A couple polls have had the Senate race in Maryland suddenly closer or tied of late, and the Cook Political report even switched it into the Tossup category yesterday. Eeek! Many of us might have thought, attuned as we are to the ins and outs of the countless polls out there.

But, here's something to put into your pipe and smoke: According to the Washington Post, it's Cardin by 11, and, oh by the way, O'Malley by 10. Outlier? Perhaps. But not 11 points off, either, I'd think.

Well, this poll -- released a half hour ago -- at least indicates that, although the recent effort of Bush and the GOP to focus on national security has indeed upped terrorism as an important issue to the country, it hasn't improved either Bush's job ratings nor Republicans' numbers in the generic ballot test.

If the election were held today...(August, June findings in parens)

Vote Democratic: 50 (50, 51)
Vote Republican: 39 (41, 39)

Bush's approval is 37%, unchanged from August.

After Sept. 11, American flags popped up on cars everywhere. It was a beautiful thing, representing our unity (at the time at least) in the fight against those who perpetrated the terror attacks. We were all Americans, all standing behind America.

Now, the Gulf Coast is devastated, with New Orleans obviously worst off of all, especially considering the horribly botched emergency response efforts there, whoever you want to blame. One way to show you will not forget these terrible events and support the citizens of New Orleans would be to buy a car sticker like this one:

(Warning, Simpsons and Desperate Housewives spoilers below the jump)

I know there are two diaries way down about tonight's Simpson's episode. But I didn't see any about tonight's excellent Desperate Housewives episode, an airing that I think is more significant.

I'm amused especially given that Sunday night is "family night" and DH follows the family-friendly, cryface-filled Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.

From the subscription-only CQ site, this article mentions all the calls Salazar's office got, and also details the Coloradan's defense of Democrats who voted against Gonzales for AG, adding that he is not "abandoning" his party.

A lot of the folks here are peeved, I know, but I suppose this may be the reality for red-state senators, at least for now...

Here are some excerpts.

Just got this info in my mailbox from GoldDerby.com, which is run by an editor of In Touch magazine, Tom O'Neill. He's a total entertainment industry insider, so while this doesn't carry the Associated Press seal of approval, certainly it's more reliable than, say Dr*dge.

Well, well, well: George W. Bush is the first incumbent president to drop to below 50 percent job approval one month after being re-elected. And only 36 percent of Americans think Donald Rumseld should stay on as Defense secretary, while 51 percent, an all-time high, say it was a mistake to go into Iraq.

These would be the findings of the latest CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll. And if Gallup is reporting this about a GOP administration, well, it must be bad.

What was that thoery about the election coming one or two months too soon for Kerry to win? :/

Riding along in my automobile this morning in northern Virginia, I approached a PT Cruiser that I saw, from a distance, proudly wore a lovely BUSH-CHENEY '04 sticker on its ass. As usual upon seeing such things, I restrained the urge to mutter a Cheney under my breath and instead quietly sighed.

Pulling closer, I saw the driver had one of those "UNITED WE STAND" license plates with an American flag on it. Well, that's nice. Plenty of those around here, especially so close to the Pentagon.

I then noticed that he had vanity plates, too. They read "GO ..." something. Three letters. UVA? UNC? UMD? Nope, not a requisite sports team.

"GO GOP!" read the license plate. Oh, and United We Stand, too.  

Congressional Quarterly pundit Craig Crawford, seen often on Countdown and other shows, says in a new column that the doc may be, well, just what the doctor ordered for the Dems.

Excerpts:

More below the fold...

Some solace hope, even, I suppose, can be taken from the fact that Bush appears to have won simply by turning out his base (Rove's strategy once it became clear he wasn't expanding the GOP share of the swing electorate).

Andrew Sullivan has the scoop from TNR (it's on Sully's main page, sorry, I am so numb, dazed and exhausted I am just not gonna bother making the tasty URL link:

I know a lot of us are high on Dean for DNC chair, but what about Edwards?

Here's a few things to think about that may be in his favor:

-- He appeals to both the base and moderates. He was 2nd in the primary, after all, and people were practically begging Kerry to name him as his veep.

-- He's articulate, young, handsome and attractive. The ladies (and gay men) will love seeing him on CNN and MSNBC.

-- He'd make mincemeat out of Gillespie every time.

-- He's less controversial (great though Dean may be).

-- He's already got a national presence.

Meanwhile, who decides who the next chair is? Kerry, I am guessing?

Congressional Quarterly pundit Craig Crawford -- seen often on Hardball and Countdown on MSNBC -- predicts a Kerry victory Nov. 2:

Now, in the grand scheme of things, this means nothing, but in the media echo chamber, perhaps it will help a bit. Especially since Crawford is a Republican (or at least was in the past), according to a column he wrote after Reagan's death:

More below the fold.

I wonder if Kerry needs to say something tonight to completely disarm Bush on his tremendous distortions and outright lies about Kerry's record -- which, of course, form the basis of the president's entire campaign.

So here's my suggestion.

Today: Bush 49, Kerry 47.

Yesterday: Bush 51, Kerry 45. Likely voters.

LINK

Someone please reassure me that Kerry is right to apparently be turning his guns totally on the economy and other domestic issues, while significantly downgrading the talk of Iraq.

As the NYT reports, the campaign is all but dropping foreign policy ads for a spate of new economic ones:

WTF????

We need to bombard the paper before this winds up in tomorrow's editions.

USA Today tells us via the AP wire:

A July swing-state poll indicates that large majorities of Americans -- even majorities of gun owners favor renewing the assault weapons ban. 81% of Floridians are for it. 68% of South Dakotans are for it. 80% of women in Penn. are for extending it. Frickin' 64% of Ohio NASCAR fans are for extending it.

Look at the detailed results below. This should be, no pun intended, a KILLER issue for Kerry. The question then, becomes this: How to keep the GOP and NRA from using their media leverage to twist the debate into a wash or even a net minus for the Democrats?

First, take my below analysis with a grain of salt. Kerry is behind, and we need to understand that. But I also don't want us all flailing about like Chicken Little.

That said, the ABC News analysis notes a few details of its sampling:

-- They had more GOPers than Dems by 6 percentage points.
-- Kerry is losing 12% of Dems to Bush; Bush, 6% of GOPers to Kerry
-- Battleground states are tied among registered voters.

This gives us a partial picture of internals, but not a full one - which is why you need to take this with a grain of salt.