Growing Doubts on Palin Take a Toll, Poll Finds  —  A growing number of voters have concluded that Senator John McCain's running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska, is not qualified to be vice president, weighing down the Republican ticket in the last days of the campaign, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.

Stan Greenberg's Letter To Bill McInturff, Lead Pollster, McCain-Palin 2008  —  To: Bill McInturff, lead pollster, McCain-Palin 2008  —  Partner, Public Opinion Strategies  —  From: Stan Greenberg, Greenberg Quinlan Rosner and Democracy Corps  —  RE: STATE OF THE RACE AND BALLOT POSITION

As a Conservative, I Must Say I Do Quite Like the Cut of this Obama Fellow's Jib  —  By T. Coddington Van Voorhees VII  —  Columnist, The National Topsider  —  Membership Chairman, The Newport Club  —  When my late father T. Coddington Van Voorhees VI founded the iconoclastic conservative …

Checks on ‘Joe’ more extensive than first acknowledged  —  Tax, welfare info also sought on McCain ally  —  A state agency has revealed that its checks of computer systems for potential information on “Joe the Plumber” were more extensive than it first acknowledged.

Qaeda wants Republicans, Bush “humiliated”: Web video  —  DUBAI (Reuters) - An al Qaeda leader has called for President George W. Bush and the Republicans to be “humiliated,” without endorsing any party in the upcoming U.S. presidential election, according to a video posted on the Internet.

Cover this!  Inside the nastiest '08 rumors  —  Thank you for your e-mails!  —  When John McCain and Barack Obama started running for president in 2007, they were two of the most universally liked and respected politicians in America — men who even members of the opposite party saw as decent …

In Which Michael Goldfarb Has A Bad Day  —  Though Sanchez shouldn't have internalized the premise of Khalidi being anti-Semitic.  Just because the McCain campaign says something doesn't make it so.

Majority of Allegheny prostitutes are on the Democratic side  —  TRIBUNE-REVIEW  —  John McCain and Barack Obama, if you're wooing a population of registered voters who are young, female and drawn to men in suits, then Allegheny County has 675 ladies ready to pull your lever.

21.7% Of Households In Top Local TV Markets Watched Obama Infomercial  —  The combined overall household rating for Senator Barack Obama's Wednesday night infomercial, in the top 56 local television markets where Nielsen maintains electronic TV meters, was 21.7.

Rahm Emanuel: Obama's chief of staff?  —  Is Rep. Rahm Emanuel being courted to run the White House for Barack Obama?  Or is that story just part of a big (not to mention premature) D.C. guessing game?  —  Aides and advisors to Obama and Emanuel — fellow Democratic members of Congress from Ilinois …

JOE?  WHERE DID YOU GO?  —  From NBC/NJ's Adam Aigner-Treworgy  —  DEFIANCE, Ohio — “Where is Joe?  Is Joe here with us today?”  —  That's the question John McCain asked roughly 6,000 people at Defiance Junior High School here this morning, But the correct answer was no — Joe the Plumber was nowhere to be found.

McCain: 'When I'm President, we're not gonna let' Exxon reap record profits.»  —  Today, ExxonMobil shattered records by reporting a $14.83 billion profit, just in the third quarter.  Campaigning in Ohio, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) declared that when he's President, “we're not gonna let that happen.”

Erica Jong Tells Italians Obama Loss ‘Will Spark the Second American Civil War.  Blood Will Run in the Streets’  —  It seems that the final days of the presidential campaign have made Erica Jong and her friends more than a little anxious.  —  A few days ago, Jong, the author and self-described feminist …

PICS AND VIDEO FROM THE LA TIMES “FREE THE TAPE” PROTEST (UPDATED: 2ND VIDEO, 25 PIC GALLERY ADDED)  —  This is why we're losing.  We don't know how to throw a protest.  A potentially explosive national issue with questions about judgment that are at the center of a Presidential election.

