Thank God for Frank Rich. If the media points out precisely what John McCain is doing, he may have no choice but to stop it. Not because McCain has any great love for America or fear of where his words may lead but because he has to fear falling below 40% in the polls (and on election day).

I've done some research. No major party nominee in our history has ever run a campaign like McCain's. FDR was excoriated by the right -- called every vicious thing possible -- but neither Hoover, nor Landon, nor Willkie, nor Dewey ever incited crowds to scream violent epithets and threats. The filth was spewed by independent outfits allied with the Republicans, not by the nominees.

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I hate this economic crash. I've lost money. And I know that poor people are hurting the most.

The only good news out of all this is that terrible rich people who bankroll some of the worst causes in the world are also being hit hard. For instance, the anti-union casino magnate Sheldon Adelson has lost more money than anyone on earth.

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One of the best ways to gauge the state of public opinion is to watch the late night comedy shows and see what comedians like Jon Stewart and the SNL team are joking about.

This year the Jewish community's supposed monomania about Israel has become a great source of merriment. Of course, it's not fair. The percentage of American Jewish voters whose primary focus is on Israel is tiny. A strong majority of Jews care deeply about Israel's well-being, but only a small number consider the Israel issue more important than domestic concerns when they vote.

According to the 2008 survey of American Jewish opinion conducted by the American Jewish Committee, the economy and opposition to the Iraq War were the most important issues for Jews when deciding whom to vote for. Israel was the deciding issue for 3 percent, tied with immigration reform. Would Jews vote for an anti-Israel candidate? No. But since no anti-Israel candidate has ever been a serious contender for the presidency, the question is moot.

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Imagine if this character answered that 3AM phone call.

I am not worried about Barack Obama. I trust the Secret Service and I believe it is not the same institution it was in 1963.

However, incitement is still incitement, even if it leads to no horrific consequences. John McCain and his moll is guilty of deliberate incitement and he clearly is indifferent to where it may lead.

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My son, Pete, who is a DJ on Hot97, a New York hip hop radio station, called to tell me that lots of his listeners are calling to ask if they can be kept from voting if they shop up at the polls wearing Obama shirts, hats, bling, whatever.

I said that he can go on air and tell his listeners not to worry. You can vote even if you are "festooned" in Obamawear from head to toe. But I said that I'd better check.

Good thing I did. In some states you can vote even if you are wearing partisan materials. In others, you can't. A whole lot of discretion is left to the officials at the polls.

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Bill Burton, Obama's spokesman is a class act. He is one of the unsung heroes of the campaign. He is always effective and, unlike pretty much all previous spokespersons for Presidential candidates, he does not put himself forward. It's never about him. Always, Obama and the country.

Anyway, listen to the measured way he addresses Andrea Mitchell's worries about the incitement rhetoric coming from the McCain-Palin camp. For obvious reasons, he plays it down although he is clearly concerned. Mitchell, however, is clearly worried about this.

I am too, and not just about Obama but about the GOP stirring up dangerous hate against minorities and liberals.

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DRUDGE's headline this morning says it all "BORING."

Just yesterday the creationists, racial paranoids, mindless hawks, neocons and gay-bashers were psyched. Bill Ayers! Rev. Wright! "Rezko."

Today they are in the dumpster. Johnny Mac dropped the ball. After sending out the cheerleader to race-bait and incite violence all week, Johnny Mac could not do it face-to-face. He feared, rightly, that if he did, Obama would remind voters of the Keating 5 or of any of the other scandals (public and personal) in McCain's record.

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I've been watching these debates since 1960 and this is the first time I haven't been frustrated by all the opportunities the Democrat missed.

This time, my nominee, and our next President, dotted every i and crossed every t. McCain needed a game changer. In stead, Obama solidified his lead.

I'm proud of Obama. (And, boy, he has sure improved since the Democratic primary debates).

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Have you seen McCain' and Palin's latest attacks on Obama?

Because what they are doing is nothing less than incitement. Saying that we don't know where Obama came from or who he is or what he would do to America is to say that, as President, he would pose a threat to America.

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I can think of few nice things to say about John McCain. Actually there are exactly two. The first is that when the great Arizona liberal Congressman, Mo Udall, was dying of Parkinson's disease, Mc Cain was one of the few of Udall's former colleagues who ever bothered to visit. There was no political gain in sitting with a dying man, but Mc Cain did it anyway.

The other was when he accepted the apologiy of David Ifshin, a 60's radical who had gone to Hanoi to support the Viet Cong and who recorded messages to imprisoned GI's urging them to give up. One of the POW's who was subjected to Ifshin's diatribes was John Mc Cain.

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Now Lieberman is invoking the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob to elect Sarah Palin. "She's so strong, she's so capable, she's so competent," Lieberman told a crowd in Florida. "With God's help, she will be Vice President.

Read this from New Republic and bear in mind that Barack Obama and Joe Biden supported Joementum in his '06 Senate race out of loyalty which has turned out to be misplaced.

Good thing the Day of Atonement is coming up.

""If we are going to go down this road -- you know, Barack Obama was eight years old, somehow responsible for Bill Ayers," he said. "At 58, John McCain was associating with Charles Keating." --
Rahm Emanuel on Sunday.

Along these lines: here is are places to go for your John McCain primer. First a short Rolling Stone video on the 5 myths that define Mc Cain. Even by the standards of politicians, he is a dishonorable man.

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The AP calls McCain/Palin out for running a racist campaign. The AP!

It raises an issue I have never considered. If McCain wins by race-baiting Obama, would it even be possible for him to govern? Think about it. Half the country will be enraged. African-Americans, in particular, will feel (rightly) that racism triumphed. And liberal Democrats control Congress.

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