UPI: 200 former U.S. diplomats endorse Obama

"More than 200 former U.S. diplomats have signed a statement announcing their support for Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama."

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Newsweek: Palin Is Ready? Please., by Fareed Zakaria

"Will someone please put Sarah Palin out of her agony?"

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Huffington Post: Latest Palin Gaffe: Can't Name Supreme Court Case Other Than Roe V. Wade

"Today, the Washington Post's Howard Kurtz reported on potentially embarrassing clips of Sarah Palin being interviewed by Katie Couric that haven't yet been aired."

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The Atlantic: Sure They Vetted Her, by Andrew Sullivan

"Capitol Hill sources are telling me that senior McCain people are more than concerned about Palin. The campaign has held a mock debate and a mock press conference; both are being described as “disastrous.”"

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Huffington Post: Why the Debates Won't Matter (Hint: It's a Felony)

"This election won't be won or lost at the debates. Nor will it be determined by the two campaigns' 'ground games' -- their get-out-the-vote efforts. Nor, unfortunately, will its outcome even depend on how many Americans wake up on Election Day intending to vote for one candidate or the other. Instead, my fear is that the Electoral College results will hang on the swing state voting systems' vulnerability to sabotage."

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FiveThirtyEight.com: McCain Is Stuck With Palin

"McCain already runs the risk of his campaign appearing to be something of a three-ring circus, with Britney Spears in one ring, Palin in another, and the 'suspension' of his campaign in a third. To replace Palin now might make his campaign seem like a farce."

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New York Times: Palin’s Words Raise Red Flags

"If, on the other hand, it becomes clear that her performance, so far, is an accurate reflection of her qualifications, it would behoove John McCain and the Republican Party to put the country first — as Mr. McCain loves to say — and find a replacement for Ms. Palin on the ticket."

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CBS News: Early Poll Results Suggest More Uncommitted Voters Saw Obama As Debate Winner

"Forty percent of uncommitted voters who watched the debate tonight thought Barack Obama was the winner. Twenty-two percent thought John McCain won. Thirty-eight percent saw it as a draw."

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Huffington Post: Jack Cafferty: If Sarah Palin Being One Heartbeat Away "Doesn't Scare The Hell Out Of You, It Should"

"He warned the viewers: 'If John McCain wins this woman will be one 72-year-old's heartbeat away from being President of the United States. And if that doesn't scare the hell out of you, it should.'"

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The Atlantic: I've now seen much of the Katie Couric / Sarah Palin interview... by James Fallows

"... and I genuinely feel sorry for Palin. This really is pathetic. Again it's not a mass/elite matter. Anyone who has been to high school immediately recognizes the terror of facing a pop quiz or an oral exam when you just have no idea what you're talking about."

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AFP: Kenyan witch-hunter blesses Palin in new Internet video

"An Internet video showing Sarah Palin being blessed by a Kenyan witch-hunter emerged Thursday in the latest online blast from the Republican vice-presidential nominee's past."

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Christian Science Monitor: McCain cancels Letterman. Letterman rips McCain

"...when John McCain cancelled on Letterman - at the last minute - you could hardly expect that the comic would take it easy on him. He didn’t."

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New York Times: Palin’s American Exception

"Behind Palinism lies anger. It’s been growing as America’s relative decline has become more manifest in falling incomes, imploding markets, massive debt and rising new centers of wealth and power from Shanghai to Dubai."

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FiveThirtyEight.com: AM Trackers Suggest Poor Reaction to McCain Announcement

"We'll have polling data rolling in all day, of course, but the very early returns suggest that the public may not have responded in the way John McCain might have liked to his announcement yesterday that he was 'suspending' his campaign to attend to the financial crisis."

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New York Times: McCain Aide’s Firm Was Paid by Freddie Mac Through August

"One of the giant mortgage companies at the heart of the credit crisis paid $15,000 a month from the end of 2005 through last month to a firm owned by Senator John McCain’s campaign manager, according to two people with direct knowledge of the arrangement."

