Washington, Oct. 11 : Michelle Obama has joined her husband Barack on John McCain''s too-tight-with-terrorists watch list.

A McCain campaign conference call Friday noted that Michelle worked at a Chicago law firm "at the same time as Bernardine Dohrn," a ''60s radical and the wife of ex-terrorist Bill Ayers.

According to the New York daily News, so did 1,800 other people back in 1987. The firm, Sidley Austin, is huge.

New polls suggest that the barrage of attacks featuring Ayers might be backfiring. A Fox News/Opinion Dynamics survey showed Obama''s approval ratings up from 57 to
60 percent.

Washington, Oct. 11 : Sleazy viral e-mails appearing on Internet sites and blogs suggest that underhand campaign is on to derail John McCain’s bid for the White House.

McCain is being described as an egotistical, sexist man who oppresses people taking vacations with him by reading aloud from William Faulkner novels.

The e-mail appears to be the first of its kind attacking McCain, and experts say it could have a subtle effect on voters'' opinion of the candidate.

Washington, Oct. 11 : Voter perceptions regarding character issues are often cited as a key factor in the outcome of presidential elections, but according to a new FOX News poll, results are mixed as to whether Barack Obama or John McCain is better suited to pass this year''s "character" test with voters.

With Election Day less than a month away, major questions still linger on a range of measures dealing with the personal make-up of the presidential contenders.

On the one hand, voters see Obama (by a 41 percent to 26 percent margin) as being more likely than McCain to hide the truth about his background and past associations.

Washington, Oct. 11 : In the latest FOX News poll, Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama leads his Republican rival John McCain by 46 percent to 39 percent as on October 10. Two weeks ago Obama led by 45 percent to 39 percent.

Obama''s advantage comes mainly from doing better among women, blacks, young voters, those with a college degree, and unmarried voters. He has increased his edge over McCain among women to 16 percentage points, up from a 4-point edge last month (Sept. 8-9).

Washington, Oct. 10 : Hopes for wresting the White House from Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama are receding for Republican presidential nominee John McCain.

According to a Washington Post report, the latest survey, done by Research 2000, puts the Arizona senator down by 10 percentage points, 51 percent to 41 percent, a four-point shift in favor of Obama since its previous poll on September 22-23.

Polls released this week by Rasmussen and SurveyUSA also give the Democrat a 10-point edge.

New York, Oct. 10 : A vast majority of American adults have heard many rumors, some of them obviously false, about presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain.

According to a first-of-its kind national survey of 1,015 adults, conducted by Scripps Howard News Service and Ohio University, the most common rumors swirled around Obama''s religion, with 
89 percent of those polled saying they had heard he was Muslim, and nearly two-thirds said they found the rumor believable.