Obama

[Soldier4Christ]

Ah.....Bach.
quote by Radar O'Rielly

 

[HisDaughter]

At least somebody got it!

[Soldier4Christ]

Obama: I’ll make energy prices “skyrocket”

In another clip from the same January 2008 interview with the San Francisco Chronicle in which Barack Obama promised to bankrupt anyone foolish enough to build coal-burning power plants, he also made an interesting admission about his entire energy plan. Obama told the editors that his policies would make energy prices “skyrocket” as the energy industry passed along the exorbitant costs of his cap-and-trade policy:

The problem is not technical, uh, and the problem is not mastery of the legislative intricacies of Washington. The problem is, uh, can you get the American people to say, “This is really important,” and force their representatives to do the right thing? That requires mobilizing a citizenry. That requires them understanding what is at stake. Uh, and climate change is a great example.

You know, when I was asked earlier about the issue of coal, uh, you know — Under my plan of a cap and trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket. Even regardless of what I say about whether coal is good or bad. Because I’m capping greenhouse gases, coal power plants, you know, natural gas, you name it — whatever the plants were, whatever the industry was, uh, they would have to retrofit their operations. That will cost money. They will pass that money on to consumers.

They — you — you can already see what the arguments will be during the general election. People will say, “Ah, Obama and Al Gore, these folks, they’re going to destroy the economy, this is going to cost us eight trillion dollars,” or whatever their number is. Um, if you can’t persuade the American people that yes, there is going to be some increase in electricity rates on the front end, but that over the long term, because of combinations of more efficient energy usage, changing lightbulbs and more efficient appliance, but also technology improving how we can produce clean energy, the economy would benefit.

If we can’t make that argument persuasively enough, you — you, uh, can be Lyndon Johnson, you can be the master of Washington. You’re not going to get that done.

[Soldier4Christ]

Fake McCain group blasts Corsi
Anti-war, Obama-supporting group pretends to be GOP 'staffers'

An anti-war, pro-Obama individual or group masquerading as a McCain organization is e-mailing dozens of journalists, radio talk shows and U.S. senators, complaining to them – as McCain campaign "staffers" – that WND senior reporter Jerome Corsi is "a wacko" for investigating the legitimacy of Barack Obama's birth certificate.

A quick examination of the "McCain" website leave little doubt it is virulently anti-McCain. But journalists, talkers and producers receiving e-mails from the address "staff@electjohnmccain2008.com" could easily think they were hearing from supporters of the Republican presidential candidate.

One e-mail sent recently by staff@electjohnmccain2008.com to 58 recipients, including Fox News, CNN, several conservative pundits like Michelle Malkin, and dozens of U.S. senators, said this:

    [Obama] HAS a valid birth certificate. What's the big F'ing deal?
    http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/born_in_the_usa.html

    Corsi is a wacko. Let's talk about issues, you morons!

    We're not defending Obama. We're only trying to stop the smearing so we can talk about real issues. This trash about Obama being a terrorist, arab, muslim or socialist is BS!

    Is McCain a socialist because he said the same thing in 2000?
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNke6ad0t6g

    Stop this ranting and join reality.

One of the recipients of this particular e-mail was C.J. Wheeler, executive producer of the Rick Roberts Show broadcast out of San Diego on KFMB 760 am.

"I assumed it was part of the McCain camp," Wheeler told WND. "But when I called Jerome Corsi, a frequent guest on our show, he said this isn't from McCain people, it's from Obama people."

In a posting last week on Barack Obama's official website, the poster reproduced an e-mail from ElectJohnMccain2008.com and headlined the blog entry: "AMAZING AND FUNNY EMAIL I RECEIVED FROM MCCAIN CAMPAIGN." The e-mail posting goes on to mock McCain with statements like this:

    Don't forget: Obama is a Muslim, Arab, Terrorist, Socialist, Communist, Homosexual Elitist who wants to tax the air you breath and send the money to Al Qaeda! With your help, my friends, Obama will lose!

Obama's website notes at the bottom of the page: "Content on blogs in My.BarackObama represents the opinions of community members and in no way should be interpreted as endorsed or approved by the campaign."

Calling the deceptive organizational name "fraud and trickery," Wheeler said "this is clearly a scam to make it appear to all the media that this guy is … a member of the McCain staff – and on the day before the election no less."

