The Note: The Big Shift

Sept. 9, 2008— -- He's danced over caucuses and superdelegates, skated past two dozen debates and 19 months on the trail, rolled through Jeremiah Wright and Hillary Clinton -- and a hockey mom from Alaska could be his undoing?

Eight weeks out -- his lead in the polls erased (for now), the money not quite flowing the way he anticipated, women voters impressed by the newest newcomer -- the weight of the race falls on Sen. Barack Obama's shoulders.

(And your real-world alert: President Bush announces Tuesday morning that he's pulling out 8,000 US troops out of Iraq by February.)

Yes, this period of the race has been all about Gov. Sarah Palin -- but how long it lasts is going to be up to Obama. Smart political types are looking for a sharper message -- one that reminds voters of the big stakes in the race, not the little items on a running mate's resume.

(Who usually wins when a presidential candidate takes on a vice-presidential one? How does Obama take on an Obama-like phenomenon? What does it say about Obama's support that it was soft enough to flee this quickly? What, in the end, do women want?)

All that work, gone? The new ABC News/Washington Post poll pegs it at McCain 49, Obama 47 among likely voters -- inside the margin of error, but with a name we're not used to seeing in the lead.

Inside the numbers, some shockers: "White women have moved from 50-42 percent in Obama's favor before the conventions to 53-41 percent for McCain now, a 20-point shift that's one of the single biggest post-convention changes in voter preferences. The other, also to McCain's advantage, is in the battleground Midwest, where he's moved from a 19-point deficit to a 7-point edge," per ABC Polling Directory Gary Langer.

"It really is stunning," ABC's George Stephanopoulos said on "Good Morning America" Tuesday. "We haven't seen a bigger shift among a single group in quite a long time. . . . There's no question that these voters have a very favorable opinion of Sarah Palin. They like what they saw, they like what they heard."

As Obama talks education Tuesday -- arguing anew that he's the change agent, not McCain-Palin -- Obama's 32-point edge on "change" is now down to 12 points.

Another key gap is closing: "For the first time since the end of the primaries, a majority of voters are enthusiastic about McCain's candidacy, and the percentage calling themselves 'very enthusiastic' has nearly doubled from late August. That percentage is drastically higher now among conservative Republicans and white evangelical Protestants," Jon Cohen and Dan Balz write in The Washington Post. "The question both campaigns are weighing is whether McCain, by hitting hard on the themes of reform and change that have been at the heart of Obama's message, has reshaped voters' perceptions of the two tickets."

For the moment, at least, we perceive a tie ballgame: It's 48-48 among registered voters in the new CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll.

"If Senator John McCain threw a political Hail Mary pass by picking Sarah Palin as his running mate, this much is clear: She caught it and ran," per The Boston Globe's Scott Helman. "Ten days after McCain upended the presidential race by tapping the little-known governor of Alaska, the buzz generated by the GOP ticket shows no sign of abating, even as Palin has yet to answer questions from the press or the public."

As for the ground game: "The McCain campaign says Palin's pick has given a 'shot in the arm' to their effort to recruit women volunteers -- doubling their 'Women for McCain' grassroots volunteer lists since her acceptance speech," ABC's Jennifer Parker writes. "Now, the McCain campaign will begin holding 'Mondays for McCain,' when women surrogates and women volunteers in battleground states call women voters, urging them to support McCain."

Obama has decided to take on Palin directly (Democrats want a fighter, but isn't this one thing the running mate could handle?):

"I mean, mother, governor, moose-shooter, I mean, I think that's cool, that's cool, that's cool stuff," he said of Palin, just maybe with a touch of condescension.

"Listening to Barack Obama, it can seem like Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin is the main person standing between him and the White House instead of John McCain," per the AP's Nedra Pickler. "Obama is putting as much heat on Palin as he is on the man at the top of the GOP ticket, objecting to the Republican Party's portrayal of her as a reformer who can bring change to Washington. That is supposed to be Obama's distinction, and he's not taking kindly to Palin trying to claim it."

"John McCain's unexpected selection of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate has confronted Barack Obama's campaign with a difficult challenge, as the Democrat seeks to undercut a new sense of excitement surrounding McCain without personally attacking a charismatic figure who is energizing a range of voters," Mike Dorning writes in the Chicago Tribune.

(This would get covered: "One adviser said the former first lady and Obama may have a joint appearance on-stage within the next two weeks," Dorning writes)

And Obama is not letting Palin cross a particular bridge:

"When it came to the bridge to nowhere, she was for it until everybody started raising a fuss about it and she started running for governor and then suddenly she was against it!" Obama said Monday in Michigan, per ABC's Jake Tapper and Sunlen Miller. "I mean you can't just make stuff up. You can't just recreate yourself. You can't just reinvent yourself. The American people aren't stupid."

"I gotta admit these folks are shameless," Obama said in Farmington Hills, Mich.

(And one of those lines Obama may want back -- says the constitutional law professor, on the need for habeas corpus: "You may think it's Barack the bomb thrower, but it might be Barack the guy running for president.")

The new Obama ad features Palin in the now-famous bridge-to-nowhere T-shirt: "Sarah Palin's no maverick, either. She was for the bridge to nowhere before she was against it," says the ad.

Tapper writes: "Want evidence the Obama campaign is worried about Gov. Sarah Palin? Look no further than this ad, which attacks her, too."

It is a bridge too far, when it comes to Palin's record: "You can't kill a dead bridge," writes Salon's Alex Koppelman.

"The Bridge to Nowhere argument isn't going much of anywhere," Elizabeth Holmes and Laura Meckler write in The Wall Street Journal.

"Far from being an opponent of earmarks, Palin hired lobbyists to try to capture more federal funding," Howard Kurtz writes for The Washington Post.

But is fighting Palin on Palin's ground the answer? Arianna Huffington thinks not: "Every second of this campaign not spent talking about the Republican Party's record, and John McCain's role in that record, is a victory for John McCain," she writes. "Contrary to what we're hearing 24/7 in the media, the next few weeks are not a test of Sarah Palin. The next few weeks are a test of Barack Obama. He needs to dramatically redirect this election back to a discussion over the issues that really matter -- the issues that will impact the future of this country."

"Once the GOP's postconvention bounce and Palinmania subside -- and they will -- how does Obama get the mojo back?" Thomas M. DeFrank writes in the New York Daily News. "By sticking to his blueprint, painting McCain as a third Bush term, relentlessly hammering home bread-and-butter economic issues -- and a debate performance on Sept. 26 as compelling as his Denver acceptance speech."

Bob Shrum doesn't see it lasting: "Sarah Palin is 'Miss September' -- and cultural populism is the Republicans' September song," he writes in The Week Daily column.