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FiveThirtyEight.com: Remains Of The Day

"Americans feel about the debates they way I felt about Bugs Bunny. The cumulative audience between the three Presidential debates will likely significantly exceed that of the Super Bowl. They like watching them, and look forward to them. If McCain denies them that pleasure, they are likely to be angry with him, perhaps in ways they have difficulty expressing."

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CNN Poll: GOP takes brunt of blame for economy, Obama gains

"A new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation Poll suggests that by a 2-to-1 margin, Americans blame Republicans over Democrats for the financial crisis that has swept across the country the past few weeks — one factor that may have contributed to an apparent increase in Barack Obama’s edge over John McCain in the race for the White House."

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Washington Post: Joe Biden, Enjoying the Campaign Trail

"Biden seems to enjoy having journalists following him around, if only to have more people listen to his running commentary on whatever springs to his mind. A CBS reporter following Biden around estimated Biden has done 80 interviews since he was named vice president, compared to two by Palin."

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Washington Post: McCain Loses His Head, by George Will

"Under the pressure of the financial crisis, one presidential candidate is behaving like a flustered rookie playing in a league too high. It is not Barack Obama."

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New York Times: The Push to ‘Otherize’ Obama

"What is happening, I think, is this: religious prejudice is becoming a proxy for racial prejudice. In public at least, it’s not acceptable to express reservations about a candidate’s skin color, so discomfort about race is sublimated into concerns about whether Mr. Obama is sufficiently Christian."

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Reason Magazine: The Libertarian Case for Obama: Seven potential upsides to a hope-monger presidency

"For those who recognize that 'libertarian Democrat' is no more oxymoronic than 'libertarian Republican,' a solid case can be made for Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) as a Leader of the Free World who won't take that American Exceptionalism conceit as seriously as 'Country First' Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.)."

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Digg: Maybe the Best Anti-McCain Ad Ever

"Perfect. It puts it all in perspective. This needs to get on the air."

Link to YouTube video

New York Times: Seeking a President Who Gives Goose Bumps? So’s Obama, by Maureen Dowd

"...the idea of American exceptionalism doesn’t extend to Americans being exceptional. If you excelled academically and are able to casually use 690 SAT words then you might as well have the press shoot video of you giving the finger to the Statue of Liberty while the Dixie Chicks sing the University of the Taliban fight song. The people who want English to be the official language of the United States are uncomfortable with their leaders being fluent in it."

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New York Times: Lipstick Bungle

"Many of your supporters will no doubt cry sexism. Fine with me. But that defense rings hollow. I find many of them to be sexist. Fresh-faced? Delegates on the floor of the Republican National Convention wearing buttons like “Hoosiers for the hot chick”?"

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New York Times: Pact on Debates Will Let McCain and Obama Spar

"At the insistence of the McCain campaign, the Oct. 2 debate between the Republican nominee for vice president, Gov. Sarah Palin, and her Democratic rival, Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr., will have shorter question-and-answer segments than those for the presidential nominees, the advisers said. There will also be much less opportunity for free-wheeling, direct exchanges between the running mates. McCain advisers said they had been concerned that a loose format could leave Ms. Palin, a relatively inexperienced debater, at a disadvantage and largely on the defensive."

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FiveThirtyEight.com: Estimating the Cellphone Effect: 2.2 Points

"Gallup, Pew and ABC/WaPo have each found a cellphone effect of between 1-3 points when they have conducted experiments involving polling with and without a cellphone supplement."

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Time: John McCain and the Lying Game

"John McCain has raised serious questions about whether he has the character to lead the nation. He has defaced his beloved military code of honor. He has run a dirty campaign."

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CNN Political Ticker: Palin’s transparency proposal already exists in D.C.

"Sarah Palin likes to tell voters around the country about how she “put the government checkbook online” in Alaska. On Thursday, Palin suggested she would take that same proposal to Washington... There’s just one problem with proposing to put the federal checkbook online – somebody’s already done it. His name is Barack Obama."

