NATIONAL & WORLD DIGEST - October 16, 2008

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New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/
Go to the links for the following articles:

-Candidates Clash Over Character and Policy
Senator John McCain used the final debate of the presidential election on Wednesday night to raise persistent and pointed questions about Senator Barack Obama's character, judgment and policy prescriptions in a session that was by far the most spirited and combative of their encounters this fall.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/16/us/politics/16debate.html?hp

-The TV Watch: Rivals Split, With Joe in the Middle
Barack Obama looked like a prosecutor delivering a polished summation in a long civil case, Joe the Plumber v. George W. Bush.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/16/us/politics/16watch.html?hp

-Final Presidential Debate
Watch the debate, analyze the transcript, check the facts and share your thoughts.
http://elections.nytimes.com/2008/president/debates/third-presidential-debate.html?hp

-Editorial: Snooping on Our Own Frontlines
The nation still doesn't know the full extent of President Bush's obsession with eavesdropping on citizens, but here's a cheesy new aspect: Phone calls home from American soldiers, aid workers and journalists in Iraq were reported to have been tapped and stored by military agents supposedly searching for terrorist intelligence leads.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/16/opinion/16thu3.html?ref=opinion

-Mob Muscles Its Way Into Politics in Bulgaria
Politics is played to the death in Bulgaria, where the lives of politicians can be as cheap as spent bullets and murky business groups wage a murderous struggle for their cut of everything from real estate deals to millions in European aid.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/16/world/europe/16bulgaria.html?hp

-Wall St. Opens Higher After More Losses in Global Shares
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/17/business/economy/17market.html?hp

-Ruling May Impede Thousands of Ohio Voters
More than 200,000 registered Ohio voters may be blocked from casting regular ballots on Election Day because of a federal appeals court decision on Tuesday requiring the disclosure of lists of voters whose names did not match those on government databases, state election officials and voting experts said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/16/us/16vote.html?hp

-Mayor's California Bid May Undercut Incumbents
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg visited California on Wednesday to stump for a measure that would prevent legislators there from redrawing their district maps, a practice that he contends is a self-serving way for lawmakers to keep themselves in office.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/16/nyregion/16bloomberg.html?hp

-Elizabeth Dole Finds a Once-Safe Race Less So
Before this campaign season, Senator Elizabeth Dole was not considered a particularly vulnerable incumbent. As Washington royalty with a gold-plated résumé, she won the seat once held by Senator Jesse Helms by a nine-point margin in 2002. But on Tuesday, when Mrs. Dole appeared at a rally for Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska, the Republican candidate for vice president, she was appealing for her political life. She told the crowd of party faithful that the head of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, Senator Charles E. Schumer, was spending nearly $10 million of "New York money" on "negative, ugly, mean-spirited, untruthful ads" against her, and the crowd responded with lusty boos.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/16/us/politics/16dole.html

-Poll Says McCain Is Hurting His Bid by Using Attacks
The McCain campaign's recent angry tone and sharply personal attacks on Senator Barack Obama appear to have backfired and tarnished Senator John McCain more than their intended target, the latest New York Times/CBS News poll has found.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/15/us/politics/15poll.html?hp

-If Elected ...
From 2 Rivals, 2 Prescriptions
With Senator John McCain unveiling a $52.5 billion package of proposals on Tuesday, both presidential candidates have now outlined their plans for addressing the economic crisis, leaving voters with a clear choice when it comes to one of the biggest challenges the next president will face.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/15/us/politics/15elected.html?hp

-In Voting Booth, Race May Play a Bigger Role
With less than three weeks until Election Day, a big question is looming over the campaign for the White House, and it has nothing to do with the economic crisis or the caustic exchanges between Senators Barack Obama and John McCain over character and credentials.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/15/us/politics/15race.html?hp

-Misplaced Blame
Critics are blaming the Community Reinvestment Act for the current economic crisis, but the charges do not hold up.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/15/opinion/15wed2.html?ref=opinion

-Op-Ed Columnist: Those Hard-Boiled Eggheads
I'm not sending Paul Krugman Champagne. He won the Nobel prize in economics this week, and while I'm sure that's delightful for him, it has raised the bar to an impossible height for his fellow columnists at The Times. We used to strive for Pulitzers, or simply regional awards, or even just try to top each other on the paper's most e-mailed list.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/15/opinion/15dowd.html?ref=opinion


