Political Strategy

After a summer of healthcare battles and sliding approval ratings for President Obama, the White House is facing a troubling new trend: The voters losing faith in the president are the ones he had worked hardest to attract. New surveys show steep declines in Obama's approval ratings among whites -- including Democrats and independents -- who were crucial elements of the diverse coalition that helped elect the country's first black president. Among white Democrats, Obama's job approval rating has dropped 11 points since his 100-days mark in April, according to surveys by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press.

In promoting Army Gen. David H. Petraeus to commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East, President Bush is doing more than rewarding a job well done in Iraq. The president also is taking a step toward perpetuating his policy of high troop levels in Iraq and is putting his most trusted general in charge of renewing the military's focus on Iran. Petraeus has been the prime advocate of Bush's policy of a large troop presence in Iraq.

Sitting on the sunny patio of a coffee shop last weekend, Averell "Ace" Smith hardly seemed the kind of guy to strike fear into a politician's heart.

Barack Obama was composing his speech the night Hillary Rodham Clinton won New Hampshire, saving her presidential campaign. He glanced up to see Jim Margolis, his media strategist. "Well?" Obama asked. "Well," Margolis recalls replying. "I guess we're going to have to do it the hard way." It was never going to be easy.

Phil Jackson huffed along the sidelines and unleashed a post-game rant: His Lakers were manhandled, but the Celtics got all the calls. Basketball is not a bad primer, it turns out, on how our political ballclubs carry on. Team McCain has been complaining no end about how easy that lanky young rookie, Barack Obama, has it with the press, while their scrappy veteran suffers "fiction" at worst and inattention at best.

Charlie Black has had his moment of straight talk -- and chances are he's not going to let it happen again. Fortune magazine, in an article posted online Monday, cited the "startling candor" by the strategist for John McCain in discussing how concerns about national security could offer political dividends for the Arizona senator and presumed GOP presidential nominee.

It's over between Roberta and me. At least for now. What with her constant travels, her series of handlers and the 3,000-mile separation (she's in D.C., I'm in L.A.), it just wasn't working. I concede, with only a tinge of embarrassment, that I've been captivated by that world traveler, grandmother, freeway speedster and potential First Mother of the United States, Roberta McCain.

Eager to take down Hillary Rodham Clinton's toughest opponent for the Democratic presidential nomination, a top aide came up with a novel -- and hard-edged -- strategy. In a March 2007 memo to the candidate, Mark Penn, a longtime pollster and strategist for the Clintons, urged the New York senator's campaign to paint Barack Obama as "fundamentally" foreign. Clinton never embraced that theme, preferring instead to cast Obama as untested and too inexperienced to be commander in chief.

One day after John McCain's running mate escalated the vitriol of the presidential campaign by invoking a 1960s radical, Barack Obama accused Republicans of trying to distract voters from the sagging economy with "smears" Speaking to thousands of voters Sunday afternoon at Asheville High School, the Democratic nominee argued that McCain shares President Bush's economic philosophy. "Sen.

Heading into the home stretch of the presidential campaign, John McCain has been sharpening his closing argument against his Democratic opponent, saying that Barack Obama's tax policies would produce a redistribution of wealth that borders on socialism.