A worker paints the center stand of the inaugural platform at the west front of the Capitol on Dec. 4, 2008. (AP)

Presidential inaugurations are big in American democracy. A chance to celebrate. And the inauguration coming next month, of Barack Obama, may be the biggest ever.

Big — gigantic — on symbolism, as the nation’s first African-American stands before the Capitol to take the oath of presidential office.

But also just plain big — huge — in numbers. Maybe millions of Americans gathered in Washington, D.C. for maybe the biggest public gathering in the history of the continent.

That’s big, and a big challenge.

This hour, On Point: Planning for an epic inauguration.

You can join the conversation. Will you be in the crowd? What are your expectations for this Inauguration?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Linda Douglass, chief spokesperson for the Presidential Inaugural Committee.

Nia-Malika Henderson, White House reporter for Politico. She reported yesterday about Obama’s plan to arrive in Washington by train.

Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton, Democratic Congresswoman representing the District of Columbia.

Kevin Johnson, Homeland Security corrrespondent for USA Today.

Earl Stafford, Virginia businessman who spent $1 million to rent out 300 rooms at the JW Marriott Hotel in Washington, D.C. He’ll open the hotel to wounded soldiers, poor and homeless people, and guests otherwise unable to attend the inauguration. Read the Washington Post story “The Benefactor of the Ball.”

(NPR map)

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It was a week for the history books — and history won’t stop for Barack Obama. President-elect Barack Obama now.

The Dow down a thousand points in two days. Warren Buffett, Paul Volker, two former Treasury Secretaries and the CEO of Google, gathering already today with Obama on the economy. Teams being formed.

Barack and Michelle scheduled to meet George and Laura in the White House on Monday.

In California, gays deal with a brand-new ban on gay marriage. And across the country, Americans take stock of an epic vote.

This hour, On Point: a monumental week.

You can join the conversation. What have we seen, what have we learned this week about America? And would you want the job Barack Obama is about to take on?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Bill McKenzie, editorial columnist for The Dallas Morning News.

Debra Dickerson, writer and blogger for Mother Jones and author of “The End of Blackness.”

Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst and senior editor at The Atlantic Monthly.

NOTE TO OUR LISTENERS: Our website was down this morning from approximately 9:45am to 10:30am ET. We hope you’ll continue to post your comments here throughout the day. Audio for this hour will be posted by 2pm today. Thanks for your patience. -On Point Staff

Sen. John McCain gestures as he delivers his concession speech at an election night rally in Phoenix, Arizona, Nov. 4, 2008. (AP)

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Listen to Republicans talk about their morning-after nightmare — looking at the map of Tuesday’s election results — and you know they’ve got trouble:

“Drubbing” … “Deep wilderness” … “Steep hill to climb” … “Ruins.”

After decades of dominance in American politics, the GOP is on the outs in the House, the Senate, and the White House. Back on its heels in state after state it once owned. Uncertain that its old alliance of cultural, economic, and security hawks still works. Talking rebirth, but around who? Palin? Pawlenty? Jindal?

On Tuesday, the new face of America, the young and minorities, came out to vote Democrat. Today, top Republicans are convening in Virginia to talk about the party’s future. How do they grow the ranks? Bring in new voters? Create a new message that resonates?

This hour, On Point: The Republican Party in defeat and debating how to rebuild. We’ll talk to conservative thinkers about the way forward.

You can join the conversation. In what direction would you like to see the Republican party go? What can they do to regain the trust of conservative Americans?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

From Arlington, Virginia, we’re joined by Jonathan Martin, senior political writer for Politico. His piece today looks at the “GOP in dire straits.”

Also with us from Arlington is Tony Fabrizio, partner with Fabrizio, McLaughlin & Associates, a research and consulting firm. In 1996 he served as chief pollster and GOP strategist to Bob Dole’s presidential campaign. His recent analysis of the Republicans’ 2008 troubles was titled, “Top GOPers: It’s Bush and Rove’s fault.”

From Washington we’re joined by Peter Berkowitz. He’s a senior fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. He served as a senior advisor on foreign policy for Rudy Giuliani’s 2008 presidential campaign.

And with us from San Diego, California, is Roger Hedgecock. He’s a nationally syndicated talk-show host based in San Diego. For more than a decade he served as Rush Limbaugh’s top fill-in host. He’s the former mayor of San Diego and author of a series of campaign issue books called “The 2008 Conservative Voter’s Field Guide.”

