Dispatch From the Northern Front

Monday at 5 PM EST

I have to say I am almost embarrassed to be so caught up in the contest- maybe its the writers strike. In New Hampshire, its almost pure horse race analysis now and issues are spoken of only in context of tactics. While flipping between the football playoffs and news analysis over the weekend, it was sometimes hard to tell which contests were being discussed (Item for John McCain- learn from the Steelers on Saturday- much like his candidacy, they suffered early missteps and had a roaring exciting comeback late in the game but then blew the lead and the game by going conservative on offense and soft on defense)

Living and working in two states neighboring New Hampshire, I have had the opportunity to see lots of TV ads on the Boston and Portland stations over the past three or four months. Hard to believe they are going to disappear after tomorrow. Recently there have mainly been offerings from the moneyed- Romney and Clinton and alot from McCain (more on these below). Have not seen anything for Huckabee. A few offerings from Giuliani last month (9-11 and 9-11 some more) and Obama and Edwards ran safe soft ads mainly full of still black and white photos and boring hopeful music (though Edwards threw in a few lines about"corporate greed" and seemed to suppress his college football coach accent a little). Saw one Ron Paul ad and it was just bad.

As a I wrote in a comment to an LA guy post yesterday, Hillary's ads are screaming desperation and seem to be written by lawyers/pollsters and are getting harder to understand. Her ad explaining why she is for change but is experienced which resulted in a lot of change in the past and therefore she is the voice of experience for change is a bit dense and requires full attention and repeated viewings to parse through. She along with McCain have also opted for showing scary news footage (looks like suicide bombings from Iraq) with ponderous music and the candidate's name at the end (Though McCain also quotes Romney's line about not needing foreign policy experience to be President)- Clearly not an attempt to appeal to reason (but what ad can really?).

Today, Hillary is reported to have cried on the stump while talking to a small group of women voters and they reacted positively and supportively- it will be interesting to see if this is replay Ed Muskie moment or another new non-traditional aspect of this campaign- praise for accepting and expressing one's emotions (maybe this will get the girl votes back from Obama)

Romney's ads appear to hike up meaningless mush to new level- he has adopted the "change" theme by saying he will change things in Washington, accompanied by pounded fist- now since he's running for Bush's job his point must be that Bush is crappy at being President and things need to change but this doesn't square with Romney's attacks on Huckabee and McCain for criticising Bush. Also his ads seem to make him sound like a tattletale. Although for all these shortcomings, his ads have clearly rattled McCain-who's reputation for "straight talk" is being undermined by his not-very-well-hidden anger at Romney and immigration questions. (McCain, Clinton and Obama all look exhausted and Romney seems more robotic than usual-with so much happening so quickly in the process, I guess no one can afford to rest. Interesting- do we get a better picture of the candidate by watching them in extremis- Giuliani has a reputation for excelling in that kind of environment, bet he wishes now he was in the middle of it)

As of now, It looks like Obama separating from Hillary by 10 points or more (though if she gets the organization out, and gets the "cry" bump and loses by say 5 or 6 %, she might talk about a "comeback") and the McCain, Romney race is tightening but with McCain in the lead. Huckabee will be lucky to beat Ron Paul (he is already talking about 4th place as a "strong showing") and Giuliani has stopped campaigning but could zoom into 3d place purely due to name recognition (though I suspect his ignored supporters will go for McCain instead). Fred Thompson doesn't appear to be doing much. If all of the 3d place and lower spots recieve 10% or less, it may not matter how the bottom tier finishes.

No Thought Left Unexpressed.