Look, we all know that Barack is a great candidate and that he had a very good shot at winning the election all by himself, but the reality of the situation is that Hank Paulson and his "end is nigh" rhetoric has virtually handed Obama the presidency without any effort on his part.
Before the credit crisis became national news the week before the debate, 538 had Obama and McCain essentially tied in their probability to win the White House (with McCain even leading at times). Then all hell broke loose, as Paulson came out and scared the shit out of everyone (especially the MSM) with the guarantee of an economic collapse if we (Congress) didn't immediately enact his bailout plan (which it will).
The net effect of all of this very visible doom and gloom economic collapse talk focused everyone on the economy and more importantly on the Republicans (Paulson, Bernanke, and Bush) who were telling them that without enacting a very unpopular and expensive bailout, we were all going to suffer greatly. By bringing the attention of America to the credit crisis, Bush automatically (and by extension McCain) gets credit for causing it from the old "he who smelt it dealt it" philosophy that most Americans subscribe to. For all of Obama's hard work and frank talk about the Republican's causing all the problems that ail us, it will actually be the direct actions of Hank Paulson that sealed this election for Barack Obama.
I would recommend that after his inauguration (and summarily firing of Paulson), that Obama at least have the courtesy to take Paulson out to a thank you dinner.