Last night during the debate – from the Las Vegas Sun:

…Senator Reid, you were quoted as saying the following: “the war is lost, and the surge is not accomplishing anything as indicated by the extreme violence.”

Do you believe that your statement demoralized the troops, and were inaccurate as judged by the success of the troop surge?…

…Reid: …I said, the war can only be won militarily, economically, and diplomatically…

No, Harry, that is not what you said.

You said the war was lost. You lied last night to the people of Nevada and the United States of America. Get you gone, we’ve had enough of you.

From the AP via Rasmussen:

Confident of keeping a seat, Senate Republicans are canceling $4 million in TV ads for Florida’s Marco Rubio to put more money toward winning a trio of Democratic-held seats — in California, Pennsylvania and Illinois — where polls show races tightening.

The moves are just the latest in a constantly shifting battleground as Republicans seek to take advantage of a political tail wind by broadening their footprint. Democrats are narrowing their focus to places they must win to keep their Senate and House majorities…

The contest now isn’t whether the GOP will win, or not, but how big the GOP win will be. The Democrats are shifting money to save embattled incumbents, while the GOP is moving resources to better attack entrenched Democrats. California is especially important as it (or Murray’s seat in Washington) might end up being the 10th net gain for the GOP, thus giving them the Senate majority (which is still a very high hill to climb…the more likely outcome is 48 or 49 Senate Republicans) – latest polling shows Boxer in CA slightly up, a big push now could knock her down.

What do I think will happen? I think there will be more GOP voters on November 2nd than the polling takes in to consideration…any Democrat not up at least 5 points in the last week is probably going to lose. Now, then, is the time to really hammer the Democrats – give them no rest and keep them down and their base dispirited.

UPDATE: What we should be doing, given the enthusiasm gap.

Something for people to think over at they decide what vote to cast next month:

The number of homes taken over by banks topped 100,000 for the first time in September, though foreclosures are expected to slow in coming months as lenders work through questionable paperwork, real estate data company RealtyTrac said on Thursday…

Our housing market is a complete nightmare right now – really, who would buy a house right now? Prices are almost certain to go down, and if you’re thinking of buying a short sale or foreclosure, would you now that there are so many questions being asked about the process?

We need to clear out the rot – and that means, most of all, finding the true bottom to housing prices. We need to know what our homes are really worth…government attempts to prop up the market via low interest rates and various “extend and pretend” banking policies are just putting off the day of reckoning – and ensuring it will be worse when we get there.

I know from personal experience how rough this is. Buying at the peak, loss of household income, house massively “underwater”, banks clueless on what to do. Its terrible – I don’t like it; I want it to end. Even a bad ending is better than endless misery. I’ve suggested plans, and so have others…but the banksters and bureaucrats just aren’t moving. They are living in a fool’s paradise where some how, some way, housing prices will magically recover and no one will have to make hard choices. It won’t happen that way – we have to brace ourselves to what has happened and just deal with it.

We can only hope that those we vote in to office on November 2nd will be willing to show some guts and get us on track to recovery via de-facto bankruptcy reorganization of the housing market. One way or the other, this will happen – better if we guide it as we wish, rather than just suffer from an inescapable collapse.

From CNN World:

Eight NATO troops were killed in Afghanistan Thursday, bringing the number of foreign troop deaths in the past two days to 14, the International Security Assistance Force said.

An improvised explosive device attack killed three service members in the west, and two died in an insurgent attack in the south.

One died after an insurgent attack in the east, one died in an insurgent attack in the south and another was killed in an IED attack in the south.

It’s the first time since August 30 that so many international troops have been killed in hostile incidents in Afghanistan in a single day, according to CNN records. On that day, seven Americans, a Canadian and an Estonian were killed…

While we go at it hammer and tongs in this election battle, we should remember that a far more important battle is happening half a world away in Afghanistan. What we do here pales in significance compared to what they do there.

Remember them, always; pray for their safety and their victory. Upon the progress of our arms hangs the safety of the world.

