The Obama Show.

I just watched the Obama "infomercial", and I was blown away. Never mind the production values that Chris Matthews is nattering on about. The real story is about the message: this campaign is about us. It's about what we need, and what we can do to get it.

The entire half hour was - well, it's hard to call it a positive ad. It was a hard look at the problems that we're facing, and need to address. This was not a "daybreak in America" kind of talk. But it wasn't negative, either. McCain was not belittled, he was ignored.

As I was writing that last paragraph, MSNBC went to the first commercial break since the Obama piece ended. One of the first commercials up was the new McCain "Obama: Not Ready ... Yet" commercial. Coming right at the end of Obama's call for unity, and for all of us to get involved, I don't think McCain could have managed to come out looking any more petty.

Added:

But this thing isn't over:

And updated some more:

Watching Countdown right now, I'm reminded of the old saying that the best measure of a man's intelligence is whether he agrees with you. Chris Hayes was just talking to Keith about the whole juxtaposition of the happy Obama/nasty McCain image thing. He proved that, at least by the measure above, he's a really smart guy. (Actually, he's a pretty smart guy by any measure.)

Finally, here's a moment of Zen type thing:

Given his amazing and shameless efforts at self promotion, it's entirely possible that Joe the Plumber might, thanks to John McCain, actually wind up in the small group of people who would see a tax increase under Obama's plan.