For undecided-but-sane voters (e.g. those uninterested in guilt-by-association smears, endorsements from self-serving pols, and other campaign ephemera), that's among the key lingering issues about the frontrunner as voting day approaches. It's a question McCain tried to push in the final debate last week, by challenging Obama to name issues where he has stood up to the majority view of his party and it's special-interest lobbies. And those of us who think charter schools - a grassroots experiment in what public schools can achieve when freed from the onerous rules and ham-handed resistance to reform of teacher unions - offer hope of positive change and real opportunity for underpriveleged kids and their families were thrilled to hear Obama cite them as Exhibit A.

"I support charter schools and pay for performance for teachers. Doesn't make me popular with the teachers union. I support clean coal technology. Doesn't make me popular with environmentalists. So I've got a history of reaching across the aisle," said Obama. A bit later, he returned to the subject, noting that he and McCain agree on expanding the reach of charters: "I doubled the number of charter schools in Illinois despite some reservations from teachers unions. I think it's important to foster competition inside the public schools."

Great news! Bill and Hillary Clinton were also charter school advocates going back to their Arkansas days, but it's especially gratifying to hear the Democratic nominee on national TV in the campaign's waning days wear his bold support of charters as a badge of honor.

But this being the harvest season for spin, I decided to double-check Obama's claim about the Illinois charter bill, actually an expansion of charters in Chicago, home to scores of wretched conventional public school .

Here is the summary of what happened from the Illinois legislature's web site. As you can see, while the bill does indeed double the number of charters allowable under law in large Illinois cities, it places strict caps on the total number of charters allowed instead of allowing parental demand to define the supply, and bars for-profit entities from the chance to run charters, a setup that has resulted in quality educational opportunities for students elsewhere around the country. And Obama did not "reach across the aisle" to pass this bill; its chief sponsors (a month before Obama signed on) were a roll call of the Democratic leadership in the Illinois Senate, including the senate president and two of the assistant majority leaders.

There's certainly nothing wrong with what Obama did here. Given the teacher-union establishment's avowed intent to strangle charters in their cribs whenever possible, any support for them is welcome, however half-baked. But if this is really Obama's prime evidence of how he'll stand tall against party orthodoxy, it's disappointing, to say the least.