STOP SPAZZING ABOUT KERRY

CNN/Time has Kerry leading Bush 51-46 in their latest poll, a seven-point shift since February. Remember, it was between those two points that Kerry's campaign has been viewed as lackluster and message-free, so this probably reflects an even larger shift than that.

The rest of the poll includes some other interesting nuggets:

Kerry and Bush are essentially tied over who would handle Iraq better -- 46 percent to 43 percent.

Bush appears to have an advantage over Kerry on the war on terrorism with 49 percent saying he would do a better job, compared to 42 percent for Kerry. He also had the edge in "moral values" -- 46 percent to 42 percent.

On the question of who would do a better job, Kerry had big leads on health care, protecting the environment, reducing the deficit and reducing unemployment. He even did better than Bush on the question of taxes.

In the fight against terrorism -- one of Bush's strengths in many polls -- this poll showed a split over whether Bush is doing a good job. Forty-six of those polled said he was, but 47 percent said he was doing a poor job.

This is huge, and big news for the Democrats. In the one category that was supposed to keep Bush over the top come November -- terrorism -- his advantage has essentially vanished. Kerry has achieved relative parity with Bush on the subject (only a 7-point spread) and more people disapprove of Bush's handling of terrorism issues than approve. Not only does this corroborate the findings in the latest CBS/NYT poll from a couple days ago, it amplifies those trends even more.

This can't make Karl Rove happy.