by NPR Political Unit

Morning, folks.

A new national poll from ABC News/Washington Post shows McCain and Obama in a statistical tie (Obama 47, McCain 46). As we've caveated ad nauseam, national poll top-lines aren't that useful...but there's gold in them thar internals. Enthusiasm for McCain has increased dramatically since he selected Sarah Palin as his running-mate, and Obama's advantage on "change" has eroded from a 32-point lead in June to a (still-significant) 12. But this is the shift that's got jaws flapping around DC this morning...via ABC's Gary Langer:

White women have moved from 50-42 percent in Obama's favor before the conventions to 53-41 percent for McCain now, a 20-point shift in the margin that's one of the single biggest post-convention changes in voter preferences. The other, also to McCain's advantage, is in the battleground Midwest, where he's moved from a 19-point deficit to a 7-point edge.

 

Stats-man Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight is unconvinced that the white women numbers are as earth-shattering as they're being portrayed, pointing out that "the margins of error are much higher for subsamples of the data than for the poll as a whole." But he does add:

Sarah Palin polls very well among women with children — specifically white women with children, who give her an 80 percent favorability rating. In fact, it appears to me that Palin's high favorability ratings among women are entirely owing to her popularity among women with children. Roughly one-third of registered female voters should have children at home, which means that among white women without children, her favorability rating is around 60 percent — still pretty decent, but barely different from the 58 percent she received in the poll overall.

So — one is led to ask — which state has the most moms?

Which means...we're back to 1996, but with a change of sporting venue from soccer pitch to hockey rink?

Politico's take: that identity politics boost is a direct result of the new McCain campaign narrative, which emphasizes biography over issues.

[T]he McCain campaign is betting its best chance to win is by aiming for the gut, not the heads, of voters.

This should not come as a huge shock. For one thing, the political climate pretty much demands it.

The Republican brand is in the tank. And despite all his talk about independent-mindedness, McCain actually differs very little from President Bush on the serious issues of the day: Iraq, taxes, trade and health care.

To win, McCain advisers believe the Republican nominee must distance himself from Bush and even his own party. That isn't easy work.

Gut-politics this political season, up to now, has been the Obama campaign's turf. With this new strategy, it appears that McCain/Palin is going to challenge the Democratic nominee on his home court. But Obama's "No Maverick" ad from yesterday suggests that his campaign will try to lay a quick smackdown on the McCain camp as they attempt to hone in on his change slogan.

Nonetheless, Obama campaign manager David Plouffe was optimistic in a Chicago briefing with the McCain press corps yesterday (you read that right: the McCain press corps), telling the reporters he's unconcerned about national poll numbers and the campaign feels good about the all-important battleground states. Plouffe added, "from a state by state perspective we'd much rather be us then John McCain."

On the financial front, the New York Times takes a closer look at the ramifications of Obama's decision to bypass public funding for his campaign. Quoth the Times, despite the Obama campaign's claims of a record month in August (official numbers aren't out yet), they are not doing quite the hand-over-fist business that they might have hoped, especially when it comes to former Clinton supporters. The piece also notes that McCain's public funding allows him to focus his energy on campaigning rather than splitting time with the fundraising events Obama will still need to do. But the aforementioned Plouffe tells the paper that many Obama donors that maxed out with $2300 primary donations haven't opened their general-election wallets yet, so there's still a lot of room to grow. And Dem strategists point out that the Obama campaign won't be hamstrung by the restrictions that accompany federal campaign dollars.

And finally, a factcheck.org item debunks some of the claims in Wasillan Anne Kilkenny's viral anti-Palin emailthat have been floating around the internet about Palin.

— Evie Stone

UPDATE: Factcheck issues a correction.

In our original story, we incorrectly said that a few of the claims we examine here were included in the e-mail by Kilkenny. Only one of the claims — about the librarian's firing — was similar to an item in that e-mail. We regret the error.