Hot on the heals of the NIE which clearly states Iraq is pivatol to success in our war against terror, the fall’s regularly falling gas prices, a rising stock market reaching new highs, low unemployment and surging consumer confidence, and poll after poll showing Democrat leads disappearing (in most cases) comes more news – the idea that Democrats are exaggerating their chances at winning this fall! [H/T Drudge]

Democratic pollsters are pushing lots of polls that show second- and third-tier candidates performing surprisingly well. If most of these challengers win, the Democrats will gain 30 or 40 House seats.

Obviously, that’s unlikely. Extremely unlikely, writes Stuart Rothenberg in fresh editions of ROLL CALL.

Say it ain’t so – Democrats exaggerating?! Too funny. One would ask why are they doing this? What is the point? The point is their base is so emotional and so angry that if they get a whiff of defeat they are going to throw a fit. And that fit will be aimed squarely at the national democrat leaders in the House and Senate. The far left has been spoiling for a fight with the conservative majority and they expect their incoherent rantings to lead the way to victory. The NIE fiasco this week is a clear example of the grasping at mirages the left has now succumbed to. The Dems and media feed some half true leak about Iraq that fits the fantasy world-view of the far left, they go crazy and then reality smacks them up side head when they find out the truth is the IC says we cannot lose in Iraq and stay safe.

The Democrats are weaving tales and myths and basically lying to their foot soldiers they are on the path to glory – when in reality it is all make believe. Make believe so they won’t quit on them and lose worse than they will. It was a huge gamble the leftwing media and congressional democrats decided to try. Lying to your base is pretty gutsy. You can lie about your opponents in politics – you should never try and fool your base. If you get caught the damage is unbelievable.

How extensive as been the propaganda campaign aimed at the liberals? According to this article it has been enormous – with little to show for it:

The media and the Democrats were giving a stampede but voters were refusing to play the role of the cattle. The good news for Republicans remains diluted, but the Dems are still overplaying their hand.

The 527 Media have begun their series of “October surprises” energetically (with another big one scheduled for this Sunday), first with a new leak story and then another contrivance trying to revive the discredited “revolt of the generals.” The lede in last Sunday’s front page New York Times story on a highly classified leaked National Intelligence Estimate from April said, “A stark assessment of terrorism trends by American intelligence agencies has found that the American invasion and occupation of Iraq has helped spawn a new generation of Islamic radicalism and that the overall terrorist threat has grown since the Sept. 11 attacks.” It quoted an unnamed intelligence official who “says that the Iraq war has made the overall terrorism problem worse.”

…

Monday’s televised “hearing” at which retired Gens. John Batiste and Paul Eaton “testified” before a panel of Democrats was concocted as poorly as the Lebanese ambulances supposedly blown up by Israeli airstrikes. The “hearing” – promoted by AP, but not by the same AP reporters who headlined the phony ambulance scenes – wasn’t news. It was a media event staged by Senate Dems.

…

The Republicans’ structural advantages – and the Dems’ corresponding weaknesses — lie in their credibility on national security. As upset as voters are over Iraq, the fact that there hasn’t been a terrorist attack on America since 9-11 isn’t lost on them. But the Dems, and the 527 Media, can’t help themselves. They fit Churchill’s definition of fanatics: people who won’t change their minds and won’t change the subject. The Dems and their media chorus continue to oversell their wares, just as the New York Times lead editorial did yesterday. Having been caught out by the president’s unexpected declassification of parts of the April NIE, the Times’s editorial shrieked that, “Mr. Bush said he wanted to release the document so voters would not be confused about terrorism or the war when they voted for Congressional candidates in November. But the three declassified pages…told us what any American with a newspaper, television or internet connection should already know. The invasion of Iraq was a cataclysmic disaster.”

All of this nonsense is not moving anyone towards the Democrats – in fact it is moving the polls in the opposite direction. The Webb campaign’s efforts to smear Sen Allen with rumors from 20+ years ago, which were coincidentally timed to get Webb’s own words from 20+ years ago about ‘horny women in the military’ off the presses, is one of many examples of ‘overplaying’ it. These silly and useless efforts are geared for one thing. To fake out the liberal base to think they have a shot at accomplishing something. I seriously doubt it. But I do know one thing, I left the Democrat party because it treated its supporters as brain dead idiots and I was fed up with having my intelligence insulted with their childish claims. The Dems have not learned anything since I left 20+ years ago, except to keep chasing people out of the party.

I may be getting ahead of things here, but I feel there is a change in the electorate’s mood and it is not going to be good news for the left.