With all of that said, Zogby is out with its latest poll. Taken directly from the front page of the Drudge Report:

ZOGBY SATURDAY: Republican John McCain has pulled back within the margin of error... The three-day average holds steady, but McCain outpolled Obama 48% to 47% in Friday, one day, polling. He is beginning to cut into Obama's lead among independents, is now leading among blue collar voters, has strengthened his lead among investors and among men, and is walloping Obama among NASCAR voters. Joe the Plumber may get his license after all... 

The fact that John McCain has not been ahead in any national poll since five days before the Red Sea parted, is the actual story here.

Andrew Roman,  Brooklyn, NY

In an article published earlier today at the ABC News website, Senator Obama, responding to Republican attacks of his economic plan as nothing more than socialism, was quoted as saying, “John McCain and Sarah Palin, they call this socialistic. You know I don’t know when, when they decided they wanted to make a virtue out of selfishness."

Read the entire article here.

If ever there was an upside down, wrong-headed, misguided, convoluted, mixed-up way of looking at how to revitalize the American economy, it is Senator Obama’s.

He says:

The point is, though, that -- and it’s not just charity, it’s not just that I want to help the middle class and working people who are trying to get in the middle class -- it’s that when we actually make sure that everybody’s got a shot – when young people can all go to college, when everybody’s got decent health care, when everybody’s got a little more money at the end of the month – then guess what? Everybody starts spending that money, they decide maybe I can afford a new car, maybe I can afford a computer for my child. They can buy the products and services that businesses are selling and everybody is better off. All boats rise. That’s what happened in the 1990s, that’s what we need to restore. And that’s what I’m gonna do as president of the United States of America. 

(Speaking now directly to Mr. Obama)

Do you not see the difference between that which is voluntary and that which is mandated under the penalty of law?

Senator Obama, if I may be so bold ... What color is the sky in your world, sir? Is a virtuosity coerced by government force really virtuous? Despite your obvious belief that America is a disgustingly self-centered nation of fat cats hell bent on sticking it to the little guy - a country that, in your own words, is in need of a fundamental transformation - the virtuosity of the American people is absolutely genuine, far-reaching, and indicative of a good, noble and just society – not because of the government, but in spite of it. The United States of America, in fact, is the most giving nation in the world - both in dollars spent and in blood shed - and will continue to be, in spite of your attempts to "fundamentally transform" her.

Andrew Roman, Brooklyn, NY

In 1974, terrorist-turned college professor William Ayers co-authored a book called “Prairie Fire” with some of his Weather Underground cohorts – including his wife, Bernadine Dohrn. Among the people Ayers, et al, dedicated the book to was Sirhan Bishara Sirhan, assassin of Senator Robert F. Kennedy.

It is a very difficult book to come across.

A blogger at the great Free Republic.com website who goes by the screen name “fight_truth_decay” has some remarkable screen shots of the radical text, which has the delightful little subtitle: “The Politics of Revolutionary Anti-Imperialism.”

I have included a scan of the book’s cover below, but to see some of the inner pages, including the dedication page, visit the original blog at Free Republic.

In an article posted at FloridaToday.com, Senator John McCain appears to have the early lead among Floridians who have already cast a ballot.

Democrats are beaming that their party is outperforming the Republicans in early voting, releasing numbers Wednesday that show registrants of their party ahead 54 percent to 30 percent among the 1.4 million voters who have gone to the polls early.

But party breakdowns for turnout aren't the same as final tallies, and at least one poll offered a different view for the campaign of Republican John McCain.

A Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll gave McCain a 49-45 lead over Democrat Barack Obama among Floridians who have already voted.

And Republicans continued to show a traditional strength, leading 50 percent to the Democrats' 30 percent in the 1.2 million absentee ballots already returned. 

Assuming there is truth to the LA Times/Bloomberg numbers, it would mean that while approximately 756,000 registered Democrats have already cast their vote (compared to only 420,000 registered Republicans), Senator Obama has only received 630,000 votes – 56,000 votes less than Senator McCain.

