Hysteria Grips Democratic Ranks as Obama Slide Continues

Here's John McCain's new ad buy on the economy, "Enough Is Enough":

Today, McCain-Palin 2008 released its latest television ad, entitled "Enough is Enough." With our economy in crisis, John McCain will meet this crisis by reforming Wall Street, enacting new rules for fairness and honesty and not tolerating a system that puts familes at risk. The ad will be televised nationally.

Meanwhile, hysteria has gripped the Democratic-left as Barack Obama struggles to regain the political momentum in an electoral environment overdetermined to favor the Democratic Party.

A leading Politico story asks,"Can Obama Really Pull it Off?

Can Barack Obama actually blow this thing? Can he actually lose in November?

We have a deeply troubled economy, an unpopular war, a very unpopular president and a historic reluctance on the part of the American people to elect the same party to the White House three terms in a row.

You look at all that, and you figure Obama would be leading by double digits. But he isn’t. The race is essentially tied, and not just in the national polls, which really don’t count for much, but in the Electoral College projections, which do. On Monday, MSNBC put its electoral count at 233 for Obama and 227 for McCain, with 270 needed for victory. That’s really close.

Some Democrats are getting very concerned, and they have been making their concerns known to the Obama campaign. “We’re familiar with this,” Obama’s campaign manager, David Plouffe, told The New York Times a few days ago. “And I’m sure between now and Nov. 4 there will be another period of hand-wringing and bed-wetting. It comes with the territory.”

Bed wetting? Geez, things must not be going well for the Dems!

Indeed, Rick Moran's article captures the current mania on the left, "Markets Crash, Media Hysterical, Democrats Thrilled":

“McCain Loses Fox News” blared the headline at the liberal website Think Progress. And that appeared to be the least of the Republican nominee’s worries. From Wall Street to Main Street, Democrats could barely contain their glee over the sudden turn of events that culminated in the crisis in the markets on Monday.

When financial writers ran out of dire adjectives to describe the serious crisis in the markets, Democratic and liberal blogs helped them out by managing to find a few more. After all, business reporters are not generally given to hyperbole, and the adjective is something of a stranger to them. Thankfully, Obama-supporting websites had access to an online thesaurus or two which they were able to comb for exactly the right apocalyptic language that would freeze the blood while getting the point across that John McCain was at fault by reason of his association with George Bush and that it was time to make sure the windows on those Wall Street skyscrapers were suicide-proofed.

New York Times columnist, blogger, and resident hysteric Paul Krugman referred to the day’s 500 point stock market drop as “Black Monday.” The problem with that is that 1) the name has already been taken; and 2) it is hyperbole.

The real “Black Monday” occurred on October 19, 1987, when stocks lost more than 22% of their value. Today’s market “turmoil” (which is as hyperbolic as the New York Times feels like getting) resulted in a loss of 4.4% in the value of the stock market. This is serious for those of us who have invested in mutual funds (I would suggest downing a good, stiff, Glenlivet or perhaps a strawberry martini before checking your portfolio today) but hardly the kind of thing that will result in an economic collapse.

Read the whole thing, here.

In my essay yesterday, "No Panic From Banking Crisis as McCain Momentum Holds," a new visitor left this comment:

Don't you ever get tired of spinning every bit of news in a way favorable to your point of view. Don't you ever get tired of deception and outright lying? I mean you must know that what you're saying is partly bs. And why the meaness? Why do you call Americans who have liberal values 'lefties.' Why do you work so hard to make the situation worse? Why do you think it's patriotic to malign other Americans?

I don't know if this fellow's been around my blog much, but suggesting, as I do at the post, that the loss of momentum for the Democrats "must be painful" is hardly being "mean."

Notice how these comments don't attempt to actually rebut any of the points I make in the essay, like the fact that John McCain actually leads Barack Obama by 20 votes in Electoral College projections, or that McCain holds a four-point edge in weekend polling in Ohio, which might be the most important battteground state in 2008.

The truth hurts, I guess, which leads the lefties to hurl accusations of "lying."