NEW PARIS, Pa.—Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin arrived at the Boyer Orchards here Friday afternoon, entering a sweet-smelling wooden barn full of crates of apples. "This is gorgeous," Palin said, greeting workers.
The visit was designed to highlight small businesses and their special needs and how a John McCain administration would help them.
And the Republican vice presidential candidate did talk business and taxes with Matthew and Bruce Boyer, whose family has owned and worked this 300-acre orchard for 51 years now.
But it was after their business chat that Palin had some special moments with a special fan, Amber Brown. As Palin left the barn, an excited crowd outside was mid-verse singing "God Bless America," but roared at the sight of Palin.
Brown, who is 23 and from New Paris, held a poster that said: “I have Down’s syndrome and I’m voting for you. I’m a fighter too!”
Palin saw Brown, headed straight for her and they embraced. “I love that poster!" said the mother of a Down syndrome baby (Click on Read more line below to see photo of Palin with her infant son, Trig).
"You’re a fighter and you’re beautiful,” Palin told Brown. The pair posed for pictures and hugged again.
Palin then continued down the rope line, paying special attention to the babies and children, at one point crouching down beside four little girls.
Once Palin finished, she returned to Brown and embraced her again. Palin's husband, Todd, also came by and chatted with Brown and her family.
This is not an unusual encounter for the 44-year-old mother of five, who gets a little emotional at such moments, as a recent MSNBC video unexpectedly captured.
Before meeting Brown, Palin talked with the Boyers, the small businessmen who told her of skyrocketing costs and....
Or it may be those in the larger group whose polls have shown Barack Obama comfortably ahead of John McCain, and whose focus has been on not whether the Democrat will win but by how much.
Charlie Cook, long one of Washington's most venerated political wonks, belongs firmly in the latter category. In his latest column for the National Journal, he opines that McCain "probably can't win without divine intervention." In a tease to his subscription-only newsletter, he writes, "Since early September this race has shifted rather dramatically in Obama's favor. ... At this stage, the most relevant question would seem to be: 'How big will the train wreck be for the Republican Party up and down the ballot in November.' "
But let's give Cook this -- if need be, he's prepared to eat crow, big time.
During a Friday evening appearance on MSNBC, he had this to say about how he would come to grips with a McCain come-from-behind victory: "I'm going to be asking, 'Paper or plastic.' Or, 'Do you want fries with that.' "
Others might similarly need to contemplate a career change.
In case you've got some spare change after filling Barack Obama'scampaign coffers with way more than $605 million this political season.
And chipping in another $10 last week like he asked. And a final $5 this week that he asked for. And another really final $5 that Michelle requested.
In case you've still got some checks left, Sarah Palin could use $5 million by Sunday night. And Bill Clinton is requesting only $189,000, which is less than two speeches for him. But he'd still like you to give it.
Just because you may be among the millions who've already voted doesn't mean you won't be asked to pay more before Tuesday. And, who knows, maybe after Tuesday to cover somebody's debts.
"Every dollar," says the nation's best-known hockey mom in an e-mail, "will help fund our final get-out-the-vote efforts." She notes the polls are tightening and raises the spectre of Democrats "spreading the wealth around."
And all we all know what that means (TAXES!)
Now, ex-president Clinton raises the spectre of Republicans "pulling out all the stops." He's afraid of an insufficiently Democratic Congress for President Obama. He wants large, veto-proof majorities in both houses.
And, oh, darn, we just noticed he set a deadline of 3 p.m. today. So we missed that.
But, wait! Just now we got another e-mail, this one from former Gov. Mitt Romney, who says at this moment he's in an airplane "somewhere over Nevada en route to New Mexico."
He says we can make a real difference fighting "the liberal turnout machine" by going to his PAC website, FreeStrongAmerica.com, checking the list of endorsed candidates and, if we can -- you guessed it -- make a last-minute donation.
Aren't we about out of last-minutes by now?
(UPDATE: Apparently not.
(Early Saturday morning we got yet another e-mail money plea, this one from Obama campaign manager David Plouffe, saying that he sensed some last-minute opportunities -- the campaign is starting a TV ad in McCain's homestate of Arizona Saturday.
(If we just gave $5 more, he threatened to put us in a lottery where the winner has to go to Chicago on election night to attend the Grant Park rally. Ah, Chicago's lakefront on a November night. Everybody's vacation dream.)
More than a million Californians have registered to vote since Sept. 5, pushing the state’s total to 17.3 million registered voters--the bulk of them, by far, Democrats.
In a statement issued Friday, California Secretary of State Debra Bowen reported that the number of Democrats increased to 7.683 million, or 44% of the state’s registered voters.
That was an increase of 600,000 voters from May. It also reflects a gain over 2004, when there were 7.1 million Democrats, accounting for 43% of the state’s voters.
Overall, 74.56% of California's eligible voters are registered, a slight drop from the 75% four years ago, and down from 80.21% in 1996.
In the latest count, the number of Republicans fell to 5.42 million, or 31.37% of the state's electorate, down from 5.7 million four years earlier, Bowen said.
