Now that Barack Obama is clearly the presumptive Democratic nominee, he and John McCain are focusing on and planning for the general election.

A new NY Times piece looks at just what we may see in the upcoming general election from both sides.

In a sign of what could be an extremely unusual fall campaign, the two sides said Saturday that they would be open to holding joint forums or unmoderated debates across the country in front of voters through the summer. Mr. Obama, campaigning in Oregon, said that the proposal, floated by Mr. McCain’s advisers, was “a great idea.”

Interesting idea that the two candidates could end up doing joint forums and/or debates unmoderated. I believe that this would seriously hurt John McCain, as he has shown that he cannot speak off the cuff very well at times. Obama, who is a very good speaker, would certainly be able to benefit in a setting like this.

“By November, every voter will know that McCain is offering a third Bush term,” said Mr. Obama’s campaign manager, David Plouffe.

While I think this strategy by the Obama campaign will work, I sure hope they don’t run solely on this idea. McCain clearly has some distinct parallels with the Bush Administration, but maybe not enough to base a campaign around. I imagine that Obama is really going to drive the topic of the war and the Bush tax cuts to try and paint McCain as a third Bush term.

This is truly going to be an exciting election and I am interested to see how the McCain campaign comes out fighting against Obama. One look at Hillary Clinton’s campaign can tell them what not to do, so it should be interesting to compare the two campaigns once all is said and done.

Get ready folks, this election is going to be an election like we have never seen before, and I am all for it.