Tonight's McCain ad
James Forsyth 7:56pm
The McCain campaign used to rail against the media’s obsession with Obama but now it feeds it. It has jumped into the conversation through a series of ads mocking Obama and tough charges all of which has helped turn the election into a referendum on Obama. (This shift from a referendum on the Bush years to a referendum on Obama is the best explanation for why race is so close.)
As part of this approach, the McCain campaign will bracket Obama’s acceptance speech tonight with an ad from McCain asking Obama a...
When you hear American television saying “Barack Obama will speak tonight at Invesco” – it conjured up images of some corporate lecture, not a baseball stadium. But Invesco has bought “naming rights” and has been at the forefront of trying to buy the English language. About a decade ago, when I was a financial journalist, I once took a complaint from Invesco. The company was INVESCO, in capitals, they said – so why don’t I comply? I asked them if it was an acronym: nope, they just wanted it to stand out on...
The expectations for Obama’s speech tonight are a mile high. I’d be tempted to say they’ll be impossible to match but, as 
Joe Biden did go after John McCain tonight, drawing contrasts between McCain and Obama. His solution to the question of how you attack a man with McCain’s record of service was to paint McCain as a good solider at a time when America needs a wise leader. The contrasts Biden drew were effective and the speech was the most useful of the convention so far for Obama. 
When John Kerry got up there to speak with his insomnia-curing drawl, I thought I’d watch the old loser just from a sense of schadenfreude. But then his attack came out. It was interesting, potent and it had Michelle Obama rising to her feet. In fact, it struck me as the punchiest, hardest-hitting speech of the convention. 
