Polls are snapshots of current political opinions and little in politics is static especially still out 99 days from the general election. Most polls such as Gallup and Rasmussen Reports canvas registered voters, that is, people who are registered to vote but for one reason or another may or may not vote. This poll out today by USA Today looks at subset of registered voters that are likely to vote. Polls of registered voters tend to show Obama with a three to nine point lead. In these polls, McCain’s standing has been fairly constant in the 39% to 43% range while Obama’s numbers have fluctuated up and down. This seems to point that McCain’s support is firmer while Obama’s is less so. Over the past month among “likely voters” McCain has gain ten points turning a six point deficit into a four point lead.

Republican presidential candidate John McCain moved from being behind by 6 points among “likely” voters a month ago to a 4-point lead over Democrat Barack Obama among that group in the latest USA TODAY/Gallup Poll. McCain still trails slightly among the broader universe of “registered” voters. By both measures, the race is tight.

The Friday-Sunday poll, mostly conducted as Obama was returning from his much-publicized overseas trip and released just this hour, shows McCain now ahead 49%-45% among voters that Gallup believes are most likely to go to the polls in November. In late June, he was behind among likely voters, 50%-44%.

Among registered voters, McCain still trails Obama, but by less. He is behind by 3 percentage points in the new poll (47%-44%) vs. a 6-point disadvantage (48%-42%) in late June.

Results based on the survey of 791 likely voters have margins of error of +/- 4 percentage points — so McCain’s lead is not outside that range. Results based on the survey of 900 registered voters also have margins of error of +/- 4 percentage points.

Gallup editor Frank Newport tells Jill that “registered voters are much more important at the moment,” because Election Day is still 100 days away, but that the likely-voter result suggests that it may be possible for McCain to energize Republicans and turn them out this fall.

Who is a likely voter? In this poll, Frank says, that was determined by how much thought people have given to the election, how often they say they vote and whether they plan to vote in the election in November.

He says the number of likely GOP voters is up for now, probably in part because of Obama’s trip and the “laudatory” media coverage of it. “At least in the short term it may have had the side effect of energizing Republicans,” he says. Also, he says that McCain’s sharp words about Obama and the media last week may have energized his faithful.

Check Pollster.com’s charts to compare the USA TODAY/Gallup results to those from other pollsters. Other recent polls of likely voters had Obama slightly ahead.

The USA TODAY/Gallup Poll is separate from Gallup’s daily “tracking” poll on the presidential race, which this afternoon shows Obama ahead by 8 points among registered voters — 48%-40%.

Frank says that while the tracking poll indicates Obama may have gotten some gains from his overseas trip last week, any benefits may be short-lived. That tracking poll of 2,674 registered voters was also done Friday-Sunday and the margins of error on the results are +/- 2 percentage points.

As for the difference between the tracking and USA TODAY/Gallup polls, Frank says not to read too much into it. “Statistical noise” may be largely to blame.

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MoveOn.org, the liberal anti-war grassroots organization, will begin running this ad on behalf of Senator Obama. The light-hearted 30 second spot will air on MTV and Comedy Central.

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Without question, there is an uptick in the number of media reports profiling the ambivalence towards at best or at worst the utter repudiation of Obama amongst former supporters of Senator Clinton. Here’s an article from the Manchester, New Hampshire Union Leader:

More than six months after they squared off in a fierce New Hampshire primary campaign, and nearly two months after their bitter nomination battle was decided, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama still generate strong emotions among Granite Staters who voted in the Democratic primary.

Democratic Party officials and top elected officials have pronounced that the hard feelings among Clinton backers have been healed. The official word is that all is well, that Hillary’s “nation” is now on board behind Obama.

But a sampling of rank-and-file Clinton donors contacted by the New Hampshire Union Leader in recent days indicates a mixed bag. The newspaper’s review ran the gamut, finding Clinton supporters who now claim to enthusiastically back Obama and Clinton supporters who contend they will vote for Republican Sen. John McCain rather than the Illinois senator.

