If McCain had picked her, Connecticut would have turned red for the first time since 1988, no doubt about it. She still enjoys pretty high approval ratings since coming into office.

And yes, I'm struggling in my decision, too. After the Ayers/Obama attackfest, I decided to protest vote for Barr. My issue is that McCain is too socially conservative for me and Obama too economically liberal. Yet, Barr represents a position that's too economically conservative for me.

Go figure.

You and I could not be farther from each other on this issue. The day the Democrat Party made its decision, I made mine, and I have not been unhappy about that decision to support McCain. Yes, he shows questionable judgement (Palin, Ayers, Keating 5 come to mind), but to me, the Democrat Party has shown its desire to swing the country in a hard leftist position, as detailed by the Obama Campaign's platform. The man is as much of an empty suit into whom the Democrats have poured their own hopes, dreams and ideas as Sarah Palin.

I cannot imagine doing anything that would even potentially give a vote to a party committed to forcing people to unionize; raise the minimum wage beyond a competitive level; sit down and talk with terrorist governments like the Hamas one in the Gaza Strip, the Iranian Government, and Hugo Chavez; raising taxes in a time of economic crisis; and finally, as Obama said himself that he would do, rob Peter to pay Paul.

I am sorry, but I can see no contest here, there never was one.

Nor is he really that far left. Fisa vote, keeping troops in Afghanistan, going into Pakistan. These are fairly clear rightist positions.

Agreed, but it takes an equally large suspension of disbelief to think that Obama will be a uniter and will defend moderate positions against Pelosi and Reed, given his liberal voting record.

Why would a moderate be interested in McCain? In most areas McCain has abandoned moderation. In his campaign McCain has abandoned moderates. For evidence of the latter I present Sarah Palin, the Ayers meme and swearing that he will support people like Roberts, Scalia and Thomas to the Supreme Court. The whole bit of bragging how he's voted with GWB over 90% of the time doesn't help either.

I would offer you one thought for consideration that commentators above have not noted:
“With no power comes no responsibility.”

The Democrats have been shut out of operational power in government for 8 years, and out of effective power for perhaps a generation. The centre has gradually shifted right in this time period . . . but has atrophied in the chattering classes and officialdom. The Tip O'Neil era when Dems. and Repubs. could castigate each other on the floor, and then go out for drinks afterward respecting each other's differences, has sadly long past.

We have witnessed extraordinary irresponsibility on the part of many Democrats and their supporters in the past years, as they have been marginalized in power.

Hence numerous leaks on intelligence matters from Democrats in the intelligence community (the CIA leaks stopping when the Democratic-connected Mary McCarthy was dismissed).

Of course, the classic example is the NYT exposure of the totally legal Swift financial monitoring program, that proved effective in catching the mastermind of the Bali resort bombing.
http://www.patterico.com/2006/06/22/new-york-ti…

Barack Obama, seeing the possibility of power, understands that there will be responsibilities he will have to uphold as President. Hence his vote for FISA. Hence, also, Obama's refusal to go along with impeachment howlings . . . noting that this will only continue the cycle of partisan viciousness.

If McCain wins, many Democrats will give up all hope in government. The culture of irresponsibility will increase.

If Obama wins, the Democrats will have effective control of the executive and the legislative branches. They will have responsibility for power . . . and will have to act accordingly.

Keller at the NYT pissed on the Bush admin. for asking they not release the story on the totally legal Swift program. Presumably, the Democratic Times would give more credence to listening to an Obama administration pleas that it not release stories on . . . say . . . an Obama plan to send Special Forces into Pakistan – a violation of international law – to kidnap bin Laden and bring him to justice.

A vote for Obama is a vote for Democratic responsibility. (Plus, if he acts irresponsibly, he will have a record to be tossed out on in 4 years.)

Actually, Obama makes me want to meet him. I want to know what he's like when not using his talking points. He seems like the kind of person you could sit down for dinner with and bounce ideas off.

I do think that the Palin selection was critical. As is temperament. Also, look at the advisers surrounding the candidates. McCain's inner circle includes neocons like Randy Scheunemann and hard deregulators like Phil Gramm. Obama works with Gen. James Jones, Paul Voelker, Warren Buffet and Robert Rubin. If the economists surrounding Obama were right out of Mother Jones and the Nation then I could see the concern over Obama being too economically liberal. But that's just not who he has around him.

In other words, the conservative is advocating a radical change based on the ideas of the liberal's policy advisor. The liberal, meanwhile, is advocating a conservative, incremental approach. It's no wonder you're confused.

Its hard to still see McCain as a maverick– he is running his campaign in a very similar way to Bush in 2004- using the politics of fear, distortion and defamation. Also after claiming he will not be influenced by Washington insiders and lobbyists, he has surrounded himself by insiders and lobbyists.

Also- ask himself if he has acted like a maverick or caved into the right wing of his party by choosing Palin (when he wanted Lieberman) and going after Obama using the washed up Ayers story (which the right wing advocated) to try to taint him as a terrorist sympathizer.

Either way I vote, I'm definitely not going to feel good about it, since there will be many things that I don't like about whoever I vote for.

I've posted more thoughts on being undecided on my blog, and I'll probably be posting a follow-up soon.