This is really strange...I had to go to the little town of Sweetwater yesterday. I had to go through this little neighborhood with roads cutting through every which way. According to the person directing me, this was a neighborhood where the "old money" people live, in homes that were nice but probably truly Southern beauties years ago.

Timothy Noah, "Chatterbox" Columnist: Obama

It's a point of pride that I managed to get through this election without professing shock at John McCain's supposed defection to the Dark Side. I do not think that McCain, a man of good character who once seemed a plausible candidate for the Democratic ticket, has sold his soul to the devil. Smart liberals like Robert Wright and Josh Marshall say the McCain-Palin ticket has waged the most despicable presidential campaign in modern memory. I doubt they'll continue to believe that much past Nov. 4. McCain-Palin doesn't rank even as the most despicable presidential campaign in 2008. (That would be Hillary Clinton's primary campaign, which is far more susceptible to the accusation that it exploited Obama's race.)

Today, the Gallup traditional model pegs McCain's number significantly higher than the RCP average. It has done this several times over the last three weeks - and every day since it began it has shown McCain doing better than the RCP average. It is unlikely that random variation would produce these effects. Today's Rasmussen poll shows McCain significantly higher than the RCP average, and it has consistently been higher than the RCP average for the last three weeks. IBD/TIPP frequently pegs Obama's number significantly lower than the RCP average, and it has shown him lower than the RCP average every day since it began. The GWU/Battleground poll has shown McCain consistently higher than the RCP average for 10 of the last 10 release dates, frequently at significant levels.

None of this is consistent with what we would expect from random statistical variation. These considerations reinforce the point I made on Friday. In all likelihood, something else is going on here. The pollsters have different "visions" of what the electorate is, and these visions are inducing such divergent results.

This is why I would urge caution when interpreting all this polling data. We're talking about disagreements among good pollsters. I take all of these firms seriously whenever they produce new numbers. They are disagreeing with one another in ways that can't be chalked up to statistical "noise." That gives me great pause.

[Obama's] tax plan, for example, accepts, at least in theory, the basic precept of the Reagan Revolution, which is that cutting taxes is good for economic growth. Those who did research for him, many from the New America Foundation, searched for third-way market solutions to social problems.

Second, today on Talk of the Nation, John McWhorter, an African American linguist at Berkeley now of the Manhattan Institute was discussing why he, a "conservative" was supporting Obama.  It's an interesting discussion and can be found here.

During the discussion he mentioned a column he wrote in 2006, in which he discussed why Obama, now.  If I understand correctly, he believes we're at a time in our culture when being black can be a real advantage.  A non-black senator with Obama's experience would not be a candidate for President.  (Thus my comparison to Geraldine Ferraro.)

Perhaps more controversially is his affirmative statement as to why he would specifically like to see an African American in office now, and that's because he feels (and I'm probably going to paraphrase this badly) while racism isn't dead, Obama in office would go along way to showing to many people the progress we've made.)

Seriously, where has this guy been?

Crunchy Taco!

MLB: Think Outside the Bun

This is the first poll which shows all of the undecideds making their choice (other than 1%).

Thirty percent (30%) say President Bush is doing a good or excellent job.