My friend, Chiara, sent me this note on Thursday, the final day of the Republican National Convention. I managed to miss the note and I’m offering it now for your consideration.

Last night, my sister-in-law, Joyce, a nurse, mother of three, and grandmother of many, wrote to a number of us in the family to express her views about the presidential election.  Joyce focused on an aspect of a potential  and unthinkable Republican victory that I think few of us — certainly not I — have considered at any length.  I believe Joyce’s take on a McCain/Palin administration is worthy of contemplation and so I’d like to share with you the note she sent to us from Santa Rosa last night, at the conclusion of the Republican National Convention.

Yes, we can.

Chiara

Dear Kim, Tami, Erik, Steven, Deena, Todd, Chiara, Lucia, Kathleen and Eddie

As most of you know I am very pro Obama.  I had the opportunity to watch all major speeches for the Democratic convention and now I’m giving equal time to the Republicans.  Two very different takes on patriotism.  I was heartened by Obama, Biden, and Michelle Obama.  This week, I watched John McCain become animated over his sudden secret weapon, Sarah Palin.  I listened to the speeches last night and heard similar slurs in each one, obviously written by the same team. No lies told, but less than the truth said.  The crowd went wild. There are lots more at home who believe and will vote.

Tonight, after listening to Cindy McCain’s profile (she has been an international relief worker!!) and her well delivered speech following Sarah Palin’s rousing rendition of the republican working super mom last night, I know big work must be done if the White House is to stay in the hands of the party that I believe is more fair and balanced.

But my greatest fear is that, if the McCain/Palin ticket wins, my grandsons, Jeff, Brennan, Justin A and Justin C will be registering for the draft before the end of 2009.  Devin won’t be far behind. There are simply not enough volunteer bodies to fill the battle needs in the many places our hawk leaders feel we should go.  I was a fierce mother against the war in Vietnam when Steven was a child and I can do it again.  And be even more involved this time because watching my grandsons go off to war for oil and power doesn’t feel patriotic to me.

I’m calling the local democratic party headquarters tomorrow.  I will volunteer however they need me because I now have the time to go with my passion that the charismatic folks running on the republican ticket are defeated in Nov.

John McCain just finished the most compelling speech I’ve ever heard from him.  Almost, but not quite eloquent.  That the crowd is going wild is an indication of what’s happening in front of millions of American TVs.  Scary.

Oh woe, we have lots of work to do.  Both parties want change in Washington, but only one party wants to escalate war in several world regions.

Going forward, I’ll keep the grandson faces in front of me to remember why the war mongers cannot win.

With love,

Mom, Joyce

Gawd, I hope this isn’t true. There’s a rumor circulating around the internet today that Governor Palin used racist and sexist slurs to refer to Senators Obama and Clinton:

So Sambo beat the bitch.

The rumor is thinly sourced to a woman named “Lucille,” who allegedly overheard the governor make the statement at a diner in Alaska.

I don’t think it’s worth getting hysterical over a thinly sourced rumor, but I do think that this particular rumor is serious enough that questions need to be asked. Here’s hoping that some enterprising journalist tries to find Lucille and gets her story on the record if she exists.

The press also ought to ask the Governor for her side of the story. The problem is that the McCain camp is now saying that Palin might not be available for a press conference for about two weeks. Yikes.

So let’s put this one in the tickler file for September 21. In addition to asking specifically about Lucille’s allegation, I’d like to know what her views are on race more generally. Does anyone have any clue?

Cross-posted from Facebook.

Does it matter that Sen. John McCain, (R-AZ), is, at best, a spent force who mortgaged any ideals and principles he might have had in a Faustian bargain for the Republican Party nomination for president of the United States?

It was painful watching McCain last night and then listening to the empty suit media types prattle on about how well he did. All he has left to spout are the inanities and incoherent babble he spewed haltingly last night.

Sen. Barack Obama, the Democratic Party nominee, needs to stick to the issues. Hit them hard. Stay on message for the next 60 days talking about issues that affect ordinary Americans and how to begin to repair the damage wrought by Pres. George W. Bush and his minions. Don’t engage these idiot Republicans. Talk to the American people about the future and how he would get the nation out of the morass the Republicans have created the past eight years.

The Republicans cannot, must not win on Nov. 4, 2008.

Excerpt . . .:

Obama has been more moving at the lectern—at the Convention in Boston four years ago, when he relied mainly on the story of his modest, yet remarkable, multicultural upbringing; at the victory party after the breakthrough win in Iowa, last January—but he has never described himself and his political vision with more clarity. In order to win the votes of the unconvinced, he could not allow “change” to remain an airy mantra. (If anything, he risked the specificity and length of a Clintonian State of the Union address.) Obama was also newly and surprisingly direct in his assault on John McCain—whose policy differences with the Bush Administration have narrowed to the vanishing point—and even questioned his opponent’s “temperament and judgment.”

Let’s give the McCain campaign credit for one thing: They sure know how to steal the Democrats’ thunder.

Democrats dominated the nation’s attention this week with their convention, culminating with their historic affirmation of Barack Obama as the first African-American to nominated for president by a major political party. Sen. Obama punctuated that with what has been generally hailed as a successful acceptance speech in front of some 80,000 rapturous supporters in Denver last night.

It was, in short, a very good week for Democrats.

The Republicans, who hold their convention next week, have detonated a political bombshell that will sweep away attention from Democrats and undercut some of the historic nature of Obama’s ascent with their pick of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as McCain’s running mate. More than the obvious ploy of picking a woman in hope of stealing some of the still miffed supporters of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, it is the attention-grabbing nature of the pick that is astounding.

I am not saying that Gov. Palin is either qualified to be president, or that she is a good pick for Sen. John McCain. I am saying that for today, at least, she helps Republicans shift attention for the Democratic ticket.

The incredible thing is that Palin exposes a significant weakness in the Democratic ticket. McCain’s pick of Palin shows now that Obama was not wise to pick Joe Biden as his running mate. Those disaffected Hillary voters can now vote for the McCain-Palin ticket in some good conscience. The Republicans found a woman who was good enough when Democrats couldn’t. I’m not saying Obama should have picked Hillary. But she is not the only woman in the country.

