Here are six articles from both the US and international media about the US Presidential race. Highlights of each article provided with a link to the full article.
Obama Wins by a Hair (So Says Politico)
By Alexander Burns writing for Politico.
Voters are closely divided over which presidential candidate won the third and final general election presidential debate, according to an exclusive Politico/InsiderAdvantage nationwide survey of undecided debate-watchers.
Forty-nine percent of respondents said that Obama won the debate, compared to 46 who believed his opponent, Sen. John McCain, came out on top. The three-point gap separating the two candidates was equal to the poll’s margin of error.
Five percent said they were unsure which candidate had the better evening.
Perhaps the best news for McCain is the rating he received from independent voters. Among respondents not identified with either major political party, McCain was judged tonight’s winner, 51-42 percent.
Now We Know Joe Six Pack Is A Plumber
By Michael Scherer in Time Magazine.
Best line of the night goes to McCain, a pre-scripted zinger that, for once, McCain delivered without a hitch: “Sen. Obama, I am not President Bush. If you wanted to run against President Bush you should have run four years ago. I will take this country in a new direction.” Obama’s response was also good, explaining how McCain had sided with Bush on the major economic issues of the day. But the response won’t get cable news play. The zinger will.
Ohio Plumber Becomes Focus of Debate
By Philip Elliott for the Associated Press.
Who is Joe the Plumber? He is Joe Wurzelbacher, an Ohio man looking to buy a plumbing business who came to symbolize the notion of “spreading the wealth” in Wednesday night’s third and final presidential debate between Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain.
Earlier this week, when Wurzelbacher got a chance to speak with Obama when the candidate visited Toledo, he told Obama that his tax plan would keep him from buying the business that currently employs him.
I am a spread the wealth kind of guy. I believe quite firmly that income inequality is a pernicious problem for any economy and any society. In this, Senator Obama really caught my attention. However, his character is a significant hurdle for me and his lack of foreign policy experience and his world view keep me up at night. Authoritarianism is on the march in Latin America, Russia and Central Asia. I’m not sure if a President Obama would make it a priority to defend and extend democratic goverance abroad. I am not sure that a President Obama sees Venezuela’s Chávez as a menace and a threat. Still, to hear Obama say “spread the wealth” is music to my ears.
On the hand Mr. Joe Wurzelbacher, the plumber in question, doesn’t seem convinced that we should “spread the wealth.” Obama’s argument at the end is actually the right argument. The idea is provide jobs that pay well enough so more households can afford Mr. Wurzelbacher’s services.
In terms of a political advantage, score one for Senator McCain. It will be interesting to see the next round of polls from states like Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan where this message tends to resonate better.
The End of Attack Politics
By Jonathan Freedland in the UK Guardian.
Political consultants such as Drew Westen, author of The Political Brain, warned that John Kerry, Al Gore and Michael Dukakis had all gone down because they had let their Republican opponents punch them and punch them again. Kerry had been “Swift-boated”, refusing to dignify vicious attacks against him by responding to them – and had lost an election in the process.
Yet in this debate, Barack Obama plainly ignored that advice. McCain kept coming at him – attacking him for his relationship with an “old washed-up terrorist”, accusing him of “class warfare”, branding him an “extremist” on abortion – but Obama did not do what the conventional wisdom of campaigns past said he should. Sure, he politely tried to set the record straight, but only gently. And not once did he throw a punch back. When asked whether Sarah Palin was qualified to be president, he said it was up to the American people – and then praised her energy as a campaigner.
In the past, that would have had Republicans licking their chops, predicting that their muscular method of warfare would put away yet another meek Democrat. But not this time.
McCain Talks Economy with Hillary
By Glenn Thursh writing for Politico.
Clinton dropped out of the race four months ago, but her presence looms large at tonight’s final McCain-Obama debate being held, appropriately enough, in her adopted state of New York.
Clinton was arguably the first candidate in either party to grasp the transformative political effect of the economic crisis, and her onetime rivals have been borrowing — liberally — from her policy and rhetorical playbooks.
“Everything in this election is being washed away by this stock market and economic stuff … and she was the one who came out first with specific policies to deal with this, so she’s clearly having an influence on both of them,” said Peter Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.
“The reason why she’s so influential is because we never had a primary candidate who won 18 million votes,” said former Bill Clinton adviser Paul Begala, who likened the former first lady’s impact to that of third-party candidate Ross Perot in 1992.
“Bill Clinton had to adjust his message to appeal to Perot’s voters, and [McCain and Obama] have to do the same thing with her,” he added. “The way you get her voters is not to suck up to her but to carry her message and her programs. … That’s why Obama’s a more natural fit.”
Clinton aides, speaking on condition of anonymity, said she is still smarting over her loss, but is gratified Obama and McCain have carried parts of her agenda. And they say she’s downright tickled that McCain, a lifelong crusader against government spending, is getting in touch with his inner Hillary to woo her white, working-class base and female voters not sold on Obama.
Perhaps if he wore a pantsuit.
Democrats Fail to Answer ‘Great Schlep’ Call
By Tom Leonard in the UK Telegraph.
The Great Schlep was launched to considerable fanfare after an accompanying video made by the comedian Sarah Silverman was watched seven million times on the internet.
Around 20,000 people signed up as Great Schlep fans on Facebook but the big push last weekend saw only one in 200 of them actually make the trip.
Even Silverman stayed away and doesn’t actually have any grandparents in Florida. The closely-contested state has a large Jewish population, much of it made up of retirees from New York, and Democrats fear most will back John McCain.
To heap further embarrassment on the project, financed by the Jewish Council of Education & Research, many who did make the schlep discovered their grandparents were intending to vote for Mr Obama anyway.