Joe Biden just wrapped up his first speech as Obama's veep candidate, and it offered a glimpse of his role on the ticket beyond offering foreign policy expertise.

Biden, who has struggled at times with adversity, will offer frequent testament to Obama's character and toughness, and will use his populist cred to sharpen up the campaign's attacks on McCain over the economy.

One thing that will certainly cheer Obama advisers was the fact that Biden appeared totally at ease on the stump and demonstrated a wide emotional range as he linked his own adversity to that of Obama's early years.

"We share a common story, an American story," Biden said, recounting Obama's upbringing at the hands of a single mom and his self-driven rise to prominence.

Biden, who has a hardscrabble Pennsylvania bio and is well respected by labor leaders, also showed that he'd be taking a lead role in voicing sharper populist attacks on McCain that Obama might be willing to venture.

In so doing, he got off the best line of the day, a reference to McCain's multiple homes, noting that McCain might have a bit of trouble sitting down to consider the kitchen table problems faced by ordinary Americans.

"He'll have to figure out which of the seven kitchen tables to sit at," Biden quipped.

Biden, who used much of his speech to link McCain to Bush, also offered a glimpse of how he'll deal with the fact that he's praised McCain in the past, painting McCain as having nothing in common with the earlier McCain he admired.

He "gave in to the right wing of his political party, and gave in to the swift boat politics that he once so deplored," Biden shouted.

Interestingly, Biden also revealed that he may be taking on McCain's war service as an issue a little more frontally than Obama may be willing to do.

"These times require more than a good soldier," Biden said. "They require a wise leader." He went on to describe Obama as "a clear eyed pragmatist who will get the job done."

As Biden showed, his emotional range, experience and rhetorical pugnaciousness will allow him to play multiple roles on Obama's behalf.

Barack Obama is currently introducing his new running mate at an event in Springfield, Illinois, and he's offering strong testament to Biden's foreign policy expertise and character, which Obama notes was forged amid tragedy and a tough upbringing

"Joe Biden's many triumphs have only come after great trial," Obama says, and runs through Biden's father's hardscrabble upbringing in Scranton, Pennsylvania, the story of Biden's loss of his first wife and daughter to a car accident, and his battle to defeat a brain aneurysm.

Interestingly, Obama then moves to link Biden's character directly to his foreign policy expertise and toughness:

"That same strength of character is at the core of his rise to become one of America's leading voices on national security," Obama says. "Joe Biden is what so many others pretend to be -- a statesman with sound judgment who doesn't have to hide behind bluster to keep America strong."

The speech's heavy emphasis on Biden's character suggests that part of what motivated the choice of Biden was to shore up what might be called the ticket's character quotient at a time when the McCain campaign is aggressively working to sow doubts about Obama's character, toughness and readiness.

There's also a hint on how Obama will deal with the fact that Biden is a longtime D.C. insider. "Joe Biden is that rare mix -- for decades, he has brought change to Washington, but Washington hasn't changed him," Obama says.

Full text of the speech after the jump.

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This statement on Biden, just out from GOP Senator Chuck Hagel, won't make him any more friends on the right:

"Joe Biden is the right partner for Barack Obama. His many years of distinguished service to America, his seasoned judgment and his vast experience in foreign policy and national security will match up well with the unique challenges of the 21st Century. An Obama-Biden ticket is a very impressive and strong team. Biden's selection is good news for Obama and America."

The whole thing edges awfully close to an endorsement, and the claim that Biden's national security experience "will" match the 21st Century's challenges sounds a lot like an outright prediction of victory.

In choosing Joe Biden as his running mate, Barack Obama is gambling that Biden's many strengths will compensate for his own weaknesses as a candidate, rather than serve as a backdrop against which those weaknesses will appear in sharp relief.

You've already heard much about Biden's strengths on paper and how they shore up Obama's weaknesses: He's one of the most knowledgeable about international affairs in the Democratic Party; he's Catholic; he has decades of D.C. experience.

But Biden brings another key strength: He's extremely effective when he goes on the attack on foreign policy. Rather than whine about how mean Republicans are when they hit Dems on national security, as so many Dems do, Biden has a real talent for responding with an appropriate mixture of mockery and contempt.

When Biden takes aim at Republicans on foreign policy, he exudes a strong sense of authority on the topic that tends to shrivel his target into a cartoonish figure rather quickly. Exhibit number one of this trait is Biden's now-infamous "noun, verb, 9/11" claim about Rudy Giuliani. Another choice example of this is here.

Biden, ultimately, shares and embodies one of the core convictions driving Obama's campaign: That Democrats can win an argument about national security with Republicans, and shouldn't run from a fight on the topic or concede any sort of presumed GOP superiority on it.

Biden's charisma and authority on the subject add a ton of firepower to Obama's arsenal in this regard, allowing Biden to act as an extremely credible voice to deliver the message that the GOP approach to foreign policy in the 21st Century has been a sad, sick joke. One has to pity the poor chump who will be facing Biden across the Veep debate table in a few weeks.

Risks Of Biden Pick

But McCain, of course, may prove a far more elusive target on national security for Biden than hapless buffoons like Rudy -- and the danger that Biden could be effectively used to highlight Obama's weaknesses is the reason why.

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The McCain campaign is already out with a tough new spot hitting Joe Biden, Obama's new running mate, and airing quotes from the primary where Biden questioned Obama's readiness to lead:

The ad, which will run in "key states," quotes a moderator during a Dem primary debate reading Biden his own earlier quotes, including one where he opined that Obama wasn't yet ready for the presidency and added that "the presidency is not something that lends itself to on the job training."

"I stand by that statement," Biden said. Then the ad twists the knife by airing this Biden quote about McCain:

"I would be honored to run with or against John McCain because I think the country would be better off."

The quote about McCain comes from a Biden appearance on The Daily Show in August 2005. That such quotes would reappear was always a danger of choosing one of the people Obama ran against, though people mostly focused on Hillary's quotes in this regard.

To our knowledge, though, Biden was the only one of Obama's leading primary opponents who's actually said he'd be willing to run with McCain. We'll be hearing a lot of this quote, obviously.

Here's the email from the Obama campaign making it official that Joe Biden is indeed his Veep choice, as earlier reports indicated:

Greg --

I have some important news that I want to make official.

I've chosen Joe Biden to be my running mate.

Joe and I will appear for the first time as running mates this afternoon in Springfield, Illinois -- the same place this campaign began more than 19 months ago.

I'm excited about hitting the campaign trail with Joe, but the two of us can't do this alone. We need your help to keep building this movement for change.

Please let Joe know that you're glad he's part of our team. Share your personal welcome note and we'll make sure he gets it:

http://my.barackobama.com/welcomejoe

Thanks for your support,

Barack

P.S. -- Make sure to turn on your TV at 2:00 p.m. Central Time to join us or watch online at http://www.BarackObama.com.

Late Update: Our take on the Biden pick is right here.

Late Late Update: Hillary on Biden...

"In naming my colleague and friend Senator Joe Biden to be the Vice Presidential nominee, Senator Obama has continued in the best traditions for the Vice Presidency by selecting an exceptionally strong, experienced leader and devoted public servant. Senator Biden will be a purposeful and dynamic Vice President who will help Senator Obama both win the Presidency and govern this great country."

The Associated Press and CNN are both reporting that Joe Biden is Barack Obama's running mate, capping off a week of frenzied speculation that centered on him in the final stretch.

The AP cites unnamed sources, while CNN says they got the news from two Democratic sources.

And so much for those text messages we all signed up for, promising that we'd be the first to know. I still haven't gotten mine.

Late Update: The Obama campaign's email announcing the decision is right here. Though Obama's supporters were promised with great fanfare that they'd hear about the decision first, the email went out to supporters many hours after the big news orgs broke the news of the decision.

Late Late Update: Our take on the Biden pick is right here.

Now this could be something: ABC News reports that the Secret Service has been dispatched to Joe Biden's house, seemingly a giveaway that he's been picked to be Barack Obama's running mate.

If this report is true, then it would be hard to read it any other way than that Biden has already been asked to be the running mate. After all, I've never heard of the Secret Service being sent to protect somebody because they aren't a candidate.

All the daily blocking and tackling over things like McCain's number-of-houses gaffe can easily lead you to forget the larger context in which this campaign is playing out. A new Pew poll offers a bracing reminder, laying out in detail just how dramatic the Democrats' generic advantage over the GOP in party identification and image is is right now.

The poll finds that among registered voters, the Democratic Party has a 13-point lead in party affiliation (51%-38%) when independent "leaners" are included. Our handy Election Central calculator tells us that means that more than half of registered voters self-identify with the Democratic Party. That seems striking.

The "image" numbers are also good for the Dems. Fifty-seven percent say they view the Democratic Party favorably, while 37% view it unfavorably. By contrast, only 43% view the GOP favorably, while a plurality of 49% rate it unfavorably. That's another big advantage for Obama.

The rest of the poll is here.

The larger point here is that for the Dems, the goal of the convention is partly to get voters to vote in line with their views of the two parties as expressed in this poll -- their platforms, policies, and performance. The GOP, of course wants the election to be about Obama's allegedly untested character and his all-around otherness, precisely because of numbers like the ones in this poll.