By not picking Kathleen Sebelius or any of the number of qualified women around this nation, Obama left the door open for McCain to make this play.

Some of abhorrently sexist manner in which Hillary was treated during the primaries and caucuses, especially by the media, has pissed off a sizeable number of her supporters.

That Palin is a conservative Christian who is anti-choice and disagrees with Hillary on virtually every issue is not lost on me. Her supporters have a legitimate grievance that the Obama campaign did not pay enough attention to. Now Democrats may pay in November. I just know that women will now vote for the Republican tickets in some states in numbers significant enough to make a difference come Nov. 4.

As I sat on the convention floor and watched the television monitors showing CNN and other corporate media outlets, I saw the presidential campaign being treated as if it were a football game, an academy awards ceremony or a beauty contest. That’s unfortunate, because this campaign is not really about John McCain or Barack Obama. It is about the future of our country and the well-being of hundreds of millions of Americans.

The essence of this campaign is pretty simple. John McCain has made it extremely clear that the policies of his administration would follow closely what the Bush Cheney administration has done. So, if you’re comfortable with what’s gone in this country for the last eight years, I suppose a vote for McCain makes sense.

But, if you’re tired of seeing the middle class decline and poverty increase while the wealthiest people have never had it so good you should give thought to voting for Barack Obama. If you think it’s absurd to provide more than a trillion dollars in tax breaks to the wealthiest 1 percent and increase our national debt even more, you should vote for Obama. If you think every American should have health care, vote for Barack Obama. If you want to stop a trade policy that lets corporate America throw workers on the street and move jobs to China, you should vote for Obama. If you think we should strengthen Social Security rather than privatizing it, vote for Obama. If you think we should bring our troops home from Iraq, you should vote for Barack Obama.

OBAMA: Thank you so much.

(APPLAUSE)

Thank you very much.

(APPLAUSE)

Thank you, everybody.

To — to Chairman Dean and my great friend Dick Durbin, and to all my fellow citizens of this great nation, with profound gratitude and great humility, I accept your nomination for presidency of the United States.

(APPLAUSE)

Let me — let me express — let me express my thanks to the historic slate of candidates who accompanied me on this journey, and especially the one who traveled the farthest, a champion for working Americans and an inspiration to my daughters and to yours, Hillary Rodham Clinton.

(APPLAUSE)

To President Clinton, to President Bill Clinton, who made last night the case for change as only he can make it…

(APPLAUSE)

… to Ted Kennedy, who embodies the spirit of service…

(APPLAUSE)

… and to the next vice president of the United States, Joe Biden, I thank you.

(APPLAUSE)

I am grateful to finish this journey with one of the finest statesmen of our time, a man at ease with everyone from world leaders to the conductors on the Amtrak train he still takes home every night.

To the love of my life, our next first lady, Michelle Obama…

(APPLAUSE)

… and to Malia and Sasha, I love you so much, and I am so proud of you.

(APPLAUSE)

Four years ago, I stood before you and told you my story, of the brief union between a young man from Kenya and a young woman from Kansas who weren’t well-off or well-known, but shared a belief that in America their son could achieve whatever he put his mind to.

It is that promise that’s always set this country apart, that through hard work and sacrifice each of us can pursue our individual dreams, but still come together as one American family, to ensure that the next generation can pursue their dreams, as well. That’s why I stand here tonight. Because for 232 years, at each moment when that promise was in jeopardy, ordinary men and women — students and soldiers, farmers and teachers, nurses and janitors — found the courage to keep it alive.

We meet at one of those defining moments, a moment when our nation is at war, our economy is in turmoil, and the American promise has been threatened once more.

Tonight, more Americans are out of work and more are working harder for less. More of you have lost your homes and even more are watching your home values plummet. More of you have cars you can’t afford to drive, credit cards, bills you can’t afford to pay, and tuition that’s beyond your reach.

These challenges are not all of government’s making. But the failure to respond is a direct result of a broken politics in Washington and the failed policies of George W. Bush.

(APPLAUSE)

America, we are better than these last eight years. We are a better country than this.

(APPLAUSE)

This country is more decent than one where a woman in Ohio, on the brink of retirement, finds herself one illness away from disaster after a lifetime of hard work.

We’re a better country than one where a man in Indiana has to pack up the equipment that he’s worked on for 20 years and watch as it’s shipped off to China, and then chokes up as he explains how he felt like a failure when he went home to tell his family the news.

We are more compassionate than a government that lets veterans sleep on our streets and families slide into poverty…

(APPLAUSE)

… that sits…

(APPLAUSE)

… that sits on its hands while a major American city drowns before our eyes.

(APPLAUSE)

Tonight, tonight, I say to the people of America, to Democrats and Republicans and independents across this great land: Enough. This moment…

(APPLAUSE)

This moment, this moment, this election is our chance to keep, in the 21st century, the American promise alive.

Because next week, in Minnesota, the same party that brought you two terms of George Bush and Dick Cheney will ask this country for a third.

(AUDIENCE BOOS)

And we are here — we are here because we love this country too much to let the next four years look just like the last eight.

(APPLAUSE)

On November 4th, on November 4th, we must stand up and say: Eight is enough.

(APPLAUSE)

Now, now, let me — let there be no doubt. The Republican nominee, John McCain, has worn the uniform of our country with bravery and distinction, and for that we owe him our gratitude and our respect.

(APPLAUSE)

And next week, we’ll also hear about those occasions when he’s broken with his party as evidence that he can deliver the change that we need.

But the record’s clear: John McCain has voted with George Bush 90 percent of the time.

Senator McCain likes to talk about judgment, but, really, what does it say about your judgment when you think George Bush has been right more than 90 percent of the time?

(APPLAUSE)

I don’t know about you, but I am not ready to take a 10 percent chance on change.

(APPLAUSE)

The truth is, on issue after issue that would make a difference in your lives — on health care, and education, and the economy — Senator McCain has been anything but independent.

He said that our economy has made great progress under this president. He said that the fundamentals of the economy are strong.