[Soldier4Christ]

Who is Jamillah Muhammad?
Camp Obama trainer steers youth away from military service

WND has learned that a senior Obama campaign staffer involved in marshalling college students and other campaign volunteers to get out the vote tomorrow is an anti-military extremist who, even during the popular first Gulf war, steered minority youth away from service in the military.

Sen. Barack Obama hired Jamillah Muhammad, an early community organizer friend in Chicago, to help train young volunteers in the "ruthless" agitation tactics of the late socialist organizer Saul Alinsky. The training sessions have been held at something called "Camp Obama" inside the campaign's Chicago headquarters.

Muhammad, a black Muslim, led anti-military counseling in Chicago during the Gulf war to steer young blacks away from supposedly racist military recruiters who she claimed took advantage of their joblessness and poor education. Her Chicago Coalition of African-American Religious Women sponsored "peace clubs" and other youth-training programs as a non-military alternative for young minorities.

Her pacifist agenda dovetails with Obama's plan to slash military spending and shift national resources to nonmilitary service, creating an army of young community organizers, such as those who work for the radical nonprofit ACORN.

"We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we've set," Obama said at a July 2 speech in Colorado Springs, Colo. "We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded."

During the 1990-1991 Gulf war, Muhammad, also director of the Youth and Militarism Program, a branch of the Clergy and Laity Concerned in Chicago, battled campus military recruiters who she claimed targeted and exploited black youth. She said they "capitalize" on their financial desperation and therefore engage in a kind of "poverty draft."

"Once and for all, black women are saying, we're not sending our sons anymore," said Muhammad, who opposed the war. "Until things change for our children," the military is not going to get them.

"Eighty-eight to 90 percent of black Americans are opposed to the war because we continually find that our young people are considered the most expendable by United States government officials," Muhammad charged, adding that the Pentagon lies about the true number of blacks enlisted in the army. She claimed they made up as much as 60 percent of the ground forces during the Gulf war.

Muhammad says the black community rejects the government's foreign policy and believes that change in the country's socio-economic structure is coming.

"We have to support our troops from a different perspective than white people, because our soldiers are going to return home to the same lousy situation they left," she said. "Patriotism means something all together different for us."

Obama's pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright has also condemned the U.S. military, even claiming the 9/11 attacks were just punishment for military aggression in the world.

Muhammad added that black youths don't get the high-tech training the military advertises.

"The only involvement they may have with computers is unloading them off a truck," she said. "We send kids to the military, and they come out qualified to be janitors with a gun."

But, "They make it sound like the promised land," she said. "How is a kid supposed to resist that?"

Muhammad compared military recruiters to inner-city gang leaders.

"Show up in uniform, and you are somebody. That's the way the gangs recruit kids," she said. "They have their colors, and their jackets, and they are a part of something."

Muhammad also is a founder of African American Women for Choice, and served as director of resource and program development for Jesse Jackson's PUSH for Excellence in Chicago.

Muhammad worked with Obama as a community organizer in the housing projects on Chicago's South Side.

Obama hired his old friend and colleague as a senior trainer at his Camp Obama, which has trained more than 2,000 young campaign volunteers in the techniques of community organization originally popularized by radical Saul Alinsky in order to organize voters and help win the election. Alinsky was a street agitator who sought to "rub raw the sores of discontent" and provoke a socialist revolution in America.

Camp Obama's director is Jocelyn Woodards, another former Obama colleague who worked with him early last decade at an ACORN subsidiary to help get out the vote during Carol Moseley-Braun's Senate campaign.

Woodards has taught campers to "be absolutely ruthless" in turning out the vote for Obama.

Obama recently told supporters in Nevada, a hotly contested state, to sharpen their elbows in the final days of the campaign. Confront Republicans, he said, and "get in their faces."

[HisDaughter]

Amazing isn't it?  For one who say's he's not a muslim, not a socialist, not a crook etc, etc...he sure has a lot of them surrounding him and on his team.

I say "It takes one to know one".  And I'll leave it at that.

If he wins, it won't be "God Bless America", it will be "God Help America"!

