I never thought it would happen to me, but I just received a new Obama smear via e-mail. Makes you wonder what this country is coming to. Full text after the jump.

Just a reminder that while McCain may have closed a handful of points in the Gallup tracking poll, Obama has a strong lead in every other poll or metric worth mentioning.

First, the Rasmussen tracking poll, remarkably, shows Obama maintaining his post-primary "bounce:"

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Sunday shows Barack Obama attracting 46% of the vote while John McCain earns 39%. When "leaners" are included, Obama holds a six-point advantage, 49% to 43%. This is the eighth straight day that Obama has enjoyed a lead of five-to-seven points.

Of course, what really matters are the state polls. One of the better analyzes out there is Nate Silver's over at FiveThirtyEight.com.

And, here's where he sees the race:

Electoral-vote is another great place to see where the state by state matchups stand. Here's where they have the race:

Obama 304   McCain 221   Ties 13

In other words, we should avoid overconfidence, but it's equally bad to cherrypick polls to prove a point.

As Chris Bowers notes, Obama's lead, on average, is signficantly greater than John Kerry's was in 2004:

Kerry's lead never reached 4% nationally, and actually peaked at around 3.0-3.5% in mid-May (post-Abu Ghraib and when he started running ads), and again from mid-July through mid-August (from the selection of Edwards through the start of swiftboating). In other words, Kerry's peaks in the 2004 election were never as large as Obama's current lead.

Bowers also has some thoughts on what Obama needs to do going forward:

The Obama campaign is clearly obsessed with maintaining a tight, top-down organizational and message structure...Let's hope that this top-down messaging includes a willingness to really attack McCain during the Democratic convention (and, of course, before and after the convention as well). Kerry's focus on positive messaging back in 2004 was one of the reasons he was left vulnerable to the Republican Noise Machine. While the campaign launched a "fight the smears" operation yesterday, pushing back isn't enough. As the old saying does, one of the best defenses is a good offense. If Obama can put McCain even more on the defensive than he already is, then he has the opportunity to build a truly substantial lead over the summer.

Wow, just a week into the general election, and the McCain gaffes are flying fast and furious. Actually, this is vintage McCain, buried in a Politico article on how McCain should use Cheney.

In an interview he gave to the Weekly Standard's Stephen Hayes in 2006 for Hayes's biography, "Cheney: The Untold Story of America's Most Powerful and Controversial Vice President," McCain said: "I will strongly assert to you that he has been of enormous help to this president of the United States."

Going further, McCain even told Hayes in comments heretofore unpublished that he'd consider Cheney for an administration post.

Asked whether he'd be interested in Cheney had the vice president not already have served under Bush for two terms, McCain said: "I don't know if I would want him as vice president. He and I have the same strengths. But to serve in other capacities? Hell, yeah."

This is the same Cheney who has earned unprecedented power in Bush's White House as the most powerful vice president in history, even according to his admirers. Who seems to pop up in every Republican administration in some capacity. And who is intimately tied to Halliburton, which has an enormous stake in the future of Iraq. In other words, it's hardly a stretch to think that his influence would continue into a McCain administration.

All of which raises the question, is McCain running for Bush's third term, or Cheney's?

Just a week after he clinched the nomination, Obama's lead among women versus McCain is just as strong as the one Hillary Clinton enjoyed. Gallup has a piece up today detailing how women who had previously been undecided in an Obama/ McCain matchup are now coming home to the Dems. According to Gallup's polling, Obama now has a 13-point lead among women, and even leads among older women.

This surge in support is due almost entirely to Hillary's departure from the race and endorsement of Obama:

These figures are based on aggregated Gallup Poll Daily tracking interviews with national registered voters conducted May 27-June 2 (the week immediately before Obama clinched the nomination on June 3), which showed Obama and McCain tied at 46%, and June 5-9 (the five days since it was reported that Clinton would suspend her campaign), which show Obama ahead, 48% to 42%. Obama clinched the nomination on the evening of June 3, and the news media reported Clinton would suspend her campaign on the evening of June 4. Thus, the data give a clear picture of voter support before and after Clinton's exit.

Remarkably, Obama now matches the level of Hillary's support in Gallup's polling:

While campaigning for president, Clinton demonstrated an especially strong appeal to women. She led McCain by 52% to 40% in her final full week as a candidate, exactly equal to the average since mid-March. By comparison, Obama held only an average 47% to 42% lead over McCain among women during the same time span. At least for now, he seems to be matching Clinton's performance among women versus McCain, given his current 13-point lead among female voters.

Even among older women, where Obama had previously trailed McCain 43-46, he now leads, 47-41. And among women age 18 to 49, Obama simply trounces McCain, leading 56-35, a 21-point margin.

MSNBC's First Read has the scoop on the potential VP names floated by Obama's team on Capitol Hill:

Hillary Clinton
John Kerry
John Edwards
Evan Bayh
Kathleen Sebelius
Ted Strickland
Mark Warner
Tim Kaine
Jim Webb
Bill Nelson
Jack Reed
Joe Biden
Chris Dodd
Tom Daschle
Sam Nunn
James Jones

My first thought was, outside of Jones (the article above has more on him) that pretty much sums up the conventional wisdom in terms of VP picks. And, John Kerry, really? Still, it's encouraging to see Warner (who would be my pick) on the list.

Hot damn. Obama seized the initiative today, delivering a barnstormer of an economic speech in Raleigh, NC as he kicks off a two week tour on the economy.

We all knew the economy would be a big deal this election, and it only makes sense for Democrats to push this as their major theme this year. Not only are Bush's policies to blame, John McCain has demonstrated weakness on this issue and, amazingly, hasn't outlined a compelling vision of his own in the past three months. But still, I wasn't prepared for how forcefully Obama was able to articulate this issue in his speech today.