But a successful Dem convention could foil this plan by neutralizing whatever fears and/or suspicions people have about Obama's heritage and whatever doubts about his character have been implanted in their heads by the GOP, allowing the Dems' huge built-in advantage to assert itself on Election Day. That's key to what's really at stake next week.

This is a sign of the unique historical nature of this presidential race, and an interesting twist on the old campaign game of raising expectations for your opponent.

The McCain campaign has just blasted out a new memo that seeks to frame the Dem convention in advance by predicting that it could bring Obama a poll bounce of as much as 15 points. More interesting, though, is the way it seeks to hike expectations for the media coverage and historical resonance of Obama's speech on the final night:

Obama's stadium address on Thursday -- the 45th anniversary of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have A Dream" speech -- will result in effusive and overwhelming press coverage.

On Thursday, Obama will give a great speech, as has been his trademark. The press will sing his praises and remark on his historic address and Obama's place in history. For example, The Associated Press today published an article comparing the historic nature of the addresses - a week before Obama's speech. This coverage will be impenetrable and will undoubtedly impact the polls.

This has an element of the usual phony ref-gaming to it. But at the same time, the McCain campaign is genuinely girding itself for what will undoubtedly be a frustrating few days. Obama's official nomination -- the first nomination of a black person at a major-party convention -- is something of a world-historical event, and will be an international story that will indeed captivate many in the media. Full McCain memo after the jump.

Late Update: Over at Salon, Alex Koppelman argues that the memo's version of Bill Clinton's post-convention bounce is a tad on the shaky side.

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It looks like Al Franken is finally using his campaign ads to do what he does best: Comedy.

You really need to watch his latest spot, because it's pretty damn funny. It features a novelty talking fish toy, informing the viewer of Republican Senator Norm Coleman's links to indicted GOP Sen. Ted Stevens and Big Oil businessmen:

"Now one of the oil guys that Norm went fishing with has been convicted of bribery -- and Norm refuses to return the money," the fish says. "Something smells fishy, and it ain't just me."

Franken has taken a serious tone for most of his campaign ads in his uphill fight against Republican Senator Norm Coleman, in an effort to get voters to view him as a more serious figure. But now Franken may be going back to his roots, thankfully.

The Obama campaign is up with another brutal ad hammering McCain over the number-of-houses gaffe.

This one really intensifies the out-of-touch elitist attack line by referring to McCain's "country club economics" and showing footage of him with George H.W. Bush riding around in -- wait for it -- a golf cart...

The ad notes that McCain was asked how many houses he owns, then says: "John McCain says he can't even remember anymore." That seems a bit like an age dig similar to the one in yesterday's Obama spot, which said McCain had "lost track" of the number of homes he owns.

The ad, which is running on national cable, concludes: "Maybe McCain thinks the economy is working -- for folks like him. But how are things going for folks like you?"

The beauty of that conclusion is that it's a direct rejoinder to McCain's ad earlier today which said that Obama, as a "celebrity," doesn't have to worry about family finances -- only Obama's ad, in its depiction of McCain as a member of the elite, has the virtue of being true.

It isn't every day that the head of a party committee goes public about his unhappiness with his colleagues and their lousy fundraising pace for him, but such is life in today's troubled Republican Party.

Senator John Ensign, who's head of the committee to elect more Republicans to the Senate, has actually put out a press release chastising his fellow Senate GOPers for not opening their wallets for the GOP:

"I recently challenged my colleagues to step up to the plate and help me provide the resources our candidates need to compete in races across the country -- to match the DSCC expenditures in targeted races," Ensign's release says. "It has become clear that my call has gone largely unanswered."

Ensign then added that he now has to cut back the NRSC's ad budget, and can only expand it again if he finally gets some checks coming in. You can almost hear the tears falling.

Meanwhile, CQ points out that Senate Republicans only contributed $1.1 million to the NRSC up through June, the last month for which this number can be calculated, compared to $5 million from Senate Dems to the DSCC.

Here's yet more grist for the mindless-Veep-speculation mill.

I've just gotten a hold of the internal Sunday-shows lineup that the Obama campaign's TV booker sends out to select Democrats. It shows that Kathleen Sebelius and Tim Kaine are both scheduled to appear on shows this Sunday to discuss Obama's Veep choice, which will likely have been announced by then.

Some might want to see this as a sign that they may be out of contention -- since the Obama campaign's booker helped arrange these appearances.

Sebelius is set to appear on CBS' Face the Nation with Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell and Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. Kaine is scheduled to appear on Fox News Sunday with Colorado Governor Bill Ritter.

Of course, this could mean absolutely nothing, too. If one of them is picked for Veep, he or she could simply be pulled from his or her Sunday appearance.

Like I said, more grist for the mindless-speculation mill. At least you now know who you'll likely be watching on TV this Sunday.

If John McCain's number-of-houses gaffe made his efforts to paint Obama as an out-of-touch elitist all the more ridiculous, the McCain campaign apparently hasn't gotten the memo yet.

McCain is up with yet another "celeb" sneer spot, and absurdly, this one makes the direct suggestion that Obama is rich. "Celebrities don't have to worry about family budgets," the spot says. "But we sure do."

One thing this is a reminder of is the audacity of the Roveian up-is-downism the McCain team is now resorting to. McCain is the grandson of admirals, married a wealthy heiress and has eight to 11 homes, while Obama was raised by a single mother, went to school on scholarships and worked his way up to his current station? Doesn't matter. We'll just say that Obama's the out-of-touch elitist -- that up is down -- over and over again as often as it takes to change reality.

The ad is running on national cable and in "key states," the McCain campaign says. Full script after the jump.

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As all you regulars know, the McCain camp's constant evocation of his P.O.W. past as an all-purpose shield against any and all criticism is a singular obsession of this blog.

So it's gratifying to see that pundits and writers at the news orgs are really starting to turn the screws on McCain over this.

Newsweek's Howard Fineman, for instance, says that the McCain camp is in danger of "trivializing" McCain's sacrifice.

"I think they are going to it way too many times," Fineman told MSNBC, adding that "you can't help but have admiration and respect for the guy" but that "it's become a crutch in the campaign."

"I think he is in danger of trivializing it," Fineman continued. "By the time they get to the convention in St. Paul, there might not be much of it left to use."

Ouch. Time magazine's Ana Marie Cox was even harsher, writing that the constant P.O.W.-past spewing is "weird" and "bordering on irrational."

"It's a head-spinning non sequitur, designed to distract us from something mildly troubling with the assertion of something impressive," Cox wrote of the McCain team's use of the P.O.W. stuff to deflect criticism of the houses gaffe.

"It does seem like they're flirting with Giuliani/9-11 territory here," opined Politico's Ben Smith, "in which a subject that seems utterly immune to humor, used as a first resort, suddenly becomes a running joke among your political enemies and your late night comic friends."

Another way to put this is that if you print too much currency, it devalues it. The McCain campaign is cranking out all these bills with a little "McCain as P.O.W." logo on it and is trying to use them to buy their way out of every controversy that comes along. Pretty soon the McCain team's money won't be good anywhere.

Here it is: The official TPM tally of precisely how many homes the McCains own. Everyone -- apparently including McCain himself -- has been working feverishly since yesterday to nail down this elusive number, with varying results.

And the grand total of houses the McCains own is...

...anywhere from eight to eleven homes, depending on how you count it.

The McCain campaign claims the Arizona Senator has four residences: Condos in Arlington, VA., and Coronado, CA., the main McCain residence in Phoenix, AZ., and a ranch in Sedona, AZ. A McCain adviser says the rest of the McCain properties are "some investment properties and things like that."

Not so much.

Here's our official list:

Arlington, VA: The McCains have a three-bedroom condo in Arlington, Virginia, for when McCain is in the DC area. It is valued at nearly $850,000. Total: One.

Arizona: Here's an example of how hard it is to keep track of how many houses McCain owns: The Arizona Republic reported in 2006 that the McCains bought two adjacent condominiums for $4.66 million, so they could combine them into a single mega-condo of over 6,000 square feet, for use as their main residence in Arizona. That's either one or two more. Total: Two to three.

Arizona: Cindy's corporation later bought another condo in the same building as the mega-condo, only on a different floor. Total: Three to four.

Coronado, CA: Then there are the two vacation condos they own in Coronado, California, which total $4.7 million. They initially just bought the first one, but Cindy decided to buy a second when her children began using the first one much more frequently. "So I bought another one," Cindy told Vogue. Total: Five to six.

Sedona, AZ: The McCains own a lot of three houses in their "Hidden Valley Ranch" area of Sedona, totaling over $1,081,000 in value, according to county records. This is the rustic location where McCain often entertains reporters and other guests. You can count this as anywhere from one to three houses -- one of them is a main residence, and the others are for guests and servants. Total: Six to nine.

La Jolla, CA: There's also their property in La Jolla, California, valued at over $1 million, where Cindy's aunt reportedly lives. (Fun fact: This is the same property for which the McCains were delinquent on their property taxes.) Total: Seven to 10.

Phoenix, AZ: Cindy's family trust also owns a $700,000 loft in Phoenix, which was purchased for use by their daughter Meghan after she graduated from college. As GQ put it, "the interior looks like a spaceship furnished by West Elm." Total: Eight to 11.