The “double dip” becomes ever more inescapable:

Lower- and middle-income Americans’ self-reported average daily spending in stores, restaurants, gas stations, and online averaged $48 per day during September — down $6 from August and $16 from July. Consumer discretionary spending by these Americans making less than $90,000 a year is now at its lowest level since Gallup began daily tracking in January 2008, as the recession was just getting underway.

I’ve noticed it in my line of work – we’re just not getting as much traffic as we used to get, even considering that October is usually pretty slow. No one wants to spend – thought it might be that no one can spend. Credit cards maxed out; income down, no more piggy bank in home equity…a tapped out nation needs to build more wealth before it can spend again, and we simply don’t have the policies in place which will allow that.

I’ve moved the live blog here.

Watching the debate, Reid was rambling and kept trying to bring up things which didn’t relate to the questions asked. Angle was focused and kept hitting the strong arguments against Reid, and the best points for herself.

I was worried about this one as Angle hasn’t been the most polished candidate…but Angle clearly won this debate. She is the better hope for the future, Reid is the tired, broken past.

On to November 2nd.

UPDATE: K-Lo’s take –

The grandmother from Reno just won the only Nevada Senate debate, against the United States Senate Majority Leader. She held her own against someone who has been in the Senate since 1987. Congratulations, Mrs. Angle. I suspect you made more than a few Americans frustrated with this Washington proud. I love how the tea party has ignited a whole new spirit of urgent civic activism. And you’re a good, hardworking spokeswoman for it.

Exactly.

UPDATE II: From the comments over at Hot Air –

Been looking at blogs and Twitter and it’s almost unanimous that Angle won. Libs are bashing Reid, calling him terrible, saying that Angle looked better prepared and was better spoken. This is at DailyKos. If they are saying that then Reid is done.

Ouch!

All Angle had to do tonight was to show she wasn’t the raving nutjob Reid has been making her out to be. What she ended up doing was showing that she will be a new and positive voice in the Senate. It’ll be interesting to see what the polls say a week from now.

So, after all those hundreds of billions of dollars, now Obama tells us there are no “shovel ready” projects…

Bachman: the $5.4 million woman. Amazing fund raising total.

Obama’s favorite fat cats, GE, got $24.9 million in stimulus funds.

Whitman makes the un-answerable argument against Brown in CA:

Whitman, 54, admitted she would benefit as an investor, then fired back at the 72-year-old former governor, who has been a fixture in state politics for decades.

“My track record is creating jobs,” she said. “My business is creating jobs. Your business is politics. You have been doing this for 40 years, and you have been part of a war on jobs in this state for 40 years.”

If the voters in California elect Brown, then they’ll get precisely what they deserve…absolute economic melt down. Its really just as stark as that…though I think that the people of CA will prove wiser than Brown hopes.

Obama attacks help Rove group raise bags of money. Thank you, Preisdent Obama; we couldn’t have done it without you!

Very interesting news:

… I was speaking with a prominent Tea Party member in the eastern part of the state she has been doing the heavy work of going door to door on days off to talk to voters, passing out literature and pushing her candidates. The report I got was astounding.

Over and over doors were about to be closed until the voter heard the Magic word “Republican”. When the voter heard that word, doors were opened, literature accepted and thumbs up given. Only one in four at best thought otherwise…

We’ll have to see how this pans out – though maybe our Matt, as a former Boston resident, can give us a better idea of what is going on in the Land O’ Liberals. But it does ring true – over and over again we’re seeing actions which indicate a Republican wave is building…not just in polling, but in stories of long-entrenched Democrats suddenly getting panicky and running attack ads against their unknown GOP opponents.

The Democrat story was that the GOP peaked too soon – my thinking is that we haven’t peaked, yet.

From the Wall Street Journal:

…so far the only thing that seems to be coming back is nostalgia for George W. Bush. A new CNN poll finds voters still believe Mr. Obama is a better president than Mr. Bush was, but by only 47% to 45%. That’s down from a whopping 23-point margin last year. “Democrats would be wise to think twice before bringing up the name of President Bush on the campaign trail this fall,” says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland.

And what are they doing? Running against President Bush. The American people wish they had President Bush and 5% unemployment back – you know, the sort of unemployment Democrats were saying was the worst disaster since Hoover?

Obama is doing the impossible – making Republicans popular.