Obama showed yesterday that he has learned what previous Democratic candidates missed: Never apologize to Republicans. It wasn't always so, witness the "doesn't look like us" pull-back.
His sound-bites from yesterday, where he even RE-USED the lipstick phrase, and his dismissal of the tactic on Letterman last night, reassure me that Obama and his team can fight. This is no Kerry campaign.
Still, this week has been a rocky one for me, as it has been for many Obama supporters. I have to admit to some lost sleep, laying awake thinking about strategy, polls, and a gazillion other things I have no control over. Wasted effort. If I can trust Barack to lead the nation and the world, I think I can trust him to find a way to win this election.
I have two sports analogies that help me along. One comes from a picture that I saw hangs in Barack's office. It's of Muhammad Ali standing over a defeated opponent (forget which one.) As I recall, Ali usually let his opponents whale away on him until they wore out and then he'd knock the suckers out.
The other image is of Tiger Woods. Does Tiger hit every shot perfectly? Nope. How many times have you seen Tiger in the weeds or bunker, coolly getting free of the trap, and then sailing into the 18th with the win?
We are still a few holes away from the club house, but I think our guy is more like Ali or Woods than their guy is.