Dole's desperate turn to Big Lie advertising  —  North Carolina knows from sad experience about negative election campaigns and misleading, untruthful advertising.  In the 1950 campaign, opponents of the late UNC President Frank Porter Graham used a doctored photo of his wife with a black man …

It's time  —  America should take a chance and make Barack Obama the next leader of the free world  —  IT IS impossible to forecast how important any presidency will be.  Back in 2000 America stood tall as the undisputed superpower, at peace with a generally admiring world.

The association that dare not speak its name  —  McCain spokesman Michael Goldfarb isn't “lying,” as this YouTube claims  —  But his hands are tied by the candidate.  —  Jeremiah Wright remains off-limits.

McCain-Palin Campaign Snubs Penn State Prez  —  Unwelcome at Palin Campus Event Because He's a “Big Democrat”  —  A McCain-Palin campaign official snubbed the president of Penn State University who inquired about attending a campus speech Tuesday by Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin …

Bill Clinton: Obama Got Lots of Help on Economic Crisis Response  —  Bill Clinton says at a rally that Barack Obama called a round of advisers during the height of the economic crisis and said, “tell me what ... to do.”  —  FOXNews.com  —  Barack Obama cultivated the image of a cool …

Colorado Agrees to Restore Voters to Rolls  —  DENVER — Tens of thousands of Coloradans who had been removed from the state's voter rolls will be allowed to vote in next week's election and given extra protections so their ballots are counted, under an agreement reached late Wednesday in federal court here.

WaPo-ABC Tracking: Breaking Up Is Hard To Do  —  Sen. John McCain has made no evident headway in separating himself from President Bush in the final days of the campaign, and that connection continues to be a drag on his candidacy.  —  According to the new Washington Post-ABC News daily tracking poll …

Obama Recruiting Volunteers For Arizona; “Real Chance”  —  An Arizonan forwarded this e-mail to Barack Obama's supporters in Arizona:

Why White Supremacists Support Barack Obama  —  How do racists, anti-Semites and all-purpose hate-mongers view the possibility of America's first black president?  Not necessarily the way you think they would.  —  If recent polls are to be believed, white voters favor John McCain over Barack …

Air Force: Nuke missile silo fire went undetected  —  DENVER (AP) — A fire caused $1 million worth of damage at an unmanned underground nuclear launch site last spring, but the Air Force didn't find out about it until five days later, an Air Force official said Thursday.

Exclusive: U.S. Expects Bin Laden Message Near Election  —  Analysts: OBL Could Speak Out in an Effort to Prove His Relevance  —  Multiple senior government officials tell ABC News the intelligence community is anticipating a message from Osama bin Laden before or just after the presidential election.

Counterevidence Watch: Obama + 3 In The Fox Poll  —  http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/ 103008_poll.pdf  —  A Democratic reader writes: … Small variations in weighting can have proportionately large effects on the perception of a poll, t'is true.  —  But I'm no expert on this question …

Sen. Bond Warns Palin Crowd That Obama Wants Judges Who Empathize With “The Gay”  —  From CBS News' Scott Conroy:  —  (CAPE GIRARDEAU, MO.) - Taking the stage as one of the pre-program speakers at a Sarah Palin rally here in Rush Limbaugh's hometown, Sen. Kit Bond, R-Missouri …

Poll finds 23% of Texans think Obama is Muslim  —  WASHINGTON — A University of Texas poll to be released today shows Republican presidential candidate John McCain and GOP Sen. John Cornyn leading by comfortable margins in Texas, as expected.  But the statewide survey of 550 registered voters …

GOP halves Democratic lead in generic ballot  —  Republicans have cut the Democratic advantage in the generic ballot question in half over the past week, according to a new GW-Battleground poll.  —  Democrats now lead by four points, their slimmest lead in more than three years.

MCCAIN'S DISGRACE  —  The McCain campaign has been throwing around so much mud and smears in recent weeks that it's easy to miss just how ugly and shameful their character assassination of Rashid Khalidi is.  This is an entirely respectable, highly respected scholar.

Condé Nast Cuts Focus on 2 Magazines  —  Condé Nast Publications will make deep staff cuts at two magazines, Portfolio and Men's Vogue, and publish them less often while cutting budgets across the company by 5 percent, company executives said Thursday.