In the middle are Clinton backers who say they will vote for Obama because he will be their party’s nominee or because they oppose the war in Iraq. These votes exude little enthusiasm for Obama, but instead a resignation that Obama would, in their view, be a better president than McCain.

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Governor Ed Rendell of Pennsylvania, a staunch Hillary Clinton supporter but now the leader of “Team O” in the Keystone state, offers his thoughts on Obama’s chances in this critical electoral battleground. His first assessment is that “not of all us (Hillary supporters) are there yet.” Perhaps he might consider that a quarter of Clinton’s supporters per the exit polls said they would shun Obama if he were to be the nominee though in his estimation 90% of Clinton’s supporters now enthusiastically back Obama. His other assessment is that the battle for Pennsylvania’s 23 electoral votes would largely be in the Philadelphia suburbs. Senator Clinton certainly did well in the Philly suburbs but she also carried all but two counties in the central and western part of the state. Can Obama capture those “bitter” people “clinging to their guns and religion”?

From the Pittsburgh Tribune Review:

The Sen. Barack Obama campaign held a conference call this morning on one of the key battleground states in this race: Pennsylvania.

Team O, led by Gov. Ed Rendell, stressed the importance of registering and winning over the one-million-plus, un-registered voters spread out over the Keystone State.

Rendell said the Philadelphia suburbs — the five or so counties that gave Rendell his 2002 primary victory over Bob Casey and a general election victory over Mike Fisher — will be the battleground area in the state.

“I think that Sen. Obama is going to do very well in the suburbs,” he said. “I would be very disappointed if we would not match John Kerry’s margin in the suburbs.”

In Kerry’s failed 2004 campaign against George Bush, almost two-thirds of the voters in the four counties surrounding Philadelphia cast ballots for Kerry — passing Al Gore’s margin when he beat Bush 51 percent to 46 percent in that region.

Rendell said if Obama wins a significant number in the burbs, then combines that with wins in Philadelphia and the Lehigh Valley, he clinches the state.

When Obama’s ‘bitter’ remarks that he made in San Francisco were brought up, Rendell said Obama wished that he phrased it differently.

“But there is no question that he is correct that there are people that are hurting … there are still a lot of people particularly in small towns who are hurting that need the help of a president that cares about them.”

Rendell said that not all of the Clinton people have jumped on board Team O: “Not all of us are there yet, but 90 percent of us are there (and) we are getting more enthusiastic by the day about Sen. Obama.”

Rendell said Team O was very good at expanding the base, which will help it win over those unregistered voters. In fact, had it not registered so many new voters, Rendell said Clinton probably would have won Pennsylvania by 14 percent or 16 percent, “and maybe had the game-changing victory that she needed somewhere along the line.”

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The Inspector General of the United States today released a long awaited report looking at the hiring practices of the Alberto Gonzalez-led Justice Department. The report charges that former Justice Department counselor Monica M. Goodling and former chief of staff D. Kyle Sampson routinely broke the law by conducting political litmus tests on candidates for jobs as immigration judges and line prosecutors.

From the Washington Post:

Former Justice Department counselor Monica M. Goodling and former chief of staff D. Kyle Sampson routinely broke the law by conducting political litmus tests on candidates for jobs as immigration judges and line prosecutors, according to an inspector general’s report released today.

Goodling passed over hundreds of qualified applicants and squashed the promotions of others after deeming candidates insufficiently loyal to the Republican party, said investigators, who interviewed 85 people and received information from 300 other job seekers at Justice. Sampson developed a system to screen immigration judge candidates based on improper political considerations and routinely took recommendations from the White House Office of Political Affairs and Presidential Personnel, the report said.

Goodling regularly asked candidates for career jobs: “What is it about George W. Bush that makes you want to serve him?” the report said. One former Justice Department official told investigators she had complained that Goodling was asking interviewees for their views on abortion, according to the report.

Taking political or personal factors into account in employment decisions for career positions violates civil service laws and can run afoul of ethics rules. Investigators said today that both Goodling and Sampson had engaged in “misconduct.”