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Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/
Go to the links for the following articles:

-Palin Too Close for Comfort
It's time to start taking Sarah Palin seriously.
Though the latest polls show the Obama-Biden ticket ahead, the Alaska governor is still uncomfortably close to becoming vice president of the United States. The thought should concentrate the mind of every American who remembers the abuse of executive power by the administration of Richard Nixon. Just look at what Palin has done, in a short time, with the authority delegated to her by Alaskans.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/postpartisan/2008/10/palin_too_close_for_comfort.html

-Social Security Benefits to Jump 5.8 percent
Benefits for 50 million people to increase by largest amount in more than 25 years.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/16/AR2008101600381.html?hpid=topnews


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Wall Street Journal
http://online.wsj.com/public/us

-Religious-Bias Filings Up
Mass firings at meatpacking plants in Colorado and Nebraska last month highlight growing conflicts over how to accommodate religion in the workplace. The plants, owned by the U.S. unit of Brazil's JBS SA, collectively fired about 200 Muslim Somali workers who walked off the job over prayer disputes.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122411562348138619.html

-School Efforts to Stem Violence Offer A Textbook Case of Limits on Speech
With the nation's school systems roiled by campus shootings over the past decade, and on the lookout for conflict, students are being asked to check a broader array of free-speech rights at the door -- raising questions about what lesson that is teaching them.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122411642705338721.html


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Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/
Go to the links for the following articles:

-Poor minorities become scapegoats
In the great search for somebody to blame for the nation's economic meltdown, an easy scapegoat is emerging. Or rather, make that a few million easy scapegoats. By golly, it's those low-income minorities! Those people who never should have qualified for home loans in the first place. The un-creditworthy defaulters of all those nasty subprime loans that caused our lending system to crumble and catapulted world markets into the tank.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/sfl-15sanchezsboct15,0,2990789.story


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Miami Herald
http://www.miamiherald.com/
Go to the links for the following articles:

-MORTGAGES: To cut losses, homeowners consider default
Some struggling homeowners are being tempted to default on purpose in order to qualify for mortgage relief from the federal government or their lenders.
http://www.miamiherald.com/457/story/728184.html

-THE OPPENHEIMER REPORT: Falling oil prices a bad omen for Chávez
The world financial meltdown of 2008 is sparing no ideologies: It has crushed the Bush administration's brand of go-go capitalism and it will put a damper on Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez's oil-based leftist populism.
http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/columnists/story/728174.html


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Inside Higher Education
http://www.insidehighered.com/
Go to the links for the following articles:

-In Defense of Ayers
William Ayers has been trashed by conservative pundits and labeled "an unrepentant domestic terrorist" by Sarah Palin, the Republican vice presidential nominee, but the University of Illinois at Chicago professor has garnered the support of a growing number of peers who admire his scholarship and see the attacks on him as an affront to academic freedom. Ayers, who helped found a Vietnam-era protest group that was blamed for bombing government buildings, has been a faculty member at Illinois-Chicago since 1987. In a statement signed by faculty members across the country, professors have spoken out against "the demonization" of Ayers, whose alleged ties to the Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama have made headlines.
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2008/10/14/ayers


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Pew Research center
http://pewresearch.org/
Go to this link for the following articles:

-Economic Outlook
Public Not Desperate About Economy or Personal Finances
Americans are concerned about the nation's economic problems and they register the lowest level of national satisfaction ever measured in a Pew survey. But there is little indication that the nation's financial crisis has triggered public panic or despair. Read more

-Media Matters
Blaming the Messenger
From Jefferson to Palin, politicians have blamed the media for public discontent with their policies, politics or personal behavior. Here are some highlights from that historical faceoff. Read more

-Campaign Tactics and Tone Trump Economy in News Media Narratives
For the first time in a month, the election generated more coverage than the financial crisis and almost one-third of that coverage was connected to the increasingly harsh tone of the campaign. Read more

-Financial Fall, Fiscal Mess
Escalating Economic Crisis Grips States
A week after President Bush signed a $700-billion bailout plan for Wall Street, the financial crisis has deepened in many state capitals with tight credit markets and new, pessimistic budget figures that pose the biggest threat to states' fiscal health in 25 years. Read more