[HisDaughter]

Forgive me, but I found this on a WND blog and had to share it with you.  I think this fella is right on.
Grammyluv


Old Man Worried
Posted Nov 03, 2008 10:36

My most important issue in this election is to keep Obama the Communists from winning the election and then attempting to set up his “Socialist” dictatorship.

I am an old man and never before have I been so worried for the future of my beloved country than I am right now. I lived through the times when Communist (they call themselves Socialists) dictators were slaughtering millions upon millions of innocent civilians for no other reason than their belief in God. I know the evil that Communism is. I know how the Communists take over a country and install their dictatorship then disarm the civilians and start killing Christians and anyone else that openly disagrees with their setting up a dictatorship. I have seen this with my own eyes.

Barry Soetoro aka Barrok Hussain Obama is a communist. He is a documented member of the Communist “New Party*, a branch of the “American Democratic Socialist Party” out of Chicago. That he is a member of that Communist Party is a documented, proven, fact. Furthermore, Obama has surrounded himself with Communists his entire life. His best friends and mentors are communists, including but not limited to: Frank Marshel Davis (a communist, self confessed pedophile, and dope dealer), William Ayres and wife (leaders of the Communist Weather Underground that bombed our nations buildings during the Viet Nam war) and Harry Bridges (a Communist union leader and official member of the Communist Party). When you listen to the plans that Obama has for our nation you will hear the Communist influence. Barrok Hussain Obama is a Communist, pure and simple. If he becomes President he will do everything within his power to change our nation into a Communist Dictatorship. Our nation has never before been in so much danger of a Communist take over from within. The Communist front groups like Acorn and the Communist Parties like the New Party and Communist supporters in Hollywood and the mainstream new media are all working together like a well oiled machine to get Obama elected. Communism is the most evil form of Government ever inflicting mankind. It is a murderous excuse for evil people to become dictators with absolute power.

There is even a very strong possibility the Obama isn’t even a US citizen but is a citizen of Indonesia. Obama’s Grandmother and Aunt say that he was born in Kenya and then later moved to Indonesia with is Step Father and became a citizen of Indonesia. There is a question as to Obama’s true citizenship that the Democratic Party and Obama supporters are making every effort not to answer. My dear God will a Communist, illegal alien, be our next President? If the Communists take over, our liberty, our freedoms including our right to free speech, our right to keep and bear arms, our right to worship God, will all be done away with. Please vote for anyone other than the Communist Obama. Thank you!

Jesus please have mercy on us and save our nation.

[Soldier4Christ]

Tomorrow is the day ...

VOTE! Your very life may depend on it.

[HisDaughter]

Tomorrow is the day ...

VOTE! Your very life may depend on it.

AMEN!

[Barbara]

Amen Pastor Roger and Grammyluv!! We already voted early. Now we can only sit back, watch and pray for our beloved country!

This from Koenig's Eye View

Executive Summary

The global financial crisis continues to ripple aroung the world. Food prices have risen with fuel prices, causing shortages and the need to find a better, more efficient way to feed people - genetically modified foodstuffs.

Large companies are coming back to Congress, hat in hand, for relief from laws that require them to fund pensions at 95 percent because they have lost so much money. And the emerging economy, once thought to be recession-proof, is now facing a record 60 percent decline in value.

All this before the most important election in the world takes place in just a few days. Whereas Democrativ Vice Presidental candidate Joseph Biden said the next president, in his thinking Barack Hussein Obama, would be tried with a crisis within six months, perhaps that time frame will be reduced to less than six days...

Inside the White House

by Bill Koenig

On  Tuesday, Nov. 4, the United States will have the most important election to date in its history. The outcome will have a significant impact on the United States, Israel and the nations of the world. Our prayers and votes are extremely important.

Our nation's sins, revellion and disobedience have given Obama a chance.

Our nation's sins, rebellion and disobedience have allowed the possibility of a person like Barack Obama to be elected president, a man who says homosexuality isn't a sin, favors later-term abortion (even infanticide), has questionable domestic and foreign associations, and says that people can be saved through other faiths while calling himself a Christian.

We have posted numerous articles at our web site  watch.org under "Provocative Commentary" that address Barack Obama's character and relationships.

Additionally, it is estimated that 50 percent of Christians are going to vote for Obama. Ninety-five percent of black Americans are going to vote for Obama, and that includes a lot of Christians. With this close a race, Christians are going to be responsible for the outcome.

