More Challenges for McCain, From Ayers to the Palin Pick  —  Obama leads on optimism and temperment in final weeks.  —  More challenges for John McCain: Likely voters overwhelmingly reject his effort to make an issue of Barack Obama's association with 1960s radical William Ayers.

Here the People Rule  —  According to the silver-penned Peggy Noonan, writing in The Wall Street Journal over the weekend, “In the end the Palin candidacy is a symptom and expression of a new vulgarization in American politics.”  —  Leave aside Noonan's negative judgment on Sarah Palin's candidacy, a judgment I don't share.

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 …

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 …

Palin Becomes Increasingly Accessible To The National Media  —  From CBS News' Scott Conroy:  —  (COLORADO SPRINGS) It was less than two weeks ago when Sarah Palin astonished her traveling press corps by lifting the curtain (literally) and journeying to the back of her campaign plane …

Jon Stewart to Sarah Palin: ‘[Expletive] You.’  —  Speaking to a college audience in Boston, Mass. Friday, “Daily Show” host Jon Stewart used his stand-up routine to respond to Sarah Palin's comments about “pro-America” parts of the country, shedding the profanity restrictions that govern his Comedy Central show.

What Bradley Effect?  —  WITH only two weeks to go before the election, talk has turned to the Bradley effect.  The phenomenon is named for Tom Bradley, the African-American mayor of Los Angeles, who lost the 1982 California governor's race even though exit polls predicted he'd defeat his Republican opponent, George Deukmejian.

The Real Plumbers of Ohio  —  Forty years ago, Richard Nixon made a remarkable marketing discovery.  By exploiting America's divisions — divisions over Vietnam, divisions over cultural change and, above all, racial divisions — he was able to reinvent the Republican brand.

Busy day expected as early voting starts  —  Monday marks the first day of early voting in South Florida.  But in a high-stakes presidential election, voting early doesn't guarantee avoiding lines.  —  MRVASQUEZ@MIAMIHERALD.COM  —  Buoyed by the hype and excitement befitting …

Barack Obama is the better choice for our president  —  In the past 50 years, The Eagle has never recommended a Democrat for president.  We made no recommendations in 1960 and 1964 — when Texas' own Lyndon B. Johnson was on the Democratic ticket — nor did we in 1968 …

The Republicans have lifted the lid off their rightwing id  —  Now McCain's supporters are casting Obama as anti-American.  This may well scare voters, but not the way they mean to  —  A year or two ago, if you'd told me that Barack Obama would be leading John McCain by a seemingly comfortable margin …

Many Holes in Disclosure of Nominees' Health  —  Fifteen days before the election, serious gaps remain in the public's knowledge about the health of the presidential and vice-presidential nominees.  The limited information provided by the candidates is a striking departure from recent campaigns …

How to Read the Constitution  —  The following is an excerpt from Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas's Wriston Lecture to the Manhattan Institute last Thursday:  —  When John F. Kennedy said in his inaugural address, “Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country …

Source: Wayne Huizenga wants to sell more of Dolphins to Stephen M. Ross this year  —  MIAMI GARDENS — By the end of the year, an NFL source said Sunday, Dolphins co-owner Wayne Huizenga would like to sell all but a small percentage of the team to real estate mogul Stephen M. Ross …

Obama's Secret Campaign Cash: Has $63 Million Flowed from Foreign Sources?  —  As Barack Obama reaped a stunning $150 million in campaign donations in September, bringing his total to more than $600 million, new questions have arisen about the source of his amazing funding.

What happened when they “spread the wealth” in Zimbabwe  —  The Raleigh News and Observer profiles a couple from Zimbabwe that was forced to escape their native country when the thug-o-crats decided to “spread the wealth around.”

Nafta-Plus  —  Canada looks to Europe in anticipation of Obama protectionism.  —  Barack Obama's promise to unilaterally rewrite the North American Free Trade Agreement if Canada and Mexico won't go along with his ideas on labor and the environment has not gone unnoticed in Ottawa.