FIRST COLIN POWELL, NOW...  Ken Adelman is a lifelong conservative Republican.  Campaigned for Goldwater, was hired by Rumsfeld at the Office of Economic Opportunity under Nixon, was assistant to Defense Secretary Rumsfeld under Ford, served as Reagan's director of arms control …

Rick Davis: Campaign Rethinking Playing The Rev. Wright Card  —  John McCain's campaign manager says he is reconsidering using Barack Obama's relationship with Reverend Jeremiah Wright as a campaign issue during the election's closing weeks.  —  In an appearance on conservative Hugh Hewitt's radio program …

From President Bush's White House team, Colin Powell hears ... nothing  —  Colin L. Powell, the former mud soldier, hurled his political grenade in defense of Barack Obama, but the collateral damage hit the Bush White House.  —  To be sure, he was opting for Obama, but the undercurrent …

Biden to Supporters: “Gird Your Loins”, For the Next President “It's Like Cleaning Augean Stables”  —  ABC News' Matthew Jaffe Reports: Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., on Sunday guaranteed that if elected, Sen. Barack Obama., D-Ill., will be tested by an international crisis within his first six months …

CNN Poll: Race may be tightening  —  Latest CNN/ORC Poll of likely voters:  —  Barack Obama: 51 percent  —  John McCain: 46 percent  —  WASHINGTON (CNN) — With two weeks and one day until election day, a new national poll of likely voters suggests the race for the White House may be tightening up.

Tires slashed during Obama rally  —  Someone slashed the tires of at least 30 vehicles parked outside the Crown Coliseum on Sunday during a rally for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, authorities said.  —  Sheriff's deputies are investigating.

ARE THEY ALL AS SLEAZY AS MCCAIN?  —  Either because of age or recent immersion in politics, a lot of readers have asked, is it really usually this bad?  Do they all get this sleazy?  As sleazy as McCain?  —  The simple answer, I think, is, No. They don't.

King of the World Says McCain Pretty Much Giving Up on Several Battleground States  —  CNN's John King reports that the Republican team is “making tough decisions” as it sees Colorado as well as New Mexico and Iowa drift away. … Response from McCain aide Hazelbaker: “We see the race tightening both internally and in public polling.

Lorne Gunter: Thirty years of warmer temperatures go poof  —  In early September, I began noticing a string of news stories about scientists rejecting the orthodoxy on global warming.  Actually, it was more like a string of guest columns and long letters to the editor since it is hard …

Poll: Obama Gained During Debates  —  CBS News/N.Y. Times Follow-Up Survey Of Likely Voters Suggests Democrat's Advantage Grew  —  (CBS) The standing of the Democratic presidential ticket of Barack Obama and Joe Biden improved during the last few weeks of the presidential campaign …

Kerry's answer to the ‘boxers or briefs’ question: He goes commando and McCain would say ‘Depends’  —  CAMBRIDGE - U.S. Sen. John Kerry, the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee, had some choice words for the political press corps and, in particular, cable news Monday.

Evidence of Obama-Ayers Tie Sent Down the Memory Hole . . . Almost!  —  The best evidence that Barack Obama launched his political career from Bill Ayers's living room has disappeared . . . down the memory hole.  —  Well, not quite.  The Wayback Machine and I have both saved copies.

Palin on SNL: What Did You Expect?  —  In 1998, I attended the Kennedy Center Honors in Washington.  A friend who is a lobbyist there escorted me to a weekend's worth of events.  As we moved around a brunch reception one late morning, I turned and suddenly faced Henry Kissinger.

EXCLUSIVE: .22 Gunshot, paint balls fired at McCain / Palin Straight Talk Express  —  (Sunday, October 19 - Filed by Mark Williams in Raton, New Mexico with the Stop Obama Tour) We learned at this morning's Stop Obama Rally here that the McCain/Palin Straight Talk Express came through town yesterday.

Defending Islam at a McCain rally  —  For all the ease of picking out fairly extreme scenes at political rallies, the American News Project has a compelling moment of the reverse at a McCain event in Northern Virginia: McCain backers responding to a man who, outside a rally …

Safety in Numbers?  Poll-Driven Press Goes Out on a Limb  —  The network maps are bathed in blue, the pundits contemplating a landslide, the conservative columnists preparing for the indignities of an Obama administration.  —  With the numbers breaking Barack Obama's way …

Giuliani: 'God Forbid Somebody Would Do Some Reporting On Barack Obama's Use Of Drugs'  —  On Saturday, the New York Times published an investigative piece on Cindy McCain that delved into, among other things, her past addiction to painkillers.  Responding with outrage …

Esquire Magazine Brutally Endorses Massive Democratic Majority In Senate  —  Lest any of you think I spend every day pouring through the Congressional Record and crunching Senate roll-call votes, I do have other interests and information sources and one of the non-political publications I subscribe to is Esquire magazine.

MCCAIN: BROTHER, CAN YOU SPARE A RUBLE?.... Some campaigns just don't have good timing.  Today, the McCain campaign decided to cast aspersions on the Obama campaign's extraordinary fundraising success, referencing “secret donations” and “illegitimate money.”  —  Now, as a substantive matter …

PALIN: TROOPERGATE DOESN'T GO AWAY  —  Sometime this week, “Palin and her husband will meet this week with an investigator determining whether she violated state ethics law when firing her public safety director.  Thomas Van Flein, the attorney for both Sarah and Todd Palin …

The Victory Chart (Updated with new polls)  —  As I noted yesterday, Obama is easily to the brink of victory, with leads exceeding 8% in states worth 264 electoral votes.  From that point, he only needs six electoral votes to in, and five to tie.  Fully six competitive states—Colorado …

Obama pays uneasy visit to a N. Carolina barbecue joint  —  FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. — When Sen. Barack Obama entered a barbecue joint here to greet dozens of people eating lunch after church services on Sunday, Diane Fanning, 54, who works at a Sam's Club, began yelling, “Socialist, socialist, socialist — get out of here!”

Is McCain Coming Back?  —  Photo by Ricky Carioti — The Washington Post  —  Amid the wall-to-wall coverage of Barack Obama's $150 million fundraising take in September and the endorsement of the Illinois senator on Sunday by former Secretary of State Colin Powell, the campaign of his Republican opponent …

Spreading the Wealth  —  For a week or so now, I've been listening to smart conservatives suggest that Obama's “spreading the wealth” remark might really, really hurt him - “talk about playing into the most extreme stereotype of your party, that it is infested with socialists,” …