I am on the move this week and will put in analysis next week.

Obama -- He continues to be hurt by his move to the center. It seems that, like in 2000, Nader has been able to pick up disfranchised left-wing voters. This has done some minor damage to Obama in the polls. We will have to see if Nader can continue to move in on the left -- he is polling around 5% nationwide. It looks like Jessie Jackson’s comments have had little to no negative impact on Obama’s campaign. However, I think that his recent trip to Iraq and Afghanistan might be a different issue. It seems to have been a mixed bag for the Obama campaign: on one hand, he has unprecedented coverage from the media on his trip and looked quite competent talking with both the Iraqis and the troops overseas. This will certainly help to counteract the view that he is not commander-in-chief potential. On the other hand, the European leg of his journey has opened him up to two new criticisms. One criticism is that he is far too presumptuous in meeting with world leaders to discuss U.S. policy before he is elected president. I think Obama himself felt this near the end of his swing through Europe when he said to a crowd in France, over and over again, that he is not yet the President of the United States. The other criticism, which has already been picked up by the McCain campaign, is that he is using Iraq for political gains. By announcing his new policy on Iraq prior to going there seemed to indicate that he was not really going to learn more. In addition, when invited by the Department of Defense to meet with wounded soldiers from Iraq that have evacuated to Germany, Obama opted to decline the invitation after the military asked him not to bring cameras. Instead of meeting with wounded U.S. troops, he decided to give a grand speech to some 200,000 Germans. This very well might be interpreted as though he cares about the troops only if they bring him a campaign opportunity.
McCain -- His campaign is still struggling to muster up enough media attention to be able to control their candidate’s destiny. He is trying a two-prong approach. First, he is criticizing Obama on his Iraq tour to try to open up new avenues of criticism. Second, he is now moving to see if he can split Hispanic voters away from the Democratic Party. I think this new outreach to the Hispanic community is a really good move that has the potential to bring New Mexico, Colorado and Florida into the Republican category; it might also make California and New York more competitive.
Third Party Folk --
Nader continues to astound most pollsters by continuing to draw three to five percent of possible voters in most national polls. His fundraising is also doing well, though he is having some trouble getting on ballots in all fifty states. He is currently on the ballot in only seven states, but seems set to be on the ballot in around 27 states, if not more.
Bob Barr's campaign is having some problems as of late. When he first announced his presidential run as a Libertarian, there was a fairly good response by the media. Fox news took a particular interest in his run. As time has gone on, his initial momentum seems to be stalling out. His lack of momentum is further compounded by the fact he has only raised about 500K so far for the election. To compound the problem, his activist base has been gutted by the creation of the newly-formed, anarchist-leaning Boston Tea Party. Many of the hard-core Libertarians have bolted, and is suffering from the lack-of-experience in his new crop of grassroots organizers. The one thing going for him right now is that he is already on the ballots in 33 states, and it looks like he very well might get on the ballot in 49 states and the District of Columbia. Barr’s injunction against the state of Oklahoma may not make it through the courts before the election.
Cynthia McKinney has little going her way right now. She has virtually no money or media coverage, and no polling agencies are currently even polling for her. Things are looking very dim for the Greens this year, even with a big name candidate.

current political situation update- As a New York Times poll this past week pointed out, our number one concern is the economy (41%), followed by Gas (14%) and Iraq/Afghanistan (14%). Healthcare, the environment and social issues all get three percent apiece; immigration, defense and foreign policy get two percent apiece; and the budget deficit, education, poverty, national unity, corruption, terrorism all round out the bottom with one percent each.
At the same time it is apparent that Obama leads on the issues of the economy, gas, and healthcare, environment, social issues, immigration, budget, education, poverty, national unity and corruption. McCain leads on Iraq/Afghanistan, defense, and terrorism. They are tied on foreign policy.
Obama continues to move more towards the center to avoid getting painted as a pointy-headed intellectual, wanting to avoid the same end that Mondale and McGovern did when this label stuck to them. He has done this by embracing George Bush’s wire-tapping program, voting for the pharmaceutical bill, watering down his position on Iraq withdrawal, and completely changing positions on public financing. In addition to protecting himself from being considered too smart to be president, these actions also strengthen one remaining weak point compared to McCain -- all things military related. This shift to the center, while politically expedient and not unexpected, is particularly difficult for Obama because of his strong support from the more idealistic left of the Democratic Party. To counteract this and to attempt to shore up his military credentials, he is touring Afghanistan and Iraq this week. We will have to see what comes of that. He also must be careful that he does not alienate his base. Both Ralph Nader and Cynthia McKinney are more than happy to make an attack from the left to pull away disenfranchised intellectuals and college students in particular.
McCain is in a difficult situation, too. He has Bob Barr the Libertarian candidate leading an all-out assault from the right, especially among the Libertarian and fiscally conservative wings of the party. He has an additional problem: Nader surprisingly is pulling votes away from him among campaign finance reform-oriented voters. His embrace of offshore oil drilling has in no way improved his numbers with regards to the economy or the gas crisis. This move has also lost him any inroads he had made among environmentalists. He has given indications that his campaign might soon release negative ads against Obama, which will most likely attack him on flip-flopping so to alienate the left wing of Obama.
As for third parties: a recent Zogby poll fairs well for former congressman Bob Barr, who is on the ballot in 32 states all ready. The poll shows him doing well in a number of states and even breaking into double digits in New Hampshire. If Obama does alienate the left wing of this party. Bob Barr is likely to be helped by this shift. As for Nader, he continues to stay around 3% nationwide and does not seem to swing any states into play at this point, but he will be getting 400K in public funding for his campaign. Former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney won the Green Party nomination and the Workers World nomination. We will have to see what type of splash (if any) she will make on the current election. The only other variable out there is Former Ambassador Alen Keyes, who is running as an independent to the right of McCain. He could cause some trouble among evangelicals if he can gain ballot access in enough states.
I think with all that is going on, we may start to see an evening-out of the polling numbers for McCain and Obama, as well as continued growth among the third party candidates, especially if the Obama is punished by the left or if something goes wrong on his visit to Iraq and Afghanistan. McCain is in a bad situation, and probably needs to keep looking for an opening to go after Obama. Such an opening may well be hard to find at this point.

The Libertarian candidate Bob Barr Continues to eat away at McCain’s base. This in addition to backlash over his position on off shore drilling has continued the downward trend for McCain.
I suspect that over the next few weeks we will see Bob Barr further strengthened by Obama's continued departure from popular issues for libertarian leaning independents such as this switch on public financing and the bush wire tapping policy. It should be noted that none of the third party candidates are at this point remotely likely to win any states or electoral votes. They can however shape the contest because neither candidate in a two way contest has many states that they can assume to be strongly in the camp

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