The other day I posited that Barack would see an uptick in the polls as a result of his debate performance this week and certainly we're seeing some (albeit minimal) evidence that that may be the case in the tracking poll averages. On Wednesday, Obama's average lead in the tracking polls (for the final pre-debate period) was 7%. Today, as Jonathan posted earlier, with approximately 2/3 of the polling taken in the aftermath of the debate, his lead is now 8.5%. Over at 538.com, Nate Silver digs deeper and finds "hints" at a post-debate surge for Obama:

The Zogby-Reuters poll is already out. From reading Zogby's write-up, it sounds like Obama must have had about a 9 point lead in Thursday's interviewing and, oh, a 5-6 point lead in Wednesday's interviewing. This compared with a 2-point lead over the Sunday-Tuesday window, before the debate occurred. (Zogby's party ID weightings are screwy, but we'll discuss that at another time; the poll should be fine for inferring trendlines).

Research 2000 had Obama winning Wednesday's daily sample by 12 points, as compared with 9 on Monday and 8 on Tuesday.

He also sees some evidence of a post-debate Obama surge in the Rasmussen state polling.

But what's perhaps more notable than whether Obama's uptick is a function of his debate performance or not is the fact that he's rising at all, as it's happening in the midst of the escalated Ayers attacks on Obama's character and "associations." It's becoming more and more evident that, to borrow a phrase from John McCain himself, these attacks are about as effective as nailing Jello to a wall.

The ineffectiveness of this line of attack is confirmed in the new FoxNews poll (h/t TPM):

There has been some discussion of Barack Obama's relationship with the former radical activist William Ayers. Because Ayers is linked to plots to bomb the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol in the 1970s, and because Ayres recently said he wished he had done more, some people say Obama's association with Ayers calls into question his judgment. Does Obama's connection with Ayers make you less likely to vote for him for president or does it not really make a difference to your vote?

Less Likely 32%

No Difference 61%

As Greg Sargent notes, most of those who respond "Less Likely" are Republicans who wouldn't have voted for Barack anyway.

Also, the Fox poll finds that the attacks could potentially be backfiring on McCain.

Meanwhile, the poll suggests that McCain's attacks could be blowing back on him: A majority -- 51% -- say he's running a negative campaign, as compared to only 21% who say that about Obama.

Our handy TPM Election Central calculator tells us that the number of voters think McCain is running a negative campaign is nearly double that of the number who care about McCain's primary attack line right now. Go figure.

Which begs the question of whether we're seeing Obama surge or McCain plunge. Of the 1.5% average net gain Obama has made over McCain since before Tuesday's debate, 1 full point of it is a result of McCain's numbers falling and just 1/2 point is due to Obama's rising.

Yglesias asks a simple question in a headline: "Does Norm Coleman Support Privatizing Social Security?"

Simple answer: yes.

Back in 2005, Republicans got crushed trying to convince the country that putting a portion of retirement money into the market was a good idea. And back then, the Dow wasn't routinely dropping 200-400 points a day.

But instead of changing bad policy, Republicans just ran from the label. So while politicians like Norm Coleman still support private accounts (the policy core of privatization), they refuse to call it by the unpopular name.

Case in point: Norm Coleman's campaign manager telling reporters the sky is green:

Let's throw Al Franken $10 or $20 for his private account to beat Norm Coleman.

Here are today's numbers:

In today's other polling, the Battleground tracker (.pdf) is largely in line with the four-poll average above, with Barack Obama leading John McCain by a 51 percent to 43 percent margin. The latest survey from Time (.pdf) isn't too far off either, pegging Obama's lead at 50 percent to 44 percent.

So what do we know now? With at least two-thirds of the interviews upon which the data above are based taking place after Tuesday night's presidential debate, Obama's lead is as big, if not bigger, than it was before the debate, when his four-poll average lead stood at 49.75 percent to 42.75 percent. In fact, there has been very little movement in the last 13 days, with Obama's average showing ranging from 49.25 percent to 50.25 percent, and McCain's average showing ranging from 41.75 percent too 43.00 percent even through a window of time that included two presidential debates and one vice presidential debate. In other words, despite the seeming ups and downs of the campaign, the race has actually remained somewhat static as of late, interestingly enough, which isn't a great sign for the GOP.

These numbers, caught a few days ago by Marc Ambinder, are just stunning:

In the ABC News / Washington Post poll of Ohio, 37% of those who made it through the likely voter screen said they had been contacted by the Obama campaign in some way or another. That's ten points higher than the number who say they've been contacted by the McCain campaign.

And adding in e-mails or texts, the Obama figure rises to 43% of voters -- probably a record for a presidential campaign.