Christian right intensifies attacks on Obama

Article excerpt:

Terrorist strikes on four American cities, Russia rolling into Eastern Europe, Israel hit by a nuclear bomb. Gay marriage in every state. The end of the Boy Scouts.

All are plausible scenarios if Democrat Barack Obama is elected president, according to a new addition to the campaign conversation called "Letter from 2012 in Obama's America," produced by the conservative Christian group Focus on the Family Action.

"It looks like, walks like, talks like and smells like desperation to me," said the Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell of Houston, an Obama supporter who backed President Bush in the past two elections. The Methodist pastor called the 2012 letter "false and ridiculous." He said it showed that some Christian conservative leaders fear that Obama's faith-based appeals to voters are working.

"Everyone uses fear in the last part of a campaign, but evangelicals are especially theologically prone to those sorts of arguments," said Clyde Wilcox, a Georgetown University political scientist, "There's a long tradition of predicting doom and gloom."

But the tone this election year is sharper than usual, an the volume has turned up as Nov. 4 nears.

Steve Strang, publisher of Charisma magazine, a Pentecostal publication, titled one of his recent weekly emails to readers, "Life as we know it will end if Obama is elected."

Strang said gay rights and abortion rights would be strengthened in an Obama administration, taxes would rise, and "people who hate Christianity will be emboldened to attack our freedoms."

Separately, a group called the Christian Anti-Defamation Commission has posted a series of videos on its site and on YouTube called "7 Reasons Barack Obama Is Not a Christian."

The commission accuses Obama of "subtle diabolical deceit" in saying he is Christian while he believes that people can be saved through other faiths.

One of the clear targets of this latest conservative Christian push against the Democrat is younger evangelicals who might be considering him. The letter posits that young evangelicals provide the margin that may let Obama defeat John McCain. But Margaret Feinberg, a Denver-area evangelical author, predicts failure.

"Young evangelicals are tired - like most people at this point in the election - and rhetoric which is fear-based, strong-arms the listener, and states opinion as fact will only polarize rather than further the informed, balanced discussion that younger voters are hungry for," she said.

Koenigs perspective: Any teachings and any believer's actions that are in opposition to the Scipturess constitute rebellion.

The "replacement theology" part of the church (approximately 65 percent of US churchgoers) believes that Bible prophecy is allegorical and not literal. This has been extremely costly to Israel and our nation.

If you don't believe in Bible prophecy,m you will tend to disregard and/or reapply the Scriptures for your own purposes. Therein lies the danger of taking away or adding to the Word of God.

Revelation 22:19 (KJV) says, "And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book."

Cont'd...

[Soldier4Christ]

Obama speechwriter defects to McCain
'I didn't leave the Democratic Party; the Democratic Party left me'

A long-time Democratic speechwriter who claims to have written for both Barack and Michelle Obama has announced she is leaving the Democratic Party and endorsing John McCain for president.

Wendy Button, a frequent columnist for the Huffington Post, where she is credited with writing speeches for Democratic Sens. John Edwards, Hillary Rodham Clinton, and John Kerry and for Boston Mayor Thomas Menino, made the announcement in a blog post called "So Long, Democrats" on The Daily Beast.

Button's reasons for defecting from the Democrats include false campaign slogans, poor economic policy and her admission that McCain was right about the surge in Iraq; but her argument begins with outrage over the way the Obama campaign attacked two women and a common man – Hillary Clinton, Sarah Palin and Joe the Plumber – the kind of people she thought the Democratic Party championed.

"I can no longer justify what this party has done and can't dismiss the treatment of women and working people as just part of the new kind of politics," Button writes.

She says "the final straw" came when Democrats attacked and mocked Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher (a.k.a. Joe the Plumber) for balking at a tax hike during difficult economic times.

"The party I believed in wouldn't look down on working people under any circumstance," Button writes. "And Joe the Plumber is right. This is the absolutely worst time to raise taxes on anyone: the rich, the middle class, the poor, small businesses and corporations."

Button further railed on Democratic fiscal policy, stating, "Our approach to problems – big government solutions paid for by taxing the rich and big and smaller companies – is just as tired and out of date as trickle down economics. How about a novel approach that simply finds a sane way to stop the bleeding?