The crowd at Grant Park in Chicago waves flags as it is announced that Barack Obama has been elected the President of the United States, Tuesday night, Nov. 4, 2008. (AP)

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History was all over the vote count last night, as Barack Obama — Democrat, first-term senator, African-American son of a Kenyan father and Kansan mother — was elected 44th president of the United States.

In any country on Earth, such a rise would be stunning. In America, with its deep history of slavery, racial strife and race-tarred politics, it is for many astounding. And it has happened.

It was just 40 years ago that Martin Luther King Jr. gave his last speech in Memphis. On April 3, 1968, King said he’d seen the potential for equal rights in the United States: “I may not get there with you,” he said. But the Promised Land would come.

Yesterday’s election of Barack Obama may not be the Promised Land. But it is a giant moment in America’s singular national story.

This hour, On Point: Obama’s victory, in the context of history.

You can join the conversation. How would you describe, for the history books, what happened yesterday at the polls? What does it mean for America’s national story?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Stanford, California, is David M. Kennedy, professor of history at Stanford University. His many books include the Pulitzer Prize-winning “Freedom From Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929-1945″ and the bestselling textbook “The American Pageant: A History of the Republic.”

And from Rutgers University in New Jersey, we welcome Nell Irvin Painter, professor emerita of history at Princeton University. She is a leading scholar of the experiences of African-Americans, women and the working class. Her many books include “Southern History Across the Color Line,” “Creating Black Americans,” and “Sojourner Truth: A Life, A Symbol.”

President-elect Barack Obama in Chicago's Grant Park on election night, Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2008.

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And so it is Obama. Barack Hussein Obama, president-elect of the United States.

And not by a whisker, but by a country mile in the nation’s Electoral College vote. State by state the results came in last night. Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Ohio, Indiana, for Obama. And then into the south and mountain west as old political barriers fell — and history was made.

John McCain, at home in Phoenix, was gracious in defeat. Barack Obama, before a jubilant crowd in Chicago, was sober in victory.

This hour, On Point: A remarkable moment for this country. Obama wins. We’ll unpack the voting patterns and shifts that produced his victory, and open the phones to you.

Is it still sinking in — Barack Obama, the next president of the United States? How do you see the election, the country, today? Are Americans ready to unite behind this new leader? Join the conversation.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is Nate Silver, founder of FiveThirtyEight.com, a polling and political analysis website.

From Hanover, New Hampshire, we’re joined by Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst and senior editor at The Atlantic.

Joining us from Alexandria, Virginia, is Whit Ayres, Republican pollster and president of Ayres, McHenry & Associates.

And from Washington, we’re joined by Roger Wilkins, professor of history emeritus at George Mason University. He served as assistant attorney general in Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration. He’s the past chairman of the Pulitzer Prize board and shared a Pulitzer in 1972 for Watergate coverage along with Woodward and Bernstein. He’s the author of “Jefferson’s Pillow: The Founding Fathers and the Dilemma of Black Patriotism” and the autobiography “A Man’s Life.”

John McCain in Defiance, Ohio, Oct. 30, 2008. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster) Barack Obama in Des Moines, Iowa, Oct. 31, 2008. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

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What a campaign year. David Broder, dean of political reporters, calls it the best he’s ever seen. Better than Nixon-Kennedy in 1960.

And the election tomorrow? Maybe transformative, the pundits say. As big as 1860, 1932, 1968. The page-one newspaper language out there: “epochal,” “historic,” “once-in-a-lifetime.”

And at the heart of both candidates’ core promises: change. How big? How much? In what direction?

The country faces enormous challenges. Eighty-six percent of Americans think the country’s headed in the wrong direction. This hour, on the last day before the vote, we sit down with two big thinkers — one liberal, one conservative — to look at the candidates’ promises of change, and what they could mean for resetting the national direction.

You can join the conversation. Broad stroke, big theme, what’s the change you’d like to see? If you’re in the 86 percent who say we’re on the wrong course, how would you turn the wheel?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Princeton, New Jersey, is Robert George, conservative philosopher and professor of jurisprudence at Princeton University. He is director of Princeton’s James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions. He is a member of President Bush’s Bioethics Council, and he formerly sat on the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. He is author of “Embryo: A Defense of Human Life” and “The Clash of Orthodoxies: Law, Religion and Morality in Crisis.”