As it happens, there's still more. Cindy also owns other properties through her family corporations. But many of these are rental properties for homes and businesses. We've decided to take the conservative road, and not count rental properties towards the total, as they aren't really homes -- they're investments or sources of income.

So, depending on how you count it, the grand total of homes owned by the McCains is...

Eight to 11. At a combined value of $12,991,000.

Report: McCain Running Mate Will Be ... ???
Various reports are coming out about John McCain's veep-hunt, with Mark Halperin reporting that GOP sources say it will be Mitt Romney. On the other hand, the New York Times reports that the campaign is considering another pick: General David Petraeus.

Both Presidential Candidates Off The Trail Today
Neither Barack Obama nor John McCain have any scheduled public events for today.

Obama VP Could Be Today -- Or Tomorrow?
The Associated Press reports that Barack Obama could announce his running mate as early as today. On the other hand, Obama has already said he's decided who it's going to be, so it should be either today or tomorrow -- which is to say, the AP doesn't have any more of a clue about when the announcement is coming than the rest of us do.

Report: Obama Tells Runners-Up They Didn't Get It
CNN reports that Barack Obama has called several candidates who were on his short list for VP, to tell them that they didn't get it. But as you might expect, CNN was not able to find out who actually got these calls.

Poll: Obama Ahead In Michigan
A new Selzer poll of Michigan gives Barack Obama a 46%-39% lead in this must-win state, beyond the ±3% margin of error. However, the pollster's analysis finds that one third of respondents could potentially change their minds, and the race could come down to which topics dominate the race -- if it's about the economy then Obama wins, while McCain would benefit from a focus on national security.

Ticketless Obama Supporters Heading To Denver, Anyway
Tickets to the Democratic convention have already run out, but that's not stopping some people -- the Los Angeles Times reports that hundreds, maybe even thousands, of people are heading to Denver just so they can stand outside.

Hillary Still Deep In Debt
Hillary Clinton's debt-relief efforts were only able to raise $1.2 million in the month of July, leaving her with $11 million in remaining debts to vendors. Another $13 million is owed to candidate herself, for a total of $24 million, but she has said she will not seek to have her personal loans paid back.

The strategy being employed by many Republicans in tough races this year -- that is, to disassociate oneself from President Bush -- is naturally a lot tougher for Minnesota Sen. Norm Coleman, whose home city of St. Paul is hosting the Republican convention. And the state Dems there are setting out to make it even more difficult.

The DFL (as the Dems are called in Minnesota) has made a novel offer: A cash reward of over $500 to anybody who can snap a photo of Coleman standing next to Bush on Monday night of the convention.

In an e-mail to Election Central, DFL spokesman Eric Fought acknowledged that this could be a tall order: "It's a safe bet that when George Bush is anywhere near the Xcel Center, Norm Coleman will be far, far away."

How bad does a wingnut ad attacking Obama have to be for Fox News to refuse to run it?

The Associated Press reports that Fox News is declining to run the new ad from the "American Issues Project," a new right-wing swift-boating operation, connecting Obama to former 1960s radical William Ayers.

This may be because the ad accused Ayers of participating in a bombing of the U.S. Capitol, despite there being no evidence he ever did such a thing. So if Fox were to run it, they'd be open to a potential lawsuit for slander.

Looks like even Fox has its limits!

The McCain people are now out with their own attack on the subject of houses -- in this case, returning fire at Barack Obama for the real-estate deal he had with Tony Rezko, who has since been convicted for political corruption:

"Barack Obama knows a lot about housing problems," the announcer warns, before laying out the details of the case, and alleging that Obama gave Rezko $14 million in taxpayer money through corrupt political influence.

Oddly enough, the ad then ends on some cheery music, and the disclaimer from John McCain that he approved this message.

In a possible sign that a real third-party attack apparatus could take shape and swift-boat Barack Obama with ads, a new entity calling itself the "American Issues Project" has produced a new spot going after Barack Obama for his past associations with Bill Ayers the former leader of the 1960s radical group the Weathermen:

The ad, which was first reported by the Politico, does stretch a major point here -- there is no evidence that Ayers was involved in the 1971 Capitol Hill bombing, which was headed up by a rival faction within the Weathermen after he'd already gone into hiding. Then again, that's not exactly a point the Obama camp would want to have to argue over.

While the group has said they will spend $2.8 million to air the ad, there seems to be some uncertainty over whether they actually have the money or a real expectation of getting it. The Associated Press reports that the ad is expected to begin airing today in Michigan, and tomorrow in Ohio.

Late Update: It's also important to note that any Obama-Ayers connection is, as the Washington Post said, "a tenuous one," involving two people who merely served together in respected community groups.

Okay, we now have another GOP Congressional incumbent linking himself positively to Barack Obama: Rep. Chris Shays of Connecticut, who has a new ad that declares flatly that he possesses "the hopefulness of Obama."...

By our count, this makes Shays, who's locked in a tough re-election fight against Dem Jim Himes, the second serious GOP down-ticketer to link himself positively with the Illinois Senator. GOP Senator Gordon Smith, who's also facing a bruising re-election battle, has run two ads hailing Obama.

The Shays campaign declined to comment on the ad, which was forwarded to us by a Connecticut source, but the Himes campaign confirms seeing it up on the air this morning.

Another fun thing about this ad is that Shays actually associates himself with both Obama and McCain, saying that he possesses "the hopefulness of Obama" and "the straight talk of McCain." Talk about fence sitting...

Late Update: The Shays campaign has confirmed to us that the ad is indeed running.

Here's a fun little find that is likely to give Dems more ammo to blast away at John McCain's number-of-houses gaffe.

It turns out that a few months ago, a McCain family corporation closed on a second multi-million-dollar beach condo in the same building in exclusive Coronado, California -- at around the same time that John McCain offered his somewhat tone-deaf observation that struggling homeowners were "working at second jobs" and "skipping a vacation" in order to make mortgage payments on time.

Cindy McCain discussed the timing of the second condo purchase in a June interview with Vogue magazine (not online) that's newly relevant in light of the explosive controversy over John McCain's inability to recall how many homes the McCains own.

And in another fun fact that could pour fuel on this controversy, Cindy told her interviewer that the reason they needed a second beach condo in the Coronado building was that the first was too crowded because her kids were staying there and as a result she "couldn't get in the place."

Cindy continued: "So I bought another one."

Here's the relevant passage, from the start of the Vogue piece:

It is a late Sunday afternoon in April, and I am sitting in a condominium in Coronado, California, taking in the view of the gorgeous San Diego Bay with Cindy McCain. She closed on the place just two weeks earlier, and the only things unpacked so far are the family photos that dot almost every surface. It's her family's second condo in the building. "I like the ocean, and the kids love it here, and I love that," she tells me, curled up on a nondescript couch that looks like it might have come with the apartment. "When I bought the first one, my husband, who is not a beach person, said, 'Oh, this is such a waste of money; the kids will never go.' Then it got to the point where they used it so much I couldn't get in the place. So I bought another one."

According to a July story in The Politico, a McCain family corporation spent a combined $4.7 million on the two condos in Coronado.

If the interview was conducted sometime in April, and she'd closed on the condo two weeks earlier, that means that the latest the closing could have happened is mid-April, and the earliest is mid-March.

On March 25, John McCain said:

And 51 million homeowners are doing what's necessary: working at second jobs, skipping a vacation, and managing their budgets to make their payments on time.

So at around the time McCain said this, the McCain family corporation was either actively in the market for, or had closed on, a second multi-million-dollar beach condo in the same building which was necessary because the first one was too crowded with their children in it.

The McCain campaign is road-testing a new argument in responding to Obama's criticism of his number-of-houses gaffe, an approach the McCain camp has never tried before: The houses gaffe doesn't matter because ... he was a POW!

"This is a guy who lived in one house for five and a half years -- in prison," spokesman Brian Rogers told the Washington Post.

For those of you who haven't kept track, the McCain campaign just recently cited McCain's POW years in explaining away the Miss Buffalo Chip gaffe, and in dealing with the allegation that he broke the rules and listened in on Barack Obama during the Rick Warren forum.

Also, Rogers made sure to play the anti-intellectual card: "In terms of who's an elitist, I think people have made a judgment that John McCain is not an arugula-eating, pointy headed professor-type based on his life story."

John McCain's number-of-houses gaffe may well be remembered as an important turning point in the campaign. It's a moment Dems have been waiting for that is serving as a catalyst for a much more intense and unified populist attack on McCain coming from many corners, particularly Barack Obama himself.

On the trail today, Obama unleashed a fusillade of populist criticism of McCain, weaving together a number of different recent gaffes or quotes from McCain or his surrogates:

Among the various points hit on by Obama: McCain's claim awhile back that we've made great economic progress; McCain's (possibly tongue-in-cheek) claim that $5 million is the threshold for richness; Phil Gramm's claim that we've become a "nation of whiners"; and of course the houses gaffe.

Separately, the Obama campaign is apparently planning to deploy surrogates in at least 16 states to press the "houses" attack.

