TWO DEMOCRATIC GOVERNORS EXPRESS CONCERNS ABOUT OBAMA

As Maine Goes - Governor Baldacci speaking by phone from the Democrat convention in Denver with George Hale and Ric Tyler on Bangor’s WVOM: "I think Barack Obama and his campaign, and working together, we need to make sure that he’s connecting to the mailman, to the fireman and policemen, to the teachers; to the women who are out there struggling to raise their famiies, and single heads of households in the difficult economy. He hasn’t been able to connect to that as directly as he needs to. All of us need to do a better job of connecting to them and fighting for them. They feel like there’s nobody out there really watching out for them."

Washington Post -- Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell captured the jitters of the Democratic Party when he conceded that for all Barack Obama's gifts, "he's not exactly the easiest guy in the world to identify with" and urged the presumptive nominee to start punching back against Republican attacks. In a wide ranging interview, Rendell insisted that while Obama still has not won over perhaps 30 percent of Hillary Rodham Clinton's voters, he will have locked down 95 percent of them by midnight tonight, after Clinton speaks to the Democratic National Convention here. But Rendell, a strong Clinton supporter during the primaries, made it clear he thinks Obama still has work to do with the white, working class voters who backed her. "With people who have a lot of gifts, it's hard for people to identify with them," the governor said. "Barack Obama is handsome. He's incredibly bright. He's incredibly well spoken, and he's incredibly successful -- not exactly the easiest guy in the world to identify with.". . . He is a little like Adlai Stevenson," Rendell mused. "You ask him a question, and he gives you a six-minute answer. And the six-minute answer is smart as all get out. It's intellectual. It's well framed. It takes care of all the contingencies. But it's a lousy soundbite. . . Everybody is nervous as all get out. Everybody says we ought to be ahead by 10, 15 points. What the heck is going on?"