Stolen Seats, Unresponsive Government

Good news, at least one poll shows that Democrats are poised to take the House of Representatives and with it John Boehner's gavel. In an eight point landslide. There are few outcomes that would be better for America. After all, it's Boehner and his willingness to be led around by the nose by Tea Party Republicans that most stands in the way of progress in America. It's they who believe that up is down, that black is white, and that undermining demand at every opportunity is good for the economy. No wonder Americans reject them.

There's one little hitch: the poll is a bit optimistic and even if it's merely close to being correct, Republicans have so rigged House elections that it wouldn't be enough.

ThinkProgress:

According to a Quinnipiac poll released today, if the election were held today 43 percent of the electorate would support a Democratic U.S. House candidate, as opposed to just 35 percent who would back a Republican. That 8 point lead for Democrats is significantly more than the GOP’s margin of victory during the 2010 Republican wave election (6.6 percent) and even more that the Democratic margin of victory during the 2006 wave (7.9 percent) — when Democrats were bolstered by both an unpopular Republican president and a failing war in Iraq.

And yet, if Democrats succeed in maintaining this substantial lead through next year’s congressional election, they will likely emerge with a tiny majority of just 5 seats.
Last January, the Republican Party published a triumphant report bragging that “Republicans enjoy a 33-seat margin in the U.S. House seated yesterday in the 113th Congress, having endured Democratic successes atop the ticket and over one million more votes cast for Democratic House candidates than Republicans.” The report touts the role GOP gerrymandering played in enabling Republicans to keep the House despite losing the popular vote, citing states like Michigan, where “Michiganders cast over 240,000 more votes for Democratic congressional candidates than Republicans, but still elected a 9-5 Republican delegation to Congress.”

See, that's why I always call Republicans shameless. When you're actually bragging about how great a job you did of stealing elections, no other description fits quite so well.

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Old Jim Crow, Back for an Encore

Take a moment and consider how unlikely this headline would be:

WEALTHY WHITE VOTERS FORCED TO STAND IN LINES FOR HOURS TO VOTE.

Doesn't seem like much of a danger, does it? And that tells you all you need to know about the continuing necessity of the Voting Rights Act, currently under attack by the right and the conservative members of the Supreme Court. America has moved on, they argue. There is no polling place discrimination anymore. Racism has been solved.

Yet in Florida, early voting lines were hours long in many places. And for many, early voting isn't a luxury, it's a necessity. Contrary to conservative rhetoric, minority voters work. And most workers don't get to set their own hours. Being able to vote when they have the time off is the only way they can vote. The crooked Governor of Florida, Rick Scott, refused to reverse changes he'd made to election rules and, when told of the long lines, tried to spin it as the consequence of a vibrant democracy; "People are getting out to vote," he said. "That's what's very good."

People having to wait hours to vote is not "what's very good," it's what's very bad. And -- surprise! -- my headline about the travails faced by the intrepid with rich fella doesn't apply here. Reality is pretty much the opposite case.

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Defending Our Most Basic Freedom

It's one of the most sacred rights you have. They should make it as painless as possible.
-Miami-Dade resident Jonathan Piccolo.

It's not the "right" to own a military assault-style weapon that Piccolo is talking about here, but rather the right from which all our other rights spring. It's our most basic freedom and our most powerful form of liberty. It's the ability to bloodlessly change government and to influence the course of our nation's history. The right to vote is the great equalizer -- no one, no matter how rich or powerful -- has a vote any more powerful than yours. Since the Supreme Court determined that money is speech, they may be able to speak louder than you can, but your vote is still equal to theirs. If you're in line behind an ex-president or a Wall Street tycoon, they get one and you get one. Democracy is the freedom we should guard the most fiercely, because democracy is the way we keep all the other ones and even earn new freedoms. There is no free nation that doesn't allow its citizens to vote. There is no free nation that's a sham democracy with a rigged vote. People without democracy are -- by definition -- not free people. Which is why I always say that the enemies of democracy are the enemies of freedom. There aren't many facts I'm as sure of as that.

Which means there's a right side and a wrong side to a battle shaping up in this country -- and one party is staking out the "enemies of democracy" position. Which would make the other the good guys.