"That's not exactly the philosophy of a Democrat," she concludes.

Button takes exception in her article to the way her former party has mocked McCain's age, used Palin's wardrobe to score political points and portrayed the Republican VP candidate as stupid.

Button writes of Palin, "When someone takes on a corrupt political machine and a sitting governor, that is not done by someone with a low I.Q. or a moral core made of tissue paper." She even praises Palin for her determination and humility, despite stating she disagrees with the governor on social issues.

"Sexism. Racism. Ageism and maybe some Socialism have all made their ugly cameos in election 2008," Button writes. "It's not inspiring. Perhaps this is why I found the initial mocking of Joe so offensive and I realized an old line applied: 'I didn't leave the Democratic Party; the Democratic Party left me.'"

Button's article has generated hundreds of responses from The Daily Beast's readers.

One poster writes, "How can you possibly fault the Democratic Party for undermining the goals and mocking the aspirations of women and members of the working class? Have you paid attention to anything that has happened in this country for the last 30 years?"

A more supportive response came from another reader: "Thank you Wendy for having the resolve to look at who's who in this election and stand up for the people of America rather than just a party."

WND contacted the Obama campaign for comment and to seek confirmation that Button worked with Obama but received no reply.

[Shammu]

Sen. B. Hussein Obama, who is truly turning out to be one of the greatest performers of all times. Obama’s biggest act is that he calls himself a Christian, yet he goes against almost, ALL Biblical Doctrine!!

Yet in the past Hussein has said "Fundamentalist Christians" are the problem with Christianty. I disagree, "Fundamentalist Christians" are not nearly as much of a threat to the free world as are the sadists, call muslims.

Obama-nation, I've said it before, I'll said it again, I believe Hussein is a muslim.

[Shammu]

Obama gives McCain the finger while congratulating him on his campaign.

For the second time this campaign season, Barack Obama the otherwise flawless campaigner has allowed his non-verbal body language to leak out again on camera. For the second time in 2 years, he’s given the finger to his opponent. First he subconsciously extended the middle digit to Hillary Clinton while talking about her.  then did the same thing to John McCain today.

This is what happens when you’re saying congratulations on the outside, but saying forget you on the inside.

I would post the site, except for the graphic behavior of Obama, is NOT that of a Christian attitude.

Obama gives McCain the finger while congratulating him on his campaign.

I've read accounts that Obama is delusional (psychotic), and this would sort of back that up a bit. If my fellow American elects him, I suppose they deserve what they'll get. All the warning signs are in plain sight.

[Shammu]

Polls Show Obama Leading in States Whose Electoral Votes Total Nearly 300

The Democrats Heading Toward Expanded House and Senate Majorities

By David S. Broder, Dan Balz and Chris Cillizza
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, November 2, 2008; AA01

Barack Obama and the Democrats hold a commanding position two days before Tuesday's election, with the senator from Illinois leading in states whose electoral votes total nearly 300 and with his party counting on significantly expanded majorities in the House and Senate.

John McCain is running in one of the worst environments ever for a Republican presidential nominee. The senator from Arizona has not been in front in any of the 159 national polls conducted over the past six weeks. His slender hopes for winning the White House now depend on picking up a major Democratic stronghold or fighting off Obama's raids on most of the five states President Bush won four years ago that now lean toward the Democrat. He also must hold onto six other states that Bush won in 2004 but are considered too close to call.

Two factors cloud the final weekend projections. The first is how voters ultimately respond to the prospect of the first African American president in U.S. history, a force that could make the contest closer than it appears. The other, which pushes in the opposite direction, is whether Obama can expand the electorate to give him an additional cushion in battleground states.

Obama leads in every state that Democratic Sen. John F. Kerry won four years ago, which gives him a base of 252 electoral votes of the 270 needed to win. He also has leads of varying sizes in five states Bush won: Iowa, New Mexico, Virginia, Colorado and Nevada. Were he to win all of those on Tuesday, he would claim the presidency with 291 electoral votes.

The tossup states include traditional battlegrounds such as Ohio, Florida and Missouri, as well as North Carolina, Indiana and Montana, which have been firmly in the Republican column in the past. They account for 87 electoral votes, and if Obama were to win several of them, his electoral vote total could push well into the 300s.

