The Denver Post's page-one story today relates to diminishing ad purchases in Colorado by the John McCain campaign in the waning days of the presidential race -- a development most observers see as a dollars-and-cents admission that Barack Obama is going to win here on November 4. But you can bet your shrinking 401K that during his KHOW talk show this afternoon, Dan Caplis, the most prominent (and most feverish) GOP partisan in the state's major media, will argue otherwise -- just as he's done for the past couple of days.
On Tuesday, Caplis and his on-air partner, Craig Silverman, hosted McCain drum-beater Craig Goldman, who refuted reports by CNN's John King that the Republicans had decided to give up on Colorado -- and as proof, he confirmed that the candidate would be making two major stops here on Friday (one in Denver, the other in Durango). Then, yesterday, Caplis dismissed polls showing Obama with a sizable lead nationwide in favor of two others that he said were more accurate in 2004; both of these surveys suggested a major tightening in the contest. He predicted that McCain would move within the margin of error during the four or five days before the election, thereby putting him in the position to pull off a stunning come-from-behind victory.
Of course, regarding this year's contest, Caplis is about as objective about the man from Arizona as is Sarah Palin. On Tuesday, for instance, he berated Obama and his assorted surrogates for declining to appear on his program, especially given the sympathies of his co-host. (That's a dubious assertion. Silverman says he hasn't made up his mind about who'll get his vote, and rather than strongly challenging Caplis' blather, he consistently allows him to go off on seemingly endless conservative monologues.) And he praised Goldman and other McCain-iacs for their willingness to tackle "the tough questions."
Not that any of them came from Caplis. He's so busy spinning for the McCain campaign that it's a wonder he hasn't got an inner-ear disorder by now. Still, that doesn't necessarily mean he's wrong about the Colorado polls or McCain's chances in the state, or nationwide. We should find out whether he's been prescient or deluded twelve days from now. -- Michael Roberts