And joining us from New York City is Alan Brinkley, professor and provost at Columbia University and a preeminent historian of American liberalism. He has won the National Book Award and authored two widely used college textbooks on American history. He’s also author of “Liberalism and Its Discontents” and “The End of Reform: New Deal Liberalism in Recession and War.”

More Links:

Each candidate makes his case for change in side-by-side opinion pieces in today’s Wall Street Journal. See “What We’re Fighting For” by John McCain and “The Change We Need” by Barack Obama.

David von Drehle’s new piece in Time, “How They Would Lead,” explores how promises of change might translate into policy and governance.

For a sense of how McCain’s temperament and leadership style might guide his potential presidency, check out David Kirkpatrick’s profile in The New York Times.

And for a sense of the complications of an Obama victory, The Wall Street Journal’s Jonathan Weisman gives an inside account of Democratic factions already jockeying to control the agenda.

Voters stand in line to cast their ballots early at the Fulton County Annex in Sandy Springs, Georgia, on Thursday, Oct. 30, 2008. (AP)

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And so it came to pass, after months and years of speech and confrontation, that America came to the last week of the 2008 presidential campaign.

Barack Obama blanketed the airwaves with a half-hour TV infomercial for his kind of change. John McCain played catch-up with warnings of a Democratic sweep and calls for last-ditch battle.

Conservative George Will called Sarah Palin a bigger drag on McCain than George Bush.

And voters streamed in record numbers to vote long before Election Day.

This hour, On Point: the last, long week of the ’08 campaign.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is Karen Tumulty. She’s national political correspondent for Time magazine and writes for Time.com’s Swampland blog. Her piece in the magazine’s latest issue is “Hidin’ Biden: Reining In a Voluble No. 2.”

Also from Washington is Gerald Seib. He’s assistant managing editor and executive Washington editor of The Wall Street Journal. He writes the paper’s weekly Capital Journal column, in which he looked this week at the impact of race on the campaign. He is co-author, with John Harwood, of “Pennsylvania Avenue: Profiles in Backroom Power.”

And from Hanover, New Hampshire, is Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst and senior editor at The Atlantic Monthly.

Top: John McCain in Hershey, Pennsylvania, Oct. 28, 2008. (AP) Bottom: Barack Obama in Canton, Ohio, Oct. 27, 2008.

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With just five days to go before Americans cast their ballots for a new president, Barack Obama and John McCain are blitzing potentially pivotal states, shoring up support and trying to win over undecided voters.

If you believe the polls, it’s Obama’s race to lose, and the avenues to victory are narrowing for McCain. But if history is any guide, the race will likely tighten in the coming days, so McCain, the warrior, is not waving a white flag, and Obama is warning against over-confidence.

This hour, On Point: From Pennsylvania to Colorado, Florida to Ohio, it’s the final push in the battleground states.

You can join the conversation. Are you following the polls, tracking the electoral map? What do you see? Do you live in a battleground state? How does the race look to you? Tell us what you’re seeing and hearing.

-Anthony Brooks, guest host

Guests:

From Washington, we’re joined by David Wasserman, political analyst for the Cook Political Report. See the Cook Report’s current outlook on the presidential race.

Joining us from Northern Ohio is Joe Hallet, senior editor and political writer for the Columbus Dispatch. He’s traveling with John McCain and we’re catching up with him on the press bus.

Joining us from Denver, Colorado, is Karen Crummy, political reporter for The Denver Post.

From Miami, Florida, we’re joined by Beth Reinhard, political reporter for The Miami Herald.

And from Pennsylvania, we’re joined by John Micek. He’s covering the presidential race for the Allentown Morning Call.

More links:

See the latest polls and analysis at RealClearPolitics and FiveThirtyEight.com.

A U.S. soldier patrols outside a Forward Operating Base near the Pakistani border in Kunar province, eastern Afghanistan, on Monday, Oct. 27, 2008. (AP)

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War — in Iraq and Afghanistan — was supposed to be the defining issue of the 2008 campaign. Instead, Americans are riveted by Wall Street’s meltdown and global financial collapse. The economy ate the wars.

But the wars go on. Just today, news of fierce Iraqi turf battles. The White House maybe ready to talk with the Taliban. Spillover American strikes into Syria and Pakistan. High costs. No resolution.