-Who Knows News?
What You Read or View Matters, but Not Your Politics
Where you turn for news may say a lot about how much you actually know. So who scores higher on a political knowledge quiz? Hardball or Hannity & Colmes? Newspapers or network news? Stewart or Colbert? Read more

-Voting Values
Culture War Politics
Leading experts discuss the history of cultural divisions in American
politics and what role, if any, they will play in the outcome of the November election. Read more

-Daily Number
79% - Tougher Times for the Middle Class
Nearly eight-in-ten (79%) Americans say it is more difficult now than five years ago for people in the middle class to maintain their standard of living. Check back every weekday for another number in the news. Read more


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Fort Report
http://www.fortreport.com/
Go to the links for the following articles:

-Too Little, Too Late For McCain?
CBSNews.com Analysis: Front-Running Obama Navigates Around Aggressive McCain
Performance In Final Presidential Debate
"Joe the plumber" achieved sudden national fame in the final presidential debate, but it was John McCain who needed the headlines. Although the Republican nominee was energetic, focused and, at times, emotional in his last on-stage appearance before Election Day, it was likely not enough to change the underlying trajectory of the race.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/10/16/politics/2008debates/main4525262.shtml

-McCain's last stand
The Republican senator's final debate performance was marked by oddball characters and marginal attacks, as hopes of his political resurrection appeared to fade. What may well have been the final debate of John McCain's political career featured oddball characters who seemed like refugees from "Sesame Street" -- Joe the Plumber (an Everyman from Ohio), Senator Government (a Freudian slip moniker for Barack Obama) and a sometimes petulant 72-year-old Republican trying to be Mac the Knife. While instant debate verdicts are always suspect, there was scant evidence that McCain, despite a strong showing during the first 45 minutes of the debate, landed a haymaker at Hofstra. As the debate clock wound down Wednesday night, along with McCain's hopes of political resurrection, the Arizona Republican ended by arguing with Obama over a nearly irrelevant issue at a time of economic crisis -- school vouchers.
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/10/16/debate3/index.html

-CBS Poll: Uncommitted Voters Say Obama Won Final Debate
UPDATED WITH FINAL RESULTS As in the previous debates, CBS News and Knowledge Networks have conducted a nationally representative poll of uncommitted voters to get their immediate reaction to tonight's presidential debate.
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2008/10/15/politics/horserace/entry4525171.shtml?CMP=OTC-RSSFeed&source=RSS&attr=Horserace_4525171

-Behind the GOP's voter fraud hysteria
As Republicans warn of catastrophe at the polls, an expert on election fraud explains the real partisan hoax -- the suppression of Democratic votes.
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/10/15/voter_suppression/

-It Was Always a War for Oil: Here's the Proof
Before Bush launched the Iraq War, I had a bumper sticker that said "No War for Oil." I got some one-finger salutes, and I remember a guy on a motorcycle screaming at me for several hundred yards. Meanwhile, all the on-air cheerleaders for Bush's war disputed the assertion that it had anything to do with that dirty three-letter-word oil.
http://www.progressive.org/mag/wx101508.html

-Ohio Files Appeal to Supreme Court on Voter Registration Data
Ohio's Attorney General filed an emergency appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court late Wednesday night seeking to block a lower court decision that could cost many thousands of Ohio voters a chance to cast a regular ballot on Nov. 4.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/16/AR2008101600702.html

-Obama cuts Michigan staff, advertising
Campaign resources are being transferred to battleground states of Indiana, North Carolina. Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama is sharply cutting his ad spending in Michigan and moving some staff to more competitive states -- completing Michigan's whiplash transformation from battleground state to an also-ran.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081016/POLITICS01/810160385/1022/POLITICS

-Ark. Pastor Challenges IRS With Pro-McCain Sermon
Ark. Pastor Challenges IRS With Sermon Endorsing McCain For President
In a predominantly black church in a city known for its past racial strife, Bishop Robert Smith is taking sides. His targets: Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama and federal restrictions barring Smith's endorsement of Republican John McCain.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/10/16/ap/politics/main4525288.shtml


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