The Sunshine Empire

“I do know Sen. Obama, he does not share those views.”

-Senator John McCain (R) AZ (On the relationship between Senator Barack Obama and the Reverend Jeremiah Wright to Fox New’s Sean Hannity)

While attending a fund raiser with the Governor of Arizona some weeks ago, I had occasion to speak with a couple whom had recently moved from Charlotte North Carolina. We were talking about the state of the United States Senate and I mentioned that incumbent Senator Elizabeth Dole seemed to be in a tight race. She was the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee when the longshot Democratic bit to retake the Senate in 2006 succeeded. They stated that there was no chance that she would win, and at the time she was winning in the polls. Now reading Politico it seems an unnamed McCain source is saying that there is no way Dole wins in November. This could mean a long shot chance to get to a 60 seat majority could be possible, if not still improbable.

Jacksonville Jaguars lead 14-7 so far.  I’ve had a good day so far.  I’m Not under the weather and I received a bottle of the finest Paddy Irish Whiskey from my Mother.  Let’s hope the Jags can finish the night strong.  The people of the Florida’s First Coast have rightly been blamed for not supporting their team as much as other NFL cities.  Yet with 64,000 to 70,000 at every home game they would sell out most of the stadiums in the league.  Yet down in South Florida they barely topped the average attendance for a Marlins game against a good San Diego team.  Steelers are driving so I’ll get back to the game.

Watching the discussion of the nasty turn in the race on Meet the Press a good point has been brought up. During the Vice-Presidential debate Governor Sarah Palin deflected the Bush-McCain comparison by awkwardly throwing out the “there you go again” Reagan impression and saying that Obama and Biden just wanted to talk about the past. She insisted that her and McCain wanted to talk about the future. She then started talking about the past and William Ayers within two days. First, if you want to throw out a man that hosted a function for Obama’s predecessor in the Illinois Senate to introduce him as a candidate go ahead and talk about the past. This will open the door to discussions of McCain’s taking bribes from Charles Keating to shut down investigations into his Lincoln Savings. He even took trips to Barbados on Keating’s private jet. When this company failed families lost their homes. So the question needs to be asked, does John McCain and Sarah Palin want to talk about the past, or the future?

I’ve spent the day trying to rid myself of a tenacious and determined cold, so I am groggy from gallons of Nyquil. What is clear politically is the state of the McCain campaign and it’s increasingly desperate actions. With Iowa almost looking lost, Senator McCain cannot depend on just recreating the Bush 2004 map. This combined with his abandonment of Michigan are surprising considering his federal matching funds and a month still to go in the race. Electoral-Vote.com has what looks like an Obama landslide in the works on their big board, and the McCain campaign openly admitted this morning that they are going to run on Senator Obama’s “associations” from now on.

It looks as if Senator McCain has come to realize what most did when he suspended his campaign to come to the rescue of the economy, that it looked like a sham and there is no way that he can win the economic argument no matter his plan. So he has decided to just ignore the crisis all together. The pullout of Michigan also shows the plan on the Obama people’s part to play outside of the Kerry states and battlegrounds is working. When a Republican candidate is having to seriously fight for Indiana and North Carolina the clouds are looking dark for the GOP this year. Indiana has traditionally had the largest KKK organization in the country and McCain is having to fight there. Now all of the this aside the race is going to tighten up no matter what. The only bad thing is that one of the remaining debates will focus on the economy, which has ravaged McCain’s numbers and helped Obama.

Many things can happen in the next 31 days, but the sooner that McCain can end the Obama rise the quicker he can begin to rise himself. The pressure is on McCain for this debate on Tuesday. The town hall meeting format is his talent the press tells us. This of course means he may actually have to look at Barack Obama.

We’ve added two more sites to our featured links category on the sidebar and these are must reads for us at the finish line to the 2008 Presidential and Congressional election. The first is FiveThirtyEight.com. This is a great blog loaded with comprehensive polling data and statistical possibilities. The second is Electoral-vote.com. As you know the popular vote nationwide means nothing at this stage of the game, and the status of the Electoral College is where the White House is really won. Electoral-Vote.com gives the nationwide map with the status of each state according to the latest polls. Get the best idea every morning on the status of all the battleground states.

McCainâ��s Economic Plan For Nation: ‘Everyone Marry A Beer Heiress’