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Getting a clear policy statement from the Romney campaign is pretty hopeless, and his statements on the Federal Emergency Management Agency are no exception. Yesterday the Huffington Post dug up a clip from a Republican primary debate in which Mitt Romney agreed it was a good idea to turn all of FEMA’s disaster response functions over to the states. Coming in the teeth of Hurricane Sandy, this was inconvenient, so today the Romney campaign has backpedaled a bit: “Gov. Romney believes that states should be in charge of emergency management in responding to storms and other natural disasters in their...

Barack Obama 44% Mitt Romney 46% D - 37% R - 27% I (and leaners) - 36%

Nearly every professional woman has had the experience of saying something in a meeting, receiving no response, and then listening as a male colleague offers the same thought or suggestion minutes later to great acclaim. The first time it happens, she feels slightly foolish and is a little unsettled. Did I say that out loud or just in my head? Maybe he made the point better than I did. The second time it happens, she gets frustrated. The third time, she gets angry. Look at the senior women meeting with Obama in this White House photo at a dinner they...

Baron Hill, a Blue Dog Democrat from Indiana, just announced he will be holding a Town Hall meeting on Healthcare at Indiana University Southeast on Monday 8/31. It will take place in the Hooiser Room at 6:30. Lets get a big FReeper contingent there to greet him.

State: Pennsylvania Updated: 9/13/2008 Summary: McCain - 49.1% Obama - 44.3% Not Sure/Other - 6.6% "This is a classic case of polling as a snapshot in time. We're turning Pennsylvania purple today, as McCain takes a small edge. But as in Ohio, we are watching this closely and things could change in this classically blue state."

Florida: McCain +8Ohio: McCain +1Michigan: McCain +1Colorado: Obama +3Nevada: McCain +1Georgia: McCain +18

In the weeks since Palin was picked and as the Republican base has tuned in, several of Ensign's Senate GOP colleagues have shown improvement. A recent poll conducted for the NRSC showed New Hampshire Senator John Sununu trailing his Democratic opponent by just two points, after surveys have showed Sununu behind by double digits. Another poll had Colorado Democratic Rep. Mark Udall leading ex-Rep. Bob Schaffer, a Republican, by a single point, while earlier surveys showed Udall with a bigger lead. And in Palin's home state, Senator Ted Stevens even boasted his first lead of the cycle over Anchorage Mayor...

"The reality is, governors every day have to make decisions for better or for worse. That's part of the job. It's an executive position. And it's a position that is like what you're going to do when you're president. Legislators, they do different things. They debate and they pass their bills back and forth," he said. "But governors make decisions, and I think it's a tactical mistake for the Democrats to question Gov. Palin's experience when she's been a governor of a state," he said. "I don't think the size of the state is relevant. It's the kinds of decisions...

John McCain has opened up a lead in the Intrade Predictions Market. As of 2:30 pm EST, his contract was trading at 50.6 while the Obama contract was trading at 49.5.Before the Democrat convention, Obama was up near 65% while McCain was hovering around 35%.

Republican Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin got a Jersey bounce following the widely viewed Republican nominating convention but continue to trail Democratic Sen. Barack Obama in the Garden State. The latest results from Fairleigh Dickinson University’s PublicMind poll show Obama leading among likely voters by 47% to 41%....For the first time since April 2005 a majority of voters (52%) say the U.S. military effort in Iraq is going “fairly well” or “very well.” Nearly one-third of Democrats agree, as well as a majority of independents, and four of five Republicans.

...Obama made a beeline for the Rust Belt when he left the Democratic National Convention last week. With a swing through Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan, Obama signaled the importance of this region to his campaign. Kerry won Pennsylvania and Michigan — two states where Obama strategists think their chances are iffy — and lost Ohio by a one-vote-per-precinct margin in 2004. Obama has long looked for a way to win the White House without the 20 electoral votes of Ohio, the prototypical swing state. His top aides, including his campaign manager, once said they could lose the state and still...

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Friday shows Barack Obama attracting 46% of the vote nationwide while John McCain earns 43%. When "leaners" are included, it’s Obama 49% and McCain 45%. This is Obama’s biggest lead since late July, when he opened up a six-point advantage following his summer speech in Berlin. A separate story looks at the Obama bounce. Other data released this morning shows that Democrats are happier now than before the convention with the choice of Joe Biden as Obama’s running mate. Overall, 74% of Democrats say their convention has unified the party.

The latest three-day Gallup Poll Daily tracking average (Aug. 25-27) is directly coincident with the first three days of the Democratic National Convention in Denver, and is no doubt beginning to reflect the typical convention "bounce" that Gallup has observed in most party conventions in recent decades. There is a lag of sorts involved in the daily tracking; interviewing is conducted in most parts of the country before that evening's high-focus speeches have taken place. Thus, the current three-day average would reflect any impact of Monday night's speech by Michelle Obama, and Tuesday night's speech by Hillary Clinton, but would...

...Obama clearly operates at a decided perceptual deficit compared to McCain on this dimension. Eighty percent of Americans say McCain can handle the responsibilities of being commander in chief, compared to 53% for Obama. These views have not changed throughout the summer. McCain's edge almost certainly reflects in part that he was a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and an officer in the U.S. Navy for decades, while Obama did not serve in the military. It may also reflect the fact that McCain is older, has more experience in the U.S. Senate and federal government, and has taken a...

Colorado: McCain 47 - 46Nevada: Obama 49 - 44New Mexico: Obama 53-40Pennsylvania: Obama 48-43

Bill Clinton appeared to undermine Sen. Barack Obama again Tuesday. The former president, speaking in Denver, posed a hypothetical question in which he seemed to suggest that that the Democratic Party was making a mistake in choosing Obama as its presidential nominee. He said: "Suppose you're a voter, and you've got candidate X and candidate Y. Candidate X agrees with you on everything, but you don't think that candidate can deliver on anything at all. Candidate Y you agree with on about half the issues, but he can deliver. Which candidate are you going to vote for?" Then, perhaps mindful...

A round of new polls by Mason-Dixon and the Denver Post, the Las Vegas Review-Journal, and the Salt Lake Tribune will give everyone something to chew on. ... On the plus side for McCain, he’s surprisingly up by four points in New Mexico (45%-41%) and seven points in Nevada (46%-39%). On the minus side for him, he’s ahead only by six points in his home state of Arizona (47%-41%), and he’s trailing Obama by three in Colorado (46%-43%), although a new Quinnipiac poll out today has McCain up one in this state (47%-46%).

Today we take our Swing State Review to Virginia. Historically, Virginia has not been much of a swing state, instead consistently favoring the Republican Party. The effect has been that the Democrats typically win Virginia when they have already secured 270 Electoral Votes. . . . So, in conclusion, I would say that of the four states we have reviewed thus far, Pennsylvania is the most likely to go for Obama, Virginia the least, and Colorado and Ohio fall in between. It's certainly not impossible for Obama to flip Virginia, but it won't be easy.

Barack Obama 264 -- John McCain 274 http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/maps/obama_vs_mccain/?map=10

The presidential race remains tight, with respondents to a Times/Bloomberg poll choosing Obama by 45% to McCain's 43%, a statistical dead heat. Obama's race remains an issue with many voters. Barack Obama's public image has eroded this summer amid a daily onslaught of attacks from Republican rival John McCain, leaving the race for the White House statistically tied, according to a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll released today. Far more voters say McCain has the right experience to be president, the poll found. More than a third have questions about Obama's patriotism.