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Politico.com: How John McCain lost me

"McCain’s recent conduct of his campaign – his willingness to lie repeatedly (including in his acceptance speech) and to play Russian roulette with the vice-presidency, in order to fulfill his long-held ambition – has reinforced my earlier, and growing, sense that John McCain is not a principled man. In fact, it’s not clear who he is."

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New York Times: Why Experience Matters, by David Brooks

"Philosophical debates arise at the oddest times, and in the heat of this election season, one is now rising in Republican ranks. The narrow question is this: Is Sarah Palin qualified to be vice president? Most conservatives say yes, on the grounds that something that feels so good could not possibly be wrong. But a few commentators, like George Will, Charles Krauthammer, David Frum and Ross Douthat demur, suggesting in different ways that she is unready."

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Editor and Publisher: How Fact-Checking Took Center Stage in 2008 Campaign

"'It's just not good,' [Brooks] Jackson concludes, 'when Americans go to vote that they do so with their heads full of disinformation that has gone unchecked by the only entity that has a special protection under the Constitution of the United States to investigate it. I mean, why have a First Amendment if you're not going to use it?'"

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D Magazine: A Conservative for Obama

"I now see that Obama is almost the ideal candidate for this moment in American history. I disagree with him on many issues. But those don’t matter as much as what Obama offers, which is a deeply conservative view of the world. Nobody can read Obama’s books (which, it is worth noting, he wrote himself) or listen to him speak without realizing that this is a thoughtful, pragmatic, and prudent man. It gives me comfort just to think that after eight years of George W. Bush we will have a president who has actually read the Federalist Papers."

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New York Times: Bering Straight Talk, by Maureen Dowd

"The really scary part of the Palin interview was how much she seemed like W. in 2000, and not just the way she pronounced nu-cue-lar. She had the same flimsy but tenacious adeptness at saying nothing, the same generalities and platitudes, the same restrained resentment at being pressed to be specific, as though specific is the province of silly eggheads, not people who clear brush at the ranch or shoot moose on the tundra."

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FiveThirtyEight.com: Dems Must Give Voters Explicit Permission To Like Palin

"To defuse the Sarah Palin Phenomenon, Democrats need to explicitly give voters permission to both like her as a person and then also not vote for her. If I were scripting the pivot, based on my conversations out in the field and away from the bubble of cable news and online analysis, I’d try something like the following (edit: in Biden's debate, in stump speeches or voter-to-voter persuasion and possibly in ads): Sarah Palin is very likable. There’s nothing wrong with liking her. But this isn’t a zany sitcom where a friendly, plucky Everywoman with dangerous ignorance on foreign policy gets to be vice president. Americans don't deserve someone too scared to do a press conference. Fun for a TV show, but running the country doesn't permit second and third takes when you mess up the scene."

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McCainpedia: Count the Lies

"John McCain may be trying to sell himself as a 'maverick' and a 'straight talker' who will tell the truth no matter the consequences, but independent, non-partisan watchdog groups aren't buying it. But, since he wrapped up his party's nomination, John McCain has offered more of the same false attacks and smears. To date, independent, nonpartisan fact checkers have published more than 50 fact checks debunking John McCain's lies and distortions. To hold John McCain accountable to his own standard, the Democratic National Committee will count and chronicle the lies here on the McCainPedia's 'Count the Lies' page."

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Politico.com: Obama: If you believe that, I've got a bridge in Alaska to sell you, by Ben Smith

"He followed up with a dig at lobbyists, saying 'if you think those lobbyists are working day and night for John McCain just to put themselves out of business, well, then, I've got a bridge to sell you up in Alaska.'"

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ProPublica: Palin Administration Still Pursuing ‘Nowhere’ Project

"Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has portrayed herself as a foe of pork-barrel spending, pointing in particular to her role in killing the $398 million 'Bridge to Nowhere” between Ketchikan (pop. 7,400) and its airport on Gravina Island (pop. 50). I 'told the Congress, 'Thanks, but no thanks,'' she said in her speech accepting the Republican vice presidential nomination. 'If our state wanted to build a bridge, we were going to build it ourselves.' But Gov. Palin’s administration acknowledges that it is still pursuing a project that would link Ketchikan to its airport -- with the help of as much as $73 million in federal funds earmarked by Congress for the original project."