This gift is four-fold: It allows the Obama campaign to reclaim the offensive after a far-too-defensive stretch. It energizes rank-and-file Dems who had been hand-wringing about what they saw as Obama's unwillingness to get tougher with McCain.

It gives Obama the opening he needed to sound a more aggressive populist tone that until now he'd left to others. And it shifts the focus away from national security politics, where McCain was making clear gains, on to domestic economic issues, which are paramount in the minds of voters.

This just keeps getting better and better. We now have a Republican candidate for Congress putting the tall tale of Cuba being ready to drill for oil off of America's shores into a campaign ad.

Here's the new ad from John Gard of Wisconsin, who narrowly lost an open House race in 2006 and is now seeking a rematch against freshman Dem Steve Kagen:

In fact, Cuba is not "poised to drill" off of the Florida coast. Exploration leases have been granted by the Cuban government to various other countries to look for oil in Cuba's waters -- though no drilling has actually begun or is about to begin soon.

We previously caught Gard's campaign distributing fliers that claimed drilling was already happening back in June.

Here's McCain campaign spokesperson Brian Rogers' response to Obama's hit on McCain today for not knowing how many houses he owns.

It hits just about every Obama-is-elitist hot-button known to exist, although, in a glaring oversight, the McCain campaign forgot to include Obama's and Michelle's educational pedigree:

"Does a guy who made more than $4 million last year, just got back from vacation on a private beach in Hawaii and bought his own million-dollar mansion with the help of a convicted felon really want to get into a debate about houses? Does a guy who worries about the price of arugula and thinks regular people "cling" to guns and religion in the face of economic hardship really want to have a debate about who's in touch with regular Americans?

"The reality is that Barack Obama's plans to raise taxes and opposition to producing more energy here at home as gas prices skyrocket show he's completely out of touch with the concerns of average Americans."

The battle over who's the real elitist here is one that many Dems have wanted the Obama campaign to wade into, and now they're getting their way.

This is obviously a big break for Obama. Nonetheless, does anyone really believe McCain's gaffe will command anywhere near the same amount of media attention as John Edwards' $400 haircut did? We don't, but perhaps we'll be pleasantly surprised.

Late Update: Some of the more optimistic among you are saying that you do think McCain's gaffe will get into Edwards haircut territory in terms of the coverage. Just a small reminder: The Edwards haircut was talked about literally for weeks and weeks, on cable TV and elsewhere, and The Washington Post did something like half a dozen stories on it, if memory serves. Just sayin'.

Man, talk about rapid response. The Obama campaign is already out with a new ad hitting McCain over the news today that he was unable to say precisely how many houses he owns:

"When asked how many houses he owns, McCain lost track -- he couldn't remember," the ad says, in what sounds a bit like an age dig. "Well, it's seven. Seven houses."

The ad dovetails with a broad populist attack on McCain being waged by the Dems today in the wake of McCain's comments, and clearly represents a turn towards a much sharper tone for the Obama camp. The Obama campaign says it's a national cable buy.

Late Update: The McCain campaign hits back.

A new set of swing-state polls show Barack Obama narrowly ahead in three key swing states, all of which voted narrowly for John Kerry in 2004:

• The new Rasmussen poll of New Hampshire: Obama 47%, McCain 46%, within the ±4% margin of error.

• The new Rasmussen poll of Pennsylvania: Obama 48%, McCain 45%, within the ±4% margin of error.

• Meanwhile, a new University of Minnesota poll gives Obama 48% to McCain's 38% -- but the pollster's analysis finds that McCain could carry the state if he picks Governor Tim Pawlenty as his running mate.

All of these states voted for John Kerry in 2004 by margins of only one to three points, so expect them to be closely contested from now through November.

The Democrats are going after John McCain over some choice quotes he gave in a Politico interview on the subject of wealth -- lines that could seriously undermine his attempts to cast Barack Obama as the man living a "grand" lifestyle.

The DNC is already blasting out to reporters two key comments. First, McCain was asked how many houses he owns. "I think -- I'll have my staff get to you," McCain said. "It's condominiums where -- I'll have them get to you."

Then there's McCain's ideas on the subject of what it means to be rich -- following up on his $5 million threshold from the Rick Warren interview and the arguments over what constitutes taxation of the wealthy.

"I define rich in other ways besides income," he said. "Some people are wealthy and rich in their lives and their children and their ability to educate them. Others are poor if they're billionaires."

From the DNC's release: "John McCain's Message to Working Families: Money -- Don't Worry About It -- You're Rich in Other Ways."

Virginia Governor Tim Kaine, a top Obama surrogate and potential Veep, is already blasting away at McCain: "He couldn't count high enough apparently to even know how many houses he owns."

Surely these McCain quotes will get every bit as much attention as John Edwards' $400 haircut, right?

Late Update: Here's video of Tim Kaine this morning:

The Obama and McCain campaigns just jointly announced that they've reached an agreement on the format for three presidential debates and one veep one.

The agreement features an interesting variety of staging choices, from open discussions to town-hall-style questions from the audience. All four debates will begin at 9 P.M. and last 90 minutes. A quick summary of the format:

* On September 26th, the topic will be foreign policy and national security, and the debate will be broken into nine, 9-minute segments. The presidential candidates will each get two minutes to comment after a moderator introduces a topic, followed by an open discussion of it for five minutes.

* On October 2nd, the veep candidates will debate, and the staging and answer format will be resolved after the veep wannabes are chosen.

* On October 7th, the presidential candidates will hold a town hall debate, taking questions from the audience and the Internet. The candidates will have two minutes to answer each question, after which the candidates will have a minute to respond to their opponent's previous answers.

* On October 15th, the topic will be domestic and economic policy, and the format will be the same as the first presidential debate, but the candidates will additionally have the chance to make a 90-second closing argument.

The campaigns' full agreement after the jump.

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Here's a troubling number from the new CBS/New York Times poll: A plurality of Americans say Barack Obama is not prepared for the job, with only 44% of registered voters saying he is prepared, compared to 49% saying he is not

On the bright side, Obama does have a narrow 45%-42% lead in the horse race, and 55% of voters say they can relate to him as compared to 41% for McCain -- but the McCain team has worked very hard to sow doubts among voters about Obama's commander-in-chief readiness, and this suggests that those attacks may be working.

In keeping with its pattern of running under-the-radar negative ads in key states without releasing them to the national press, Obama is up with this spot in Nevada attacking McCain for favoring the storage of nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain.

Meanwhile, at a time when leading Dems are pressing Obama to sharpen up his economic message, he also is up on the air with a new spot painting McCain as out of touch. The spot features a now-infamous GOP-primary quote from McCain: "We've had a pretty good prosperous time with low unemployment and low inflation."

Unclear where this one is running. (Both ads via Politico.)

Here's some good polling news for Obama. It appears voters are accurately perceiving John McCain as far and away the more negative campaigner in the race...

By a nearly six-to-one margin, voters say Republican presidential candidate John McCain is running a negative campaign against his Democratic rival, Barack Obama, according to the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll.

Nearly three in 10 voters, 29%, pointed to McCain as the candidate running a negative campaign, compared to just 5% who said Obama is running a negative campaign. McCain's 29% rating is the highest of any one candidate in the previous two presidential elections according to the WSJ/NBC News survey.

This lends some comfort to purveyors of the "rope a dope" theory of the campaign, which holds that Obama is waiting for McCain to firmly define himself as the dirty campaigner, thus giving himself cover to go after McCain in earnest after the conventions, when voters are really paying attention.

We now have a second Democratic leader who's willing to whisper that Joe Lieberman just may -- may -- face consequences for using whatever Dem credentials he still has left to try his best to legitimize GOP smears of Obama.

Last week Nancy Pelosi said that Senate Dems wouldn't need Lieberman after the election. Now, in the wake of the news that Lieberman will speak at the GOP convention, Politico's Glenn Thrush got Rahm Emanuel to say the following:

"What you can't do anymore is just roll your eyes and say, 'Oh, that's just Joe.' Lieberman knows what he's doing and there are consequences."

We've still heard nothing remotely like this from Senate Dem leaders, of course. Prediction: The threats towards Lieberman -- public and private alike -- will continue coming exclusively from Dem leaders who have exactly zero direct influence over what actually happens to him.

Late Update: Sam Stein of The Huffington Post quotes a well-connected Hill aide saying that Senate Dem leader Harry Reid is still "non-committal" about Lieberman and will take a look at things after the election.

CNN adds its voice to the wailing Greek chorus:

According to a new CNN poll of polls, the Illinois senator's once-comfortable lead over McCain is down to only 1 point nationwide -- potentially troubling news for Obama as he gets set to accept his party's nomination in Denver.

Obama now leads McCain 45 percent to 44 percent, down from a 3-point margin in a CNN poll of polls yesterday and down from an 8-point lead in mid July.

National polls aside, on the bright side Pollster.com's aggregate of state polls still has Obama way ahead in electoral votes.

In an apparent effort to regain the offensive, the Obama campaign launched a broad attack on McCain today, portraying him as reckless on foreign policy, a hot-head who's too willing to use force and not willing enough to apprise himself of facts on the ground before urging military action.