And when one of his chief advisers, the man who wrote his economic plan, was talking about the anxieties that Americans are feeling, he said that we were just suffering from a mental recession and that we’ve become, and I quote, “a nation of whiners.”

(AUDIENCE BOOS) A nation of whiners? Tell that to the proud auto workers at a Michigan plant who, after they found out it was closing, kept showing up every day and working as hard as ever, because they knew there were people who counted on the brakes that they made.

Tell that to the military families who shoulder their burdens silently as they watch their loved ones leave for their third, or fourth, or fifth tour of duty.

These are not whiners. They work hard, and they give back, and they keep going without complaint. These are the Americans I know.

(APPLAUSE)

Now, I don’t believe that Senator McCain doesn’t care what’s going on in the lives of Americans; I just think he doesn’t know.

(LAUGHTER)

Why else would he define middle-class as someone making under $5 million a year? How else could he propose hundreds of billions in tax breaks for big corporations and oil companies, but not one penny of tax relief to more than 100 million Americans?

OBAMA: How else could he offer a health care plan that would actually tax people’s benefits, or an education plan that would do nothing to help families pay for college, or a plan that would privatize Social Security and gamble your retirement?

(AUDIENCE BOOS)

It’s not because John McCain doesn’t care; it’s because John McCain doesn’t get it.

(APPLAUSE)

For over two decades — for over two decades, he’s subscribed to that old, discredited Republican philosophy: Give more and more to those with the most and hope that prosperity trickles down to everyone else.

In Washington, they call this the “Ownership Society,” but what it really means is that you’re on your own. Out of work? Tough luck, you’re on your own. No health care? The market will fix it. You’re on your own. Born into poverty? Pull yourself up by your own bootstraps, even if you don’t have boots. You are on your own.

(APPLAUSE)

Well, it’s time for them to own their failure. It’s time for us to change America. And that’s why I’m running for president of the United States.

(APPLAUSE)

You see, you see, we Democrats have a very different measure of what constitutes progress in this country.

We measure progress by how many people can find a job that pays the mortgage, whether you can put a little extra money away at the end of each month so you can someday watch your child receive her college diploma.

We measure progress in the 23 million new jobs that were created when Bill Clinton was president…

(APPLAUSE)

… when the average American family saw its income go up $7,500 instead of go down $2,000, like it has under George Bush. (APPLAUSE)

We measure the strength of our economy not by the number of billionaires we have or the profits of the Fortune 500, but by whether someone with a good idea can take a risk and start a new business, or whether the waitress who lives on tips can take a day off and look after a sick kid without losing her job, an economy that honors the dignity of work.

The fundamentals we use to measure economic strength are whether we are living up to that fundamental promise that has made this country great, a promise that is the only reason I am standing here tonight.

Because, in the faces of those young veterans who come back from Iraq and Afghanistan, I see my grandfather, who signed up after Pearl Harbor, marched in Patton’s army, and was rewarded by a grateful nation with the chance to go to college on the G.I. Bill.

In the face of that young student, who sleeps just three hours before working the night shift, I think about my mom, who raised my sister and me on her own while she worked and earned her degree, who once turned to food stamps, but was still able to send us to the best schools in the country with the help of student loans and scholarships.

(APPLAUSE)

When I — when I listen to another worker tell me that his factory has shut down, I remember all those men and women on the South Side of Chicago who I stood by and fought for two decades ago after the local steel plant closed.

And when I hear a woman talk about the difficulties of starting her own business or making her way in the world, I think about my grandmother, who worked her way up from the secretarial pool to middle management, despite years of being passed over for promotions because she was a woman.

She’s the one who taught me about hard work. She’s the one who put off buying a new car or a new dress for herself so that I could have a better life. She poured everything she had into me. And although she can no longer travel, I know that she’s watching tonight and that tonight is her night, as well.

(APPLAUSE)

Now, I don’t know what kind of lives John McCain thinks that celebrities lead, but this has been mine.

(APPLAUSE)

These are my heroes; theirs are the stories that shaped my life. And it is on behalf of them that I intend to win this election and keep our promise alive as president of the United States.

(APPLAUSE)

What — what is that American promise? It’s a promise that says each of us has the freedom to make of our own lives what we will, but that we also have obligations to treat each other with dignity and respect.

It’s a promise that says the market should reward drive and innovation and generate growth, but that businesses should live up to their responsibilities to create American jobs, to look out for American workers, and play by the rules of the road.

Ours — ours is a promise that says government cannot solve all our problems, but what it should do is that which we cannot do for ourselves: protect us from harm and provide every child a decent education; keep our water clean and our toys safe; invest in new schools, and new roads, and science, and technology.

Our government should work for us, not against us. It should help us, not hurt us. It should ensure opportunity not just for those with the most money and influence, but for every American who’s willing to work.

That’s the promise of America, the idea that we are responsible for ourselves, but that we also rise or fall as one nation, the fundamental belief that I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper.

That’s the promise we need to keep. That’s the change we need right now.

(APPLAUSE)

So — so let me — let me spell out exactly what that change would mean if I am president.

(APPLAUSE)

Change means a tax code that doesn’t reward the lobbyists who wrote it, but the American workers and small businesses who deserve it.

(APPLAUSE)

You know, unlike John McCain, I will stop giving tax breaks to companies that ship jobs overseas, and I will start giving them to companies that create good jobs right here in America.

(APPLAUSE)

I’ll eliminate capital gains taxes for the small businesses and start-ups that will create the high-wage, high-tech jobs of tomorrow.

(APPLAUSE)

I will — listen now — I will cut taxes — cut taxes — for 95 percent of all working families, because, in an economy like this, the last thing we should do is raise taxes on the middle class.

(APPLAUSE)

And for the sake of our economy, our security, and the future of our planet, I will set a clear goal as president: In 10 years, we will finally end our dependence on oil from the Middle East.

(APPLAUSE)

We will do this. Washington — Washington has been talking about our oil addiction for the last 30 years. And, by the way, John McCain has been there for 26 of them.

(LAUGHTER)

And in that time, he has said no to higher fuel-efficiency standards for cars, no to investments in renewable energy, no to renewable fuels. And today, we import triple the amount of oil than we had on the day that Senator McCain took office.