John McCain and Barack Obama talk different games on the wars. Either would be seriously challenged by them.

This hour, On Point: With one week to Election Day, a basic, brutal issue: the wars.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

From Washington, we’re joined by Tom Bowman, Pentagon reporter for National Public Radio. He recently reported on the U.S. search for a new strategy in Afghanistan.

Joining us in our studio is Joseph Nye, professor of international relations at Harvard University. He served as Assistant Secretary of Defense under President Clinton. He is the author of several books, including “Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics” (2004) and, most recently, “The Powers to Lead.”

And from McClean, Virginia, we’re joined by Robert Kagan, senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, columnist for The Washington Post, and contributor to The Weekly Standard. He is an informal adviser to John McCain, and he served in the State Department under President Reagan. His new book is “The Return of History and the End of Dreams.”

More links:

Barack Obama’s campaign website spells out his positions on Iraq and defense; John McCain’s website explains his positions on Iraq and national security.

For differing views on the candidates’ foreign policy positions, see David Sanger’s recent New York Times article “Rivals Split on U.S. Power, But Ideas Defy Labels,” Nicholas Lemann’s New Yorker feature “World’s Apart,” and Robert Kaiser’s Washington Post article, “Iraq Aside, Nominees Have Like Views on Use of Force.”

An investigator enters the ACORN office in Las Vegas, Oct. 7, 2008. (AP)

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John McCain put the pedal to the metal on election fraud rhetoric in the last presidential debate, charging that liberal get-out-the-vote group ACORN “may be perpetrating one of the greatest frauds in voter history.”

Sounds bad. One of my guests today, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., says the bad news is mainly on the other side of the ledger — that GOP operatives are dead set on vote suppression and pulling every string to deny millions the ballot.

How bad is it, really? We’ll ask. The integrity of the vote itself is a deeply serious issue, and a politcal football.

Up next On Point: The American vote, and the challenges it’s facing next Tuesday, November 4th.

You can join the conversation. Are you confident, confident enough, with America’s registration and voting process?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

From Washington, we’re joined by John Fund, a political journalist and a columnist for The Wall Street Journal. He’s the author of “Stealing Elections: How Voter Fraud Threatens our Democracy,” originally published in 2004 and revised and updated for 2008. His recent New York Post op-ed warned of the potential for voter fraud.

With us from White Plains, N.Y., is Robert F. Kennedy Jr. A lawyer and activist, he’s the chief prosecuting attorney for Riverkeeper, a New York environmental organization, and co-host of Ring of Fire on Air America Radio. He is co-author of the article “Block the Vote” in the October 30 issue of Rolling Stone.

And joining us from New York is Nathaniel Persily, a professor of law at Columbia University. He is founder and director of Columbia Law School’s Center on Law and Politics.

Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan testified on Capitol Hill before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, Oct. 23, 2008. (AP)

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Nevermind the week. When Alan Greenspan sat before angry Democrats in Congress yesterday and conceded he had been wrong in his fundamental assessment of free markets, regulation, and risk, it had the feeling of the end of an era.

So did the bloody numbers coming again out of markets around the world.

And the poll numbers pouring out now showing Barack Obama deepening his lead.

John McCain fought back this week, his camp insisting there is still a way to victory. But the hour is late. The path is steep.

This hour, On Point: Final push. Our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

You can join the conversation. What do you make of Greenspan’s giant “oops”? Of McCain’s last-ditch push? Of Palin this week? Biden? Colin Powell? Of Obama’s push back, and his trek to Hawaii? Tell us your thoughts.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is Nina Easton. She’s Washington editor of Fortune magazine, where she writes the Power Play column, and a political analyst for FOX News.

Also from Washington, we’re joined by Matt Bai, political writer for The New York Times Magazine. His cover story “Working for the Working-Class Vote,” looked at Barack Obama’s appeal to “Gun-Toting, Church-Going White Guys.” He’s the author of “The Argument: Billionaires, Bloggers, and the Battle to Remake Democratic Politics.”

And from Hanover, N.H., we’re joined by Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst and senior editor at The Atlantic.

A University of Oregon student takes part in an effort to sign up new voters in Eugene, Ore., Thursday, Oct. 2, 2008. (AP)

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In the January snows of Iowa, young voters, college kids, played a huge part in the primary triumph of Barack Obama.

