One of John McCain's advisers recently called his running mate Sarah Palin a "diva" after she went off-script at a rally, and suggested she was looking after her own political future over the current campaign. Now another adviser ups the ante in a conversation with the Politico's Playbook, labeling Palin a "whack job."

After the rally, we witnessed a near-street riot involving the exiting McCain crowd and two Cuban-American Obama supporters. Tony Garcia, 63, and Raul Sorando, 31, were suddenly surrounded by an angry mob. There is a moment in a crowd when something goes from mere yelling to a feeling of danger, and that's what we witnessed. As photographers and police raced to the scene, the crowd elevated from stable to fast-moving scrum, and the two men were surrounded on all sides as we raced to the circle.

"Now, because he knows that his economic theories don't work, he's been spending these last few days calling me every name in the book. Lately he's called me a socialist for wanting to roll-back the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans so we can finally give tax relief to the middle class. I don't know what's next. By the end of the week he'll be accusing me of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in kindergarten. I shared my peanut butter and jelly sandwich."

Thank you God above for giving us George W. Bush, and for giving us John McCain and Sarah Palin.

Democratic early voters outnumber Republicans in key states, according to incomplete election statistics, suggesting a surprising break from traditional trends, said analyst.

Just a week before a historic Election Day, registered Democrats in North Carolina are out-voting Republicans by a nearly 2-to-1 margin, according to official election statistics.

The state is seen as a crucial battleground for Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama.

The turnout by Democrats also appears to be higher in at least two other battleground states, Colorado and Nevada, whose electoral votes could make the difference for either White House hopeful.

As of Tuesday, at least 9,813,052 ballots had been cast in 31 states that allow early, in-person or absentee voting without having to provide an excuse. The figures are based on reports from state election officials.

A record-breaking 33 percent of all U.S. voters are expected to cast ballots early this year, said James Hicks of the Oregon-based Early Voting Center, a nonpartisan voter tracking group affiliated with the Pew Charitable Trust.

Hicks, who's been working long hours through a "blur of numbers and charts" as November 4 approaches, said this year's turnout is "astronomical" and a high Democratic turnout would be "very unusual."

"It's just not historically what we've seen -- to have very high levels of Democratic turnout," said Hicks, a self-described election geek. "Traditionally we see white, older, wealthier people turning out for the early vote, and this time we're seeing Democrats, we're seeing minorities -- clearly there are some changes in the demography of early voting."

WWD: You mentioned that the McCain campaign thinks that blogging is inimical to journalism. Do you think it’s true what they said in your story, that reporters are “primarily young, snarky, blog-obsessed and liberal?”
R.D.: Oh, yes, I think it’s true, but I don’t think it’s a fatal impediment.

I'd like to think he realizes that he's going to eat it and is trying to save some dignity.

As for ABC's underdog "Pushing Daisies," airing on the only major broadcaster not to carry the ad, the counterprogramming still came in fourth place in the adults 18-49 demo. Still, "Daisies" (6.8 million, 2.2) was up by 16% from last week to a season high. The CW's "America's Next Top Model" (3.9 million, 2.0), also running in the time period, didn't receive a bump and was on par with last week.

Taking the stage as one of the pre-program speakers at a Sarah Palin rally here in Rush Limbaugh’s hometown, Sen. Kit Bond, R-Missouri, fired up the crowd by warning them about Barack Obama’s judicial philosophy.

“Just this past week, we saw what Barack Obama said about judges,” Bond said. “He said, ‘I’m tired of these judges who want to follow what the Founding Fathers said and the Constitution. I want judges who have a heart, have an empathy for the teenage mom, the minority, the gay, the disabled. We want them to show empathy. We want them to show compassion.’”

Glass Bead Collective, Twin Cities Indymedia, and other independent media activists have released a new film, 'Terrorizing Dissent', an exposé of events at the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Featuring first-person accounts and footage from more than forty cameras on the streets, 'Terrorizing Dissent' focuses on the story of dissent suppressed. People charged with "conspiracy to riot in furtherance of terrorism" speak out against the government's campaign to manipulate media coverage and label civil disobedience and community organizing as terrorism.

McCain admitted to causing that incident through "daredevil clowning" but returned safely.

PURGE: SKEPTICAL REPORTERS TOSSED OFF OBAMA PLANE
Fri Oct 31 2008 08:39:55 ET

NY POST, DALLAS MORNING NEWS, WASHINGTON TIMES TOLD TO GET OUT... ALL 3 ENDORSED MCCAIN

**Exclusive**

The Obama campaign has decided to heave out three newspapers from its plane for the final days of its blitz across battleground states -- and all three endorsed Sen. John McCain for president!

The NY POST, WASHINGTON TIMES and DALLAS MORNING NEWS have all been told to move out by Sunday to make room for network bigwigs -- and possibly for the inclusion of reporters from two black magazines, ESSENCE and JET, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.

When an MTV viewer wanted to know what Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama thought of Proposition 8, a state constitutional amendment on the 2008 California general-election ballot that would eliminate the right of same-sex couples to marry, MTV News brought the question straight to the man himself.

"I think it's unnecessary," Obama told Sway, in response to a question sent in by Gangstagigz from San Leandro, California. "I believe marriage is between a man and a woman. I am not in favor of gay marriage. But when you start playing around with constitutions, just to prohibit somebody who cares about another person, it just seems to me that's not what America's about. Usually, our constitutions expand liberties, they don't contract them."

It is an acknowledgment of biology to some extent. Governments want to encourage child birth, at least traditionally.

"I hate to sound callous, but... isn't the timing ringing any bells for anyone?

On a personal note, should he actually win, regardless of how she died, I will begrudge her I do believe. I had always hoped to be dead before red."

The national polls have all consolidated into a range of roughly Obama +7. That is right about where our model sees the race as well, giving Obama a 6.8 point advantage in its composite of state and national polling. Our model notes, however, that candidates with large leads in the polls have had some tendency to underperform marginally on election day, and so projects an Obama win of 6.0 points tomorrow.

Far more important, of course, is the race for 270 electors. It appears almost certain that Obama will capture all of the states won by John Kerry in 2008. Pennsylvania, while certainly having tightened somewhat over the course of the past two weeks, appears to be holding at a margin of about +8 for Obama, with very few remaining undecideds. Obama also appears almost certain to capture Iowa and New Mexico, which were won by Al Gore in 2000. Collectively, these states total 264 electoral votes, leaving Obama just 5 votes shy of a tie and 6 of a win.

Obama has any number of states to collect those 5 or 6 votes. In inverse order of difficulty, these include Colorado, Virginia, Nevada, Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, Missouri and Indiana. Obama is the signficant favorite in several of these states; winning any one of them may be fairly difficult for John McCain, but winning all of them at once, as John McCain probably must do, is nearly impossible.