Crunch time for McCain? Perhaps--for on Wednesday night at his final debate with Barack Obama, John McCain has a do-or-die decision to make. To Atwater or not to Atwater--that is the question. (If you're too young to get the Atwater reference, look it up.) And whatever his answer is, McCain is poised to disappoint--perhaps alienate--one of two crucial blocs of voters.

The Republican party's base wants blood. They cannot believe that a former community activist (read: Socialist!) with barely a moment's experience in Washington who is a secret Muslim and quasi-Black Panther is close to the presidency. For them, the association game--tying Obama to former, bomb-throwing radical Bill Ayers and extreme-rhetoric-hurling Jeremiah Wright--ought to be a fundamental part of the McCain campaign, for these connections reveal the real Obama. Obama, they contend, is fooling the voting public by coming across as a mainstream, composed, confident politician who reasonably talks of consensus-building and change. In their view, he is both the embodiment of the evils of the 1960s and Islamofascism. A sleeper agent. A Manchurian candidate from Mecca. But he is so skilled at keeping his true loyalties covert, he can only be exposed via his ties to Ayers and Wright. This is not guilt by association or the petty politics of personal destruction. It's the key to decoding Obama. Its what must be done so the Republic does not fall into the hands of an internal enemy.

And it was only a few days ago that McCain and Sarah Palin were on the Ayers trail. She accused Obama of "palling" around with domestic terrorists. (She used the plural.) McCain promised a supporter he would raise this connection at the final debate.

But recent polling has indicated that McCain's attacks on Obama have lost him support among voters. More voters see McCain as the more negative of the two candidates and less concerned with issues than Obama. McCain's assaults are simply not working--especially when tethered to McCain's erratic moves regarding the economic crisis. So if he goes all Ayers (or Wright) on Obama, he faces a real risk: pissing off indie and uncommitted voters. But, then, if he holds his fire on this front, he will anger the die-hard conservatives who want to see him pummel Obama and expose the true Obama to the entire world.

It was not surprising to me that the first cable-news analysis of Barack Obama's speech on race--delivered on Tuesday morning in Philadelphia--focused almost entirely on what he had to say about Jeremiah Wright, his former pastor. A good chunk of the speech was indeed devoted to Wright--but in a bigger context than gotcha journalism. Obama's speech was daring and unique. No modern-day presidential candidate has ever given such a speech and taken race so head-on--and, perhaps, dead-on. But it's not surprising that the larger accomplishment of the speech will be lost in the nitty-gritty of controversy-driven journalism.

Jay Rosen, press critic, immediately took CNN to task for this:

I was watching CNN for Obama's speech. Moments after it concluded Wolf Blitzer was asked to tell us what he heard in it. Wolf's ear is the big ear for the Best Political Team on Television, according to CNN. So he went first. And according to Blitzer, Obama's speech boils down to a “pre-emptive strike” against various attacks that are still to come, in the form of videos, ads, and news controversies that are sure to keep Reverend Jeremiah Wright and “race” in play as issues in the campaign. (I don't have his exact words; if someone has does, ping me.)

Wasn't the speech about that very pattern?

This is a style of analysis and a level of thought we have become utterly used to, especially from Blitzer but many others on TV: everything is a move in the game of getting elected, and it's our job in political television to explain to you, the slightly clueless viewer at home, what today's tactics are, then to estimate whether they will work.

That Blitzer, offered the first word on that speech, did the horse race thing tells you about his priorities (mistakenly “static,” as Obama said about Wright) and his imaginative range as an interpreter of politics (pretty close to zero.)

In fact it was a speech aimed right at him, at the best political team on television, and all the makers of our election year spectacle.

Obama had moments earlier told Blitzer. “You've scoured every exit poll for the latest evidence of racial polarization, not just in terms of white and black, but black and brown as well.” And so he had- him as much as anyone on television.

Obama had just said to Blitzer, look: “If all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and You Tube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way…” And so if the reactions you report on are reactions to your reporting and video looping how are you, the talent in political television, not an actor with me in this cycle?

I'm not sure that Blitzer deserves such harsh singling-out. But Obama's speech certainly deserves deeper treatment than cable news shows are accustomed to granting such events. Fortunately (for you, dear reader), I've done just that at MotherJones.com:

With racial sentiments swirling in the 2008 campaign--notably, Geraldine Ferraro's claim that Barack Obama is not much more than an affirmative action case and the controversy over his former pastor's over-the-top remarks-- Senator Obama on Tuesday morning responded to these recent fusses with a speech unlike any delivered by a major political figure in modern American history. While explaining--not excusing--Reverend Jeremiah Wright's remarks (which Obama had already criticized), he called on all Americans to recognize that even though the United States has experienced progress on the racial reconciliation front in recent decades (Exhibit A: Barack Obama), racial anger exists among both whites and blacks, and he said that this anger and its causes must be fully acknowledged before further progress can be achieved. Obama did this without displaying a trace of anger himself.

Speaking in Philadelphia, Obama celebrated his own racial heritage but also demonstrated his ability to view the black community with a measure of objectivity and, when necessary, criticism--caring criticism. But this was no Sister Souljah moment. He did not sacrifice Wright for political ends. He hailed the good deeds of his former minister, noting that Wright's claim that America continues to be a racist society is rooted in Wright's generational experiences. And Obama identified the sources of racial resentment held by whites without being judgmental. With this address, Obama was trying to show the nation a pathway to a society free of racial gridlock and denial. Moreover, he declared that bridging the very real racial divide of today is essential to forging the popular coalition necessary to transform America into a society with a universal and effective health care system, an education system that serves poor and rich children, and an economy that yields a decent-paying jobs for all. Obama was not playing the race card. He was shooting the moon.

Obama delivered his speech in a stiff manner. The melodious lilt and cascading tones that typically characterize his campaign addresses were not present. This was a speech in which the words--not the delivery--counted. He began with a predictable notion: slavery was the original sin of the glorious American project. Removing that stain has been the nation's burden ever since, and he tied his campaign to that long-running endeavor: "This was one of the tasks we set forth at the beginning of this campaign--to continue the long march of those who came before us, a march for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous America." And he proclaimed that due to his own personal story--"I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas"--he both recognizes the need to heal this divide and possesses an "unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people." Unlike the black leaders of recent years, Obama identified with both the winners and losers of America: "I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible." He is E Pluribus Unum.

You can read the rest here.