October 15, 2004-The latest Rasmussen Reports survey found that voters trust President Bush more than Senator Kerry on national defense and the War on Terror by a 53% to 42% margin. A week ago, the President held an 8 pointÔøΩ advantage on this question, 52% to 44%.

The President’s advantage on national defense and the War on Terror is identical to the advantage he had when the Presidential debates began.

[snip]

The Rasmussen Reports survey also found that forty-nine percent (49%) of voters trust George Bush more than John Kerry when it comes to managing the economy while forty-five percent (45%) now prefer Kerry.ÔøΩ

These numbers are unchanged from a week ago and have changed little recently.ÔøΩ Looking at the past five weeks the President has been steady in the 48% – 50% range while the Senator has held at 45% or 46% during the same period.

I’m thinking this may be evidence for Tom Holsinger’s observation that you don’t know who “won” the debates until after the election.

Friday October 15, 2004–The Presidential debates are over and the election is just two-and-a-half weeks away. The latest Rasmussen Reports Presidential Tracking Poll shows President George W. Bush with 49% of the vote and Senator John Kerry with 46%. The Tracking Poll is updated daily by noon Eastern.

Voters surveyed last night declared the third and final debate a tie, with fans of each candidate thinking their man won. The number of voters who prefer Bush over Kerry on both national defense and the economy has returned to the levels that existed before the first debate.

It’s interesting that the Dems are starting the “We wuz robbed” meme so early. The private polling must be truly disastrous.

There is a truly remarkable level of tone deafness in this campaign.

KerrySpot posts the list of campaign events:

Other than Condi Rice and John Edwards in Ohio, almost every event today is in a Blue State. (And Edwards is in Maryland? What’s with that?)

Did you even read the document on Drudge’s site? Conveniently, your link is broken so none of your other readers can see that you’re making stuff up.

The plan is to take actions ahead of time to counteract the expected interference with legitimately-registered voters trying to exercise their constitutional right to vote. Because yes, that’s been interfered with before, by Republican operatives. (You’re not really a convicted felon? Tough. You still can’t vote, ’cause you’re on the list. That’s not your middle initial or address? Tough. Next.)

There’s nothing dishonest or underhanded about Democratic operatives, say, helping people verify their voter registration ahead of time (because there are news reports of Republican groups shredding registrations). There’s nothing wrong with stationing people near (but not too near!) polling places so that anyone turned away will have an educated, informed advocate who can double-check whether they really are not allowed to vote.

The memo doesn’t say to make up charges — that would be illegal and dishonest. The memo says to preempt underhanded attempts to disenfranchise voters. Seems wise to me.

That call was a “push poll”:

push poll, noun or verb: A scientific method of opinion polling in which a candidate’s campaign (or more likely, unnamed surrogates) contacts potential voters and asks questions such as “Are you aware that [insert candidate's opponent's name here] is a three-time convicted child molester with kleptomaniac tendencies?” and “Does that fact that [insert candidate's opponent's name here] beat his wife regularly make you (a) more likely to vote for him (b) less likely to vote for him (c) throw up?”–somewhat tongue-in-cheek definition from evote.com

The idea is to change your mind under the guise of getting your opinion. You were right to blow it off.

Actually, you’re doing a grave injustice here to the Afghans. The opposition candidates agreed that the ink issue was a minor glitch that didn’t invalidate the recognition of the official result. And no one seems to realize how remarkable that is! These people are voting in a real election for the first time in (almost all of their) lives and they’re showing an understanding and respect for the process that the Democrats have entirely abandoned.

I read the Afghanistan coverage and all I could think about was what a wretched example Terry McAuliffe are setting for the rest of the world.

Thanks for the link to VP. I complimented Stephen and then ended up extending it on my own blog – much to long for a comment.

The “party” knows this is a loser fight; they intended it to be that way from the get go. That’s not important. Setting the stage for 2008 is.

Congratulations!