Obama framed the economic situation in a way that was both populist and centrist:

We did not arrive at the doorstep of our current economic crisis by some accident of history. This was not an inevitable part of the business cycle that was beyond our power to avoid. It was the logical conclusion of a tired and misguided philosophy that has dominated Washington for far too long.

George Bush called it the Ownership Society, but it's little more than a worn dogma that says we should give more to those at the top and hope that their good fortune trickles down to the hardworking many. For eight long years, our President sacrificed investments in health care, and education, and energy, and infrastructure on the altar of tax breaks for big corporations and wealthy CEOs - trillions of dollars in giveaways that proved neither compassionate nor conservative.

And for all of George Bush's professed faith in free markets, the markets have hardly been free - not when the gates of Washington are thrown open to high-priced lobbyists who rig the rules of the road and riddle our tax code with special interest favors and corporate loopholes. As a result of such special-interest driven policies and lax regulation, we haven't seen prosperity trickling down to Main Street. Instead, a housing crisis that could leave up to two million homeowners facing foreclosure has shaken confidence in the entire economy.

Obama then pivoted to hit McCain hard, painting him as a flip flopper, spelling out the choice between spending to rebuild America or rebuild Iraq, and tying McCain's policies to Exxon giveaways.

John McCain once said that he couldn't vote for the Bush tax breaks in good conscience because they were too skewed to the wealthiest Americans. Later, he said it was irresponsible to cut taxes during a time of war because we simply couldn't afford them. Well, nothing's changed about the war, but something's certainly changed about John McCain, because these same Bush tax cuts are now his central economic policy. Not only that, but he is now calling for a new round of tax giveaways that are twice as expensive as the original Bush plan and nearly twice as regressive. His policy will spend nearly $2 trillion on tax breaks for corporations, including $1.2 billion for Exxon alone, a company that just recorded the highest profits in history.

Think about that. At a time when we're fighting two wars, when millions of Americans can't afford their medical bills or their tuition bills, when we're paying more than $4 a gallon for gas, the man who rails against government spending wants to spend $1.2 billion on a tax break for Exxon Mobil. That isn't just irresponsible. It's outrageous.

John Edwards was in the crowd, and Obama mentioned that he was "teaming up" with Elizabeth Edwards on health care. Most encouraging, though, was the outrage and emotion Obama brought to this issue, as well as how aggressively the Obama campaign is moving to lay claim to this ground. This was a pitch-perfect speech and a must-watch. I'll post the video when it's up.

In web design we have a name for when someone steals or appropriates someone else's work, it's called a rip. It's the kind of behavior you can expect from unscrupulous companies trying to put up a site on the cheap but...the Republican candidate for president?

Check out the new tagline and branding on display on John McCain's site and tell me if it looks familiar:

Sam Stein:

McCain's seems to be positioning himself so that he is not caught, like Sen Hillary Clinton, simply ceding the mantle of change to Obama. But when the co-opting of images, logos, and slogans is this blatant, it could prove more embarrassing than advantageous.

I mean, seriously folks, is this a joke or what? Is there any better display of the bankruptcy of ideas in the Republican party?

In a last ditch effort, Clinton supporters have been advancing for weeks now an argument that supers should hand Clinton the nomination because she performs better in certain swing states.

And it's true, that, as of late, Clinton has an edge over Obama in traditional swing states such as Ohio and especially Florida.

Too bad we can't take a snapshot of these polls and travel in time to November and win the election.

First of all, I see the better numbers Clinton enjoys in some states and nationally (sometimes) as a result of the heat being taken off her and put on Obama as far as vetting, gaffes, etc, goes. For the better part of the year, Obama performed consistently better in these polls, now he's at parity or slightly behind.

Is it a coincidence that Obama's edge in swing states has dipped and Clinton's has risen as he's taken on the role of presumptive nominee? McCain and Republican attacks are trained solely on Obama, at the same time Clinton is hitting him.

But, for the sake of argument, let's assume for the course of this diary these numbers hold up when the spotlight turns back on Clinton.

Let's think about what happens to get Clinton the nomination.

Sometime between now and the convention, Clinton is successful in convincing the remaining superdelegates to take an unprecedented step in modern political history and hand her the nomination. Now I realize that according to the rules they "can" do this, but the question to ask is what happens if they do. In doing so, they would overrule the pledged delegate leader, not to mention first AA candidate in history and the guy who has brought so many new voters into the process.

Now I understand Clinton's run is also historic. And I understand Clinton supporters will be unhappy when Obama clinches the nomination; indeed, I'd argue this unhappiness is largely present in the polls. But, whichever side you are on, it's hard to argue that Obama's nomination isn't largely expected at this point. As the pledged delegate leader, and the popular vote leader as well by most counts, he has by far the most legitimate claim to the nomination.

But can you imagine the uproar were the supers to hand the nomination to Clinton? Quite frankly, if you expect the numbers Clinton currently enjoys to hold up then, you are dreaming.

AA voters are crucial to Dem victory in many states. After this tumultuous primary season with accusations of race baiting flying either way, it's easy to imagine those people staying home or voting for the Green party in large numbers, even being disenfranchised from the Democratic party for good. For the young voters and Dem-leaning independents, Clinton's nomination would be nothing less than confirmation that the Dem process is stacked in favor of the establishment. Imagine those voters that were drawn into the party staying home or voting Nader in protest.

In other words, in making the case for her electability, the burden is on Clinton supporters to do more than point to a handful of polls this far out in the cycle. They need to paint a convincing path to the nomination for her that doesn't involve a total implosion of the Democratic party.