Amid the wall-to-wall coverage of Barack Obama's $150 million fundraising take in September and the endorsement of the Illinois senator on Sunday by former Secretary of State Colin Powell, the campaign of his Republican opponent -- John McCain -- believes the media is missing one critical thing: the Arizona senator is making up ground.
McCain advisers insist that since last Wednesday's final debate in New York, their candidate has slowly but surely cut into Obama's edge -- carving a double-digit lead down to the mid-single digits in both national polling and surveys conducted in key battleground states.
While the final debate was widely cast by the media -- and by a series of instant reaction polls -- as a win for Obama, McCain's senior strategy team argues that it was, in fact, a critical turning point in their favor in the contest.