New York Times:

With studies suggesting that long lines at the polls cost Democrats hundreds of thousands of votes in November, party leaders are beginning a push to make voting and voter registration easier, setting up a likely new conflict with Republicans over a deeply polarizing issue.

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GOP Election-Rigging and Our Broken Government

In terms of votes cast for candidates to the House of Representatives this year, my home state of Wisconsin was close to evenly split. The edge went to Democrats, which is what you'd expect from a state that went for Obama. In the end, the total popular vote from all congressional races went Democrat -- 50.8%-49.2%. And here's where the math starts to get fishy: Wisconsin sent five Republicans to the House and three Democrats. This is a Republican controlled state and the congressional districts have been rigged through gerrymandering.

Wisconsin is a robbed electorate, but we aren't the worst off. That dubious award seems to go to Michigan. In that state, Democrats won the total house vote with a clear majority, 52.7%-47.3%. But they sent only five Democrats to Washington, while electing nine Republicans.

Republicans seem have Democracy bass-ackward and believe it should work the way the filibuster works in the Senate -- i.e., the side with the least votes wins. But I say "seem to" because it's pretty clear that Republicans believe democracy shouldn't work at all and that the most skillful cheater and vote-rigger deserves the office. That is, so long as they're a Republican.

Princeton University's Sam Wang, an election modeller who outperformed Nate Silver in the 2012 presidential election, has been investigating gerrymandering and finds that it's a largely Republican-caused problem.

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Registration Fraud May Give the GOP a Taste of Their Own Medicine

They say Karma is a bitch. After pushing voter ID to disenfranchise groups that tend to vote Democratic, the Republican Party is at the heart of a growing scandal over voter registration fraud. That would be the same crime the right -- falsely, it turned out -- accused ACORN of doing. It was a crime so heinous that ACORN had to be defunded, thereby killing off the organization. Logical consistency demands that the GOP must meet a similar fate.

But no one's seriously going to demand the organizational death penalty. Still, this may be in the neighborhood.

Los Angeles Times:

[A California voter registration fraud scandal] has also raised anew the question of whether the state should ban firms that pay workers for each voter they register or signature they secure on a petition rather than paying them an hourly rate. Workers have an incentive to cut corners under such arrangements, according to Assemblyman Richard Pan (D-Natomas), who has proposed barring the practice in a bill that is on the governor's desk.

Registration fraud's becoming a bit of a scandal for Republicans. The story broke big in Florida, followed by the California story this weekend.

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GOP Hired the Right Crook for the Voter Suppression Job

It should be a scandal eclipsing Mitt's 47-percent comments -- but it's not.

Raw Story:

The Republican National Committee fired a voter registration firm owned by a paid consultant to the party’s presidential candidate Mitt Romney Thursday, after Florida officials traced more than 100 possibly fake registration forms back to the company.

NBC News reported that the RNC cut ties with Strategic Allied Consulting (SAC), run by party strategist Nathan Sproul, had been paid $2.9 million this year to register voters in five swing states before being dismissed.

Sproul is also the founder and managing partner of another company, Lincoln Strategy Group, which records show was paid by the Romney campaign paid to do “field consulting.”

The Romney campaign told NBC News, "We used this vendor for signature gathering services during the primary but have not used them since 2011." The question should be why Romney or the RNC hired Sproul at all. The man should be washed up and unemployable in the voter registration business -- or in anything to do with elections.

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GOP Wins a Battle No One was Fighting

Yesterday was a big day for residents of the nation's capital. Taxation without representation will finally end in Washington DC. With the passage of a DC Voting Rights Bill, the city will get one voting member of the House of Representatives -- Obama is certain to sign it. I was flipping through the channels recently and came across Glenn Beck claiming it would give Democrats two more senators, but -- not surprisingly -- Beck has no idea what he's talking about. The bill increases the seats in the house from 435 to 437 (a deal was struck to add a balancing seat from Utah). It doesn't do anything to change senate membership.

It's kind of fitting that I came across Beck's idiocy on this subject, because another deal swung in the senate to get the bill passed involved the Fairness Doctrine.

Reuters:

The U.S. Senate passed an amendment on Thursday that would bar regulators from requiring broadcasters to give equal time to all points of view, a ban strongly supported by some Republican lawmakers.