Now, with less than two weeks to final balloting, the youth vote looks like it may be huge again on Election Day. Young voters have been registered in record numbers across the country, in schools and military towns and auto-body shops.

But campuses have been the hotbed, on fire with the sense that whole lives may hinge on this election.

This hour, On Point: The campaign on campus. We’ll talk with campus newspaper editors about Obama, McCain, and the year of the youth vote.

You can join the conversation. How do you see the youth vote playing this year, on-campus or off? What’s at stake for the youngest American voters? And young voters, what matters most in this election to you? Tell us.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Waterville, Maine, is Suzanne Merkelson, editor-in-chief of The Colby Echo, the student newspaper at Colby College.

From Dallas, Texas, and Southern Methodist University, we’re joined by Jordan Hofeditz, editor-in-chief of the SMU Daily Campus.

From Chapel Hill, North Carolina, is Allison Nichols, editor-in-chief of the Daily Tar Heel, at the University of North Carolina.

And from University Park, in central Pennsylvania, is Terry Casey, editor-in-chief of The Daily Collegian at Penn State University.

More links:

A new poll out today from Harvard’s Institute of Politics finds 18 to 24 year-old likely voters favor Barack Obama over John McCain 56 to 30. You can read the executive summary here.

Supporters of Sen. John McCain, dressed as Joe the Plumber, near a rally for Sen. Barack Obama in Roanoke, Va.., Oct. 17, 2008. (AP)

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First it was the economy, meltdown, and bail-out, and now the hot talk on the campaign trail is all about how to survive the meltdown and pay for a comeback. About taxes and spending.

Suddenly, Joe the Plumber is a star and McCain is calling Obama’s plans “socialist.” That after a Republican White House nationalized American banks.

One thing is true: Barack Obama and John McCain have very different plans on tax policy. And neither, say the experts, would really balance the budget.

Today, we’ll make their plans as clear as we can, so you understand what they could mean for your bottom line. And also for America’s soaring federal deficit.

This hour, On Point: Big issue — taxes, spending and your money under McCain or Obama.

You can join the conversation. Who’s singing your song on taxes and spending? McCain or Obama? Who’s got the edge, the answer, for our challenges now? Tell us what you think.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is William Gale. He is vice president and director of economic studies at the Brookings Institution and co-director of the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, which has analyzed both candidates’ tax plans.

Also from Washington, we’re joined by Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan research group that has looked at the budget implications of the candidates’ plans.

More links:

The Washington Post has published a chart comparing the candidates’ tax plans.

And you can read the candidates’ tax policies at the official Obama and McCain campaign websites.

The U.S. Capitol. (AP photo)

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In the 2006 midterm elections, Democrats grabbed back a majority in the House of Representatives, and squeaked out a majority in the U.S. Senate.

That was before an Obama candidacy that could draw in $150 million a month in small donations and attract endorsements from Republicans like retired general and former Secretary of State Colin Powell.

And it was before the financial panic of ’08.

Now, the GOP fears a bloodbath in November voting. And Democrats dream of maybe even winning a filibuster-proof, 60-seat majority in the U.S. Senate.

This hour, On Point: From race to hot race, we’ll go to Senate races across the country — in North Carolina, New Hampshire, Minnesota, and Oregon, from Al Franken to “Liddy” Dole — to ask what’s coming on Capitol Hill.

You can join the conversation. Beyond the White House, what do you see coming for Congress, and the U.S. Senate, on November 4th? Share your thoughts.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is Carl Hulse, chief congressional correspondent for The New York Times. He’s been reporting on Congress for twenty years.

Joining us from Charlotte, North Carolina, is Jim Morrill, senior political reporter for The Charlotte Observer.

From Nashua, New Hampshire, we’re joined by Kevin Landrigan, senior political reporter for the Nashua Telegraph.

Patricia Lopez joins us from from St. Paul, Minnesota. She’s political reporter for the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

And from Portland, Oregon, we’re joined by Jeff Mapes. He’s senior political reporter for The Oregonian.

Barack Obama and John McCain during their final presidential debate on Wednesday, Oct. 15, 2008, at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y. (AP)

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We’re getting used to big, wild news. On Wall Street, epic swings up and down, and Warren Buffet saying it’s time to buy. In the economy, rough headlines all over and warnings of worse to come.

