Honest, It's Still Not Over

Damn this election cycle - it's destroyed my ability to sleep in on Sunday. No matter when I turn in on Saturday night, my eyes snap open at about 7:50am, which on the west coast is ten minutes before MEET THE PRESS, THIS WEEK, FOX NEWS SUNDAY and FACE THE NATION. Then in ten minutes I have to choose between those four. Lately it's been MTP (it's fun to laugh at Brokaw's "ells") but today I opted for Fox News Sunday.

May I say, mad props to Chris Wallace. I've seen him on other occasions and he's just has hard on Conservatives as he is on Liberals, the way good journalists should be. It's the job of the subject to accept the challenge and either repudiate it or dig themselves into a deeper hole. Wallace at the helm (plus a desire to play beyond the base in a way that people at the Fox News Network don't seem to care to) makes Fox News Sunday a decent news show. Its bias is mitigated considerably by the Wallace interviews, and then shoots back up again during the panel. More on that later.

This morning the guest was Master Strategist Karl Rove.

Karl isn't looking as ebullient as we've seen him in the past. In fact, though he took a few stabs at "it isn't over until it's over" this clip demonstrates that he's pointing a finger at the people who have destroyed the campaign by pointing fingers at the ones who are destroying the campaign. This interview seemed to be the result of a little too much heavy drinking by Rove the night before. And more in the green room. 

Karl tried to dismiss the polls by saying you can't trust them, that's why candidates conduct their own polls. However, the impression he gave was that the inside polling was probably just as bad, possibly much, much worse.

The interview was followed by a segment that was to feature Gov. Tim Kaine, D-Va. and former Gov. Tom Ridge, R-Pa. Ridge had plane trouble and couldn't make it, leaving only Obama supporter Kaine, whom Wallace seemed to be going easy on; that is, no talk of Ayers or socialism.

Then came the round-table discussion. It was the usual balanced panel - William Kristol and Britt Hume representing the right, Mara Liasson and Juan Juilliams (ha ha, just kidding - Williams) representing the left. Though the latter two work at NPR, they're moderates. Liasson seemed visibly perturbed at the idea of an Obama presidency. So the panel, just like the rest of the country, is three-quarters opposed to Obama. Anyway, the discussion ranged from whether Sarah Palin is a liability to the McCain campaign to how over the race is. There was a notable lack, again, of the terrorist-socialist-antichrist subject matter that has dominated the race. Since I haven't seen that muck on MTP either I cannot say that FNS has been wading through it. Maybe all these shows think it's beneath the purview of the beltway insiders; it's for the Applebee's crowd and they dine at Puck's.

It's only nine days to the election, and it could still turn around. But it's gonna have to turn around A LOT in such a short time, and nobody can quite put their finger on what the thing is that will make Obama look like a worse choice than McCain. With Ashley Todd in jail, there is even less hope.