The legislative amendment, sponsored by Republican Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina, would prevent the Federal Communications Commission from reimposing the so-called Fairness Doctrine to all broadcasters. It was repealed more than 20 years ago.

Aides to President Barack Obama have said he has no intention of trying to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine, but that has not stopped some Republicans from raising the issue.

DeMint added the amendment to the voting rights bill, in order to save right wing talk radio and conservative media from destruction by the forces of... Well, fairness. The right has been demagoguing the issue for some time, pretending that there was some danger of the doctrine ever returning -- while completely misrepresenting what the Fairness Doctrine actually was.





Basically, the right has been collecting off-hand comments by Democrats to convince people that there was some big lefty groundswell to bring the doctrine back. For example:

The Hill:

“It’s time to reinstitute the Fairness Doctrine,” said Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.). “I have this old-fashioned attitude that when Americans hear both sides of the story, they’re in a better position to make a decision.”

Eek!! Durbin wants to destroy Rush Limbaugh! Never mind that one casual comment does not a movement make. There was no bill, there was just two sentences thrown over the shoulder at a reporter.

Durbin had "no plans, no language, no nothing. He was asked in a hallway last year, he gave his personal view," said Durbin's press secretary in 2008. "...and it's all been blown out of proportion."

The biggest problem with the left is that the Fairness Doctrine wouldn't actually do anything. "The Fairness Doctrine had two basic elements: It required broadcasters to devote some of their airtime to discussing controversial matters of public interest, and to air contrasting views regarding those matters," wrote Steve Rendall in 2005. "Stations were given wide latitude as to how to provide contrasting views: It could be done through news segments, public affairs shows, or editorials. The doctrine did not require equal time for opposing views but required that contrasting viewpoints be presented."

One of the biggest BSers about the doctrine has been Bill O'Reilly. On his FOX show, O'Reilly said that "liberal politicians hate conservative talk radio and want to lessen its impact." He sent FOX News producer Griff Jenkins to ask Sen. Jeff Bingaman, "The implication was that it would impose or infringe on the free speech rights of broadcasters. Do you not see that the Fairness Doctrine would do that?"

But here's the thing, the Fairness Doctrine could be reinstated tomorrow and Bill's show wouldn't have to change a thing. He regularly reads letters from viewers -- many of whom disagree with him -- so he'd be golden. Bill O'Reilly is complaining that he'd be ruined if he had to do exactly what he's doing now.

In fact, the Fairness Doctrine would probably have been the best thing that ever happened to the right. The media is already obsessed with "balanced reporting," which relies on repeating facts, but not in telling the truth. You can see the problem with reporting on global warming or evolution. The fact is that one group of people say one thing and another group says another, but the truth is that one side is right -- provably and inarguably. By reporting these facts, while ignoring the truth, the media fails to inform and only confuses.

And this is what they're doing now. Imagine what would happen if they were required to tell "both sides of the story." Would we be treated to some flat-earther nut saying we never landed on the moon every time there was a story about NASA? Would we watch Holocaust deniers balancing every story about WWII? There are both sides to every story, but one side is often insanity, BS, or both -- while being completely unnecessary in understanding the issue. We don't need to hear both sides, we only need to hear the truth. The right would have more to worry about if the media stopped trying to represent a balance between truth and PR.

But, in the end, the right did something they often do -- believed their own propaganda. They scored a victory in a one-sided battle against a phantom enemy. There was no push to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine, making DeMint's amendment the easiest concession anyone's ever made to get a bill passed. Republicans weren't all that happy with the DC Voting Rights bill either, since the city is a guaranteed Democratic seat from now until forever. But they gave up that fight in order to win a different battle against nothing. DeMint might as well have banned elves from ever holding office.

But I guess a phony win is still a win -- at least in perception. Republicans got the base to believe that the Fairness Doctrine really was a threat to the First Amendment, an attack on conservative media, and just around the corner. I suppose the nuts will believe there was a victory, mostly because they believed there was a battle. But the Fairness Doctrine wasn't anything they ever should've been afraid of.

"If Congress really wants to help the folks, it will pass the 'Honesty Doctrine,'" says O'Reilly.

