Look, I want to be optimistic. I don't want to be a doomsayer. But I'm losing heart.

Bloody hell -- now Kerry's in Dukakis's tank.

Have you seen the decontamination-suit picture? It's here. (And here and here and here and, in variations, here and here.) Read the stories. The GOP is milking this.

How the fuck did this happen? Why was there no one in this campaign who saw the potential for disaster in that photo op?

Why has the Edwards pick fallen flat? Why did no one perceive that the Johns were touching each other too much until not only Matt Drudge but late-night comics were joking about it?

Why do we know so much about Teresa's verbal grenades and so little about any aspect of her life? Does the campaign have any plan to counter the impression some people surely have by now that Teresa's an unexploded bomb?

And did anyone vet Christie Vilsack?

This is not acceptable. This is not how you're going to beat the '27 Yankees of gutter politics.