Now is the time to end this addiction and to understand that drilling is a stop-gap measure, not a long-term solution, not even close.

(APPLAUSE)

As president, as president, I will tap our natural gas reserves, invest in clean coal technology, and find ways to safely harness nuclear power. I’ll help our auto companies re-tool, so that the fuel-efficient cars of the future are built right here in America.

(APPLAUSE)

I’ll make it easier for the American people to afford these new cars.

OBAMA: And I’ll invest $150 billion over the next decade in affordable, renewable sources of energy — wind power, and solar power (OTCBB:SOPW) , and the next generation of biofuels — an investment that will lead to new industries and 5 million new jobs that pay well and can’t be outsourced.

(APPLAUSE)

America, now is not the time for small plans. Now is the time to finally meet our moral obligation to provide every child a world-class education, because it will take nothing less to compete in the global economy.

You know, Michelle and I are only here tonight because we were given a chance at an education. And I will not settle for an America where some kids don’t have that chance.

(APPLAUSE)

I’ll invest in early childhood education. I’ll recruit an army of new teachers, and pay them higher salaries, and give them more support. And in exchange, I’ll ask for higher standards and more accountability.

And we will keep our promise to every young American: If you commit to serving your community or our country, we will make sure you can afford a college education.

(APPLAUSE)

Now — now is the time to finally keep the promise of affordable, accessible health care for every single American.

(APPLAUSE)

If you have health care — if you have health care, my plan will lower your premiums. If you don’t, you’ll be able to get the same kind of coverage that members of Congress give themselves.

(APPLAUSE)

And — and as someone who watched my mother argue with insurance companies while she lay in bed dying of cancer, I will make certain those companies stop discriminating against those who are sick and need care the most.

(APPLAUSE)

Now is the time to help families with paid sick days and better family leave, because nobody in America should have to choose between keeping their job and caring for a sick child or an ailing parent.

Now is the time to change our bankruptcy laws, so that your pensions are protected ahead of CEO bonuses, and the time to protect Social Security for future generations.

And now is the time to keep the promise of equal pay for an equal day’s work, because I want my daughters to have the exact same opportunities as your sons.

(APPLAUSE)

Now, many of these plans will cost money, which is why I’ve laid out how I’ll pay for every dime: by closing corporate loopholes and tax havens that don’t help America grow.

But I will also go through the federal budget line by line, eliminating programs that no longer work and making the ones we do need work better and cost less, because we cannot meet 21st-century challenges with a 20th-century bureaucracy.

(APPLAUSE)

And, Democrats, Democrats, we must also admit that fulfilling America’s promise will require more than just money. It will require a renewed sense of responsibility from each of us to recover what John F. Kennedy called our intellectual and moral strength.

Yes, government must lead on energy independence, but each of us must do our part to make our homes and businesses more efficient.

(APPLAUSE)

Yes, we must provide more ladders to success for young men who fall into lives of crime and despair. But we must also admit that programs alone can’t replace parents, that government can’t turn off the television and make a child do her homework, that fathers must take more responsibility to provide love and guidance to their children.

Individual responsibility and mutual responsibility, that’s the essence of America’s promise. And just as we keep our promise to the next generation here at home, so must we keep America’s promise abroad.

If John McCain wants to have a debate about who has the temperament and judgment to serve as the next commander-in-chief, that’s a debate I’m ready to have.

(APPLAUSE)

For — for while — while Senator McCain was turning his sights to Iraq just days after 9/11, I stood up and opposed this war, knowing that it would distract us from the real threats that we face.

When John McCain said we could just muddle through in Afghanistan, I argued for more resources and more troops to finish the fight against the terrorists who actually attacked us on 9/11, and made clear that we must take out Osama bin Laden and his lieutenants if we have them in our sights.

You know, John McCain likes to say that he’ll follow bin Laden to the gates of Hell, but he won’t even follow him to the cave where he lives.

(APPLAUSE)

And today, today, as my call for a timeframe to remove our troops from Iraq has been echoed by the Iraqi government and even the Bush administration, even after we learned that Iraq has $79 billion in surplus while we are wallowing in deficit, John McCain stands alone in his stubborn refusal to end a misguided war.

That’s not the judgment we need; that won’t keep America safe. We need a president who can face the threats of the future, not keep grasping at the ideas of the past.

(APPLAUSE)

You don’t defeat — you don’t defeat a terrorist network that operates in 80 countries by occupying Iraq. You don’t protect Israel and deter Iran just by talking tough in Washington. You can’t truly stand up for Georgia when you’ve strained our oldest alliances.

If John McCain wants to follow George Bush with more tough talk and bad strategy, that is his choice, but that is not the change that America needs.

(APPLAUSE)

We are the party of Roosevelt. We are the party of Kennedy. So don’t tell me that Democrats won’t defend this country. Don’t tell me that Democrats won’t keep us safe.

The Bush-McCain foreign policy has squandered the legacy that generations of Americans, Democrats and Republicans, have built, and we are here to restore that legacy.

(APPLAUSE)

As commander-in-chief, I will never hesitate to defend this nation, but I will only send our troops into harm’s way with a clear mission and a sacred commitment to give them the equipment they need in battle and the care and benefits they deserve when they come home.

(APPLAUSE)

I will end this war in Iraq responsibly and finish the fight against Al Qaida and the Taliban in Afghanistan. I will rebuild our military to meet future conflicts, but I will also renew the tough, direct diplomacy that can prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons and curb Russian aggression.

I will build new partnerships to defeat the threats of the 21st century: terrorism and nuclear proliferation, poverty and genocide, climate change and disease.

And I will restore our moral standing so that America is once again that last, best hope for all who are called to the cause of freedom, who long for lives of peace, and who yearn for a better future.

(APPLAUSE)

These — these are the policies I will pursue. And in the weeks ahead, I look forward to debating them with John McCain.

But what I will not do is suggest that the senator takes his positions for political purposes, because one of the things that we have to change in our politics is the idea that people cannot disagree without challenging each other’s character and each other’s patriotism.

