This “closest election in history” and the year of Florida 2000 multiplied by who knows how many states may be dying a quick and messy death, aided by the unprecedented economic panic afflicting voters and countless late missteps from what has become a bumbling McCain campaign. The race is widening all over the country and in nearly every battleground state: Obama is winning the minds, if not hearts, of swing voters by going through the pocketbook.

A host of new state polls nearly gives Obama a sweep across some of what had been projected to be the most hotly contested toss-ups this campaign. The Dem nominee has already chased McCain-Palin out of Michigan - ground zero for Dem nervousness over Obama as recently as September - and has virtually done the same in battlegrounds from Pennsylvania to Iowa. These are red and purple states where McCain is watching his support literally vanish overnight.

Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama is ahead in a series of new polls from Florida to Iowa, gains that are helping him maintain a national lead over Republican John McCain. Obama was on top in seven of 11 new state polls, while McCain claimed the advantage in Alabama, and the two were statistically tied in Georgia, North Carolina and one Ohio poll. The Democrat’s edge, on average, is now more than 7 percentage points in national polls, according to realclearpolitics.com.

McCain is losing ground to Obama as Americans become more focused on the financial crisis. Polls have long shown that voters trust Obama more than McCain when it comes to handling the economy, and Obama is focusing on the issue at every stop.

In Florida, Obama is ahead 49 percent to 44 percent for McCain, according to a survey by Research 2000 of 600 likely voters taken Oct. 6-8. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points. In a poll in mid-September, McCain led Obama 46 percent to 45 percent.

Obama holds a 12-point lead in Pennsylvania, according to a Muhlenberg College tracking poll of 602 likely voters. That has grown from just 4 points in late September, equal to the survey’s margin of error.

In Iowa, a state that President George W. Bush narrowly won four years ago, Obama leads McCain 54 percent to 41 percent, according to a SurveyUSA poll of 692 likely voters conducted Oct. 8-9. Three weeks ago, Obama’s lead was 54 percent to 43 percent.

In Colorado, Obama is ahead 52 percent to 42 percent, according to a Public Policy Polling survey of 1,331 likely voters conducted Oct. 8-10. That is up from 7 points three weeks ago.

Rattle off those states and you get what was once a roll call of Republican targets with what was prematurely projected to be the unstoppable “maverick” team of McCain and Sarah Palin. Iowa, Pennsylvania, Colorado, Florida; all were either dead heats or leaning McCain in the middle of last month. Add in the rest of the Rust Belt and you have states where the power of Palin - the lure of a “hockey mom” who was supposedly speaking to the “hearts” of  ordinary Americans - had been predicted to be the knockout blow to Obama’s attempts to convince Middle America and those all-important white swing voters.

The economic mess and market crises have obviously exploded that myth. Palin was a superficial add-on to a what was always a shaky message from McCain. Change with experience (Hillary tried that…). Bush-style foreign policy and economics paired with rhetoric that promised a break from the last eight years. An old man on stage courting voters who wanted a fresh start. He has been hijacking Obama’s themes  for nearly the entire campaign, and know it comes back to haunt him. Palin’s quick punch was merely a temporary distraction for voters still not in love with Obama, but who know enough about their own everyday worries to be skeptical of McCain’s economic message.Not helping is the fact that the McCain campaign has effectively taken the economy out of McCain’s playbook.

Republicans across the spectrum are screaming their collective heads off. Hot tips and desperate advice for a McCain “comeback strategy” are coming from every corner of the GOP, telling their nominee to play it cool and focus on the economy but get mad about Ayers and Wright at the same time. Appear “presidential” while trying to rip a hole in Obama’s gut at the next debate. In other words, McCain must do everything he has failed to in his entire presidential run in a matter of three weeks.

Three weeks before the election, Republicans are growing increasingly concerned about John McCain’s ability to mount a comeback, questioning his tactics and even his campaign’s main thrust in a White House race increasingly focused on economic turmoil.

“He has to make the case that he’s different than Bush and better than Obama on the economy,” said former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, one of more than a dozen prominent Republicans who in interviews during the past week expressed concern over the course of McCain’s bid. “If he doesn’t win that case, it’s all over, and it’s going to be a very bad year for Republicans.”

Several Republicans, who spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid angering McCain, said the campaign should have sought to plant doubts about Obama’s associations with 1960s-era radical William Ayers and others months ago, rather than waiting until the campaign’s final weeks. Doing so now, they said, makes the 72-year-old McCain come off as angry, grouchy and desperate, playing into Democrats’ hands.

Rather, these Republicans said, McCain needs to strike a balance in his tone - appearing presidential while also questioning Obama’s readiness to serve and judgment to lead. And, several said McCain should close the campaign on an honorable note.

“He doesn’t need an attack strategy, he needs a comeback strategy,” said Alex Castellanos, a longtime national GOP media consultant who worked for McCain primary rival Mitt Romney.

 All of this advice fails to recon with the fact that McCain needed to create whatever negative aura he wanted around Obama - Ayers, Wright, etc. - long before the last three weeks of the race. This is the type of strategy that takes time to seep into the minds and decision-making processes of voters. There would be no need to take the huge risk of dumping non-stop vicious attacks on Obama in the midst of an economic meltdown if the seed had been planted in August.

The McCain campaign made what might turn into the fatal mistake of punting on Ayers and Rev. Wright back in the summer. The campaign sat down and decided to run a best-of-both-worlds campaign. They formed a very vanilla campaign gameplan that would allow McCain to keep his public image as a “maverick” and a clean campaigner while hitting Obama on the edges with advertising, surrogates and whomever the VP pick would be. If you believe the McCain campaign storyline that Palin was at the top of the list from the start of August, then they would have already been planning on using her working-class appeal and political hardball skills to be the dedicated attack dog, leaving McCain to stay above the fray for a majority of the time. Ayers and Wright were off the table. McCain’s integrity as a person and a politician - so important to him ever sine Keating Five - would remain intact…. until October, of course.

Was this decision made by the quickly wilting “bulldog” Steve Schmidt? Was it a decree straight from McCain himself? Maybe their was a collective mindset to keep the boss happy and stay away from the mud-slinging that brought his 2000 campaign to a grinding halt, courtesy of George W. Bush. The plan was in place to merely slap at Obama, hit him mostly on the traditional Republican arguments and let the rapid-response and ad team of the campaign do the mud-slinging along with Palin (this messy set-up is what gave us such far-fetched and off- base ads and attacks against Obama).

Now it has come time to truly panic for McCain. Ayers and Wright are suddenly on the cusp of becoming fair game and “important” for voters to know. Ads have consistently called Obama a liar and unfit to be president. McCain and Palin’s verbal attacks and insinuations about Obama’s past and future intentions have become so vitriolic that campaign town halls are filled with taunts and often obscene or offensive remarks aimed at the Dem nominee.

McCain perhaps gave a signal today that he is listening to the growing number of his GOP critics. A few days after defending Obama from the angry hordes at his own rallies, McCain cryptically promised to “whip” Obama’s “you-know-what” at the Wednesday debate - the final showdown.