PURGE: SKEPTICAL REPORTERS TOSSED OFF OBAMA PLANE  —  NY POST, DALLAS MORNING NEWS, WASHINGTON TIMES TOLD TO GET OUT... ALL 3 ENDORSED MCCAIN  —  The Obama campaign has decided to heave out three newspapers from its plane for the final days of its blitz across battleground states …

Eagleburger Blisters Palin: “Of Course” She's Not Ready  —  A former Republican Secretary of State and one of John McCain's most prominent supporters offered a stunningly frank and remarkably bleak assessment of Sarah Palin's capacity to handle the presidency should such a scenario arise.

An ‘Idiot Wind’  —  John McCain's latest attempt to link Barack Obama to extremism  —  WITH THE presidential campaign clock ticking down, Sen. John McCain has suddenly discovered a new boogeyman to link to Sen. Barack Obama: a sometimes controversial but widely respected Middle East scholar named Rashid Khalidi.

Obama and the Runaway Train  —  The race, the case, a hope for grace.  —  The case for Barack Obama, in broad strokes:  —  He has within him the possibility to change the direction and tone of American foreign policy, which need changing; his rise will serve as a practical rebuke to the past five years …

Attorney general's private trips have cost taxpayers $155,800  —  WASHINGTON — Attorney General Michael Mukasey has taken personal trips on government jets almost every weekend since he took office less than a year ago at a cost to taxpayers of more than $155,800, Justice Department …

Senate race in final leg  —  THE PUSH: Stevens insists he's not guilty while Begich envisions a different future.  —  scockerham@adn.com  —  With just four days before the election and Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens insisting he's not a felon, the U.S. Senate race is white hot.

Obama's 99% Lie  —  In an MSNBC interview yesterday, Barack Obama repeated his canard that differing judicial philosophies among Supreme Court justices don't matter in “ninety-nine percent of cases [because] the Constitution is actually going to be clear.  Ninety-nine percent of the cases …

AZ-Pres: Neck and neck, and check out 2010  —  Research 2000 for Daily Kos. 10/28-30.  Likely voters.  MoE 4% (No trend lines) … I can't believe we may actually win Arizona.  And I have a bonus treat for you guys: … Janet Napolitano is Arizona's governor, currently serving her second term.

When Consumers Capitulate  —  The long-feared capitulation of American consumers has arrived.  According to Thursday's G.D.P. report, real consumer spending fell at an annual rate of 3.1 percent in the third quarter; real spending on durable goods (stuff like cars and TVs) fell at an annual rate of 14 percent.

Mortgage Plan May Irk Those It Doesn't Help  —  As the Treasury Department prepares a $40 billion program to help delinquent homeowners avoid foreclosure, it confronts a difficult challenge: not making the plan too tempting to people like Todd Lawrence.  —  An airline pilot who lives outside Norwich …

A Last Push To Deregulate  —  The White House is working to enact a wide array of federal regulations, many of which would weaken government rules aimed at protecting consumers and the environment, before President Bush leaves office in January.  —  The new rules would be among …

Opponent Accuses Rep. Alcee Hastings of Threatening His Life  —  At a candidate forum in Boca Raton last night, the G.O.P. candidate running against Rep. Alcee Hastings, former Chief Medical Officer for the state of Florida Dr. Marion Thorpe, filed a police report claiming the congressman threatened his life.

Obama targets McCain's home state  —  (CNN) - Barack Obama's campaign announced Friday that it was going on the air in John McCain's home state of Arizona for the first time this cycle, as a new CNN poll of polls released this morning finds the Republican nominee leading the Illinois senator …

Poll: Dead heats in 2 key swing states  —  Barack Obama and John McCain are evenly matched in the swing states of North Carolina and Missouri, though Obama is strongly outpacing McCain in two of those states' crucial battleground counties, according to new Politico/InsiderAdvantage polls.

How Obama might just win Ohio  —  Sen. Barack Obama greets supporters at a campaign event in Toledo, Ohio, Oct. 13, 2008.  —  COLUMBUS, Ohio — The Buckeye stops here.  Ohio is where Democratic dreams died four years ago as John Kerry came up 120,000 votes short of winning the state's 20 electoral votes and the White House.

Exclusive: Petraeus Wants to Go to Syria; Bush Administration Says No  —  Petraeus Proposed Visiting Syria But Was Rejected By Bush Administration  —  Apparently Gen. David Petraeus does not agree with the Bush administration that the road to Damascus is a dead end.

America isn't about to become liberal heaven  —  Yes, Americans will be voting for Obama and change.  But they don't want radicalism, just competence and decency  —  As America's government prepares to take a sudden and historic leftward turn, this might seem an odd moment to ponder what a conservative country it is.

If it redistributes like a duck ...  Barack Obama is going to fix the economy by “spreading the wealth around”?  —  Now, I'm not attempting to demonize Obama, God forbid.  It's just that, as we all know, that's what Obama told Joe the Plumber.  —  Obama laughs off the charge of socialist behavior …

McCain for President, Part II  —  Last week I made the open-and-shut case for John McCain: In a dangerous world entering an era of uncontrolled nuclear proliferation, the choice between the most prepared foreign policy candidate in memory vs. a novice with zero experience and the wobbliest one-world instincts is not a close call.

Don't Just Do Something.  Stand There.  —  People ask me if the current mess feels like 1929.  But the right comparison is 1932, when Herbert Hoover was desperately trying anything, anything at all, to get the economy going.  The stock market had crashed.  The economy was starting to follow it down.