You better hope not, pal. Because then you'd be screwed.

-Wisco

Yes We Did

The world is celebrating this morning. In Kenya, there's dancing in the street and a national holiday. In Japan, the toast of the day is "President Obama, Banzai!" (I say we take that one). But it's Chicago that's the temporary center of the universe and they were cheering last night as Barack Obama and Joe Biden lost the title "Senator" and became "President-Elect" and "Vice President-Elect."

The fight didn't last very long -- when Ohio went Obama, it was over. He had more than 200 electoral votes in his pocket at that point and a solid 77 west coast votes in the bank. When Virginia went blue, the extremely improbable became the all-but impossible. AP gave Obama Florida, McCain conceded, and it was over.





In his victory speech, President-Elect Obama praised his supporters, his detractors, his opponent, his staff, his family, his running mate, and democracy.

If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer...

It’s the answer that led those who have been told for so long by so many to be cynical, and fearful, and doubtful of what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.

"There will be setbacks and false starts," he said. "There are many who won’t agree with every decision or policy I make as President, and we know that government can’t solve every problem. But I will always be honest with you about the challenges we face. I will listen to you, especially when we disagree. And above all, I will ask you join in the work of remaking this nation the only way it’s been done in America for two-hundred and twenty-one years – block by block, brick by brick, calloused hand by calloused hand."

I'm tempted to go looking through the right wing blogosphere for sour grapes, but we've got four years -- at least -- to talk about that. Those "many who won’t agree" have already decided they hate Obama. Convinced he'll raise everyone's taxes, give all that money to Africa and terrorists, institute communism, and destroy America, they're beyond reason. The right used to talk about "Bush derangement syndrome" -- wait until you get an eyeful of anti-Obama delusion. All those people who believe he really is a terrorist, a Marxist, and the anti-Christ weren't shocked back to sanity last night. They won't be any time soon, either. They're completely insane and happy with that.

When all is said and done, we did this. You and me and everyone else who stood in line, who made phone calls, who kept up the fight. The voters who had a hard time and the voters, like me, who got in and out no problem.

And all those nuts, they did it too. With every cry of "KILL HIM!" and every dumbass who insisted a black man couldn't be allowed in the White House, another ten, twenty, one hundred votes went to Obama. Hate and paranoia aren't an attractive platform. Division, racism, and lies aren't the most appealing vision of the future. In their panic to avoid an Obama presidency, they practically guaranteed it. The thrashing of the drowning man exhausted him and he went under. The nuts on the other side did a lot to elect Obama, but we don't have to thank them for it. We only need to acknowledge it.

This isn't done. Not by a long shot. None of those people are going away and they'll fight the new president every step of the way, neutered as they are. When the battle's won, the winners tend to go home, but the losers are still ready to fight. Don't go home. In democracy, there is no decisive victory and, if that seems like bad news to you right now, remember the last eight years. That was the good news then. Nothing is irreversible in America. If you can't lose hope when things seem hopeless, then neither can you quit while you're ahead. This whole nation is a work in progress, never finished, never unchangeable, and never safely in the right hands. Victory is temporary, just as defeat is fleeting.

But right now, take five. Take a moment to remember what you did and where you are. "Yes we can" becomes "Yes we did." It's not over, but take a breather and pretend it is. You've earned it. Pour a glass of your favorite drink and make the toast of the 21st century.

President Obama, Bonzai!

-Wisco

What Did You Do Today?

It's one of those election day traditions. Every four years, a bunch of media remote trucks show up at Dixville Notch, New Hampshire to report the earliest election results in the nation. The polls open at midnight and everyone in town casts their votes right away. The results? Barack Obama by a nearly three to one margin. Every single Dixville Notchian -- or whatever the hell you call them -- has voted and the results of this 100% turnout is McCain 6, Obama 15. It's the first time in forty years that the town has chosen a Democrat. Only a gazillion more votes to go.

Dixville Notch always has 100% turnout -- I think if you don't show, the Children of the Corn come by your house and stone you. The media gods must be appeased. Nationwide, many have already cast their ballots in early voting. Voice of America reports that "more than 28 million people in 34 of the 50 states" have already voted. The turnout for election day is expected to be even bigger.

