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Yet another poll with bad news for the Republicans: "Two weeks before midterm elections, Republicans are losing the battle for independent voters, who now strongly favor Democrats on the major issues facing the country and overwhelmingly prefer to see them take over the House in November, according to a new Washington Post -ABC News poll."

And, wait, here's one more, from USA Today : "Just 19% of those surveyed say the United States is winning in Iraq, an all-time low. And 38% say their own member of Congress doesn't deserve re-election, an all-time high."

You might think the public editor of the New York Times would get a little credit from the right for admitting error and saying he now opposes his paper's decision to publish that controversial story on administration surveillance of banking records. You would be wrong. And his reference to "vicious criticism" of the paper really set off the bloggers.

"Un. Freaking. Believable," says Michelle Malkin . "The NYTimes ombudsman, Byron Calame, buried a bombshell mea culpa in his column--reversing his prior defense of the Times' blabbermouth report on a once-secret terrorist banking data surveillance program and now admitting the paper was wrong to publish it . . .

"You and every other Chicken Little, anti-Bush editor at the Times who put lives at risk and undermined counterterrorism operations by giving your bogus justifications 'too much weight.' . . .

"Stop making excuses. It's Bush hatred that led to the reckless publication of the story."

Bill Quick at Daily Pundit is, if anything, even more acerbic:

"Oh, horse manure. You let your ingrained hatred of everything not nakedly leftist - including the Bush administration - govern your thoughts and actions, as do almost all employees of the Times.

"This is an especially telling admission from the Times 'ombudsman,' who, in theory at least, is supposed to be the most objective journalist in the Times organization. But a 'vicious criticism' (what? did GWB forget to call you the world's greatest newspaper?) is enough to warp your objectivity enough to print a story that did major damage to the safety . . . of the United States?

"You people are pathetic."

Looking for one paragraph on why the GOP should lose next month? Andrew Sullivan sums it up:

"If the Republicans lose this election, it will be for a simple reason. They have forgotten what conservatism means. You cannot spend and borrow more than any Democratic Congress since FDR and remain a credible conservative. You cannot elevate executive power permanently above individual liberty and remain a credible conservative. You cannot wage a war without the care, resources, and troops needed to win and remain a credible conservative. You cannot wage a religiously-based culture war and remain a limited government conservative. It's not that complicated really."