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Monday, October 11, 2004
The TrailĀ©
Morning for the campaign workers, and the inevitable walk down to Taylor's Books for morning coffee. Myself, Lida and Jaya are talking about upcoming projects, and the day's "huh?" moment—Ralph Nader is polling at 10% in Alaska. (New poll is 5%, but still.)

On our way out we pass a couple of higher-ups doing their run, with a woman I'm sure I recognize from ... somewhere. Did I see her at the dinner where Albright spoke? Or maybe I know her from Job Corps, student government. No, it's Vanessa Kerry.

The Bush twins and Chelsea Clinton occupy that same space in the American collective consciousness as supporting characters on mildy successful sitcoms and serial killers. We've seen their faces, we recognize them in a crowd, we know them from ... somewhere. Did we go to high school with them?

Vanessa Kerry spoke at a small rally later. I held a large sign—four foot by eight—and wandered the periphery. A half-dozen Bush supporters were doing the same, trying to get on camera; I was diligently using my sign to block them from view.


Vanessa Kerry, late for her flight and pretending to listen.

Today's polls show a Kerry win, 280 electoral votes to 254. But that depends on calling Pennsylvania, Ohio, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Nevada for Kerry; all these states poll within the margin of error. Maine, too, and they have this odd system where they split the electoral votes by congressional district.

Long story short: there are no undecideds in this election. It's a get-out-the-vote game, and the Kerry campaign needs to be concentrating on turning out Philly, Pittsburgh, the twin cities and places in Ohio that start with a "C".

Overall, though, the news is good. Andrew Sullivan:

The longer perspective shows you where this race has been heading. CNN/Gallup shows that Bush-Cheney have lost six points since this time a month ago. Kerry-Edwards have gained nine points. That's a huge shift. So Zogby now shows a dead heat with Kerry nominally ahead by three points. WAPO shows a Bush lead - but only back to where he was a week ago and all within the margin of error. Bottom line: the race is dead-even. A month ago, it wasn't close. And the undecideds are leaning Kerry. Of course this is exactly the kind of moment that Kerry, like the Cubs, tends to screw up. And it's also a scenario in which Rove unloads his dirt-bomb. Uh-oh.
He's not very cheerful, Andrew; but anyone expecting anything good from Karl Rove needs to self-medicate. Speaking of self-medicating, check out Bob the Ball.