Obama.

A friend talked to a senior Democrat who suggested that if Mr Obama is doing well, the Clintons will be on board for certain in order to shore up the legacy and be part of the winning team but if Mr Obama is in trouble, Bill's appearance today will one of his last...

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