Newsweek Poll Shows Americans Buy Into Palin Myths

I continue to believe that the bump McCain is experiencing is entirely Palin-related. She has very high favorables, and the polls also show that people are buying into the BS narrative that McCain has constructed around her. This suggests both that the Obama camp needs to hit harder on those narratives -- whatever the conventional wisdom about a presidential candidate attacking a VP -- and that there is room for McCain to drop once the honeymoon wears off.

Some samples from the latest Newsweek poll:

• 47% of Americans think Palin "has a record of opposing wasteful earmarks or 'pork barrel' government spending", where 31% do not and 22% don't know.
• 24% still buy the GOP lie about Palin opposing the "Bridge to Nowhere"; 41% know she dropped it only when Congress wouldn't fund it, and 35% don't know what her role was.
  
• 23% think Palin supports legal abortion in the case of rape or incest; 6% think Palin supports full abortion rights! Only 43% know her actual position.
• Only 31% know Palin supports teaching creationism in schools.

This is what is holding McCain up in the polls.