The Republicans’ loss was the gain of nonpartisans.
The number of California voters who declined to state a party preference remains the fastest-rising segment. There are now 3.44 million decline-to-state voters, or 19.9% of the electorate. That is up from 2.9 million and 17.67% in 2004.
The long-term trend is less than rosy for political parties. In 1996, 11.3% of the voters declined to state a party preference, while 47.2% were Democrats and 36.4% were Republicans.
In Los Angeles County, Democrats currently hold a 51.8%-24.06% edge over Republicans.
In Orange County, Republicans hold a 44.4%-31.82% edge over Democrats.
Alameda County is the most heavily Democratic county, with 57.59% Democratic. Lassen County in far Northern California has the smallest Democratic registration, at 28.66%.
The Barack Obama for president campaign has kicked off its campaign plane three newspaper reporters.
The campaign says it was a tough decision deciding to boot the working reporters for the New York Post, the Dallas Morning News and the Washington Times. But, they say, there are only so many seats on the plane that the spunky new Christian Science Monitor politics blog calls "O-Force One."
And somebody had to go for these last few campaign days.
It's probably just a simple coincidence that all three newspapers recently endorsed Obama's Republican rival, Sen. John McCain, for the White House job.
"It feels like the journalistic equivalent of redistributing the wealth," quipped John Solomon, executive editor of the Times, which lost its seat after three years of travel with the candidate and just 72 hours after endorsing McCain.
That newspaper's website this afternoon headlined a report that Obama spent nearly $700,000 in U.S. campaign donations just on staging and lights for that Berlin victory rally last summer and those 200,000 Germans who can't vote over here. Gee, you could dress more than four Republican vice presidential candidates with that much money.
What's not to like in that news for the Obama campaign?
The Dallas paper reported no evidence its plane departure was political. Think about it: Why would a political campaign take retribution on reporters for a decision made by their publication's separate editorial boards? The publications, after all, pay their own way on the charters.
That would be a cheesy hardball -- and quite possibly counterproductive -- Chicago kind of thing for a frontrunner to do, especially one on a national unity ticket. A candidate's organization would have to reflect an enormous ego and over-confidence to pull something like that.
And it's certainly not the kind of hands-across-the-aisle, bipartisan change we need and/or can believe in a national capital that could use a large dose of both.
True, the Obama campaign has buttoned itself up from most press access, apparently fearing some kind of late-minute gaffe that might threaten its lead in most polls.
A reporter could choose to travel instead on the Joe Biden plane, plenty of seats there, and perhaps really exciting, except the old-time senator who ad libbed that Hillary Clinton might have been a better Democratic VP pick coincidentally hasn't done a media availability since right after the Republican convention in early September.
Amazingly, as Howard Kurtz points out, two seats did suddenly open up on the Obama campaign plane this weekend to accommodate Ebony and Essence magazine reporters. Another coincidence.
Ken Duberstein, a longtime Washington insider who briefly had a higher public profile as White House chief of staff in the waning days of Ronald Reagan's administration, today visited two cable networks to announce he will be voting for Barack Obama.
On CNN, he cited Colin Powell's recent decision to endorse Obama as a big factor for him. "Well let's put it this way -- I think Colin Powell's decision is in fact the Good Housekeeping seal of approval on Barack Obama," he said.
On MSNBC, he became the latest Republican known to frequent Georgetown cocktail parties to take a shot at John McCain for selecting Sarah Palin as his running mate. And he did so with closing lines that Democratic operatives already are circulating.
The Palin pick, Duberstein said, "very much undermined the whole question" of McCain’s judgment. He added:
You know what most Americans I think realized is that you don’t offer a job, let alone the vice presidency, to a person after one job interview. Even at McDonald’s, you’re interviewed three times before you get a job.
The rest of what he had to say can be checked out below.
No word yet on whether Duberstein will be showing up on the Fox News Channel (we won't be holding our breath for that).
Maybe you're one of those conscientious American voters who's still pretty much had it with each day's 17 new political polls, each one telling a conflicting story line about the floating fortunes in the race between the Sens. Barack Obama-Joe Biden Democratic ticket and the Republican package of Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin.
And, so, you can't wait until next Tuesday is over so you'll only have to endure the occasional poll showing how the new president's popularity is plummeting because, it turns out after these guys spend $3 billion to buy the White House, it doesn't really matter who's in there anyway.
Thank goodness, after Election Day this carpet-polling will cease.
Not.
Nope. No way. The Gallup Poll -- which you may have missed if you've been asleep since June, has run a closely-watched daily tracking survey of voters in the presidential election contest this year.
Now, Gallup says it plans to start a daily measure of the president-elect's popularity and voter-optimism right after Election Day. Daily.
This is new territory: During the transition to a new White House, before the guy even opens a single drawer in the Oval Office, Gallup will be interrogating voters every 24 hours about their optimism over the new administration and their opinion of the president-elect, favorable, unfavorable.
News you didn't need to know.