Andrew Roman

Brooklyn, NY

On Sunday, the New York Daily News ran a story about domestic terrorist turned professor - and thus, to many in academia, a perfectly honorable man – William Ayers. He was in New York City to address a gathering at the Stella Adler Studio of Acting. While his appearance may or may not have been interesting in and of itself, I will not squander space in this column focusing of the human debris that is Ayers. Rather, I want to focus on some wording used in the story by its author, Richard Vanderford.

Like most who make their bones in objective journalism, Vanderford’s bias is more than just hard-wired in him. It is actually unrealized by him in his work - and it is wholly indicative of where the media are today.

In the very first sentence of the article, he writes:

The man the GOP loves to hate tiptoed out of hiding Sunday - if only to blast Fox News and the rest of the media for his predicament.

Take that in for a moment.

While I couldn’t give a rat’s tonsil if the radical scum Mr. Ayers blasts Fox News – as long as he doesn’t do it with real bombs - I do care how Ayers is characterized by journalists like Vanderford.

William Ayers is “the man the GOP loves to hate.”  When I read that, I cringed.

“Love to hate?”

Vanderford makes William Ayers sound like a soap opera villain or a movie bad guy – the man we love to hate.

“Next week, on Days of Our Lives, the man that everyone loves to hate is back ..”

“Hannibal Lecter, the man that America loves to hate, returns … in a new Christmas Special … Hannibal the Cannibal on Ice!”

William Ayers, for the umpteenth million time, is a genuine, bona-fide domestic terrorist, yet Vanderford – right off the bat – renders him as some sort of prime-time television desperado.  Ayers has not only exhibited no remorse for his despicable acts (other than his lamentations for not being able to do more harm), but does nothing to hide his contempt for the very country that affords him the opportunity to reap the benefits of his radical past by rewarding him with a professorship. He is the very definition of “anti-American.”

Imagine for a moment if Mr. Ayers had tossed a homemade bomb into a campaign headquarters for someone like George McGovern back in 1972, or detonated an IED in front of an abortion clinic right after Roe vs Wade made on-demand abortion a national reality. Let’s further imagine that thirty-odd years down the road, Mr. Ayers became a successful oil executive or a conservative talk show host and never even as much as apologized for his deadly deeds of the past. Is there anyone who believes for a moment that the media would refer to him as the man “Democrats love to hate?” They would never be so flip - or so dismissive - as to minimize the evil perpetrated by a radical from the right with phraseology that sounds like it was extracted from a check-out stand fan magazine – nor should they.

As Vanderford also writes:

Ayers, a University of Illinois education professor in Chicago, has mostly kept a low profile since McCain started using him as a poster boy for Obama's supposed left-wing leanings.

“Supposed left-wing leanings?”

Andrew Roman, Washington, D.C.

According to the story from the Fox News Channel website:

According an LA Times article written by Peter Wallsten in April, Obama was a "friend and frequent dinner companion" of Rashid Khalidi, who from 1976 to1982 was reportedly a director of the official Palestinian press agency, WAFA, which was operating in exile from Beirut with the PLO.

Click here to read the original LA Times story: 'Palestinians See a Friend in Barack Obama.'

In the article -- based on the videotape obtained by the Times -- Wallsten said Obama addressed an audience during a 2003 farewell dinner for Khalidi, who was Obama's colleague at the University of Chicago, before his departure for Columbia University in New York. Obama said his many talks with Khalidi and his wife Mona stood as "consistent reminders to me of my own blind spots and my own biases."

The Los Angeles Times, which has already endorsed Obama, refuses to release the videotape. Here's the complete story from Fox News.

Fox News continues:

On the tape, according to the Times, Obama said in his toast that he hoped his relationship with Khalidi would continue even after the professor left Chicago. "It's for that reason that I'm hoping that, for many years to come, we continue that conversation -- a conversation that is necessary not just around Mona and Rashid's dinner table ... [but around] this entire world."

Senator Obama has more emanations and penumbras in his past than all of the "non-radical" Warren-court decisions combined.

Andrew Roman, Washington, D.C.

I think we can say that the Constitution reflected a enormous blind spot in this culture that carries on until this day, and that the Framers had that same blind spot. I don’t think the two views are contradictory, to say that it was a remarkable political document that paved the way for where we are now, and to say that it also reflected the fundamental flaw of this country that continues to this day.

You can hear the actual clip right here: Obama says Constitution Deep Flaw Continues Today.