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Washington Post: A Big Rally and Talk of Economy as Obama Visits N.H.

"The Obama campaign couldn't let that pass, and Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton issued a statement of his own. 'We will take no lectures from John McCain who is cynically running the sleaziest and least honorable campaign in modern Presidential campaign history,' he said in an e-mail. 'His discredited ads with disgusting lies are running all over the country today. He runs a campaign not worthy of the office his is seeking.'"

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Edge: What Makes People Vote Republican? By Jonathan Haidt

"...now that we can map the brains, genes, and unconscious attitudes of conservatives, we have refined our diagnosis: conservatism is a partially heritable personality trait that predisposes some people to be cognitively inflexible, fond of hierarchy, and inordinately afraid of uncertainty, change, and death. People vote Republican because Republicans offer 'moral clarity'—a simple vision of good and evil that activates deep seated fears in much of the electorate."

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New York Times: Once Elected, Palin Hired Friends and Lashed Foes

"As she assembled her cabinet and made other state appointments, those with insider credentials were now on the outs. But a new pattern became clear. She surrounded herself with people she has known since grade school and members of her church."

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New York Times Editorial: Gov. Palin’s Worldview

"But that is not what troubled us most about her remarks — and, remember, if they were scripted, that just means that they reflect Mr. McCain’s views all the more closely. Rather, it was the sense that thoughtfulness, knowledge and experience are handicaps for a president in a world populated by Al Qaeda terrorists, a rising China, epidemics of AIDS, poverty and fratricidal war in the developing world and deep economic distress at home."

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New York Times: McCain Barbs Stirring Outcry as Distortions

"“The last month, for sure, I think the predominance of liberty taken with truth and the facts has been more McCain than Obama,” said Don Sipple, a Republican advertising strategist."

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ABC News: Palin Wrong on Former VP Credentials

"ABC News' Lisa Chinn reports: During her interview with ABC News' Charlie Gibson Thursday Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin attempted to deflect a question about the fact she has never met a foreign head of state by saying that 'many' other vice presidential nominees in history hadn't met a head of state either. However Palin was mistaken, at least where recent history is concerned. Every vice president over the last 30 years had met a foreign head of state before being elected."

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Huffington Post: Obama Gets Tough. Too Little, Too Late?, by John Ridley

"So, Obama making the pilgrimage to Clinton's Harlem office (I'm sorry, did somebody order a big, steaming plate of irony?) is an open acknowledgment from Team Obama that they need to bring out the BFG of Democratic politics. Though I don't think polls are the end all/be all, Obama's softening numbers indicate it's time to do...something. Especially with that crazy Hail Sarah ball McCain tossed up looking like it might just make it into the end zone. Her deer-in-headlights responses to questions about the Bush Doctrine notwithstanding."

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mlive.com: Barack Obama ad mocks John McCain as computer illiterate, marks aggressive new attitude

"John McCain is mocked as an out-of-touch, out-of-date computer illiterate in a television commercial out Friday from Barack Obama as the Democrat begins his sharpest barrage yet on McCain's long Washington career."

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New York Times: Blizzard of Lies

"What it says, I’d argue, is that the Obama campaign is wrong to suggest that a McCain-Palin administration would just be a continuation of Bush-Cheney. If the way John McCain and Sarah Palin are campaigning is any indication, it would be much, much worse."

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Huffington Post: Enough!: Why Obama Should Release His Righteous Rage

"To fully become the transformational leader we need, Obama must demonstrate to the American people his capacity for indignation -- for the kind of ferocious passion that fueled King and Nelson Mandela. He has to fight fire with fire, and wield anger in the service of what right, true, and good. The fierce urgency of now demands nothing less."