(APPLAUSE)

The times are too serious, the stakes are too high for this same partisan playbook. So let us agree that patriotism has no party. I love this country, and so do you, and so does John McCain.

The men and women who serve in our battlefields may be Democrats and Republicans and independents, but they have fought together, and bled together, and some died together under the same proud flag. They have not served a red America or a blue America; they have served the United States of America.

(APPLAUSE)

So I’ve got news for you, John McCain: We all put our country first.

(APPLAUSE)

America, our work will not be easy. The challenges we face require tough choices. And Democrats, as well as Republicans, will need to cast off the worn-out ideas and politics of the past, for part of what has been lost these past eight years can’t just be measured by lost wages or bigger trade deficits. What has also been lost is our sense of common purpose, and that’s what we have to restore.

We may not agree on abortion, but surely we can agree on reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies in this country.

(APPLAUSE)

The — the reality of gun ownership may be different for hunters in rural Ohio than they are for those plagued by gang violence in Cleveland, but don’t tell me we can’t uphold the Second Amendment while keeping AK-47s out of the hands of criminals.

(APPLAUSE)

I know there are differences on same-sex marriage, but surely we can agree that our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters deserve to visit the person they love in a hospital and to live lives free of discrimination.

(APPLAUSE)

You know, passions may fly on immigration, but I don’t know anyone who benefits when a mother is separated from her infant child or an employer undercuts American wages by hiring illegal workers.

But this, too, is part of America’s promise, the promise of a democracy where we can find the strength and grace to bridge divides and unite in common effort.

I know there are those who dismiss such beliefs as happy talk. They claim that our insistence on something larger, something firmer, and more honest in our public life is just a Trojan horse for higher taxes and the abandonment of traditional values.

And that’s to be expected, because if you don’t have any fresh ideas, then you use stale tactics to scare voters.

(APPLAUSE)

If you don’t have a record to run on, then you paint your opponent as someone people should run from. You make a big election about small things.

And you know what? It’s worked before, because it feeds into the cynicism we all have about government. When Washington doesn’t work, all its promises seem empty. If your hopes have been dashed again and again, then it’s best to stop hoping and settle for what you already know.

I get it. I realize that I am not the likeliest candidate for this office. I don’t fit the typical pedigree, and I haven’t spent my career in the halls of Washington.

But I stand before you tonight because all across America something is stirring. What the naysayers don’t understand is that this election has never been about me; it’s about you.

(APPLAUSE)

It’s about you.

(APPLAUSE)

For 18 long months, you have stood up, one by one, and said, “Enough,” to the politics of the past. You understand that, in this election, the greatest risk we can take is to try the same, old politics with the same, old players and expect a different result.

You have shown what history teaches us, that at defining moments like this one, the change we need doesn’t come from Washington. Change comes to Washington.

(APPLAUSE)

Change happens — change happens because the American people demand it, because they rise up and insist on new ideas and new leadership, a new politics for a new time.

America, this is one of those moments.

I believe that, as hard as it will be, the change we need is coming, because I’ve seen it, because I’ve lived it.

Because I’ve seen it in Illinois, when we provided health care to more children and moved more families from welfare to work.

I’ve seen it in Washington, where we worked across party lines to open up government and hold lobbyists more accountable, to give better care for our veterans, and keep nuclear weapons out of the hands of terrorists.

And I’ve seen it in this campaign, in the young people who voted for the first time and the young at heart, those who got involved again after a very long time; in the Republicans who never thought they’d pick up a Democratic ballot, but did.

(APPLAUSE)

I’ve seen it — I’ve seen it in the workers who would rather cut their hours back a day, even though they can’t afford it, than see their friends lose their jobs; in the soldiers who re-enlist after losing a limb; in the good neighbors who take a stranger in when a hurricane strikes and the floodwaters rise.

You know, this country of ours has more wealth than any nation, but that’s not what makes us rich. We have the most powerful military on Earth, but that’s not what makes us strong. Our universities and our culture are the envy of the world, but that’s not what keeps the world coming to our shores.

Instead, it is that American spirit, that American promise, that pushes us forward even when the path is uncertain; that binds us together in spite of our differences; that makes us fix our eye not on what is seen, but what is unseen, that better place around the bend.

That promise is our greatest inheritance. It’s a promise I make to my daughters when I tuck them in at night and a promise that you make to yours, a promise that has led immigrants to cross oceans and pioneers to travel west, a promise that led workers to picket lines and women to reach for the ballot.

(APPLAUSE) And it is that promise that, 45 years ago today, brought Americans from every corner of this land to stand together on a Mall in Washington, before Lincoln’s Memorial, and hear a young preacher from Georgia speak of his dream.

(APPLAUSE)

The men and women who gathered there could’ve heard many things. They could’ve heard words of anger and discord. They could’ve been told to succumb to the fear and frustrations of so many dreams deferred.

But what the people heard instead — people of every creed and color, from every walk of life — is that, in America, our destiny is inextricably linked, that together our dreams can be one.

“We cannot walk alone,” the preacher cried. “And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back.”

America, we cannot turn back…

(APPLAUSE)

… not with so much work to be done; not with so many children to educate, and so many veterans to care for; not with an economy to fix, and cities to rebuild, and farms to save; not with so many families to protect and so many lives to mend.

America, we cannot turn back. We cannot walk alone.

At this moment, in this election, we must pledge once more to march into the future. Let us keep that promise, that American promise, and in the words of scripture hold firmly, without wavering, to the hope that we confess.

Thank you. God bless you. And God bless the United States of America.

You know, I–I love this, and I thank you, but we have important work to do tonight. I am here first to support Barack Obama. And second — and second, I’m here to warm up the crowd for Joe Biden, though as you will soon see, he doesn’t need any help from me. I love Joe Biden, and America will too.

What a year we Democrats have had. The primary began with an all-star line up and it came down to two remarkable Americans locked in a hard fought contest right to the very end. The campaign generated so much heat it increased global warming.

Now, in the end, my candidate didn’t win. But I’m really proud of the campaign she ran: I am proud that she never quit on the people she stood up for, on the changes she pushed for, on the future she wants for all our children. And I’m grateful for the chance Chelsea and I had to go all over America to tell people about the person we know and love.