On a conference call with reporters just now, senior Obama foreign policy adviser Susan Rice argued that there is "a pattern here of recklessness" when it comes to McCain's approach to various national security issues. She pointed out that McCain reacted too quickly with "aggressive and bellicose" rhetoric on the Russia-Georgia crisis, and contrasted that with Obama's measured response to the dust-up.

"There's something to be said for letting facts drive judgment," Rice said, also referring to McCain's desire to target Iraq right after 9/11.

The key here is that this is actually a character attack on McCain, something the Obama campaign has been reluctant to undertake at a time when McCain has shown no such reticence with regard to "celeb" Obama.

Will painting McCain as a hair-trigger hothead who's catastrophically overeager to support the use of military force, and not willing enough to apprise himself of the facts before acting, prove effective in the face of a withering assault on Obama as weak and indecisive?

In one sense, the grand experiment at the heart of the Obama campaign is an effort to win the election by speaking to the voters like adults.

Late Update: Furthering the hothead meme, Richard Clarke was also on the call, and he described the Republican as "quick draw McCain" and "trigger-happy."

Oh, it's just so great to have Rudy back!

On a conference call with reporters just now set up to attack Obama over his foreign policy adviser's trip to Syria, the pro-choice Rudy basically said that as a "matter of conscience" McCain should choose his Veep not based on his views of abortion but on his national security readiness.

Even more interestingly, Rudy seemed to suggest that he was speaking for McCain on the Veep question.

Rudy said: "I know from talking to John McCain about this" that "our main criteria would be a person that would allow us to sleep at night knowing he could immediately be president."

Asked about the relevance of his pro-choice views to the Veep selection process, Rudy added that a presidential candidate is bound to pick someone as Veep who would "be able to handle" whatever "could happen in the age we live in."

Rudy also seemed to suggest that the Republican Party wouldn't really mind that much if McCain picked someone who is pro-choice.

"It would see to me that the Republican Party is not, as far as I can tell, a one-issue party," Rudy opined, adding that whatever happened, "I believe that the party will support Senator McCain's choice."

No doubt the folks in McCain campaign headquarters really appreciate Rudy's willingness to share McCain's views on these pressing questions.

Late Update: Also, Ben Smith points out that a reporter asking tough questions on the call seemed to have been cut off mid-sentence by the call's organizers.

It looks like the designated attacker on the issue of Obama's foreign policy adviser going to Syria will be none other than Rudy Giuliani.

As we reported below, the McCain campaign has been planning to make an issue out of a new report in the New York Sun saying that the adviser, Daniel Kurtzer, provided advice to the Syrian government last month. Now comes this release from the McCain campaign:

Senator John McCain's presidential campaign will hold a press conference call with former New York City Mayor, Rudy Giuliani and Randy Scheunemann, McCain 2008 Senior Foreign Policy Adviser to discuss reports that an Obama campaign Middle East adviser was recently in Damascus for meetings with Syrian officials.

As always, we strive to bring you tomorrow's McCain smears today.

Rudy seemed to have disappeared into one of his many bunkers/love nests for months after abandoning his multi-million-dollar campaign. But now he's back in full 9/11 spewing force.

Indeed, it was also announced today that Rudy will keynote the Republican National Convention. Hey, at least it won't be tough to write the speech.

...noun...verb...9/11...noun...verb...9/11...

The McCain campaign is likely going to try to make an issue today over this report in the New York Sun saying that a foreign policy adviser to Obama provided advice to the Syrian government last month, a McCain campaign source tells me.

The adviser, Daniel Kurtzer, advised Syrian foreign minister Walid al-Moallem that the next president, whether Republican or Democrat, will "make a Syrian-Israeli peace agreement a priority only if the two sides, meeting now in Turkey, make substantial progress before the inauguration," the Sun story reports.

Though Kurtzer's trip wasn't connected to the Obama campaign, and Kurtzer was in Damascus for a law conference that was underwritten by Syrian corporations and an oil company, McCain advisers think there's an opening to hit Obama over the visit, and will almost certainly do so today, though the plan could change.

The McCain team is likely to highlight the fact that the campaign knew about the trip. Kurtzer told The Sun that he'd told the campaign about it.

It's hard to predict in advance how this will play -- after all, the Obama campaign explicitly said that Kurtzer isn't a paid adviser and isn't authorized to conduct talks with any government. But it's the sort of thing that the McCain campaign might be able to get the media to play up.

Late Update: It looks like the designated attacker on the issue will be Rudy Giuliani.

Responding to Obama's demand yesterday that John McCain stop saying mean stuff questioning his patriotism, McCain himself will take up the issue today on the stump and deny that he'd ever done such a vile thing.

Here are his prepared remarks for delivery today:

Yesterday, Senator Obama got a little testy on this issue. He said that I am questioning his patriotism. Let me be clear: I am not questioning his patriotism; I am questioning his judgment. Senator Obama has made it clear that he values withdrawal from Iraq above victory in Iraq, even today with victory in sight. Over and over again, he has advocated unconditional withdrawal -- regardless of the facts on the ground. And he voted against funding for troops in combat, after saying it would be wrong to do so.

He has made these decisions not because he doesn't love America, but because he doesn't seem to understand the consequences of an American defeat in Iraq, how it would risk a wider war and threaten the security of American families.

This bears repeating a thousand times: The national press is basically giving McCain a pass on the McCain campaign's double-talk about Obama's patriotism. McCain, after all, has repeatedly said that Obama would rather lose a war than lose a campaign. McCain also said -- just this week, in fact -- that Obama's desire to lose in Iraq was driven entirely by "ambition."

And finally, the McCain campaign sent out to reporters those remarks by Joe Lieberman, in which Lieberman said Obama hasn't always put his country first. That constitutes an official campaign endorsement of Lieberman's assertion.

These facts deserve to be mentioned in every story about McCain's remarks today. But they will get scattered mention, if that.

In addition to the fact that McCain isn't being held accountable for these glaring inconsistencies in his own claims, he's also getting a pass on the assertions of his own surrogates from the very same press corps that aggressively held the Dem candidates accountable for every syllable that came out of their surrogates' mouths during the Dem primary.

The McCain campaign's double-talk on Obama's patriotism is a key feature of this campaign. That this should have entered the media narrative of this campaign at this point is undeniable. And it just hasn't in any meaningful sense. Where are the Times political memos about this? How about a "news analysis" or two on this topic?

The McCain campaign confirms what we all have known for months would happen: Senator Joe Lieberman will speak at the GOP convention on the first night.

Maybe Lieberman will reiterate his claim that Obama has not always put his country first. It's awfully valuable to McCain and the GOP to have a so-called Democrat leading with such a smear, and there apparently is nothing Lieberman won't do for his new buds.

There's simply no chance whatsoever that Lieberman will have his plum committee slot come 2009, presuming he's still calling himself an "Independent Democrat" by then.

Late Update: Some quality snark from Chris Bowers about the Dem Congressional leadership: "I still remain skeptical that they will actually strip him of his committee chair, since it will demonstrate self-respect and a willingness to stand up to conservative Democrats."

It's instructive to compare the two ads that the campaigns unleashed today attacking each other on taxes.

McCain is up with a new radio spot that keeps up the attack line that Obama is a "celebrity" who would hike your taxes, to boot.

"Celebrities like to spend their millions," McCain's ad says. "Barack Obama is no different. Only it's your money he wants to spend." It's unclear where the ad is running.

Meanwhile, Barack Obama is up with a new spot attacking John McCain on taxes:

"Can we really afford more of the same?" the ad asks. It runs through the familiar charges that McCain would give tax breaks for huge corporations and oil companies, and concludes that Obama's plan "cuts taxes for middle class families three times as much as John McCain would."

Both ads try to weave the tax attacks into the campaigns' larger themes: McCain's with yet another repetition of the "celeb" sneer; Obama's with the "more of the same" line.

Obama's ad has the virtue of being, you know, true, while McCain's is false -- Obama is actually calling for a middle-class tax cut. But only one of the ads also launches a character attack on the opponent. There may be good reasons for this. But it's worth keeping in mind.

It's time to acknowledge the possibility that the "celeb" hook may be in deep.

This new poll from Reuters/Zogby, which finds McCain up by five points, might be the first national poll to find Obama with a disadvantage on the economy, the paramount issue for voters:

In a sharp turnaround, Republican John McCain has opened a 5-point lead on Democrat Barack Obama in the U.S. presidential race and is seen as a stronger manager of the economy, according to a Reuters/Zogby poll released on Wednesday.

McCain leads Obama among likely U.S. voters by 46 percent to 41 percent, wiping out Obama's solid 7-point advantage in July and taking his first lead in the monthly Reuters/Zogby poll.

The poll was taken Thursday through Saturday, while Obama was on vacation and McCain's commander-in-chief playacting on the Russia-Georgia crisis was at its most visible and cartoonish.

A couple of caveats: Most national polls show Obama up, though a smattering are now showing a dead heat. What's more, Zogby's record is spotty this cycle. And the economy numbers seem a lot like an outlier, which makes one question the overall findings.

Still, however suspect they may be, one would obviously rather not see numbers like this.

Here's a new ad running in New Mexico from an outfit called PowerPAC, which, as Ben Smith notes, is pretty much the only third party effort on the Dem side doing paid media in the presidential race:

The ad says that "Barack Obama believes it shouldn't matter" if you "look different" or if your "name is unusual."