"We have statistics that we can point to right now that suggest that 28.8 million people have so far voted in this election," Michael McDonald, an elections expert at George Mason University in Virginia told VOA. "We are expecting 40 million people when all the numbers are compiled. And that will be about 30 percent of the 136 million people that we are expecting to vote." If that 136 million figure is correct, that would represent a turnout of 64% of all eligible voters.

"We may quite literally see turnout of a magnitude that we have not seen in a century of American politics," he said.





All that early voting has gone heavily for Obama -- 60% -- which helps explain why Team McCain didn't vigorously break out a new attack on Obama over the weekend. For as much as a third of voters, it would've come too late to make a difference. Instead, both campaigns have spent the last few days oiling the gears of the get out the vote machines.

While some of the early voting had unreasonably long lines, McDonald says this was the nature of the early voting mechanism in most municipalities. "What's happening here is that local election officials only have a limited number of polling places available for early voting in person," he said. "And those polling places seem to be completely overwhelmed. As we look from state to state where they do have these polling places, in many places they have had to extend hours. They have had to open up additional polling places to accommodate the demand for early voting."

Here in Madison, Wisconsin, for example, long lines for early voting had been reported. But this was because early ballots had to be cast at the city clerk's office. One polling place for an entire city means long lines. If there have been reports of hours long lines in your area, don't expect them to be nearly as long today.

I guess what I'm saying is don't let a long wait scare you off. Ask yourself this question; how long would you have waited in line in 2000 if you knew you could avoid what happened over the last eight years? If you're really worried, bring a headset, a book, and a lunch. If you're lucky, you'll have time to eat the lunch on the way home.

If you're in line when the polls close, you get to vote. Don't let them send you away. If you need another incentive to stick it out and vote, remember, George W. Bush is voting today and for once you get a chance to veto him. Cast a ballot to cancel out the vote of your least favorite rightwinger; Cheney, Bush, Bill Kristol, Limbaugh, Hannity, O'Reilly, etc. Sponsor a nut and cancel out their vote.

If you have any problems voting, call 1-866-OUR-VOTE. Report it, get advice from volunteer election lawyers, and protect your right to vote. Anyone who would deny you that right, anyone who stands in the way of democracy, is not a friend of this nation and our principles. Don't let them get away with it. Write that number down and take it with you -- 1-866-OUR-VOTE.

I'm going to do what I always do on election day, take a nice autumn walk to the polls at the nearby high school. It's an unbelievable beautiful day here -- an indian summer day very late in the season. I'll vote, go home, and watch the returns all damned night -- I don't think the presidential race will remain undecided that long, but I want to see how Prop. 8 turns out in California.

It's all over now. The endless polls, the stupid, distracting non-issues, and the crappy media obsession with those stupid, distracting non-issues. With any luck, we'll soon stop hearing about made-up demographics like "hockey moms" and "Joe Six-Pack." It'll go on for a while, as the pundits either try to explain why they were wrong or capitalize on the fact that they were right. But there will be two speeches tonight; one a concession and the other a victory speech. We decide which is which.

But only if we go vote. I'm an atheist, so whenever I'm asked for my religion, I say "none." But if someone really pinned me down and required me to state some sort of religious belief, I'd have to say "democracy."

You're going to remember this day for the rest of your life and you're going to remember what you did today. If you haven't voted already, you can take your place in history or you can polish that chair your sitting in with your ass. There are no other chances, there are no more days. You're choice today isn't just between the candidates, school funding, amendments to state constitutions. Your choice today is between the most basic of all democratic actions and undemocratic inaction.

Which do you want to remember doing today?

-Wisco

The Right's Stealth Campaign

The final USA Today/Gallup poll is out today and Barack Obama holds a national lead of 11 points. A Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll puts it closer, with an 8-point lead for the Democrat, 51% to 43%. Gallup also gives it to Obama by a pretty wide margin, 55% to 44%. We can pretty safely say that the consensus is that Obama's walking away with this thing tomorrow. In fact, networks will probably call it for Obama before the Mountain Time zone polls close. But, just between you and me, you can write McCain off if he loses Virginia. If that happens, the race is over early for most of the nation -- 8 p.m. Eastern at the latest. And it's looking like that's the way it's going to go.

