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Thursday, October 9, 2008

Dem Campaign Chatter 10-9-2008

George Wenschhof

Today, Obama is in Dayton, Cincinnati and Portsmouth, Ohio - this is one of the swing states and it is a large state with diverse voters. I've been to many of the cities in the state - given a speech in a few and interviewed elected officials in others. Cleveland, Toledo, Dayton, Columbus and Cincinnati all have different characteristics which along with the many smaller rural communities across the state is what makes this a difficult state for either candidate to win.

Biden is in St. Joseph, Liberty, and Jefferson City, Missouri - the show me state and another swing state.

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Obama has 4 point national lead over McCain 48% to 44% - the Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby poll was taken 10-6 to 10-8 which does not reflect voter reaction to the second presidential debate. Reuters.com has more details of the poll here.

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Let's see how the Financial Markets react today - the Dow has lost 1600 in the past week, including 189 yesterday to it's present close of 9258.10. Some feel there will a market rebound today, but most economists say we are in for a long bumpy ride. CNN.com has more here. As of 10:40 Am ET, the Dow was down 26.52.

By the way, the national debt clock displayed in Times Square in 1989 by a real estate developer to track the national debt has run out of digits and will need modifications. The national debt in 1989? 2.7 Trillion. Today, it exceeds 10.2 Trillion. Currently, the U.S. annual budget is operating at a 500 Billion deficit and the recent 700+ Billion bail out bill has not been added in. Read more here.

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Obama campaign releases new ad blasting McCain's proposed mortgage plan - during the second presidential debate, McCain proposed a 300 Billion mortgage plan but left out the details - this ad shows how McCain's plan would shift the burden from the lenders to the taxpayers and concludes with we can't afford more of the same. You can watch the ad here.

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Pundits agree, the attempted town hall debate format did not help McCain in the second presidential debate - I noted during my live blogging of the debate that at times McCain seemed confused and almost appeared as though he was babbling. Joan Walsh at Salon.com has a good read on her take on the debate, including McCain's use of the words "that one" to describe Obama. You can read her comments here.

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Time's cover and cover story discusses race and the economy - the article discusses the concerns some white voters have on the economy and how that may overcome their fears on race. The picture of Obama on the cover appears to be half white and half black. You can read it here.

As I have said repeatedly during this election year, it is great the U.S. finally has Women and African-Americans vying for the top elected positions in the country. Unfortunately, we have not reached Dr. King's dream of judging people by their character. Sexism and racism still exist today as pointed out in the column noted above.

Today, Gallup.com has an article entitled "Obama's race may be as much as a plus as a minus" - their data shows while 6% of voters may vote against Obama due to his race, 9% say they will vote for him. Read the article here.

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