In Senate races, Democrats, who control 51 votes, are closing in on a filibuster-proof 60-seat majority. Three GOP-held seats whose Republicans are retiring -- in Colorado, New Mexico and Virginia -- appear almost certain to go to Democrats. In five other states -- Alaska, Minnesota, New Hampshire, North Carolina and Oregon -- incumbent Republicans are seriously threatened. To get to 60, Democrats would have to win all those seats, plus one of three other competitive races: in Georgia, Kentucky and Mississippi.

In the House, Democrats look to repeat their gains of two years ago, when they picked up 31 seats and took control of the chamber. On Tuesday, they could add 25 to 30 seats to that majority, which would bring them to their highest number since 1990, when they had 267 seats. Ten Republican-held seats lean toward Democrats, and two dozen are viewed as tossups. Five Democratic-held seats are considered up for grabs.

Of the 11 gubernatorial races, only three are competitive. Democratic Attorney General Jay Nixon has the advantage over Rep. Kenny Hulshof in Missouri, where Republican Gov. Matt Blunt is not running for reelection. Two other races in states held by Democrats are considered tossups.

In Washington, Democratic Gov. Chris Gregoire, who won a controversial victory four years ago, faces a tough rematch against businessman Dino Rossi. In North Carolina, where Democratic Gov. Mike Easley is term-limited, Lt. Gov. Bev Perdue and Republican Pat McCrory, the mayor of Charlotte, are in a race that is too close to call.

These projections are based on interviews by a team of Washington Post reporters with strategists in both parties, the presidential campaigns, state and local officials, and other analysts. The projections also include an analysis of a wealth of polling data on individual races and states.

In the Washington Post-ABC News daily tracking poll, Obama currently holds a nine-point national advantage, topping McCain 53 to 44 percent. The poll started after the last of the three presidential debates, and Obama's margin has held between seven and 11 points throughout.

More than half of all voters in the Post-ABC poll say the economy is their central voting issue, and Obama has been the main beneficiary of that focus. He has a double-digit edge on the question of which candidate is better able to handle the economy, and he has had even wider leads as the one who is more in touch with the financial problems people face.
Presidential

No Democrat has won more than 50.1 percent of the national vote since Jimmy Carter in 1976, but Obama could eclipse that number on Tuesday if current projections hold. McCain advisers said yesterday that they think the race has tightened but acknowledged that the senator has a difficult path to victory, given the economy, Bush's unpopularity and the sour public mood.

Early on, Obama set his sights on expanding the number of battleground states. He has used his superior financial resources to put Democrats in a competitive position in places where they have not been before. With the largest war chest in presidential history, Obama has heavily outspent McCain on television and has poured millions into building an enormous field organization around the country. As a result, he has many more options to get to 270 electoral votes.

David Plouffe, Obama's campaign manager, said he has always assumed the race would be close in the end, but added: "We are entering the election with a lot of different scenarios to win the election, which was always our number one strategic goal. We think we are not in danger in any of the Kerry states, and we've got obviously about a dozen Bush states that we think are potentially winnable. So, a lot of different ways to get to 270."

McCain strategists insist that he is still in a position to win. But his margin of error is very small. He is investing time and resources in Pennsylvania, the one big state Democrats carried four years ago where his advisers think he has a chance to win. McCain is currently behind in Pennsylvania, but even if he were to win there, and hold onto Ohio and Florida, he could still lose if Obama carries the five Bush states where he is now leading.

Bill McInturff, McCain's pollster, offered a counter view by saying that the contest is shifting in the final days and that it is highly competitive. "The race is changing quickly," he said, "and I believe we're seeing real movement that is putting this race within margin of error nationally and too close to call in too many states to be able to predict the outcome."

Obama lost Pennsylvania to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton in the primaries, and some Democrats have fretted publicly that the state's older population and the issue of race make it a more difficult state for him than many others. Democratic Gov. Edward G. Rendell said he expects a massive vote from Philadelphia and a potentially strong showing in the surrounding suburbs to compensate for weaknesses in other parts of the state.

cont'd next post

[Shammu]

Both of the vice presidential running mates -- Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin for the Republicans and Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware for the Democrats -- have been employed heavily in the Pennsylvania campaign. Palin has proved popular among conservatives in the central and western parts of the state, while Scranton native Biden has worked to overcome resistance to Obama in northeastern Pennsylvania.

