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If you're an undecided Minnesota voter, expect a volunteer for Barack Obama's campaign to knock on your door — probably early and often. The Obama campaign in Minnesota today announced what its leaders described as the largest volunteer effort ever in the state to identify voters' candidate preferences, persuade the undecided to support the Democratic presidential candidate and turn them out to vote. An estimated one in five voters is undecided, and the Obama campaign will come calling "as many times as it takes to move them," Jeff Blodgett, Obama's Minnesota campaign director, said during a conference call with reporters....

Barack Obama isn't just relying on urban Democratic strongholds to win Ohio in November. Obama's campaign released a document Tuesday outlining a strategy to organize extensively in rural areas throughout the key battleground state. Some of those areas have long been strongholds for Republican candidates.

Former Republican Rep. Jim Leach endorsed Barack Obama's White House bid Tuesday, and said he hopes the Illinois senator considers a former GOP ally of rival John McCain as his running mate. Speaking on a conference call with reporters to announce a new effort among Republicans in support of Obama's candidacy, Leach said he thought Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel should join the Democratic ticket. "There are a number of impressive potential vice presidential candidates and this is a singular decision for one person, and that is Barack Obama," Leach said. "But personally I'd be hopeful in the list of serious...

The year was 1984, and the state was Iowa. A white man who had just voted walked out of his precinct caucus and saw the Rev. Jesse Jackson standing outside. ''I did all I could,'' the man told Jackson ruefully, ''but I just couldn't bring myself to pull the lever and vote for you.'' L. Douglas Wilder laughs as he relates the story Jackson once told him, the sting eased by time and Wilder's vantage point as the nation's first elected black governor. Now it's a quarter of a century later, and the man everyone's talking about is Barack Obama,...

Leach, Chafee start ‘Republicans for Obama’ By Walter Alarkon Posted: 08/12/08 01:48 PM [ET] Former Republican Rep. Jim Leach (Iowa) and former GOP Sen. Lincoln Chafee (R.I.) touted Barack Obama as the presidential candidate who represents the traditional conservatism that they feel has been forgotten under President Bush. In an Obama campaign conference call Tuesday, during which Leach announced his endorsement of Sen. Obama (D-Ill.), the two former lawmakers tied presumptive Republican nominee Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) to Bush’s positions, particularly on the war in Iraq and spending.

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A policy memo by Sen. Hillary Clinton's one-time chief strategist challenging Sen. Barack Obama's "American roots" could make it difficult to close any remaining gaps between the former rivals, the magazine writer who revealed the memo said Tuesday. Mark Penn was Sen. Hillary Clinton's chief strategist until April. In a March 2007 memo, Mark Penn, Clinton's former chief strategist, wrote, "all of these articles about his boyhood in Indonesia and his life in Hawaii are geared toward showing his background is diverse, multicultural and putting that in a new light. Save it for 2050," according to Atlantic...

Media bias for Obama helps McCain Friday, August 08, 2008 THE ISSUE: Media bias in presidential campaign OUR OPINION: McCain yet could benefit from public perception Sen. John McCain isn’t the best when it comes to joking, but his attempt made the point. Referencing Sen. Barack Obama’s recent visit to Berlin, McCain said his Democratic opponent was greeted by thousands -- and that was just the media. Obama’s worldwide tour and the massive media attention it got were a sore point with the McCain camp. He has been abroad numerous times without such fanfare. Some say the Obama travels were...

Every Tuesday, I'm generating a map based on pollster.com's running averages of all reported state presidential polls. (I was on vacation last week.) The map shows the states sized in proportion to their electoral votes. I've also added a graph showing the trend.

http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_Colorado_811.pdf My analysis says otherwise. Notes: ---Poll shows only 77% White vote, when White vote in last CO Election was 86 percent! http://www.exitpollz.org/exitpolls/Colo1224CNNScreen0006.pdf ---15-Point Obama lead among Independents in hooey. Anyone who knows anything about this election knows Obama is lucky to get a statistical tie among Independents. ---37%-30% Statistical GOP identification lead in CO (last election) is now 38%-37%???? Slant a little, do we? ---Ken Salazar owns a 39% approval rating, but beats all potential opponents in a landslide (won by 4% last time)? ---Men tied between Obama and McCain (Whites, too) - the only place in the country?...

One of the challenges of the week for Chicago is finding a way to control the news cycle without the candidate. Today's answer: "Republicans for Obama." The most surprising name out there so far is probably that of former Iowa Rep. Jim Leach, a prominent figure in a battleground state. Also, former Sen. Linc Chafee, and Douglas Kmiec. There's still room for some higher-profile, more current figures -- an apostate of the profile of Joe Lieberman. The leading candidate for that slot still seems to be Chuck Hagel.