In politics, tough digs, the last head-to-head debate of the presidential campaign, and a welcome respite of humor. Obama concedes he has the ears of Alfred E. Newman. McCain jokes he’s hired Joe the Plumber to work on all seven of his houses.

This hour, On Point: We’ll look at the week. Our news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

You can join the conversation. Is the fog clearing yet for you on the American economy? On the presidential race? What do you see? Tell us.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is Liz Halloran, senior writer for U.S. News & World Report, who’s been all over the presidential campaign.

Also from Washington is David Leonhardt, economics columnist for The New York Times.

And with us from Hanover, New Hampshire, is Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst and senior editor at The Atlantic Monthly.

More links:

Here’s the full video of Wednesday night’s third and final presidential debate between Barack Obama and John McCain:

And here’s the next night’s comic relief at the Al Smith Memorial Dinner in New York, which featured roasts by the candidates:

Large windmills and solar panels are seen Monday, Oct. 6, 2008, in Atlantic City, N.J. (AP Photo/Mel Evans)

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The economy and Wall Street crisis are like the whale that has surfaced to swallow the presidential campaign season. We saw it again in the debate last night.

But the bigger leviathan, the deeper monster waiting to bite, may still be energy and the environment.

John McCain and Barack Obama each have big plans on nukes, clean coal, and global warming. But their tag lines are very different: “Drill, baby, drill!” versus wind, solar, innovate.

Can we still afford either? Do we have a choice? We’ll ask their top advisers.

This hour, On Point: energy, the environment, and the choice on election day.

You can join the conversation. Who do you trust to lead the country toward a cleaner, safer energy future? And will economic crisis speed the move? Or slow it down?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

From San Francisco, we’re joined by James Woolsey, energy adviser to the McCain campaign, director of the CIA from 1993 to 1995, now a VantagePoint Ventures partner and Annenberg Fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. He is a founding member of the Set America Free Coalition, which advocates for energy independence. To find out more about McCain’s ideas, see his energy plan.

From Washington, we’re joined by Elgie Holstein, senior energy policy adviser to the Obama campaign. Under President Clinton, he was chief of staff at the Energy Department and Assistant Secretary of Commerce for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. To find out more about Obama’s ideas, see his energy plan.

Also from Washington is Keith Johnson, energy reporter for The Wall Street Journal and writer of its “Environmental Capital” blog.

Republican presidential candidate John McCain pauses as he speaks at a rally at Montgomery County Community College in Blue Bell, Pa., Tuesday, Oct. 14, 2008. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

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Last debate tonight. Two weeks and change ’til election day.

And John McCain is way down in the polls. Tumbling. In national polls, down by double digits to Barack Obama. In key swing states, down. Among white women voters, down.

For weeks, McCain and Sarah Palin hit the trail with angry, almost mob-stirring attacks on Obama. It backfired. McCain suspended his campaign to, he said, jump on the economic crisis. That backfired, too.

Ronald Reagan came back from a deeper hole, in less time, in 1980. Can McCain do it this time?

This hour, On Point: the McCain campaign, trailing, and running out of time.

You can join the conversation. Are you a supporter who has drifted away? Can McCain and Palin win you back? Is it too late? Tell us what you think.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

We’re joined first from New York by Frank Luntz. He’s a well-known political pollster whose clients have included Newt Gingrich and Rudy Giuliani, and he’s been running post-debate focus groups for Fox News. He’s the author of “Words That Work: It’s Not What You Say, It’s What People Hear.”

From Boston we’re joined by Jonathan Kaufman, senior reporter for The Wall Street Journal covering the campaign. His latest piece looks at the shift of working-class women to Obama as the economy has worsened.

Joining us from Washington, DC, is David Winston. President and founder of The Winston Group, he’s a Republican pollster and strategist currently advising House Minority Leader John Boehner and other GOP congressional leaders. He served as director of planning for former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and was chief information officer for the Republican National Committee from 1989-1993.

And from New York we’re joined by Holly Bailey, a correspondent for Newsweek traveling with John McCain on the campaign trail.

Traffic on Interstate 405 in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Reed Saxon)

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Suddenly, everybody’s an economic reformer.

John McCain talks nonstop about hard times. Barack Obama’s knocking down walls to make “breathing room” for the middle class. The Bush administration is pouring public money into private American banks.

Out beyond Wall Street and Washington, it is not news that things are tough — and were tough before the meltdown of the last month.