Not to be churlish about it, but this ad strikes us as boring and whiny and defensive. It's partly geared towards Hispanic voters in the Southwest -- there's also a Spanish-language version -- but presumably these voters already know that Obama is different and that being different shouldn't matter. It's hard to know what this spot is supposed to accomplish.

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An odd little scoop from Pennsylvania's Scranton Times:

A brother of New York Sen. Hillary Clinton and local Democrats who backed her unsuccessful presidential campaign socialized privately Monday with a top surrogate of the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Arizona Sen. John McCain.

The private gathering featured Carly Fiorina, Mr. McCain's top economic adviser, and took place at the Dunmore home of political consultant Jamie Brazil, a longtime friend of Mrs. Clinton's family who has signed on as paid national director of Mr. McCain's Citizens for McCain Coalition.

The attendees included Tony Rodham, Mrs. Clinton's youngest sibling, his wife, Megan, and their two children; attorney Kathleen Granahan Kane, who coordinated Mrs. Clinton's presidential campaign in Northeast Pennsylvania during the primary election; and Virginia McGregor, sister of Scranton Mayor Chris Doherty.

With the Democratic National Convention less than a week away, the gathering raises questions about the support Illinois Sen. Barack Obama can expect from former local supporters of Mrs. Clinton, who dominated at the polls in the Northeast in the April primary election.

Via Mark Halperin, who calls it "essential reading." Obama's Pennsylvania campaign, wisely, declined to comment. It's hard to gauge how much this matters, but it seems worth digging into a bit.

The new Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll is out, and it finds that McCain's barrage of "celeb" ads and smears on Obama's alleged lack of patriotism has worked to produce a dead-heat:

Barack Obama's public image has eroded this summer amid a daily onslaught of attacks from Republican rival John McCain, leaving the race for the White House statistically tied, according to a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll released today.

Far more voters say McCain has the right experience to be president, the poll found. More than a third have questions about Obama's patriotism.

Obama is leading McCain 45%-43%, within the poll's margin of error. In June, an LA Times poll found Obama up by 12, though other polls found a tighter race.

The poll also finds a noticeable erosion in Obama's favorability ratings:

Obama's favorable rating has sunk to 48% from 59% since the last Times/Bloomberg poll in June. At the same time, his negative rating has risen to 35% from 27%.

Meanwhile, the results are a bit mixed on whether McCain's attacks on Obama's commander in chief readiness have worked. On the one hand, the poll found that 63% of voters have confidence in Obama's ability to deal wisely with an international crisis, which is certainly solid and not far behind the 77% who feel that way about McCain.

On the other hand...

Nearly half of voters say Obama lacks the right experience to be president, while 14% feel that way about McCain.

There is some good news in the poll for Obama. McCain faces some serious problems: Obama's leading on the economy, which is the most important issue to voters; McCain's supporters are less enthusiastic than Obama's; and independents are leaning towards Obama.

Okay, not so much mindless speculation. Mostly real news. Here's a quick roundup of the latest Veep and convention updates...

* The Obama campaign announces a battleground state tour leading up to the Dem convention, complete with as-yet-unknown Veep, beginning with a Saturday campaign announcement in Springfield, Illinois.

* Al Gore will speak at the convention on Thursday night at Invesco Field.

* Half of Dems nationwide agree that Hillary's act of putting her name in nomination -- you know that heinous, scheming act at the heart of Hillary's plot to steal the convention for herself -- think it will help unify the party. Only 28% disagree.

* Top advisers to McCain are reportedly sounding out activists and party officials about the possibility of either pro-choice Tom Ridge or pro-choice Joe LIeberman on the ticket. Not seeing how this one ever happens in the real world.

* Joe Biden's Veep chances shoot up -- on Intrade. And with Newsweek's Howard Fineman, who is convinced it will be Joe after conversations with multiple sources close to the process.

Late Update: Maybe it isn't Biden! ABC News reports:

As Delaware Sen. Joe Biden was leaving his house in Wilmington this afternoon, he slowed down and said to the gathered news reporters outside his home: "Hey guys, I'm not the guy. See ya."

The McCain campaign keeps the "celeb" sneer attack ad campaign going with this new Spanish-language radio ad that tweaks the main theme a bit: "Fame must be grand for Barack Obama. But is he ready to lead in tough economic times?"

The ad also lays it on thick with the "grand" crack, adding that Obama has a "grand history of raising taxes." As in, dahling, you're so grand.

The ad, which translates "grand" as "fabulosa," is running in Colorado, Florida, Nevada and New Mexico. Full script after the jump.

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One thing that frequently gets this blog in a funk is the rather astonishing ability of some pundits to see questionable or even reprehensible political behavior on the part of McCain and his top advisers as a sign of good character on his part.

Today David Brooks offers a classic of this genre, lamenting about how sad it is that McCain has been forced by external events -- and Obama's stubborn refusal to agree to a debate framework entirely on McCain's terms -- to run the negative campaign he never wanted to:

When McCain and his team set out to win the presidency in 2008, they hoped to run a campaign with this sort of spirit. McCain would venture forth on the back of his bus, going places other Republicans don't go, saying things politicians don't say, offering the country the vision of a different kind of politics -- free of circus antics -- in which serious people sacrifice for serious things.

It hasn't turned out that way. McCain hasn't been able to run the campaign he had envisioned. Instead, he and his staff have been given an education by events.

Can someone pass me a hankie? It's...it's...so sad!

Brooks, of course, never bothers actually talking about McCain's negative campaigning with any specificity, and needless to say, he certainly never gets around to passing judgment on his tactics. Because in the narrative Brooks -- and certain select other pundits -- have built, McCain is exonerated in advance for any and every political tactic he employs, because he supposedly never wanted to do it in the first place.

But Brooks adds a new twist to this narrative: "The man who hopes to inspire a new generation of Americans now attacks Obama daily," he writes. "It is the only way he can get the networks to pay attention."

Yes, the "celeb" sneer ads; McCain's willingness to accuse Obama almost daily of being willing to lose a war to avoid losing a political campaign; the McCain campaign's endorsement of Joe Lieberman's claim that Obama hasn't always put his country first -- all this is just the media's fault.

Update: A typically sharp take on this from Ed Kilgore.

There's been a ton of buzz on the web for the last day or so -- beginning with this Daily Kos diary -- suggesting that John McCain patterned his story about a Vietamese captor drawing a cross in the dirt before him on a similar episode from Russian novelist Alexander Solzhenitsyn's time in the Soviet gulags.

But it turns out that this episode probably never happened to Solzhenitsyn at all, and according to a Solzhenitsyn biographer it appears nowhere in his published writing. Columbia University professor Michael Scammell, the author of Solzhenitsyn: A Biography, says the episode "never happened," and didn't appear in Solzhenitsyn's book, Gulag Archipelago, either.

This only solves a piece of the mystery, but it's a key piece. It doesn't necessarily rule out the possibility that McCain or his biographer, Mark Salter, picked up the tale that this happened to Solzhenitsyn elsewhere and embellished it for their own purposes.

But it takes one well-trafficked theory off the table: That McCain, a fan of Solzhenitsyn, picked it up straight from his works. More broadly, it also skewers once and for all the cherished right-wing falsehood that this happened to Solzhenitsyn at all.

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We've just learned that MoveOn is about to sink half a million dollars into a huge ad buy in North Carolina linking Elizabeth Dole, who's facing a tough re-election fight, to John McCain and Big Oil.

Here's a first look at MoveOn's spot, which will run statewide starting tomorrow night:

The ad, which highlights GOP support for tax breaks for oil companies, will be released sometime today in honor of McCain's high-profile trip to an oil rig.

It's likely that the spot foreshadows more ads from MoveOn linking GOP Senate incumbents to Big Oil and McCain. Though some polls show public preference for McCain's position on drilling, MoveOn and Dems believe that hammering away at the links between the GOP and the big oil companies can change the conversation in their favor.

A quick note to readers: With the general election now in full swing as we head into the fall, we're hoping that you guys will help us with our coverage by tipping us off to what's going on in the presidential race -- and in the Congressional races -- in your states.

We want to know what you are seeing on the ground from the many state operations of both presidential campaigns -- Republican and Democratic. Mailers, ads, surrogate action, weird or revealing coverage in the local papers or on the local TV channels, materials being spread by independent third-party groups -- we want to hear about it all.

If you see anything you think is interesting, shoot us an email at talk@talkingpointsmemo.com.

You can help us make the site more useful, more informative, more fun -- in short, better. And thanks in advance for your help.

Barack Obama is giving his speech before the Veterans of Foreign Wars right now. With some Dems questioning whether he's hitting back hard enough against John McCain's attacks, Obama went out of his way to directly confront McCain's claim that he would rather lose a war than lose an election.

From the prepared remarks:

But one of the things that we have to change in this country is the idea that people can't disagree without challenging each other's character and patriotism. I have never suggested that Senator McCain picks his positions on national security based on politics or personal ambition. I have not suggested it because I believe that he genuinely wants to serve America's national interest. Now, it's time for him to acknowledge that I want to do the same.