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Washington Post: As Campaign Heats Up, Untruths Can Become Facts Before They're Undone

"'The more the New York Times and The Washington Post go after Sarah Palin, the better off she is, because there's a bigger truth out there and the bigger truths are she's new, she's popular in Alaska and she is an insurgent,' Feehery said. 'As long as those are out there, these little facts don't really matter.'" [Note: Feehery is a Republican strategist]

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FiveThirtyEight.com: Lipstick

"My first reaction upon hearing Barack Obama's "lipstick on a pig" remark was that it was deliberate. Not a deliberate attempt to smear Sarah Palin per se, but a deliberate attempt to provoke exactly the sort of fanatical reaction that they have gotten from the Republicans. The McCain campaign has spent a week campaigning on big themes and big personalities, and gotten a fair amount of mileage out of it. This takes everyone back down a notch, back down to the tedium and banality of partisan politics. It would be wishful thinking to call it a momentum-changer, but it may by default be a momentum-stopper. The convention/Palinmania phase of the news cycle -- a phase the Republicans clearly thought they were winning -- is now over."


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The Washington Independent: Obama’s Alternative Red State Universe

"While the national press and political websites go gaffe-gorging, local papers cover Obama’s working class agenda."

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Huffington Post: This Crazy Sex Ad is Obama's Dukakis Moment

"Everyone who sees this ad can see how dirty it is. And if Obama wants Americans to respect him, they must be allowed to see him react with the kind of anger - controlled, but still palpable - that they would feel if somebody did that to them."

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Washington Post: Palin Billed State for Nights Spent at Home

"Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has billed taxpayers for 312 nights spent in her own home during her first 19 months in office, charging a 'per diem' allowance intended to cover meals and incidental expenses while traveling on state business."

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CBS News: Lipstick On A Pig, By Steve Benen

"The media seems to find all of this fascinating, as if use of an old American expression, utilized by all kinds of political candidates from both parties for generations, might be some kind of sexist insult -- not when McCain used it to slam Hillary Clinton, but only when Obama used it to criticize the Republican campaign in general. It's honestly like being stuck in a 'Twilight Zone' episode in which reality has no meaning at all."

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Huffington Post: Sarah Palin: A Trojan Moose Concealing Four More Years of George Bush

"McCain's team, in an effort to distract, is going to keep doing what they're doing -- diverting voters and the media with a tantalizing combination of personal trivia and small lies. It doesn't matter if they're caught in them -- in fact, all the better. Because they know there is no way in hell they can win if this election is about the big truth of the Bush years."

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Huffington Post: Hillary Clinton: "No Palin!"

"Clinton said the nation should be proud that the Republicans have a woman on the ticket, but argued that returning Republicans to the White House 'is like asking the iceberg to save the Titanic.'"

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Huffington Post: We're Gonna Frickin' Lose this Thing, by Adam McKay

"So what is this house advantage the Republicans have? It's the press. There is no more fourth estate. Wait, hold on...I'm not going down some esoteric path with theories on the deregulation of the media and corporate bias and CNN versus Fox...I mean it: there is no more functioning press in this country. And without a real press the corporate and religious Republicans can lie all they want and get away with it. And that's the 51% advantage."

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Daily Kos: On Being Pentecostal Holiness

"The mere idea of having someone who believes like this in a high office is so personal and repulsive to me, that I not only donated more money to the Obama campaign, but will get involved actively in some way. I know what these people believe. I have lived it. Any one of them near the White House is not okay."

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New York Times: The Resentment Strategy

"What struck me as I watched the convention speeches, however, is how much of the anger on the right is based not on the claim that Democrats have done bad things, but on the perception — generally based on no evidence whatsoever — that Democrats look down their noses at regular people."

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FiveThirtyEight.com: Sarah Palin Is Not a Hockey Mom

"In the hockey analogy, Palin wouldn’t get within a thousand miles of an NHL All-Star Game because she’s not a scoring talent. She’s a role player, an emotion-rouser. Emotion messes with the chalkboard-drawn game plan and thus achieves a specific strategic objective. She can make game-changing agitation plays that rouse her home team and provoke the other side into counterattacks that – 100% of the time – end up punishing the team who hits back. Democrats would be smart to understand her as such, and I see a lot of reaction that doesn't seem to grasp what Palin is doing and the value she's providing. I see a lot of Democrats taking a lot of bait."

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