Check out the new Obama volunteer tool we just put up on the sidebar of DoubleSpeak (veer eyes to the right). It’s very important that in these final days of the 2008 campaign, you get out - make some calls, knock some doors, call your friends and family and Get Out the Vote for the Obama/Biden ticket.

As I write this post, Matthew is in Winchester, VA, Josh is working hard in Pennsylvania, and I’m bringing up the rear in beautiful Tampa, FL.

This is the moment we’ve all been waiting for - let’s finish the task of electing Sen. Barack Obama as our next President of the United States of America. Volunteer tomorrow, Monday and take the day off for Election Day on Tuesday.

Go to work! We’ll see you on the other side of victory.

Just in case you needed more inspiration to get to work:

After the debate ended last night, I got a couple emails and texts from friends and family who wanted to know what I thought about the show. Here are some of my musings on last nights debate.

Gov. Palin went into the debate with a pretty easy task - she couldn’t fall, she couldn’t have another deer-in-headlights moment, she couldn’t trip over words - she simply had to be Sarah Palin. To that end, she accomplished her singular goal. I don’t think she fell, she hit her basic talking points and she didn’t get lost in her words, like we saw in the network interviews.

However, she didn’t answer questions, she evaded policy issues, she brought everything back to the topics she wanted to discuss and personally, I found her folksy “Joe six-pack” lingo and overall presentation to be absolutely nauseating.

Seriously folks, we tried the slow-talking, colloquial, down home politician thing - his name was George W. Bush. How well did that work out?

Sarah Palin is out of her league, not because she is a woman, but because she’s not up to the task of running America. She regurgitated a stump speech last night and showed no mastery or command of issues. The mere thought of he serving as Vice President of the United States literally scares me. She’s not ready for prime time, she’s not ready to lead America.

For his part, Biden was good. I expected Biden to be good, he’s been at this for many years. He showed a command of policy, a leadership on important issues and even showed an emotional side when he spoke of his family and the loss of his first wife in a tragic car accident when he was 29 years old.

Last night’s debate didn’t move voters. It may have stopped the Palin slide that we’ve seen over the past couple weeks, but I don’t think anyone changed their mind based on the performance of either of these candidates. At the end of the day, I urge Americans to think past the novelty of Sarah Palin and remember that Bush is our living, breathing example that hiring someone into the executive merely on style is a mistake. Listen to what these people are saying, not just how they are saying it. This time around, I have confidence in the American people to do the right thing.

If you missed the debate, here’s the full broadcast courtesy of our friends at MSNBC.

Gov. Palin has been on the national stage for just about a months time. Is she ready to serve as Vice President, or even President, should something happen to 72 year old John McCain? Well, you decide.

As the rhetoric ramps up and the invective intensifies, a clearer picture of the overall attack strategies utilized by the two presidential campaigns emerges. In the case of the McCain campaign, a particularly ingenious (or insidious, depending on your perspective) tactic has become commonplace; the magic of turning strengths into weaknesses. DoubleSpeak co-host Peter “the one without a mole on his cheek” Slutsky brought up this topic in his appearance on MSNBC Sunday morning (see the video below). Today, we take a closer look.

Of all the attacks on Obama leveled by John McCain, the most widely known and commented upon is his assertion that Barack is a celebrity on the order of Paris Hilton and Britney Spears. In equating Obama with Spears and Hilton, McCain implies that the junior Senator from Illinois is a product of media infatuation and a rampant culture of meaningless celebrity. This is an effort to turn Obama’s greatest strength against him; people actually seem to like the guy. Ridiculous, right! Who wants to vote for a president that’s likable? As an added bonus, the commercial juxtaposes pictures of the aforementioned Spears and Hilton with shots of Barack in front of the world’s two most-recognizable phalluses (the leaning tower of Pisa and the Washington monument). Get away from our white women, Barry!

Another of Obama’s supposed faults is his youth. In an article in the Chicago Tribune Steven G. Calabresi, who serves on John McCain’s justice advisory committee tackles the horror of kids head-on. He suggests that if the framers of the Constitution were still around today, they would change the presidential age qualification from 35 to… wait for it… 55 or 60! Re-read that line. 55 or 60. Calabresi goes on to point out that Obama, at 46 would be the fourth youngest President in American history, and the three younger than him were all crap. Yup, Bill Clinton, John F Kennedy and Theodore Roosevelt sure did suck it up. Young people are just too vital and healthy, with their awful clothes and their rock an’ roll! What we need is somebody really old.

Speaking of healthy, the McCain campaign has even taken to suggesting that Barack is too thin to be President. McCain’s campaign manager Rick Davis issued a memo in which he attacked Obama for working out and eating healthy food. I mean, who does that? Protein bars? Organic tea? In John McCain’s America, a protein bar would be a deep-fried turducken wrapped in bacon. The rallying cry was picked up by Wall Street “journalist” Amy Chozick whose August 1st article entitled “Too Fit to be President?” plagiarizes Davis’s memo and backs it up with the type of hard data that can only be acquired by starting a Yahoo! Message Board and picking short phrases out of sarcastic responses. Clearly, Barack Obama is too fit.

The McCain campaign has gotten so good at turning virtue into vice, that they can do it almost instantaneously. Just hours after Obama announced that Joe Biden would be his running mate, McCain had Ron Fournier (his man inside the Associated Press) publish an article accusing Obama of making a nefarious strategic decision to choose somebody with a lot of experience. The temerity! The message here is clear. Barack Obama has too little experience. Joe Biden has too much experience. But John McCain is juuust right.

The picture of Obama painted by John McCain is a scary one. Here is a man that is too personable and well-liked. A man that is too young. A man that is too healthy. A man who surrounds himself with people that are too qualified. Who would vote for such a man? Choose John McCain, the candidate of old, detested, infirm dilettantes. You know, he makes a good point.

NY TIMES: Obama Chooses Biden as Running Mate

The nomination…in eight minutes…

It’s no secret that I am no fan of Senator Joe Biden running for President. However, I can also do without Johnny Reid Edwards so this quote got me going this morning.

Hat tip to our friends at Politicalwire:

“I don’t think John Edwards knows what the heck he is talking about.”

-Senator Joe Biden, quoted by the New York Observer.