For Republicans and rightwingers in general, looking for good news will mean looking elsewhere -- the national race is all but officially over. Where might they find these little rays of sunshine? In statewide victories for Republican Jesus. Down ticket races seem to be trending Democrat, so they're prepared for big congressional losses as well as the big one in the electoral college. They can't lose every race, but the wins will be nearly meaningless, given the lopsided nature of the next Congress.

No, the wins for the right will come in ballot initiatives. The stealth campaign for control of the nation comes in the form of control of the states through direct democracy. If they can't rule by elected office, they can rule by referendum. The highest profile referendum is Proposition 8 in California, which would amend the state's Constitution to ban same sex marriage. The good news there is that the proposition looks to be headed for a loss. The bad news is that it exists at all and that the loss looks to be a narrow one.

Los Angeles Times:

The Field Poll of 966 likely voters, conducted between Oct. 18 and 28, shows 49% opposed to the measure, 44% in favor and 7% undecided. The race is narrowing. A September Field poll showed the measure trailing by 14 points, 52% to 38%.

The new poll also found that "significant proportions" of voters on both sides are conflicted about the issue.

Women are more likely to oppose Proposition 8 than men, the poll reports; 51% of women and 47% of men surveyed oppose the measure. It also found that respondents who said they personally knew a gay person were more likely to be opposed than respondents who said they did not.

The problem here is that this ballot initiative, like similar discriminatory referenda, isn't only designed to change California's Constitution -- it's also an organizational tool. All those petitions become mailing lists, all those volunteer canvassers and phone bankers don't go away after they lose. They'll be told they'll keep up the fight and that Jesus will eventually prevail in California's battle with the Homosexual Menace. If they win -- which is still a very real possibility -- then they'll use that energy to move forward with other "pro-family" issues.





But the fact is that a loss is almost better than a win -- at least in terms of organizing. When the battle's over, people on the winning side tend to go home. When the culture war continues, the culture warriors fight on. This is where the Republican base will rebuild -- not around failed candidates, but around wedge issue ballot measures.

Arizona and Florida will both be voting on referenda similar to California's Prop. 8. In Florida, it seems close. Although polling shows the voters approving the ban 56% to 37%, Florida requires a super-majority of voters -- 60% -- to pass such a measure. This one's a nailbiter, but leaning the right way. Organizing after losing this one will be a pretty simple matter, since they can use that majority to claim "mainstream" status and because Florida conservatives tend to be pretty insane anyway (see Katherine Harris).

To give you an idea of how powerful these referenda become as organizing tools, we can look at Arizona. In 2006, Arizona became the first state to defeat an anti-marriage equality measure. The groups opposing marriage kept working, turned their petitions into mailing lists, and now a second attempt looks likely to pass -- 49% to 42%.

In Arkansas, voters will be asked to bar gays from adoption or foster parenthood. Thankfully, this looks like a big loser -- 55% oppose the measure, while 38% support it.

Don't get the idea that the right's stealth campaign is all about hating on the gays. It's just mostly that way. In South Dakota, it's about hating on the women. An initiative there asks voters to make abortion illegal in almost every circumstance. A similar ban lost last time around, but these people aren't taking no for an answer. Where the original ban had almost no exceptions, the current measure would include "limited exceptions for rape, incest and the health of the pregnant woman." That brought it much closer to winning. In fact, it's a tie -- 44% to 44%.

The S. Dakota measure is certainly unconstitutional and is meant only to challenge Roe v. Wade. There's absolutely no guarantee that it'll ever make it all the way to the Supreme Court, but it's all about the PR anyway. They're building the groundwork for a propaganda campaign to energize the crazies.

Want a reason to vote? There you go. And it's important to remember that these don't represent the right going away next year -- so neither should you. That's the danger of a successful presidential campaign, people go away. In a democracy, the fight is never over, by design. Wins must be defended.

No matter what's on your ballot, vote. But remember, democracy doesn't end on November 5. The religious right isn't going away on that day, so neither should you. We've got to win the big one and keep fighting the other ones. Democracy means that the fight never, ever ends.