To these defeatists, the election is a mere formality now. As far as they’re concerned, Senator Barack Obama can begin measuring the Oval Office for window treatments.

It’s enormously aggravating.

Expecting gloom and doom from the left is one thing. It’s like expecting a hungry mosquito to be happy at a nudist colony. It’s simply inevitable. Yet, some of these supposed conservative column-jockeys sound determined to be the ones to show that they hammered in John McCain’s coffin nails before anyone else did. Their collective pessimism and Obama-coronating scribbles are, as talk-show host Laura Ingraham would say, tedious.

Just imagine these conservative thinkers waging the battles and authoring the strategies in the War on Terror with the same zeal, virility and attitude with which they have approached the home stretch of this election.

They’d be Democrats.

Inspiring, yes?

This, of course, is the same group of oft-convoluted wordsmiths who rail incessantly against the intrinsic liberal bias in the media (rightly so) - and yet, now that the struggle for the White House has proven to be a tough one, and Senator McCain is clearly fighting an uphill battle against a candidate who not only embraces socialist ideals but is protected by a media behemoth doing exactly what they do best - namely, deprecating conservative values at almost every possible juncture – there are concessions and defections taking place all over.

Excuse me, fellow traditionalists, conservatives, Republicans and patriots – your party, your movement, your country desperately needs you now. Where is your intestinal fortitude?

If I may offer a suggestion … how about not throwing in the towel like a bunch of front-running crybabies and support your team? How about waiting until the last out is actually made before you begin heading back to the dugout with your chin on your chest, trying to figure out how Republicans can deal with a Messianic administration?

I simply don’t understand the mindset. The election is still nine days away. Historically, presidential polling has been known to be – how would you say – a bit off?

By no means is this thing a done deal.

Yet, many of the most respected and widely-read self-proclaimed conservative columnists have all but wheeled the champagne cart into the opposing team’s locker room.

Washington Post columnist David Frum, for example, says that Republicans need to create a plan of salvage, which includes conceding the White House while pouring resources into Senate races. 

New York Times columnist David Brooks predicts a nine point Obama victory while calling Sarah Palin a "fatal cancer to the Republican party."

Christopher Buckley, son of the great William F. Buckley – who for a period penned the back-page column at National Review and was a speech-writer for then Vice President George H.W. Bush – openly threw his support behind Senator Obama because, among other reasons, he “has in him … the potential to be a good, perhaps even great leader. He is, it seems clear enough, what the historical moment seems to be calling for.”

Okay, Chris.

Columnist Kathleen Parker suggested that victory could be possible if Governor Sarah Palin simply stepped aside as John McCain’s running mate, lest she be the authoress of any more cringe-worthy moments.

There are others.

Add to this list of opinion-page word slingers actual Republican defectors - like former Secretary of State Colin Powell, or former Republican Governor of Massachusetts, William Weld (who actually said that Barack Obama was a “once-in-a-lifetime candidate who will transform our politics and restore America's standing in the world"), or former Republican Minnesota Governor, Arne Carlson, who wrote that Obama was “a remarkably disciplined and focused leader who has the potential to become a truly great president."

I am convinced I have slipped into an alternate dimension.

Notice not one of these pundits or politicians claim to admire Obama’s policies or positions. Why should they? He speaks so well. It’s all about his “potential” or his “discipline” or his “historical significance” or some other off-the-rack slice of bumper-sticker twaddle.

So, what exactly about this big government, wealth-distributing, terrorist-befriending, cliché spewing, all-abortion all-the-time one-trick phony-baloney hyper-liberal do these so-called Republicans find so alluring?

This is, and can only be, about one thing - that is, wanting to be on the winning side of an historic election.

What else?

Is it Obama’s plan of swiping more earnings from the successful among us and handing it out to the undeserving (under the guise of tax cuts) that is so appealing to these Republicans? Perhaps it is Obama’s pledge to sign the Freedom of Choice Act into law upon taking office that has these so-called conservatives all gaga. Maybe it is Obama’s associations with an unrepentant terrorist, an America-hating clergyman and a corrupt community organizing group that has the mouths of the converted awash in salivary admiration. Of course, it could also be Obama’s willingness to sit down unconditionally with despotic world leaders, coupled with his sound judgment in opposing the “surge” in Iraq that instills confidence in his abilities to be Commander-In-Chief.