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Barack Obama will hold meetings on the economy on Monday with a group that includes billionaire investor Warren Buffet.

On Sunday, the candidate found himself still defending his eight country, nine day trip that included visits to Afghanistan and Iraq.

“I was puzzled by this notion that somehow what we were doing was in any way different from what Senator McCain or a lot of presidential candidates have done in the past. Now I admit we did it really well.”

You held a campaign rally overseas. No American candidate has ever done that. No candidate of any nation has ever held a rally abroad. It’s pretty simple. You crossed a line and politicized an electoral contest beyond the borders of the United States. It is without precedent.

A day after landing back in the United States, Obama landed at the University of Chicago Medical Center where he had some x-rays for a sore hip suffered while playing basketball rather visiting with the troops.

“Everything’s okay.”

Frankly, I wasn’t worried. The arrogance of this man is hard to stomach.

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Comfortably seated on a Iberia flight a few years ago from London to Barcelona, all hell broke loose when a bachelor party boarded the plane. Clearly they had been drinking but our travails were just getting started. On came the groom dressed in this giantatic chicken costume. Why they let him board in the first place is beyond me. But they did. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to buckle his seat belt so the costume had to come off. Problem was he was naked underneath the plumage. So they had to pull his luggage to get the young lad some clothing. 90 minutes later we took off. Mercifully, I fly business class but the group of 20 some odd young Britons sang songs intermittingly throughout the two hour twenty minute flight. In-flight entertainment, it wasn’t. One has to pity flight attendants who have to put up with this loutish behaivour frequently.

On my own vacations in Mediterranean Europe, I too have noticed something. Whenever there is a problem, it involves Brits. It might be Brits and Germans, Brits and Dutch, or Brits and Brits but Brits always form half of the equation in whatever trouble is brewing. I have found that this even transcends sexual orientation. Gay Brits or straight Brits, problems abound. And to be fair, by Brits I mean English since I have never encountered Scots or the Welsh posing such discomforture.

I refuse to go to Ibiza because as the above video attests, there are drunk Brits by the boatload but no matter where English youths venture these days trouble is not far behind. Two weeks ago, a drunk (and horny) English woman was arrested in Dubai for having sex on the beach in front of their hotel in broad daylight. She wasn’t exactly young. She was 30 and they had been warned once before getting arrested. Her English partner somehow escaped arrest but then again he didn’t attempt to hit the arresting officer. One more bloody brilliant fact. The couple didn’t even know the other’s name. They had met at brunch. Let’s see, let’s go to an Islamic country and have sex on beach with a total stranger and then assault the police officer. Bloody brilliant. And in both Greece and Spain, year after year, it’s mad dogs and Englishmen causing trouble. Scores of young British women are being raped by young British men. One wonders if British morals lapse once they hit the continent. And quite naturally, the Foreign Office is now quite concerned. You’ve got quite the problem when you are forced to effect an anti-rape campaign abroad aimed at your citizens on holiday.

From the UK Guardian:

In the seaside resort of Faliraki it is a good year for Mayor Ioannis Iatrides. ‘Mercifully our clientele this summer is a wonderful mix of people from all over Europe who know how to peacefully enjoy their time in the sun,’ he enthuses. ‘There are far fewer Britons, which means no rapes, no accidents, no drunken debauchery, no going on the rampage. I’m so relieved.’

But Iatrides’s cause for cheer is someone else’s headache. While Faliraki might be shaking off its notoriety as a ‘modern-day Sodom’, young Britons are still flocking to its neighbours in search of sun, sex and a hedonistic nightlife. Sometimes the result has been rape or even death, leaving bewildered Greeks to ask: what is wrong with the British?

In Malia on Crete, for example, the tourist season may barely have begun, but already a seemingly non-stop stream of Britons, many in their teens and most on their first trip abroad, have passed through the local courts. Evangelos Rossakis, the owner of a local supermarket, was last night recovering at home after being attacked by six British youths who had beaten him ‘black and blue’ because he had dared to ask them to drive less recklessly on quad bikes through the resort. Rossakis says his injuries are nothing next to the damage the teenagers later inflicted on his shop - or the time when a Briton bit off the nose of a bartender who asked him to leave.