How tough? We’ll ask.

This hour, we convene a national roundtable of ordinary Americans for their view of the economic moment, and the fix we’re in. We hope you’ll join the conversation.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Fort Myers, Florida, is Jean Ann Berg. She has been a certified nursing assistant for 28 years and works at a nursing home and rehabilitation center. A single mother, she’s a member of the Service Employees International Union in South Florida and is on leave from her job to work full-time for the union on election issues.

Joining us from Indianapolis, Indiana, is Deb Peters. A mother of two, she is head of Quality Environmental Professionals, a 32-person environmental consulting company. Her business has been hit by the rising price of gas and health care.

Joining us from Van Nuys, California, is Jay Ybarro. He’s a locksmith and owner of Veteran Lock & Key. A Gulf War veteran, he is a single father of two children.

Joining us from Nashua, New Hampshire, is Joe Iaquinta. He was in the mortgage industry for fifteen years, as a broker and office manager. Since that work dried up, he’s delivered newspapers and worked as a substitute teacher and a cook. He currently sells flooring. Last month he lost his house to foreclosure.

And from Washington, DC, we’re joined by Eric Toder, former director of the Office of Research at the Internal Revenue Service. He conducts research on tax policy and retirement policy at the Urban Institute and Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center.

People walk to work on Wall Street last week. (AP)

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Whatever the candidates planned to run on to win the presidency, there’s One Big Issue that has galloped past the Iraq war, terrorism and everything else. You know it, we know it, they know it: It’s the economy.

It’s how do we get out of this mess, and then, what will the new rules of the road be? That’s our issue.

Barack Obama and John McCain come at America’s suddenly-raging economic challenge with different instincts, different records, different plans, and different parties behind them. What would they do as president?

This hour, On Point: We’re talking with the top economic advisors to candidates McCain and Obama on how they would put the United States back on the path to prosperity.

You can join the conversation. What’s your question, your advice, for the men who have the ear of Obama and McCain on the economy? Who do you trust to change the course that brought us to crisis? Do you want to change?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Greg Ip, U.S. economics editor for The Economist. He led the magazine’s recent survey of 142 economists for their views of the two candidates’ economic policies.

Douglas Holtz-Eakin, senior policy adviser to John McCain. He served as chief economist on George W. Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers in 2001-2002 and as director of the Congressional Budget Office from 2003-2005. Most recently, he was a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

Austan Goolsbee, senior economic adviser to Barack Obama. He is an economist at The University of Chicago and the Progressive Policy Institute, a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research, and former editor of the Journal of Law and Economics.

UPDATE:

Marc Ambinder at The Atlantic points to the exchange during this show between Holtz-Eakin and Goolsbee over the Treasury Secretary Paulson’s proposal to recapitalize banks, which Holtz-Eakin called “disturbing” and “not the way things should be done in the United States.” We’ve posted a transcript of the exchange here.

Senators Obama and McCain at the second presidential debate. (AP)

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They called it a “town hall” debate in Nashville, but in many ways it looked more like a dance. Two contestants, running through their steps.

Obama unflappable, cool. McCain passionate, on the attack. The polite town hall audience looking more than a little shell-shocked by the economic hurricane blasting the world outside.

Everything is on the line here. The election, with the days ticking down. The economy, with markets quaking.

The country’s future, with McCain and Obama battling to frame the challenges their way.

This hour, On Point: As the world reels, the debate in Nashville.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Jake Tapper, senior national correspondent for ABC News. You can read his live blogging on last night’s debate on his Political Punch blog.

Joining us from New York is Bob Shrum. A veteran Democratic strategist, he has worked on eight presidential campaigns, beginning with George McGovern’s in 1972, and was chief strategist for John Kerry in 2004. He’s the author of “No Excuses: Concessions of a Serial Campaigner.”

Joining us from Los Angeles is Dan Schnur. A leading Republican strategist who has worked on four presidential and three gubernatorial campaigns, he was director of communications for John McCain’s 2000 presidential run. He is now director of the Institute of Politics at the University of Southern California.

Bill Schneider, senior political analyst for CNN. He is also a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, and a contributing editor at the Los Angeles Times, National Journal, and The Atlantic Monthly.

More links:

CNN has the transcript of the Nashville debate, and C-SPAN offers the full video on YouTube, here: