The Edwards Bounce and the Russert Flop

Dan Froomkin is certainly a bright spot over at the Washington Post. Today he provides some initial public reaction to Kerry's VP choice along with another example of Little Russ's bias:

Here's Tim Russert on the NBC Nightly News filling Brian Williams in on the latest quickie poll.
For one, it shows that the Kerry campaign got a bounce from the Edwards announcement, now leading Bush/Cheney by a 49 to 41 margin.

But the real shocker: When asked who they would prefer, upon the death of the president, if the vice president had to serve as president, Edwards outpolled Cheney 45 percent to 38 percent.

"It really is striking," Russert said. "We had assumed that an incumbent vice president, with the gravitas of Dick Cheney, would do much better than that against the inexperienced John Edwards."

Mark Murray of NBC goes through yet more results and writes: "Moreover, when asked who is more optimistic about the future of the country, 49 percent said Edwards, while just 28 percent chose Cheney."

Keep in mind that optimism is arguably the paramount theme of the Bush/Cheney message.