In a presidential campaign season that has set many firsts, we are about to experience a new 'first' from Presidential hopeful Barack Obama. In an article published by Politico, sources have learned that on September 9th, Crown Publishing will release Barack Obama's 3rd book, Change We Can Believe In: Barack Obama’s Plan to Renew America’s Promise". The release of the book will be unlike any other in modern history as it will represent the first time that Presidential Candidate has released a book while in the heat of a political campaign. I have wondered for months what Obama would do...

WASHINGTON – No question about it – somebody is going to win the U.S. presidential election Nov. 4. There's also little dispute it will be either Republican John McCain or Democrat Barack Obama. However, as the campaign goes on, more voters are running away from the two front-running candidates to other, much lesser-known, third-party candidates. An Associated TV/Zogby International poll released last week showed McCain leading Obama 42 percent to 41 percent – leaving 17 percent either undecided or leaning to third-party candidates. A recent CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll had Obama with 47 percent to McCain's 43, leaving 10 percent...

WE have just had a lesson in how the next president of the US would react to a real menace to the world's peace. Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain were set a test with Russia's invasion of Georgia. The results? Be terrified that Obama leads in the polls. Russia has driven deep into Georgia on the excuse of defending separatists in the Georgian territory of South Ossetia - a pro-Russian statelet that Georgia has tried to bring back under its control. But the truth is Georgia is being punished for its sins against Russian pride and power. Those...

Last week, I wrote on efforts by House GOP members to draw attention to the fact that Nancy Pelosi sent House members home for the summer without a vote on domestic oil drilling. The American people want it, and the GOP House members are fighting for it. I also wrote on how big the energy issue is. It could be THE issue of the upcoming elections... an issue upon which Republicans could run AND win. However, this is a new week, and whenever too much time passes, there is bound to be a new effort by the GOP to stall...

Salim Hamdan was just sentenced to five and half years for chauffeuring Osama bin Laden through McDonald’s drive-thrus, or whatever the Afghani equivalent is, while he plotted the 9/11 attacks. Hamdan has been holed up in Guantanamo Bay for over five years without a trial, so he’s actually eligible for release in five months, although Bush & Co. have threatened to hold him indefinitely after he has served him time. The media has been all over the story because 1) Not every programming minute can be filled by the Olympics; and 2) It potentially sets a precedent for suspected terrorists...

New documents just obtained by NRLC, and linked below, prove that Senator Obama has for the past four years blatantly misrepresented his actions on the Illinois Born-Alive Infants Protection bill. Summary and comment by NRLC spokesman Douglas Johnson:  "Newly obtained documents prove that in 2003, Barack Obama, as chairman of an Illinois state Senate committee, voted down a bill to protect live-born survivors of abortion -- even after the panel had amended the bill to contain verbatim language, copied from a federal bill passed by Congress without objection in 2002, explicitly foreclosing any impact on abortion.  Obama's legislative actions in 2003 --...

Last week Doug Johnson of the National Right to Life Committee drew my attention to a previously unnoticed January 2008 article by Terence Jeffrey stating Barack Obama actually did vote against a version of the IL Born Alive Infants Protection Act that was identical to the federal version, contrary to multiple public statements Obama or his surrogates have made to rationalize his opposition to the IL bill for the past 4 years. Since then we have found 2 separate documents proving Barack Obama has been misrepresenting facts. In fact, Barack Obama is more liberal than any U.S. senator, voting against...

In the Pennsylvania primary, Barack Obama rolled up more than 90 percent of the African-American vote. Among Catholics, he lost by 40 points. The cool liberal Harvard Law grad was not a good fit for the socially conservative ethnics of Altoona, Aliquippa and Johnstown. But if Barack had a problem with Catholics then, he has a far higher hurdle to surmount in the fall, with those millions of Catholics who still take their faith and moral code seriously. For not only is Barack the most pro-abortion member of the Senate, with his straight A+ report card from the National Abortion...

John McCain has cut Barack Obama’s lead in Iowa in half over the past month but still trails the Democrat 46% to 41%, according to the latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of voters in the state. When “leaners” are factored in, Obama leads his Republican opponent 49% to 44%. Last month Obama had a double-digit lead on McCain, 51% to 41%. In June, after Hillary Clinton dropped out of the Democratic presidential race, he led McCain by seven points. McCain had held steady at 38% for two months running, so the three-point uptick in the new survey is good news...

There’s speculation on the US site, VP Watch, this evening that Barack Obama might be considering the former general and 2004 contender for the presidential nomination - Wes Clarke - for the VP slot. This is the report: “Gen. Wes Clark’s slogan — “Securing America’s Future” — is the theme for the night Barack Obama’s running mate is scheduled to speak at the Democratic National Convention. Clark’s political action committee is called WESPAC — Securing America’s Future. It could just be a coincidence. After all, Clark appeared to dash his hopes of running with Obama in late June when he...