Malia hasn’t reported a sexual assault yet. But in Cavos, on Corfu, last week four Northern Irishmen were charged with gang-raping an English tourist, an act they allegedly filmed on their phones.

Meanwhile in Laganas, on Zakynthos, 17-year-old Matthew Cryer, from Sheffield, appears to have drunk himself to death last week; the previous week 15 English tourists were charged with ‘lewd behaviour’ after participating in an open-air oral sex contest.

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Here is the Monday, July 28th, 2008 edition of what’s making news around the world.

Bombings Leave India on Edge
As the death toll nears 50 in Ahmedabad on the heels of last week’s bombings in Banglalore that took two lives, India fears a surge in militant violence and the often bloody reprisals that accompanies Islamic terror. After the trust vote win in the Lok Sabha, the government of Prime Minister Manhoham Singh had been looking to focus on energy issues, the US-India nuclear agreement and on curbing inflation but now it seems that terrorism has become the central agenda for the Manmohan Singh government with intelligence and geo-political assessments indicating that terror groups are planning more attacks against Indian targets in the coming months. More from the Times of India.

Bomb in Turkey Kills 16
The death toll in a bombing in Istanbul rose to 16 on Monday while around 150 were wounded, state-run Anatolian news agency reported, in an attack hours. Turkish officials suspect Kurdish rebels.

Baghdad Bombing of Shi’ite Procession
Three suicide bombers and a roadside bomb struck Shiite pilgrims taking part in a massive religious procession in Baghdad on Monday, killing at least 28 people and wounding 92, police said. More from the New York Times.

Oil Exploration in the Spratleys
If you haven’t heard of the Spratleys and Parcel Islands, you are probably not alone but the group of islands in South China Seas have been a potential regional firespark for decades. China, Taiwan, the Philippines, Vietnam and Malaysia all claim the sparsely populated but presumed to be energy rich sea bed around the islands. ExxonMobil is forging a pact with PetroVietnam to do some exploration leaving the others, mainly China, none too pleased. More from the Asia Times.

Are the Zimbabwean Armed Forces on the Verge of Collapse?
The UK Telegraph points to a lack of pay that is causing soldiers in the Zimbabwean to desert in large numbers.

Mexico Notes a Rise in Dead Sea Turtles
Environmental officials in Mexico say dozens of dead sea turtles apparently killed in fishing nets have washed up on beaches in recent days. Mexican authorities noted that 59 Olive Ridley turtles have been found on beaches in and around the resort of Acapulco. Environmental protection officer Manuel de Jesus Solis says his agency found 12 dead turtles bearing marks apparently caused by fishing nets. Victor Berdejo says another 47 dead turtles were found by personnel at a turtle-protection area he supervises. The sea turtles, once hunted in Mexico for their meat and eggs, were declared a protected species in 1990. Fishermen are required to include turtle escape devices in their nets.

Beijing’s Air Quality Falls Short of WHO Standards
Beijing’s air quality is still falling well short of international guidelines, despite desperate efforts to clean the Olympic host city’s skies before the Games, a report by Greenpeace said on Monday. However, the city has met many of its commitments on environmental issues and will leave an important legacy for Beijing after the August Games. More from Economic Times.

Lufthansa’s Employees Set to Strike
Lufthansa’s 50,000 plus ground staff and cabin crew have voted to go on indefinite strike from Monday over their pay claim. Germany’s Verdi trade union said almost 91% of their members at the airline had voted for industrial action and the mood among the staff was “explosive.” More from Euro News.

Rising Inequality Hinders Upward Mobility in the United States
Lane Kenworthy looks at data that finds that rising inequality in the United States is hindering upward mobility. In short, the United States is becoming increasingly stratified along permament class lines. If you were born poor in 1930, you stood a greater chance of escaping poverty than if you were born poor in 1990.

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