Let me be clear: I will let no one question my love of this country. I love America, so do you, and so does John McCain. When I look out at this audience, I see people of different political views. You are Democrats and Republicans and Independents. But you all served together, and fought together, and bled together under the same proud flag. You did not serve a Red America or a Blue America -- you served the United States of America.

So let's have a serious debate, and let's debate our disagreements on the merits of policy -- not personal attacks. And no matter how heated it gets or what kind of campaign he chooses to run, I will honor Senator McCain's service, just like I honor the service of every veteran in this room, and every American who has worn the uniform of the United States.

Obama declared that it's time for McCain to "acknowledge" that Obama genuinely wants to serve America's national interest. It'll be interesting to see what McCain says if and when he's asked directly by reporters whether he's prepared to acknowledge this -- and how hard the national press corps will grill him for a direct answer to the question.

Keep in mind that the McCain campaign endorsed Joe Lieberman's claim that Obama hasn't always put his country first. Obama's full speech after the jump.

Late Update: Here's video:

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Whoopsie! Check out this inadvertent description of Joe Lieberman in an Associated Press story on the Veepstakes...

His top contenders are said to include Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. Less traditional choices mentioned include former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge, an abortion-rights supporter, and Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman, the Democratic vice presidential prick in 2000 who now is an independent.

A stopped clock is right twice a day and all that...

Special thanks to TPM Reader KS for spotting this one.

Late Update: Turns out Atrios was on this first.

A new Quinnipiac poll finds that Barack Obama's national lead over John McCan has shrunk from nine to five points -- and it also suggests that McCain's playacting of commander in chief during the Russia-Georgia crisis may have paid off.

Here are the numbers, compared to mid-July:

Obama 47% (50%)

McCain 42% (41%)

The poll also finds McCain has a substantial edge on who voters think is best qualified to deal with the Russia crisis, 55%-27% -- suggesting that McCain had success with his efforts to brand himself as the leadership figure during the crisis by dispatching campaign allies to the region and generally filling the airwaves with a lot of tough talk.

Indeed, almost a third of Democrats, and 55% of independents, prefer McCain to Obama on Russia. Of course, it's unclear how much of an issue the Russia crisis will be in the fall campaign.

Separately, the poll finds that Obama is holding on to his commanding lead among women, younger voters, and blacks, while McCain's lead among men and whites has edged up slightly. Full poll here.

In the latest veepstakes development, the Politico reports that John McCain is likely to announce his running-mate pick on August 29 -- the day immediately after Barack Obama officially accepts the Democratic nomination in Denver.

If this pans out, it could really cut one of two ways: McCain's pick could have to share media time with the post-game coverage of Obama's speech, and thus lose some of the bump that often comes with VP coverage. Or it could work to McCain's advantage and completely overshadow the post-Denver coverage, thus depriving Obama of his own post-convention bump.

Matt Drudge is -- ahem -- "reporting" that the New York Times has learned that Obama has made his Veep choice, and lots of folks in the political world are chattering away about this as if it's true.

Drudge, who's blaring this as his big lead story, also says that the paper's Jeff Zeleny and Adam Nagourney have learned that his Veep roll-out could begin tomorrow morning.

Mark Halperin reports that Drudge is "wrong." I checked in with Nagourney himself, and he emailed this:

Don't believe everything you read on Drudge. We'll post a story when it's ready.

That's pretty much a denial. Sort of, anyway.

Late Update: The Times story is now up:

WASHINGTON -- Senator Barack Obama has all but finalized his choice for a running mate and set an elaborate roll-out plan for his decision, beginning with an early morning alert to supporters, perhaps as soon as Wednesday, followed by a trip to swing states by the new Democratic ticket, aides said.

Mr. Obama's deliberations remain remarkably closely held. Aides said perhaps a half-dozen advisers were involved in the final discussions in an effort to enforce a command that Mr. Obama issued to staff: that his decision not leak out until supporters are notified.

Mr. Obama had not notified his choice -- or any of those not selected -- of his decision as of late Monday, advisers said. Going into the final days, Mr. Obama was said to be focused mainly on three candidates: Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana, Governor Tim Kaine of Virginia and Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware.

So the paper isn't reporting that Obama has finalized his decision, as Drudge said; he has "all but" finalized it. And the roll-out could come tomorrow. Or it might not. And the Veep pick himself or herself -- if there is one -- hasn't been told.

And Bayh may still be in the running, supposedly, though that's very hard to imagine.

The McCain campaign has outspent the Obama camp by hundreds of thousands of dollars, and in some cases by as much as a million dollars or more, in virtually all of the dozen battleground states where both campaigns are up on the air, according to a firm that tracks national advertising.

Evan Tracey, the chief operating officer of TNS Media Intelligence/Campaign Media Analysis Group, confirmed to us in response to our questions that McCain's campaign has racked up a huge ad spending advantage in what he called "traditional battleground states," the states that both campaigns are sinking cash into.

McCain is advertising heavily in 12 traditional battlegrounds; Obama is advertising in those same 12 plus roughly seven more; and McCain holds a heavy advantage in virtually all the 12 shared states.

The comparison is significant, and in one sense it lends comfort to Obama, because McCain has not been able to pull ahead in those states despite vastly outspending him in them. But the flip-side of this is that Obama has not been able to make significant enough headway in many of the seven states where Obama has the airwaves to himself.

Here's the comparison of the two camps' spending on ads up to the present in the 12 states where both are up on the air, according to Tracey:

Iowa: McCain has spent roughly $700,000 more than Obama.

Missouri: McCain has spent roughly half a million more than Obama.

Ohio: McCain has spent approximately one million more than Obama.

Pennsylvania: McCain has spent roughly a million and a half more than Obama.

Michigan: McCain has outspent Obama by about a million dollars.

New Hampshire: Spending is about even.

New Mexico: McCain has spent approximately $300,000 more, and has outspent Obama by roughly two to one.

Nevada: McCain has outspent Obama by $800,000, also roughly two to one.

Missouri: McCain has spent $500,000 more than Obama.

Virginia: Obama has spent a million more than McCain, largely because Obama is advertising statewide while McCain is only up in a small part of the north.

Wisconsin: McCain has spent roughly a half million more than Obama.

North Dakota: Obama has outspent McCain by around $170,000.

The reason for this is partly that both campaigns are spending at roughly the same rate overall, but Obama is spread thinner and is spending in more states. Tracey says that the campaigns are both spending between $1 million and $1.6 million a day overall.

Meanwhile, Obama is up on the air in all of McCain's states, but also in Indiana, Alaska, Montana, North Carolina, Florida, Georgia, and southern Virginia.

"There are two ways to look at this," Tracey says. On the one hand, Obama is pouring significant resources into seven states where McCain is spending nothing at all, and hasn't necessarily gained enough in those states to show for it.

But Tracey adds that the spending disparity in the core battlegrounds also bodes well for Obama in some ways. "The concern for McCain is that he's outspending Obama" in the more traditional battlegrounds at a rate "that's not going to be sustainable," he says. "But he's not building any real leads in these states."

The Obama campaign may be banking on the fact that with enough spending in non-traditional states they can eventually force the McCain campaign to broaden the number of states they're spending in, making it tougher for the McCain team to keep pace with Obama's spending advantage this fall.

Late Update: Some of you rightly note that Colorado isn't on the list even though both campaigns are advertising there. We'll bring you word on Colorado's spending disparity as soon as we get it.

Separately, it's worth pointing out that the total list where both are up is still 12, even including Colorado. That's because Virginia shouldn't really be on the list, because McCain's advertising is very limited there regionally.

Late Update: We inadvertently left Colorado and Michigan off the list of states where both are advertising; they've now both been added, above. Also, North Dakota was accidentally described as a state where Obama is advertising solo; in fact, both campaigns are up on the air there.

Finally, we initially said that there are 11 states where both are up on the air; it's in fact 12 states, not counting Virginia, which is a special case because McCain is only up in a small northern corner of the state in order to access the D.C. market. Obama is up statewide there.

Early on in the general election, the McCain campaign announced to great fanfare that they were going to make an all-out effort to pursue the female vote and win over disaffected Hillary supporters.

Since then, Obama advisers have been very sensitive about stories saying he is struggling among women. And today, Dana Singiser, Obama's senior advisor for the women's vote, uncorked a detailed and extensive memo making the case that McCain's the candidate struggling with the female vote. It asks: "Does McCain have a Woman Problem?"

Despite his campaign's outreach efforts, McCain's attempt to bridge the gender gap has fallen flat. He fares worse among women than any presidential candidate since Bob Dole in 1996. In the August 13 Pew Poll, Obama holds a 51-38 lead among women over McCain. In the August Time Magazine poll, Obama leads 49-39.

McCain's share of the women's vote is considerably below the 48% George W. Bush won in 2004 or the 43% he earned in 2000. Indeed, if McCain dips even a little, he is at risk of falling below Bob Dole's 38% share of women's vote in 1996, which is the lowest share of any major part candidate in the last 36 years. More than half the female electorate (53%) holds mostly positive views of Obama, while only 37% feel mostly favorable toward McCain.

Part of the idea here might be to try to get a "McCain's women problem" media drumbeat going, much as opinion-makers have been quick to jump all over Obama's alleged problems with working class voters and with Hillary supporters. (We're waiting...)