Now, I am not so grateful for the chance to speak in the wake of Hillary’s magnificent address last night. But I’ll do my best.

Last night, Hillary told us in no uncertain terms that she is going to do everything she can to elect Barack Obama.

That makes two of us.

Actually that makes 18 million of us - because, like Hillary, I want all of you who supported her to vote for Barack Obama in November.

Click to continue reading…

Hillary needed to do three things last night:

(1) Tell her supporters not to vote for John McCain
(2) Tell her supporters why they should vote Democrat.
(3) Tell her supports why they should support Obama, in particular.

In my view, Hillary did the first two and didn’t even attempt the third. Her rationale for why to support Obama was nothing more than “He’s the Democratic nominee.” She delivered that message well and with sincerity, but she fell short of offering a compelling reason to vote for the Obama/Biden ticket.

Hillary could have, in a paragraph or less, done precisely what Joe Biden did on Saturday. Biden said that he had observed Obama over the course of the campaign and had come away impressed. That’s all Hillary had to say. but she didn’t. She also did nothing to disavow her comments about Obama that the McCain camp is running in anti-Obama ads.

I suspect that the speech will convince all but the lunatic fringe of her supporters not to vote for McCain. But I don’t think she convinced very many people to vote for Obama. Expect a lot of extreme Clintonites to stay home on Election Day.

Cross-posted from Facebook.

It is obvious in this campaign that you cannot question McCain about anything without him bringing up the fact that he was a prisoner of war in Vietnam.

When I was a young newspaper reporter (a nerdy one, at that) at The Record in Hackensack, N.J., one of the journalists I looked up to was Michael Powell. Mr. Powell was then at New York Newsday but he had passed through The Record in what was becoming an itinerant career, with stops at Newsday, the Washington Post and now The New York Times.

When some of us would get discouraged about something in journalism, we would reach for some of Mr. Powell’s old stories, particularly his profile of Frank E. Rogers, the long-serving mayor of Harrison, N.J. His stories in The Record and Newsday gave us hope. He was the writer we aspired to be when we grew up as reporters.

I recount this to say that Michael Powell is a phenomenal reporter and a great writer.

I don’t know whether Mr. Powell aspired to a career at The Times (as most of us did) but we heard that he turned down The Times to go to the Washington Post when New York Newsday imploded. Some writers have been known to spurn the stultifying culture of The Times, some of them preferring the Post (Washington) and the Los Angeles Times.

In any case, Mr. Powell is at The Times now and The Times that he comes to, though still a colossus, is somewhat tarnished, prone to getting in its own way. And the Mr. Powell that I now read in that newspaper seems different. His work here, especially covering the candidacy of Sen. Barack Obama for the Democratic Party nomination and for the presidency of the United States, has bothered me at times.

Which is a long way to come around to what I want to say, which is that I enjoyed immensely Mr. Powell’s “American Wanderer . . . “ piece in Sunday’s “This Week In Review” section. The piece is well researched and well written. In fact, it may be over-written, especially the opening section:

That an air of the enigmatic attends Barack Obama is a commonplace; he is a man of fractured geography and family and wanderings.

He came of age in far corners, Indonesia and Hawaii, went to schools on both coasts and landed in Chicago, where he had no blood tie. With talent and ambition, he has leapt for the presidency at a tender age and will go to Denver to claim his Democratic nomination for the office.

There is to Mr. Obama’s story a Steinbeck quality, like so many migratory American tales: the mother who flickers in and out; the absent and iconic father; the grandfather, raised in the roughneck Kansas oil town of El Dorado, who moves the family restlessly, ceaselessly westward.

The American DNA encodes wanderlust ambition, and a romance clings to Mr. Obama’s story. The roamer who would make himself and his land anew is a familiar archetype.

And yet to describe such a man as rootless, as some people do, can stir up more questions, and an ambivalence reflected in the answers. What is rootlessness anyway? The word connotes something both celebrated and feared. Early on in Mr. Obama’s time in Chicago, the Democratic machine types would ask of this preternaturally calm young pol: Who sent him?

That question, probing and suspicious, has tendrils extending deep into our history. Again and again in American culture, the rootless outsider becomes an insider, and begins to guard his prize.

First he has to find that prize. For four centuries hope and despair pushed immigrants to these shores. Royalist Cavaliers found in the Virginias a new hierarchy. Puritans spread insistently across not always fruitful lands of New England. The Highlands English and Scots no sooner landed in Philadelphia in the 18th century than they lit out for the hills of Pennsylvania and down the mountain ridges of the Appalachians. In their sackcloth and baggy trousers, they were unceremonious and warlike wanderers.

“When I get ready to move, I just shut the door, call the dogs and get started,” is a Highlands saying transposed to a new world. The historian Frederick Jackson Turner argued in 1893 in his influential “Frontier Thesis” that the key to American vitality could be found in this relentless, drifting movement.

My only quibble with this section is that what Mr. Powell claims as a uniquelly American trait is actually a universal one. It transcends every culture. It is the linchpin of every fairy tale, adventure, or fantasy, from “Beowulf” to “Harry Potter” and everything in between.

Every society fears-lionizes the stranger who by dint of talent, vision, unique strength, or magically power overcomes to lead.

After this immensely enjoyable, yet strained, opening, the piece settles down and reaches some surprising conclusions:

Of the two nominees, Sen. John McCain has been the more peripatetic figure, with Obama the more rooted one. Obama is the one who sought out community and has stayed in one place, Chicago, for two decades. He is the one who is not divorced and has raised a family with his wife while Mr. McCain abandoned one family to marry a much younger and wealthier woman.

I hope Mr. Powell stays and that his career flourishes at The Times. I want him to take everything that is good about the place without being infected by its many maladies.

Both Frank Rich and Bob Herbert had sound advice for the presidential campaign of Sen. Barack Obama on the Op-ed pages of the New York Times this weekend.