Frankly, this is just ridiculous.

As talk show host Dennis Prager often says, “First tell the truth, and then give your opinion.”

With that in mind, answer this …

If Senator John McCain were up by, say, ten points in all of these tracking polls, how many defections to the Democratic ticket do you think you’d count?

Perhaps a better question is … if a Democratic nominee who held the identical positions of Senator Obama were running for President, and he were not black, would any of these head-hanging, whiny, incoherent converts even dream of compromising their values to sing the praises of such a card-carrying leftist? Would it even be an option to concede the White House until the votes were tallied?

Truth first. Opinion later.

Of course, all of that is conditional on whether or not the event being commemorated passes muster with those on high in the main-stream-media. If the anniversary celebrates a positive aspect of something that is otherwise overwhelmingly ostracized by the main-stream-media – such as the war in Iraq – you can bet it will go unseen.

I wonder how many know that tomorrow, October 25^th, is the three year anniversary of the official approval of the Iraqi Constitution.

After tomorrow, how many more will know that it was?

If modern journalism were a living entity, it would almost contradict Darwin’s theory of natural selection. It is questionable how such an organism in its present form can continue to survive – and yet, it does somehow.

Three years ago, when the story was new, in what some had recognized as one of the greatest events in modern history – that being the democratically adopted Constitution of the formerly despotic nation of Iraq – there was barely a butterfly’s eye-lash of a whisper about it on front pages anywhere in this country. This profound and monumental story with international ramifications was relegated to be buried beyond the latest “Tom Cruise and his new bride” diatribes by editors who continually note and criticize the American-centric nature of our collective attention spans. A most relevant cog in the wheel of war against Islamo-Fascist terrorism was all but a footnote.

Yet, going back to the same time period, how many recall the media frenzy – the nearly pathetic orgasmic unison – with which newsrooms across the map commemorated the 2,000^th American military casualty in Iraq? (In the spirit of remembrance, this coming Sunday will actually be the three-year anniversary of that grisly “benchmark”) I wonder how many truly remember how obsessive the media were about that number. It was almost “Y-2-K-ish” for a period of time – although I’m surprised some creative young newshound somewhere didn’t come up with the phrase “I-2-K”.

Living in New York City,  I recall that the Daily News, New York Post and Newsday each had full front page spreads letting us know that the grizzly new landmark had been reached - this following several weeks of television reports and newspaper articles reminding us of how the death toll in Iraq was approaching two-thousand. It had a strange “Guess how much the Power Ball jackpot is up to now?” kind of feel to it. Once the big board hit the magic number, it was everywhere, right on cue, complete with morose photographs, pointed criticisms of evil Republican diktats and Cindy Sheehan references.

Sadly, the 2K death toll story wasn’t meant to serve as a tribute to fallen heroes who gallantly sacrificed their lives for this nation. It became the story it did because the words “two thousand” had a more lyrical quality and smoother timbre than, say, “one-thousand eight-hundred, forty two.”

It rolled off the tongue better.

Try it. You’ll see.

According to the KDKA website:

At a news conference this afternoon, officials said they believe the woman's injuries were self-inflicted.  Ashley Todd, 20, is now facing charges for filing a false report to police.

Todd, of Texas, initially told police that she was robbed at an ATM in Bloomfield and that the suspect became enraged and started beating her after seeing her GOP sticker on her car. Police investigating the alleged attack, however, began to notice some inconsistencies in her story and administered a polygraph test. Authorities, however, declined to release the results of that test.

Investigators did say that they received photos from the ATM machine and "the photographs were verified as not being the victim making the transaction."

This afternoon, a Pittsburgh police commander told KDKA Investigator Marty Griffin that Todd confessed to making up the story. 

For a multitude of reasons, this is an obviously disgusting development.

In purely political terms, it was an exercise in sheer and utter stupidity. There is so much ammunition that can be leveled at the campaign of Barack Obama - even by marginally articulate thinkers on the right – it just isn’t necessary to have to make up such a terrifying and violent attack perpetrated by one of his demented supporters.

Andrew Roman, Brooklyn, NY

Check it out here.