To understand changes in the political map, we naturally tend to look for contemporary explanations. But American political alignments are not written on an empty slate. Beginnings matter, and the civic personalities of states tend to reflect the cultural folkways of their first settlers.
With school just around the corner, parents are shopping for new clothes and school supplies, but most adults say a textbook is the most important thing children need to get ahead.
Gas prices may be going down slightly at the pump, but there’s no doubt the energy issue is number one right now in the presidential campaign. John McCain’s proposal to lift the ban on offshore oil drilling is resonating with voters, forcing Barack Obama to back off his opposition to the idea.
As gas prices soared past the four-dollar-a-gallon mark, the energy issue became one of the key driving issues of Election 2008 and America’s voters perceive a stark difference between Barack Obama and John McCain on the subject.
The number of Americans who believe getting the troops home from Iraq is more important than winning the war there has fallen below 50% for the first time since Rasmussen Reports began polling on the question in May.
Americans overwhelmingly believe there is an urgent national need to find new sources of energy, and this need is more important that reducing current energy usage, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.
If baseball fans are correct this season, the Los Angeles Angels and the Chicago Cubs will be battling it out this October in the World Series. The newest national telephone survey of 560 fans found that 28% think the Halos will be the American League Champions, while 31% say the Cubs will take the National League.
You won't hear me straining to defend Phil Gramm, the Texas Republican whose penchant for grating commentary sunk his 1996 bid for the presidency before the New Hampshire primary. It was really just a matter of time before the former senator, serving as John McCain's economic advisor, put his foot in it: Gramm opined that Americans complaining about the economy were "whiners."
Touring America's oilrigs and nuclear plants, John McCain sometimes sounds as if he'll produce enough wind to power the nation all by himself. So strongly does his current rhetoric smell of methane -- the gas emanating from manure -- that he might even qualify for an alternative energy tax incentive.
Leave the presidential contest aside for the moment. At other levels of politics, the Republicans may eventually file the 2008 campaign under the Double Jeopardy category of "It Just Keeps Getting Worse". Surely, GOP House strategists are asking themselves whether they are cursed this year.
The Discover U.S. Spending Monitor was virtually flat in July, rising just one-tenth of a point to 86.1, as a rise in economic confidence among consumers during the last week of July kept the Monitor from falling to a new low.
As Sen. John McCain and the GOP leadership nationalize the drill, drill, drill message, the Republican Party might conceivably be riding a summer political rally. The question of offshore drilling, along with expanded domestic energy production, has suddenly become the biggest political and economic wedge issue of this election. Is there a Republican tsunami in the making?
The conventional wisdom has it down pat: A bad economy works against the candidate from the party in power as voters take out their rage and fear on the president's party and back the challenger, just like they did in 1992.
Eighty-seven percent (87%) of Fox News viewers say they are likely to vote for John McCain, while those who watch CNN and MSNBC plan to support Barack Obama in November by more than two to one.
With Hillary Clinton scheduled to make her first solo campaign appearance for Barack Obama this Friday, more than seven out of 10 Democrats (72%) rate her conduct as good or excellent since dropping out of the presidential race. Sixty percent (60%) of all voters agree.
The knives are out for my friend Bill Clinton. Again.
Barack Obama had it half right when he said that the McCain campaign would focus on raising voters' fears about him.
Television is the news source of choice for most Americans for information on the 2008 presidential campaign, with local stations having a slight edge over their cable competitors, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.
John McCain is now trusted more than Barack Obama on nine out of 14 electoral issues tracked by Rasmussen Reports. The latest national telephone surveys find that McCain has the biggest advantage on the war in Iraq, by a 51% to 39% margin.
In a rare burst of bipartisan consensus, Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama have agreed on a dreadful proposal: Open more of America's fragile coastlines to offshore oil drilling.
