Obama’s Convention Bounce

The polls completed over the weekend vary wildly but Barack Obama is averaging a lead of 4.5 points over John McCain: Given that I predicted, before the Democratic Convention got underway, that Obama would get a bounce of "between four and five points," I'm not terribly surprised. I would have predicted a similar bounce for the Republicans coming out of their convention ...

Obama’s Speech

Barack Obama's speech accepting the Democratic presidential nomination was . . . long. Too long. The last fifteen or twenty minutes of it, when he went into preacher mode and talked of unity and reconciliation and change and such, were uplifting and solid political theater. Whether it'll meet the ridiculously high expectations that he had coming in -- and ...

Obama Gets ‘Big Bounce’ in Gallup Poll

In the first poll since the start of the Democratic convention, Gallup gives Barack Obama what RealClearPolitics calls "a big bounce," taking a six point lead over his rival, John McCain. Democratic candidate Barack Obama has gained ground in the latest Gallup Poll Daily tracking average from Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and now leads Republican John McCain among registered voters by ...

Best. Speeches. Ever.

I just haven't been able to muster the enthusiasm to watch much of the Democratic Convention coverage. It's a shame, too, as I understand John Kerry, Bill Clinton, and Joe Biden all gave the best speeches of their lives last night. Really, though, what were the odds? I'll watch Obama's performance at Mile High Stadium tonight, though.  I understand it's ...

ABC Producer Arrested for Photographing Democrats

An ABC News producer-reporter has been arrested for taking pictures of Democratic Senators and other VIPs, apparently from a public sidewalk. Police in Denver arrested an ABC News producer today as he and a camera crew were attempting to take pictures on a public sidewalk of Democratic Senators and VIP donors leaving a private meeting at the Brown Palace Hotel. Police ...

Hillary Convention Speech: I Question the Timing

It's 10:13 Eastern time and Hillary Clinton hasn't spoken yet.  Granting that large numbers of people live in other time zones, it strikes me as awfully odd that they saved the premier speech of the night for so late. Perhaps she insisted on a 3 a.m. speaking time?

Can Hillary Convince Supporters to Back Obama?

Hillary Clinton's speech is the big draw tonight at the Democratic Convention.  She's going to have to convince a lot of people  -- perhaps starting with herself -- to put aside their grudges and voter for Barack Obama to be the next president. Matt Yglesias echoes my longstanding view that this will happen organically and notes a recent parallel: As you may ...

Obama Assassination Plot

Reports from several Colorado sources (although, curiously, not yet WaPo or the NYT) about an assassination plot against Barack Obama has the blogosphere abuzz. Denver's CBS 4 appears to have broken the story: CBS4 has learned at least four people are under arrest in connection with a possible plot to kill Barack Obama at his Thursday night acceptance speech in Denver. All ...

Who Does Obama Need to Sway?

Today's National Journal poll question: Pick the demographic group that Obama most needs to sway during the convention, with Women, Whites over 45, and Blue Collar Voters the proffered choices. Once again, the breakdown of Left and Right bloggers varied dramatically: Amusingly, also again, Left bloggers seem to be much less constrained by the given choices. I picked Blue-collar workers, commenting, "A too ...

Democratic Convention and the Republican Brand

National Journal is going to be polling several of us throughout the conventions on various issues.  The first question: Q: What portion -- if any -- of the Democratic convention program should be devoted to tearing down John McCain and the Republican brand? Perhaps not surprisingly, the answers broke down quite differently by ideology: I was in the "About a third" camp (interestingly, ...