-Wisco

Vote Dammit!

The McCain team got some news yesterday. It wasn't good. I imagine that they drew straws or flipped coins or played rock-paper-scissors to find out which adviser would break it to the candidate and get an up-close look at his legendary temper -- the Senator from Arizona stands a damned good chance of losing Arizona.

AZCentral.com:

A new poll from Arizona State University shows the presidential race too close to call in Sen. John McCain's home state.

The Arizona senator is leading Democratic candidate Sen. Barack Obama by 2 percentage points, 46 to 44, down from a 7-point lead a month ago and a double-digit lead this summer. Factor in the poll's 3-point margin of error, and a race that was once a nearly sure thing for McCain is a statistical dead heat, pollsters say.

"One would think McCain would still carry Arizona, but anybody who says they can predict the state this time, they can't. It's going to depend on who goes to the polls," said Tara Blanc, associated director of the poll by ASU's Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication and local PBS affiliate Channel 8 (KAET).

Not surprisingly, the pool of remaining undecideds there is small, at about 9%. There's a real chance that Arizona could go blue this year, but only if Obama voters get out and vote.





And, with a mere five weekdays until E-Day, that's what it's down to -- who votes. Both in Arizona and nationally. That's bad news for John McCain who, despite firing up the base with his selection of Sarah Palin as running mate, finds himself losing the voter enthusiasm race. A Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll taken last week found that enthusiasm for McCain was low. 26% of respondents said they were "excited" to cast their vote for the Republican, 34% were just "satisfied," and the largest percentage -- 39% -- called him "the lesser of two evils.”

Obama did much better, with 52% saying they were "excited," only 14% calling him "the lesser of two evils," and 33% merely "satisfied." Excited people vote, unexcited people may not. If past elections are any indication, Obama will have the edge in voter turnout. There are voter suppression efforts going on out there, but they only seem to be succeeding in the states McCain would probably win anyway. Still if Democrats don't make it their goal in life to punish illegal campaign tactics and make elections must harder to steal in this next term, they may not get another chance for a while. Democrats are taking this election because it's not close enough to steal.

For their part, the GOP is planning (plotting?) their triumphant return at some undetermined point in the future. Politico's Jonathan Martin reports that they've already scheduled the strategy meeting.

Two days after next week's election, top conservatives will gather at the Virginia weekend home of one of the movement's most prominent members to begin a conversation about their role in the GOP and how best to revive a party that may be out of power at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue next year.

The meeting will include a "who's who of conservative leaders -- economic, national security and social," said one attendee, who shared initial word of the secret session only on the basis of anonymity and with some details about the host and location redacted.

The decision to waste no time in plotting their moves in the post-Bush era reflects the widely-held view among many on the right, and elsewhere, that the GOP is heading toward major losses next week.

"There's a sense that the Republican Party is broken, but the conservative movement is not," Martin's source told him. The idea will be to rebuild a "national grassroots political and policy coalition similar to the out Reagan years." I guess that means "pre-Reagan" years, since the talk is of the time during the Carter administration.

"Should McCain lose next Tuesday, the conversation will include who to groom as the next generation of conservative leaders," Martin writes. "A list that will feature [McCain running mate Sarah] Palin at or near the top." The lesson, apparently, was that McCain wasn't far enough to the right.

The logic here is a little hard to grasp. If the problem with the candidate was that he wasn't conservative enough, how did that result in voters turning in droves to a candidate Republicans pretty successfully branded as extremely liberal? In what world does that argument make any sense? Reason would seem to lead you to the conclusion that McCain either wasn't moderate enough or failed to portray himself as moderate enough. Yet here they are, assuming that someone like Palin holds the keys to the kingdom. No wonder they're losing seats all over the nation.

Still, November 4 isn't a sure bet -- it's just damned close to one. Those two, four, eight, twelve years in the political wilderness won't happen for Republicans if people don't get out and vote. Aesop's tortoise and the hare, you know. Sit at home in smug certainty and that big lead in the polls means jack.

That goes double for you, Arizonans. For the rest of us, if someone asks why you think McCain's losing, tell them it was because he wasn't conservative enough.

Reinforcing Republican false assumptions can't hurt any.

-Wisco