Ohio and Florida were major disappointments to Democrats in the past two elections, twice providing Bush with his electoral-vote margins. Obama, however, is competitive in both states and will spend his final days working each one.

The Mountain West is another region where Obama has expanded the battlefield. A rising Latino population and other demographic changes have reshaped the politics there, with significant increases in Democratic registration in Colorado and Nevada. McCain, who pushed for comprehensive immigration reform, hoped to attract significant support from the Hispanic community but has fallen short, according to polls. That has helped Obama in Colorado, Nevada and New Mexico.

Obama planted his flag early in two traditionally conservative states -- Indiana and Virginia -- in a further effort to stretch the map. He appears to have withstood McCain's effort to depict him as a tax-and-spend liberal and clearly has benefited from the economic woes that hit hard this fall. He is in a solid position in Virginia and competitive in Indiana. Neither state has voted for a Democratic presidential nominee since 1964.

African American votes are critical to Obama's hopes in both those states, and the same is true in Georgia and North Carolina, which have even higher percentages of black voters. Georgia appears likely to stay Republican on Tuesday, but North Carolina is highly competitive, based on the patterns of early voting there.
Senate

Democrats hold a 51-to-49 edge in the Senate. Two years ago, on their way to capturing control during the midterm elections, they won every close race. The same must happen Tuesday for them to reach the 60 votes needed to block Republican filibusters.

Three Republican retirements have given Democrats almost certain victories. In Virginia, former governor Mark R. Warner (D) is trouncing former governor James S. Gilmore III (R) for the seat of Sen. John W. Warner (R). In Colorado, where Republican Sen. Wayne Allard is stepping down, Democratic Rep. Mark Udall is the clear favorite. In New Mexico, Rep. Tom Udall, Mark Udall's cousin, is in similarly strong shape to win the seat of Republican Sen. Pete V. Domenici.

The collapse of support for Bush has put three other incumbent Republicans in jeopardy. In New Hampshire, Sen. John E. Sununu is in a rematch with former Democratic governor Jeanne Shaheen. In Minnesota, Sen. Norm Coleman faces stiff competition from comedian Al Franken. In Oregon, Sen. Gordon Smith appears to be trailing state House Speaker Jeff Merkley.

Three other incumbent Republicans are in trouble in part because of the potential for sizable African American turnout for Obama on Tuesday. In North Carolina, Sen. Elizabeth Dole is in a very competitive contest against state Sen. Kay Hagan. In Georgia, Sen. Saxby Chambliss is in some jeopardy in his race against former state representative Jim Martin. In Mississippi, appointed Sen. Roger Wicker is struggling to hold on against former governor Ronnie Musgrove.

Two other prominent Republicans are in tough races. In Alaska, Sen. Ted Stevens, who was convicted on seven corruption counts last week, faces possible rejection in his race against Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich. In Kentucky, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has gotten a scare from businessman Bruce Lunsford.

Only one Democrat is in a competitive race. In Louisiana, Sen. Mary Landrieu rates a narrow favorite over State Treasurer John Kennedy.
House

An extremely challenging national political environment, a series of unexpected retirements in swing seats and a deep fundraising deficit have put Republicans on the defensive in the House. Twenty-nine Republicans chose not to seek reelection, opening unexpected opportunities for Democrats.

By early fall, the cash shortage had grown beyond the expectations of even the most pessimistic Republicans. At the start of September, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee had $54 million to spend on House contests, compared with $14 million for the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Democrats see pickup opportunities everywhere they look, including multiple races in Florida, Ohio and Virginia, three normally Republican states that are now presidential battlegrounds.

Republicans, however, are counting on gaining the seat of Rep. Tim Mahoney (D-Fla.), who admitted to infidelity. In Texas, Democratic Rep. Nick Lampson, who two years ago took over the district of former House majority leader Tom DeLay, is struggling to win reelection. In Pennsylvania, Democratic Rep. John P. Murtha, a close ally of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, is in trouble.

Polls Show Obama Leading in States Whose Electoral Votes Total Nearly 300