Echoing the theme of an essay I’m working on and still hoping to post, Herbert weighed in on Saturday with advice that Obama hew close to economic themes:

I’m all for thoughtful, reasonable, even cerebral candidates. John Wayne has had way too much influence on our politics. (“Bring ’em on.” “Bomb, bomb Iran.”) But if ever there was a presidential campaign that cried out for a populist’s passion, this is it.

The last eight years have been calamitous. We’re struggling with two wars, one of which we never should have started. The economy has tanked big time. The housing market has collapsed and foreclosures have skyrocketed.

Motorists are reeling from high gasoline prices. The financial-services sector is teetering like a skyscraper in an earthquake. Robust budget surpluses have morphed into deficits stretching to the horizon and beyond. And cash-strapped, debt-ridden working families are viewing the future with high anxiety, if not outright fear.

Senator Obama should be invoking F.D.R., who wanted to make the U.S. “a country in which no one is left out.” And Harry Truman, who had no qualms about getting in the face of the political opposition. (“I never gave anybody hell. I just told the truth, and they thought it was hell.”) And Robert Kennedy, who wanted the government to get behind a massive effort to rebuild the country and create millions of new jobs.

Senator Obama has been talking about the economy lately, but his approach has been tepid and his remedies vague. The electorate wants more. A so-so appearance in Martinsville, Va., this week warmed up considerably when Senator Obama began talking about jobs and the nation’s infrastructure.

“We need a policy to create jobs here in America,” he said. Suddenly, the crowd was paying closer attention.

That’s what Obama needs to be talking about, Herbert says.

Frank Rich points out that McCain is a man whose time has passed. That Obama needs to work the “Change we can believe in” theme that vanquished the vaunted Clinton machine.

“Change We Can Believe In” was brilliantly calculated for a Democratic familial brawl where every candidate was promising nearly identical change from George Bush. It branded Obama as the sole contender with the un-Beltway biography, credibility and political talent to link the promise of change to the nation’s onrushing generational turnover in all its cultural (and, yes, racial) manifestations. McCain should be a far easier mark than Clinton if Obama retools his act.

What we have learned this summer is this: McCain’s trigger-happy temperament and reactionary policies offer worse than no change. He is an unstable bridge back not just to Bush policies but to an increasingly distant 20th-century America that is still fighting Red China in Vietnam and the Soviet Union in the cold war. As the country tries to navigate the fast-moving changes of the 21st century, McCain would put America on hold.

After reminding Obama that the media is not his friend, that the press would highlight and amplify his presumed faults while glossing over and giving a pass to McCain on real defects, Rich offered the following advice:

What should Obama do now? As premature panic floods through certain liberal precincts, there’s no shortage of advice: more meat to his economic plan, more passion in his stump delivery, less defensiveness in response to attacks and, as is now happening, sharper darts at a McCain lifestyle so extravagant that we are only beginning to learn where all the beer bullion is buried.

But Obama is never going to be a John Edwards-style populist barnburner. (Edwards wasn’t persuasive either, by the way.) Nor will wonkish laundry lists of policy details work any better for him than they did for Al Gore or Hillary Clinton. Obama has those details to spare, in any case, while McCain, who didn’t even include an education policy on his Web site during primary season, is still winging it. As David Leonhardt observes in his New York Times Magazine cover article on “Obamanomics” today, Obama’s real problem is not a lack of detail but his inability to sell policy with “an effective story.”

That story is there to be told, but it has to be a story that is more about America and the future and less about Obama and his past. After all these months, most Americans, for better or worse, know who Obama is. So much so that he seems to have fought off the relentless right-wing onslaught to demonize him as an elitist alien. Asked in last week’sNew York Times/CBS News poll if each candidate shares their values, registered voters gave Obama and McCain an identical 63 percent. Asked if each candidate “cares about the needs and problems of people like yourself,” Obama beat McCain by 37 to 23 percent. Is the candidate “someone you can relate to”? Obama: 55 percent, McCain: 41. Even before McCain told Politico that he relies on the help to count up the houses he owns, he was the candidate seen as the out-of-step elitist.

So while Obama can continue to try to reassure resistant Clinton loyalists in Appalachia that he’s not a bogeyman from Madrassaland, he must also move on to the bigger picture for everyone else. He must rekindle the “fierce urgency of now” — but not, as he did in the primaries, merely to evoke uplifting echoes of the civil-rights struggle or the need for withdrawal from Iraq.

With his choice of vice president in place and the party convention starting this week, the real campaign is about to begin. How will we finish? Obama has to craft a message for the times, a message that will convince America to turn away from the chimera that is McCain to the real solutions that Obama offers.

I know it’s been some hours but I still have not wrapped my mind around the selection of Joe Biden as Sen. Barack Obama running mate. This piece is by Eileen Davis of the Central Virginia Progressive.

Fighting Joe Biden-The Silver Fox of the Senate-Chairman of the foreign relations committee and 30 year champion of the working class is the VP select.

Family leave Legislation, Domestic violence legislation, his brilliant plan on what to do in Iraq (take the time to google and read it) all a “Tapas” taste of what this man has done in his stellar career.

You will learn alot about Joe Biden in the next days and will be impressed. For those of us who already knew, we are pleased, really pleased, b/c we know the possibility of this newly created dynamic duo.

Joe will soften the hearts of the pissed off Hillary’s because he has a resume that rivals hers and his record on woman’s issues ,social issues and education is laudable.

The swing votes-Catholics, some East Coasters, union, fire, police, nurses,teachers-many will be pulled back solidly to Dem land.

And Tivo any debates featuring Biden, he is one of the most brilliant debaters ever-it will be not to be missed viewing.

I heard a laudable “swoosh” from all the people slidng back into Dem land when my phone and email started screaming “OMG its Biden-I’m so happy, I know your pleased”!

Yes I am dear friends, yes I am Not forgetting our own dear Tim Kaine I expect to see him in the administration as undersecretary of education,where his championing for preK and educational parity can get national exposure and implementation.

Together Foward my Friends…

The DAVISReport

Posted by www.EileenDavis.blogspot.com The Davis Report - The Voice of Central Virginia and the Capital City.

First, I’d like to point out that Biden was at the top of my VP short list back in June. Yes, that’s because the list was in alphabetical order, but shouldn’t I get at least half credit for making the right pick?

