[Cindy] McCain, who stopped to visit a half-dozen children at the Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt today, said the presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama has "waged the dirtiest campaign in American history,”

Umm. You know, I think there's only one campaign that has been calling out 'traitor', that has its supporters crying out 'kill him!' and indulging in character assassinations because even they admit that they don't want to talk about the economy. But believe what you want to, Mrs. McCain.

Paint your face....paint the walls.

So, debate number three. Obama is currently riding high in national and state polls; if the election was held tomorrow, the Southern Strategy would almost be defeated; the coasts would turn blue, and the Republicans would be facing total defeat, the Democrats in the Senate dangerously edging closer to the filibuster-proof 60 level, the House firmly blue, and the White House back in Obama's hands, poised to take over as Great Depression II: Electric Boogaloo strikes.

Huh. Maybe the GOP wants to lose this thing after all. But nobody's filled John McCain in on that just yet, so the man is up tonight for another try and getting what he feels is owed to him. He tried being the neo-con's neo-con back in 2000, but was sent back to Arizona by dirty tricks in South Carolina. Although he was furious at the time, McCain seems to have got over the 'black baby' affair, seeing as how he's hired the man behind it to work on his campaign. A brief spell followed where he tried to drive a knife into Bush in preparation for a 2004 challenge, but 9/11 changed everything, remember. McCain established a few 'maverick' positions on tax, torture and immigration which gained him a lot of favourable press, so favourable, in fact, that the press didn't seem to notice too much when he abandoned all of them along his road to the GOP nomination.

And so here he is, looking at an electoral map where even North Carolina is looking shaky. He's played almost every rule out of the classic Rove instruction manual, and nothing seems to be working. While the economy crashes all around the country, all he has left is murky charges of 'association with terrorists' and 'against the troops'.

I said I'd be Tony Cascarino, circa 1995

But this is his element! The town hall debate, the series of debates he pleaded for back after Obama finally clinched the Democratic nomination. McCain needs this to go over well tonight; the previous debate didn't really have winner, but voters appear to have judged that Obama was indeed ready to be President based on his performance; a deadly conclusion considering that McCain had been basing a considerable amount of his campaign around the idea that he wasn't experienced enough for the position. Choosing Sarah Palin has energised his base, yet at the same time, she doesn't appear to be helping him in the swing states where he desperately needs to hold on to the Bush 2000/2004 map. They're in trouble.

I expect McCain will do well tonight. He has to.