According to a Zogby poll, Obama's support among Catholics has fallen 11% in the last month, from 47% to 36%. His support has also fallen dramatically among other key groups such as women and voters under age 35.

Zogby doesn't speculate why Obama's Catholic support is declining -- he attributes the general drop to McCain's questioning of his experience and readiness to lead the country.

I would call this phase of the relationship between Obama and Catholic voters the "Strike Two Moment."

Catholics shrugged off the Rev. Wright phenomenon fairly quickly; Wright was so over the top, they figured anyone nominated for president by a major political party couldn't possibly hold opinions that extreme.

Then came a succession of stories revealing Obama positions on the social issues important to religiously-active Catholics. He very publicly opposed California's Proposition 8 which defines marriage between a man and a woman. And the tangled explanations of his opposition to BAIPA have led to greater public awareness of his extremism on abortion.

Jill Stanek's appearance last night on Hannity & Colmes is bad news for the Obama campaign. The issue of infanticide and Obama has become a national story.

Whether "Strike Three" will arrive -- or what it would be -- is hard to predict. But the way Obama and his campaign are handling controversy thus far makes it highly likely. Encouraging the candidate and his surrogates to defend the indefensible is a losing strategy, especially among active Catholic voters. If the "above my pay grade" comment had occurred in a televised president debate, it might have qualified for the strike out.

Obama will not regain the ground he has lost among Catholics unless he moves the debate away from the non-negotiables -- but the combatitive style of the Obama campaign makes that unlikely. It's starting to remind me of Kerry's attempt to prove his Catholic bona fides... which ended with him proving the contrary.