In the real world, the Republicans just spent $3 million to run ads in key battleground states claiming Obama supports higher gas prices and McCain supports the environment. In my Political Machine world, I just spent the week running ads that say McCain supports higher gas prices and Obama supports the environment. Take that, real world! My ads have a national as well as local effect, but I've launched them in California, where my web master makes it cheaper to maintain television advertising. I've also sent Obama to a few key states to give speeches to that effect.

(By the way, don't ask me how a web master makes it cheaper to run an ad on TV. This is one of Political Machine's many unintuitive connections, such as a speech writer improving charisma and an outreach center bringing in endorsements from powerful lobbying organizations.)

Whether or not McCain actually supports high gas prices is immaterial in the world of Political Machine. Elections are won based strictly on perception. If voters believe McCain supports high gas prices, and if they care enough about the issue, they'll vote for Obama instead.

Gas prices is one of the few issues in the game that wins voters across the board. For instance, if Obama were to campaign on withdrawing from Iraq, he wouldn't win over any Republicans, and he would furthermore alienate a lot of undecided voters (another of Political Machine's disconnects from reality). Whether it's a nod to the real world or a limitation of the gameplay, Political Machine is full of useless issues. If you want to get to the Oval Office, there are a handful of no-brainers. You can pretty much leave everything else alone, at least until the developers get around to making a patch that adds some much-needed randomization.

So in my game, it's a bit weird to see McCain continue to blow money placing "I support the war on terror" ads. Hey, McCain, that's played out. No one's into that talking point anymore. If you want to win the election, you should be more like the real McCain.

However, the virtual McCain must be doing something right. By the end of April, he's erased my lead in projected electoral votes. Obama has 272 and McCain has 266. The popular votes is 40 million for Obama to 37 million for McCain.