First of all, I'd like to praise Isaac for his insightful analysis of the state of the election. He made several excellent points, and I won't argue with the idea that an Obama victory seems more and more certain with each passing day.

But what I didn't pick up from Isaac's article was the fact that for McCain, there still remain several feasible paths to victory.

For two weeks after the Republican National Convention, McCain held a solid lead over Obama. And then came news of Lehman Brothers' failure, followed by an avalanche of further financial turmoil. Such bad news, I read, was the reason for a steady shift away from McCain and toward Obama. From mid-September onwards, Obama has been rising in the polls like there's no tomorrow.

The economic crisis isn't going away for a while. But surely we can't come home every night to worsening news. The Dow can't drop a thousand more points every day.

On the contrary, we're already seeing headlines like "Global stocks: A good start" and "Gas prices drop at record pace, downward trend expected to continue." (By the way, gas is now below $3 a gallon at local stations.)

So while full economic recovery will take time, will signs of improvement help McCain in the coming weeks? I would think so. Even if not, however, McCain could still best Obama on Nov. 4.

McCain's supporters are angry at the prospects of a loss on Election Day. They want McCain to be more aggressive, and McCain has promised to do just that. Earlier on Sunday, he assured supporters that he would "whip (Obama's) you-know-what" at the final debate on Wednesday. McCain lost the previous two debates, but that doesn't mean he can't win the third.

In the minds of voters, questions about Obama's judgment still linger. Earlier in the year, support for Obama waned a little when voters learned about his former pastor, Jeremiah Wright. McCain needs to emphasize and call into question this and other dubious past associations of Obama.

McCain should also highlight how he's not Bush, and how he won't continue to drive the country on the wrong track. I noticed that he did this in the last debate, and I think he needs to do it more.

McCain needs clarify why his economic plan will bring about more prosperity. Obama's been hitting McCain hard on tax policy, so I think that more aggressiveness on McCain's part is needed.

If Obama mentions how his plan will give 95 percent of families a tax cut, McCain should note that his proposal would cut taxes for 100 percent of families. McCain should note that the leftover 5 percent in Obama's plan represents tens of millions of people, not just Fortune 500 CEOs.

McCain should mention that his planned cut doesn't leave out the middle class — that his proposed cut for the middle class is very similar to what Obama has planned. McCain should say that his tax cuts coupled with responsible government spending is a better solution than Obama's proposed tax increases.

We could host an entire debate on tax policies alone, but the point is if McCain is more aggressive on this issue, he could easily draw more voters.

In Isaac's post, he cited a lot of poll numbers, Electoral College estimates, and win probabilities. I can't say it any better than this Salon.com author who wrote: "What polling mavens too often forget is that an election is not a computer simulation or a contest decided by the best use of regression analyses in analyzing published data. As a one-time event, all that is required is for a winning candidate to get lucky, very lucky, on Election Day."

One day before the 2004 election, this prediction site estimated Kerry up with 298 electoral votes. Remember, this is a site which uses the latest state polling data, and this was its prediction a single day before the real thing.

It's been said that a week is like a year in politics. Even a day could be a long time.