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...that looks as good for Democrats as 1980 did for Republicans. They have a candidate who, like Reagan, is a fabulous performer and represents a major break with the past--and has a smaller lead than he'd like going into the conventions. And in the end, debates will almost certainly decide this election. The sheer, slimy audacity of the McCain ads has given him a nice midsummer run. The polling numbers haven't changed all that much, but Obama has been on the defensive since he returned from his overseas trip. And the zeitgeist of the race is headed...
Which is why I'm almost as puzzled by Obama's debate strategy as I am by McCain's advertising. Obama's decision not to accept McCain's offer of 10 summer debates--or, at least, to negotiate a more manageable total--always seemed wrong to me. After all, Obama is supposed to be the fresh breeze, and that would have been a brand-new, high-road way to engage the public. Obama's refusal made him seem less than courageous. It played into the notion that he wasn't a very good debater and that McCain...
...Baptist seminary, with neither a building nor a congregation, and grew it relentlessly to its current size. In 1995 he shared his secrets in a book called The Purpose Driven Church: Growth Without Compromising Your Message & Mission. (The "purpose" was God's.) His knack for schematization allowed almost any minister to reconfigure his church along the lines of Saddleback. Warren says that he and his staff have given "purpose-driven training" to 500,000 eager pastors worldwide and that 1 out of 20 U.S. churches has done his "40 Days of Purpose" exercises. In all, says fellow megapastor Joel Hunter...
...efforts. The report, requested by Warner and Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin of Michigan found that Washington had underwritten $48 billion for stabilization and reconstruction activities in Iraq since invading in 2003. The Iraqi government, meanwhile, grossed an estimated $96 billion in revenues from 2005 to 2007, almost entirely from oil. Between $67 another $79 billion in oil revenues is projected for Iraq in 2008 with prices remaining at record levels on the world market. That leaves the Iraqi government with a budget surplus this year of roughly $50 billion, which is managed by the Central Bank...
Washington is another question. American administrations have traditionally favored military strongmen over weak civilian governments. President Bush has routinely praised Musharraf in almost effusive terms and maintained complicit silence over his sacking of the judiciary last year. And with renewed anxiety over militancy in the tribal badlands, and disappointment with the civilian leaders' failure to tame it, the Bush administration may wish to hang onto the man it once termed its "most allied ally...