Time is running out on Mitt Romney's campaign for President, which seems to have roared back into a competitive posture, but not the lead its cheerleaders in the media would wish.  Here's what the polls showed in another day that provided some good news for Obama, and no more good news for Romney. [Read more]

October 26 was a good day for President Obama's re-election prospects, though not for the portrayal of his campaign in conservative media.  The volume of positive state polls for the President provide very good news for him as the campaign heads to its last full week, though as we discussed yesterday, it can be challenging to reconcile them with national polling that tends to show an even race or a tiny Romney lead.  Meanwhile, the Romney campaign and its allies in media are very assertively advancing the argument that Romney is surging.  This blog explains the implausibility of that claim, and how President Obama is closing in on re-election, with ten days of campaigning ahead. [Read more]

Republicans can't seem to keep from diving into the nexus between rape and abortion during this "jobs, jobs, jobs" election.  Aside from the obvious - that this is probably a bad political play for a party that has a big gap with women voters nationally - it's been quite common during this cycle.  The latest such comment from a running GOPer comes from Richard Mourdock, the Tea Partier who primaried Indiana's Dick Lugar.  Mourdock recently made comments that have people comparing him with Missouri's Todd Akin. [Read more]

Today was undoubtedly a good day for President Obama.  Both national and state polls suggested that he gained as a result of his debate win on Monday, state polls showed that Mitt Romney's electoral path is narrowing, and the national political story of the day impliedly aids President Obama.  Here's an analysis of the day's data. [Read more]

Someone keep Mitt Romney out of Boca Raton.  Last time he was in town, it was all 47% and I'd be President if I were Mexican.  Tonight?  Oy.  You know how you can tell Barack Obama peeled the bark off of his debating opponent this evening?  Click on RealClearPolitics.com.  It's burying the snap polls about the debate.  (What debate?  There was a debate?)  Or look around the Internet -- Kudlow tweeted that Romney was on Valium, and Hannity is angry that Libya was not a topic this evening.  This was Denver in reverse -- Romney assuming the role of the front-runner who didn't want to disagree, and who accepted harsh criticisms without rebutting them.  Just as Romney won the CBS poll of undecided voters by 24 in Denver, President Obama won that poll tonight by 30.  It is hard to see after tonight how President Obama does not win re-election. [Read more]

For two years, the prehistory of this race was one of Bush-Kerry -- an incumbent during war with a middling economy, a firm base, a modest deficit with independents, a middling flip-flopping opponent with big hair from Massachusetts, and just enough popular desire to stay the course to win a narrow re-election.  The race now looks a bit more like Bush-Gore:  it is rational to think that the Democrat might win the Electoral College and lose the popular vote, the Republican electoral path is narrower, but the Republican candidate has surprising momentum through the debate cycle and heading toward the wire.  I still see President Obama's re-election as likely, but I am downgrading the probability of his winning from 80% to roughly 65%, as a result of the week's event [Read more]

The second of three debates between Romney and President Obama is in the books.  The instant post-debate polls all had Obama winning.  Nevertheless, Rasmussen and Gallup have now published their first tracking polls which include data compiled after the thrill(a) at Hofstra(uh) and they ain't pretty.  Gallup shows Romney up among likely voters 52-45 (7 points!) and Rasmussen has Romney up 49-47.  The Thursday data moved both polls 1 point towards Romney.  [Read more]

Gentlemen, your objectives are clear.

Obama: Get those nuts on the table or the pedestal or whatever it is you're using. Wait, it's Town Hall style. Just thrust out your pelvis then. You're big! You're bad! You're mad as hell and you're not going to take it any more! (It's OK, it's just pretend.)

Romney: No apologies! Keep on rolling out those double-speak plans and fake studies. Americans suck at math! They do not care if man means what he says so long as he says what he means. You know that I mean.

Crowley: You are the master of your domain. I want to see some alpha males asses get kicking!

Uncommitted voters: Try not to look dumb, you're on national television. (Seriously, you're still uncommitted?) [Read more]

WASHINGTON — Stung by criticism over using a soup kitchen for a staged photo op that showed him washing dishes that were already clean, Vice-Presidential candidate Paul Ryan has announced he will be making a large donation to the Human Fund. [Read more]

With twenty-four days to go until the final votes are cast, it is clear that the Obama-Romney contest has narrowed drastically.  The number of states that are “in play” remains small, and the number of states that could realistically decide this election is smaller still.  Taking a close look at data from the last week and reading it against what we know from 2010 gives us a window into how narrow this contest is, where it will be decided, and likely how.  As I will explain, I am more bullish on President Obama’s likelihood of winning re-election than others caught up in the national trackers, Nate Silver’s plummeting assessments of the President’s prospects, or the gloomy post-debate narratives (Andrew Sullivan being the undisputed champion of that particular raindance).  So here – with close attention to polls and what they do and do not show – is why I see President Obama’s chance of winning re-election at roughly 80% today. [Read more]

At the easternmost edge of Michigan's Upper Peninsula, where I live, the land is low.  In the deep south it would be called the low country.  Here it's called the cedar swamp.  Where there isn't swamp there is rock, where thin sheaths of earth allow only the shallow-rooted trees to thrive--the quaking aspen, white birch and the Michigan cottonwood known as Balm-of-Gilead.  The weed trees.
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The Supreme Court may forbid any use of race in college admissions in the case of Fisher v. University of Texas, being heard today, because the conservative wing really wants to overturn previous rulings and because Justice Kagan has recused herself. If that happens, the winning plaintiff will be a classic poster child for anti-affirmative-action litigation: a white kid who got 1180 on her SATs.
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