A common refrain from Obama supporters these days is to state that voters are no longer concerned about "distractions;" they are concerned about the "issues." Matters such as Obama's character, integrity, and decision-making are deemed divisive and thus not worthy of discussion in the post-partisan world of Obama-mania. Moreover, we are told that voters have already weighed Jeremiah Wright, bitter clinging, and the like and pronounced: "No problem!"

It's clear even the Obama campaign itself does not share this view of the world. In a recent interview his campaign manager acknowledged as much:

"In many ways, it feels like, let's say, last July or August in Iowa for us," says David Plouffe. "You look at these voters who are going to decide the election in these battleground states, and they know very little about him."

[snip]

"The people in the middle--in some cases we're only talking about six to ten percent of the people in a state--they will decide the election," Plouffe says. "Some of these voters just haven't been consuming the political news . . . So we think we have some very, very important foundational work to do" in spreading Obama's message.

There's some interesting evidence to back that up. Pollster Scott Rasmussen has said:

"This election is remarkably fluid with two nonincumbents running," says pollster Scott Rasmussen. "Some 30% of voters say they could easily change their minds, and a third of independent voters aren't paying much attention yet." [emphasis added]

Moreover, well beyond the horserace politics that has dominated election news in recent months, another factor remains, as noted in the Baltimore Sun piece interviewing Plouffe: "Far less attention has been paid to the lack of new thinking behind [Obama's] candidacy, which closely tracks liberal Democratic orthodoxy."

Therein lies the potential trouble that Obama's cheerleaders should be cautious about, even as conservatives are likewise wary of the totality of John McCain's skill on the trail (not to mention ideological concerns).

Even left-of-center MSM types are picking up on this. Affable dean of the Washington press corps David Broder declared last weekend:

Despite those fundamental weaknesses in the Republican position, McCain trails Obama in that same poll by only six points, hardly an impossible margin to overcome. What may be crucial in the end is whether people become comfortable with the prospect of Obama as their president.

McCain benefits from a long-established reputation as a man who says what he believes. His shifts in position that have occurred in this campaign seem not to have damaged that aura. Obama is much newer to most voters, less familiar and more dependent on the impressions he is only now creating.

Broder went on to question Obama's decisions to dodge joint-townhalls with McCain as well as to void his verbal commitments to the public financing system in the general election. Proud liberal Richard Cohen went further:

But here is the difference between McCain and Obama -- and Obama had better pay attention. McCain is a known commodity. It's not just that he's been around a long time and staked out positions antithetical to those of his Republican base. It's also -- and more important -- that we know his bottom line. As his North Vietnamese captors found out, there is only so far he will go, and then his pride or his sense of honor takes over. This -- not just his candor and nonstop verbosity on the Straight Talk Express -- is what commends him to so many journalists.

Obama might have a similar bottom line, core principles for which, in some sense, he is willing to die. If so, we don't know what they are. Nothing so far in his life approaches McCain's decision to refuse repatriation as a POW so as to deny his jailors a propaganda coup. In fact, there is scant evidence the Illinois senator takes positions that challenge his base or otherwise threaten him politically. That's why his reversal on campaign financing and his transparently false justification of it matter more than similar acts by McCain.

All important stuff, but then Cohen throws a roundhouse right at the "it's all about the issues" meme: "A presidential race is only incidentally about issues. It's really about likability and character."

Uh oh.

It's entirely possible that Obama could crush McCain for a number of reasons. Yet, Obama fans should be prudent enough to realize the true lay of the land. Many voters don't know their guy all that well, and it isn't just progressive policy issues that affect people's votes.

That's why choosing to sit in Jeremiah Wright's pews for twenty years is an issue, why thoughts on the bitterness of rural America matter, and even symbolic acts like creating one's own Presidential seal why voters won't simply embrace new policy proposals simply because they don't come from George W. Bush and those evil Republicans.

More so than McCain, Obama has an interesting sales job to perform in the coming months. Regardless of what his GOP competitor does in response, this year's election may well come down to how successfully - or how poorly - that sales job goes.