On August 25 Patrick Donahue of Bloomberg breathlessly informed us that a recent poll showed that Germans love Barack Obama. In a week where Obama's soft polling numbers with Americans who will do the actual voting, you'd be excused if you wondered who cared, but apparently Bloomberg thinks this Obama puffing "news" is worth reporting. It's more reason to be suspicious that the Old Media is in the tank for Barack Obama, in any case.

This particular Bloomberg story has little substance and is centered on a population that cannot even vote for Obama in the first place. Interestingly, however, this story makes no effort to contrast high polling numbers in Germany with the much softer support Obama finds in the U.S.A. At least such a comparison might have served a more newsworthy purpose.

Germans overwhelmingly back Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama over Republican contender John McCain, a poll showed, though a majority said the U.S. election outcome won't affect relations with Europe.

Among Germans under 30 years old, 84 percent said they back the Democratic senator from Illinois.

Once again... who cares what the 1,009 Germans polled think about our election? Why is this news?

Still, maybe the reason this is getting reported as news is because Obama has been seeing very soft support, even losing ground to McCain here among people that, unlike their German counterparts, will actually have the opportunity to vote for president of the U.S.A.? Perhaps Bloomberg is looking for good news to support Obama in any place they can find it?

For instance, as late as August 20, Zogby reported that McCain had not only closed the gap, with Obama but earned a 5 point-lead over the candidate of "hopenchange." McCain was enjoying a 46 percent to 41 percent lead over Obama by the 20th. The coverage by USA Today shows an August 21 Gallup poll with the candidates tied at 45 percent each and an August 23 CNN poll also proves a tie at 47 percent each.

Conventional wisdom claims that Obama should be running away with this election but polls simply have not backed up this assumption. Naturally, Democrats are charging the nation with racism for Obama's polling deficit.

So, if Bloomberg can't find polls to support the conventional wisdom among the actual voters, Germany comes to the rescue to shore up a feeling that an Obama win is the popular choice.

Not much in the tank, eh?