The jury is still out, however, on the question of whether female subgroups are holding Obama back in key battleground states. For instance, whatever advantages he may have among the national female vote, the latest Public Policy Polling survey finds that McCain is dead even with Obama in Ohio in part because of the reluctance of middle-aged white females to back the Illinois Senator.

For the hard-core junkies among you, the full memo is after the jump.

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An interesting factoid buried in this Associated Press article:

Recognizing an opportunity, Obama has opened more offices in rural areas than any other Democratic presidential candidate in years, pushing a message focused on job creation.

The fact that Obama has opened up more offices in rural areas than many past Dems could partly reflect how well funded he is, as well as his broader 49-state strategy. But it's noteworthy in light of everything we keep reading about his alleged troubles with these voters.

Indeed, AP says Obama has an opportunity here. While Bush carried 60% of the rural vote in 2004, an AP poll in June found that McCain isn't doing as well, winning rural voters over Obama 40%-34% (also suggesting a large undecided bloc there).

Anyway, the story of Obama's rural outreach seems worth fleshing out. We'll bring you more when we get it.

The Obama campaign is trying out a new message in response to McCain's endless discussion of his own POW experiences: Describe Obama's time as a community leader and public servant as akin to military service.

On a conference call with reporters moments ago, the Obama campaign rolled out a new effort called "Next Generation Veterans For Obama," a group of Iraq and Afghanistan vets who back Obama (the nod to the change message is a nice touch).

On the call, several of the veterans went out of their way to describe Obama's "service" to his country in various ways.

"The fact is, Senator Obama has served," said Koby Langley, a former Army JAG officer and Iraq and Balkans veteran. "He's served his community." Langley added that veterans like people who "actually legislate for change" and "serve" vets.

"Most of my friends and colleagues in the military look at Senator Obama's lifetime of service and they identify with that," added former Army military police Iraq veteran Philip Carter, who's now serving as the veterans director for the Obama campaign.

One interesting moment on the call: When the assembled vets were asked by a reporter if their fellow vets were resisting Obama because of his lack of military service, most said no, but one went a bit off message.

"Yes, I have had some resistance to it," that vet said. "Most times their views are based on inaccurate information they have heard. I try and give them the information that they need. They're not gonna change their minds sometimes."

A nice catch from Steve Benen: When top McCain surrogate Bobby Jindal, who's been discussed as a Veep possibility, was asked by NBC's David Gregory what "big idea" is at the heart of McCain's campaign, Jindal pulled a homina homina homina, citing McCain's energy policy...

In response to the "big idea" question, Jindal said: "I think there's several, but certainly when it comes to domestic issues, he understands the energy crisis is probably the biggest economic obstacle we face..." That doesn't count as a big new original idea.

When pressed again by Gregory for any "big idea," Jindal again filibustered by talking about McCain's energy policy, suggesting that McCain would battle Washington "gridlock." That doesn't count as a big new original idea, either, needless to say.

Late Update: It looks like Think Progress' Faiz Shakir was the first one to flag this. Apologies.

Here's the response from Obama spokesperson Bill Burton to McCain's attack today proclaiming that Obama wants us to lose in Iraq out of "ambition":

"All his bluster, distortions and negative attacks notwithstanding, it is hard to understand how Senator McCain can at once proclaim his support for the sovereign government of Iraq, and then stubbornly defy their expressed support for a timeline to remove our combat brigades from their country. The difference in this race is that John McCain is intent on spending $10 billion a month on an open-ended war, while Barack Obama thinks we should bring this war to a responsible end and invest in our pressing needs here at home."

The idea that McCain's Iraq policies are directly at odds with what the Iraqi government wants has gotten scattered mention by Team Obama in statements and ads. Perhaps this is the start of a renewed effort to push it for all it's worth.

A bunch of folks have pointed out already that yesterday's long New York Times piece on John McCain's response to 9/11 is really, really good.

With McCain today questioning Obama's judgment on Iraq, this nugget from the Times piece is really worth flagging -- it highlights very vividly just how eager McCain was to go to war with Iraq in the days after the terror attacks:

Within hours, Mr. McCain, the Vietnam War hero and famed straight talker of the 2000 Republican primary, had taken on a new role: the leading advocate of taking the American retaliation against Al Qaeda far beyond Afghanistan. In a marathon of television and radio appearances, Mr. McCain recited a short list of other countries said to support terrorism, invariably including Iraq, Iran and Syria...

Within a month he made clear his priority. "Very obviously Iraq is the first country," he declared on CNN. By Jan. 2, Mr. McCain was on the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt in the Arabian Sea, yelling to a crowd of sailors and airmen: "Next up, Baghdad!"

Recall that a key McCain campaign message is that he hates war and that he, unlike the man he would replace, knows its costs and approaches it with great reluctance. In that context, video of this moment referenced by The Times would be gold.

John McCain is ratcheting up his attacks on Obama over Iraq in a speech this morning, declaring flatly that Obama wants the U.S. to fail in Iraq because of "ambition."

In the speech, which is going on now, McCain accuses Obama of having tried to "legislate failure" in Iraq. He adds his familiar charge that Obama would rather lose the war than lose the election, and declares that Obama's desire to lose in Iraq is motivated by nothing but his desire to be president:

Senator Obama still cannot quite bring himself to admit his own failure in judgment. Nor has he been willing to heed the guidance of General Petraeus, or to listen to our troops on the ground when they say -- as they have said to me on my trips to Iraq: "Let us win, just let us win." Instead, Senator Obama commits the greater error of insisting that even in hindsight, he would oppose the surge. Even in retrospect, he would choose the path of retreat and failure for America over the path of success and victory. In short, both candidates in this election pledge to end this war and bring our troops home. The great difference is that I intend to win it first.

Behind all of these claims and positions by Senator Obama lies the ambition to be president. What's less apparent is the judgment to be commander in chief. And in matters of national security, good judgment will be at a premium in the term of the next president -- as we were all reminded ten days ago by events in the nation of Georgia.

Here you have the Roveian strategy at its most naked: Keep repeating that your opponent's strong point -- his judgment in opposing the war, something that majorities agree was a bad idea -- is a negative.

Also, it bears repeating that here McCain is basically accusing Obama of treason. Full speech after the jump.

Late Update: The Obama camp responds.

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A number of you have already chewed over the new poll from Public Policy Polling that finds McCain has pulled even with Obama in Ohio.

The survey finds the two in an absolute dead heat, with 45% apiece, with 10% undecided. McCain had trailed in the state in two previous Public Policy polls.

The pollsters say that McCain's gains are fueled by the fact that he's actually doing better among Republicans (89%-7%) than Obama is among Dems (75%-17%). That's largely because middle-aged white females are neglecting to choose Obama, "an indication that it could be former supporters of Hillary Clinton who are holding out.

One caveat, however: The poll finds that Obama is winning only 80% of black voters, a finding that's out of line with some other surveys.

Dem Party leaders call on Obama to run sharper race on economy
Some leading Dems, worried that the race against McCain looks tougher than they imagined, want Obama to sharpen his economic message and convert his popularity into a stronger sense among voters that he will improve their lives in concrete ways. "It's fine to tell people about hope and change," says Governor Ted Strickland of Ohio, "but you have to have plenty of concrete, pragmatic ideas that bring hope and change to life."

Obama in Nevada today; McCain off the trail
Obama is in Reno today and will attend a fundraiser tonight in California; McCain has no public events. Hillary is campaigning for Obama today in New Mexico.

Obama: By November, people will understand that this election is "not about me"
In an interview with CBN's David Brody, Obama responded to a question about the "celeb" sneer ads with an answer that sounded a bit like an acknowledgment that right now, the election is shaping up more as a referendum on his character than on his opponent or on their respective policies. "I think ultimately the American people are going to understand by the time they go into the polling place in November that this is not an election about me," Obama said. "This an election about them."

Kaine: It's unlikely I'll be Veep
Virginia Governor Tim Kaine is campaigning his heart out for Barack Obama, but he appears to have largely written off his chances of becoming Veep. "I don't have any illusions about it," Kaine said. "I don't think that's likely to happen."

Pundits: McCain won the day at Saddleback Church
Some on-air pundits say McCain was the winner last night when both men appeared at the Sddleback megachurch in Orange County, California. ABC's George Stephanopoulos said that McCain "solidified his ties to the evangelical community," while Jake Tapper said that McCain "won over this crowd" with tales about his POW captivity -- you know, the topic we keep hearing McCain is reluctant to discuss.

Obama outworking McCain in North Carolina
In yet another sign that the Obama camp is dead serious about broadening the electoral map, his campaign is vastly out-organizing McCain's in North Carolina, a state that hasn't voted for a Democratic president since Jimmy Carter in 1976. Although John Kerry lost to President Bush in this state by over 13 points -- with John Edwards on the ticket, no less -- the polling average finds Obama trailing McCain here by only around four or five points.

Bush: "Bullying and intimidation are not acceptable" in the conduct of foreign policy
Displaying his typically acute self-awareness, President Bush is now reacting to the Russia-Georgia crisis thusly: "Bullying and intimidation are not acceptable ways to conduct foreign policy in the 21st century."