Think about this number for a moment. About three in eight voters deemed likely to show up to the polls in Ohio on November 4 have been contacted by the Obama campaign. Considering that hardcore Republicans -- say 40 percent or so of the electorate -- is out of play for Obama, that means that upwards of 72 percent of likely voters who could even conceivably vote for Barack Obama have heard from his campaign, whether through a knock on the door, a piece of direct mail delivered to the house, a call on the phone, a text to the cell, or an email sent to the computer. All of this, of course, about a month away from election day.

The ground game metrics may not come through in the top like numbers from polling around the country, but when it comes to election day -- when it actually counts -- the team with the far superior GOTV organization generally is able to pull out the victory. How exactly these efforts can and will swing the numbers, both nationally and in the key states, remains to be seen, but I would be very surprised if this seeming organizational divide between the two campaigns isn't apparent in the ultimate results of the election.

Even as Bush's boy Henry Paulson (you might remember him from such bailouts as Bear Sterns and AIG) considers radical measures:

Boy that's reassuring ain't it. The guy who used to be the CEO of Goldman Sachs is now about to step in and use our money to nationalize them.

Paulson is, of course, the architect of both Goldman's failed strategy and the utter disaster that has been the last two years of Bush administration financial policies (since his appointment as Treasury Secretary in 2006.)

But don't forget, its not really the U.S. taxpayers who are financing this bailout. From a a NewsDay Op-Ed by James Ludes and Bernard Finel:

And owing money to "our friends" has serious implications:

They go on to outline the Suez Crisis of 1956 when President Dwight Eisenhower used America's financial power over Britain and France to force them to pull their troops out of the Suez Canal. Now we're the ones with global strategic delusions of grandeur that we're letting other countries pay for. As Ludes and Finel conclude:

The Zogby release is here on their telephone tracking poll out today:

I looked through the cross-tabs, which are behind the pay firewall, and will pass some of that on here (Zogby, weights party ID by 38% Democratic, 36% Republican and 26% Independent. Age by 18% 18-29, 15% 30-49, 24% 50-64, and 17% 65+. And 75% White, 11% Black, 10% Hispanic, 2% Asian, 2% Other. All quite solid).

It's especially with the older voters that Obama has increased his vote margin, trailing by just 44-46 to McCain in the 65+ group; compared with 41-50 just two days ago. I can't imagine worse timing for the Republicans to voice their primal scream over Ayers & ACORN through McCain than when the stock market is crashing. Among "investor class" voters, Obama has went from trailing by a 41-53 margin two days ago, to just 45-48 vs McCain, today.

Obama and McCain are about tied in terms of pulling in partisans, but Obama is winning Independents by a 44-34 margin, which is good, but leaves quite a large amount (22%) of those Zogby polls not yet choosing between the candidates. Just a couple of days ago, Zogby said:

Another couple of days of polls like this though, and Zogby will be showing it moving outside the MOE (also: here's Scott Rasmussen being interviewed on the state of the race).

Also, in the MyDD EV counter today, NC flips, with Obama now having a 48.1-46.9 lead over McCain (average between RCP & Pollster). The VA, NC, FL southeast angle for Obama looks stronger than the OH, MO, IN midwest region now, which is an amazing turnabout.

People were shocked by ARG's poll showing Barack Obama up by 8 points here in West Virginia.

I'll admit, I was too. I spoke to people in the West Virginia Democratic Party, who looked at the polls internals on the demographics: age, party breakdown, etc. They thought the demographics looked accurate except for this:

The poll listed 55 percent Democrats. The actual number in the state is 58 percent. Democrats are actually slightly underrepresented in the polling.

Just out from the Times:

Ms. Palin has denied that anyone told Mr. Monegan to dismiss Mr. Wooten, or that the commissioner's ouster had anything to do with the trooper. But an examination of the case, based on interviews with Mr. Monegan and several top aides, indicates that, to a far greater degree than was previously known, the governor, her husband and her administration pressed the commissioner and his staff to get Mr. Wooten off the force, though without directly ordering it.

In all, the commissioner and his aides were contacted about Mr. Wooten three dozen times over 19 months by the governor, her husband and seven administration officials, interviews and documents show.

"To all of us, it was a campaign to get rid of him as a trooper and, at the very least, to smear the guy and give him a desk job somewhere," said Kim Peterson, Mr. Monegan's special assistant, who like several other aides spoke publicly about the matter for the first time.

Go read the whole thing. And make sure to catch how Palin even prevented Wooten from dressing up as the mascot "Safety Bear" for the state fair.

The AK Legislature's report drops tomorrow.