The daily obsession with polling will carry over not only during the transition from Nov. 5 until Jan. 20, it appears, but also throughout the new president's new term. Surely, you're already wondering who's in the lead now for 2012.
Gallup plans to run a daily tracking survey of presidential job approval after the inauguration of the 44th president on Jan. 20 -- as opposed to the biweekly gauges that Gallup has offered during President Bush's terms.
Bush has gone from "the highest approval rating in history'' (90% after the 9/11 attacks) to a near-record low -- 25% at the latest Gallup measure. That is still not a record low. Harry Truman bottomed out at 22% in 1952. But he's dead and doesn't care.
And Congress, which both party's presidential candidates are trying to flee, is enjoying a poll approval somewhere around 9%, which as McCain likes to note, is pretty much down to family, friends and staff.
Anyway, our blogging buddy Mark Silva over at the Swamp has more details on Gallup's nefarious scheme to drive everyone crazy, +/- 4.5%.
-- Andrew Malcolm
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Now that the presidential election business has been pretty much settled in much of the media and Barack Obama has obviously won, we can get down to the next political game at hand: guessing who's going to make up his administration's team.
First, White House Chief of Staff.
How about Rep. Rahm Emanuel? Is he being courted to run the big house for the big man? 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 Illinois -- are trying hard to tamp down the rumors. At least before next Tuesday.
"There's no news because there's no job to offer," Obama spokesman Bill Burton said on behalf of his team. "We're focused on one thing and that's the election, not anonymous D.C. parlor games."
It's not the looniest idea ever floated. Emanuel was a key money guy in Bill Clinton's campaign and then in that administration and is an ally of Obama. Both are helpful credentials for the position.
But as a high-ranking member of the House, Emanuel's also in a pretty good position to help Obama shepherd his agenda through Congress. That's not something to give up lightly.
And while Emanuel's name is prominently in the mix, there's also a contingent putting its money on former Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle.
Neither Emanuel nor Daschle is Mr. Bipartisan, but who cares about that promise now that the voting is, in effect, over?
Our colleague Christi Parsons has the rest of the details over at the Swamp. But before you go there, click the Read more line below to see how some Obama folks are trying to fight campaign complacency with a video.
Repetition can be a very effective tool in political communications.
Here's an effective collection of very brief sound bites by folks who apparently don't think much of the freshman senator from Illinois. Maybe you'll recognize his face here.
Click on the Read more line below to see another video involving repetition and both major party candidates for president, which is so good we're republishing it this morning.
At least, they don’t know exactly what to make of him.
Connerly, an African American, is the former University of California regent who promoted Proposition 209, the 1996 initiative that abolished affirmative action in California state hiring and contracting and public college admissions.
But now, writing an opinion article in today’s Sacramento Bee, Connerly announced his opposition to Proposition 8, the initiative on Tuesday’s ballot that would ban same-sex marriage by defining marriage as being between one man and one woman.
“I consider it discriminatory and I abhor discrimination by our government against its taxpaying citizens,” Connerly writes. “That is why I am voting no on Proposition 8.”
In an interview today with The Times, Connerly said he made the decision without telling the No-on-8 campaign consultants, and against the wishes of some of his political advisors.
“There are times when you have consider who you are,” Connerly said.
Connerly, whose wife is white, noted that when he got married in 1962, “the government in many parts of our country did not legally allow us to do that. I have never forgotten that.”
“Many people invoked the Bible to say that blacks and whites should not marry and that our marriage was going to destroy Western society,” Connerly said. “All that stuff comes back.”
Connerly, appointed to the regents by former Gov. Pete Wilson in the 1990s, remains on the bad side of many liberals. He has taken his anti-affirmative-action campaign on the road, winning passage of similar measures in two other states.
Such measures are on ballots in Colorado and Nebraska on Tuesday. In Colorado, foes of the Amendment 46 targeted Connerly personally and aired an ad that was yanked by Clear Channel stations because, Connerly said, “it was over the top.”
Connerly gave $500 to Barack Obamaearly in the campaign but never endorsed him. Connerly since has given $5,000 to John McCainand McCain-related committees and said he intends to vote for the Republican.
Connerly and Obama, by the way, are joined in their opposition to Proposition 8. McCain supports its passage.
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Our Bloggers
Andrew Malcolm's immigrant parents repeatedly stressed the importance of active participation in a democracy. Early lessons included learning the alphabetical list of states by watching televised roll calls of national political conventions. That childhood exposure led to a lifelong fascination with politics, including 40-plus years of covering them and a brief stint practicing them as press secretary to Laura Bush in 1999-2000. A veteran foreign and national correspondent, Malcolm served on the Times Editorial Board and was a Pulitzer finalist in 2004. He is the author of 10 nonfiction books and father of four.
Johanna Neuman is a veteran Washington correspondent for both The Los Angeles Times and USA Today, having covered presidents and politics as far back as Ronald Reagan. A former president of the White House Correspondents Assn., she authored a book on media and foreign policy, “Lights, Camera, Wars.” Most recently she was co-author of the Countdown to Crawford blog here at The Times.
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