On a more serious note, I’m feeling mixed emotions about the pick this morning. I like Biden a lot. Those of you who know me well may remember that he was very high on my list of presidential choices last year before he dropped out of the race. He’s a legislative leader, a great speaker, and a brilliant and pragmatic thinker. He also has an extremely compelling life story. I should be very happy this morning.

But I’m not. Three different thoughts leave me a little disappointed. First, I don’t think that Obama picked him for the right reasons. Kerry, Gore and Bill Clinton had all advised Obama to pick someone he trusts completely. I don’t think that’s Joe Biden even though Obama and Biden are, by all accounts, friendly and cordial in their relationship.

Second, the pick doesn’t obviously reinforce the Obama brand. Biden is not change. Biden is not hope. Biden is many good things but neither of those two. We may see some re-branding of Team Obama today at the unveiling, but I think it’s a little late in the game to be doing that.

Third, I don’t think Biden gives the greatest chance of success in November. I probably wouldn’t even have put him in the top 3 on that score. My biggest concern is that Hillary’s die-hards (and remember, Hillary was my first choice) will make a big fuss. I think the Obama campaign underestimates the number of votes that Obama will now not get because of this choice.

A few days ago, I was worried that Obama sounded too much like Michael Dukakis. Now I just hope that Joe Biden doesn’t turn out to be Lloyd Bentsen.

Cross-posted from Facebook.

The New York Times

Obama Chooses Biden as Running Mate

In a lot of ways, this presidential campaign is about biography, who John McCain is and who Barack Obama is.

A lot of people say, for instance, despite his books, that they don’t know much about Sen. Obama. He’s still too new to the national scene.

Here’s my question: John McCain has occupied the national scene for decades. Does it matter that much of what we know about him is either incomplete, or outright fabrication?

For instance, his record in the United States Navy.

I came across an article, Will `Ace’ McCain Flame Out Again? by Kelly Patricia O’Meara, that lays out in more details what I’m about to tell you.

We’ve heard ad nauseum about how McCain came from a family of warriors, how his fathers and other forebears were admirals. How about McCain himself?

McCain has been a Congressman and United States Senator. We know him as a “war hero” (McCain spent all of 20 hours in combat, getting 28 medals) who was a prisoner of war for five and half years. Just this week, when John McCain could not remember just how many houses he owned, one of his campaign handlers mentioned that he was a prisoner of war for five and half years.

Before any of this, however, McCain was indeed a pilot in the navy and he did fly in Vietnam. But he probably should have never flown in anyone’s navy.

John McCain graduated 894th out of 899 cadets at the U.S. Naval Academy.

McCain got elite assignments in the Navy despite racking up an unusual number of crashes. Until his fateful crash that led to his capture and POW status in Vietnam, McCain had been involved in four other crashes.

McCain’s engine allegedly “quit” and his plane plunged into Corpus Christi Bay in 1958. He would regain consciousness at the bottom of the water. But, when the engine was tested afterward, there was no indication of engine failure. Later, while deployed in the Mediterranean, McCain flew too low over the Iberian Peninsula and took out power lines. Then, returning from flying solo to Philadelphia for an Army-Navy football game, McCain allegedly got a “flameout” and had to eject, landing on a deserted beach as the plane slammed into trees.

Then, in 1967, the ever snakebit McCain was seated in the cockpit when a rocket slammed into the exterior fuel tank of his assigned A-4 Skyhawk. McCain escaped from the burning aircraft but dozens of his shipmates were killed and injured in the explosions that followed.

Just three months after this incident, the Vietcong shot McCain’s A-4 Skyhawk down over Truc Bach Lake near Hanoi, North Vietnam.

“John McCain,” says one Navy pilot in the linked O’Meara article who was an acquaintance of McCain in that era, “was the kind of guy you wanted to room with — not fly with. He was reckless, and that’s critical when you start thinking about who’s going to be the president,” The old pilot laughs, and then continues: “But the Navy accident rate was cut in half the day John McCain was shot down.”

The rest of the story–McCain’s torture during five-and-a-half years as a prisoner of war–we pretty much know. He came home a war hero, cheated on the wife who raised his family while he was away, then dumped her for a much younger woman who then financed his political career.

I just would have loved to see what Karl Rove would have done with McCain, especially his conduct as a POW, if he had had the opportunity.  There are Vietnam veterans (in the video above) now who see McCain as less than a hero for his conduct as a POW. They are calling for the record from that time to be declassified.

The Obama campaign yesterday confirmed Lynn Sweet’s report that the Illinois senator has reserved the grounds of the old state capital for a major event on Saturday and will appear with his choice for vice president.

Obama’s from Illinois, of course, but he’s already made a big announcement there. Springield strikes me as an odd place to hold a rally with Biden or Kaine unless the announcement comes very soon and the pair hold a rally in Delaware or Virginia somewhere before Saturday. Springfield might not be an unusual place to hold a rally with Sebelius or Bayh, because both of them live within pretty easy driving distance of Springfield.

Maybe he’s not planning to hold a rally in the prospective veep’s home state at all. I don’t see the sense in that unless the pick is someone, like Chet Edwards or Chuck Hagel, from a reliably red state.

Could Obama be considering a vice-presidential candidate who hails from the Land of Lincoln???

As far as I can tell, there’s only one person under serious consideration who fits that bill: Hillary Clinton.

Cross-posted from Facebook.

michael o. allen to Bryan Sells: Today @ 9:18am

Good morning.

I think you’re wrong but would you post your veepstakes piece?

And may I put a link to the New York Times piece in that post?

Bryan Sells’s reply Today @ 9:24am

OK. You can certainly add the NYT link.

Bryan Sells’s follow-up to his reply Today @ 9:26am

And what part is wrong? who’s your guess?

michael o. allen to Bryan Today @ 11:17am

I agree with you that all the names that have been floated could be feints. I don’t think Gore is in the mix. Neither is Hillary. I have a hard time seeing Hagel (such a pick would confirm what many suspect that Obama is a moderate in a sheep clothing; the Democratic base would rebel).

Webb is still a possibility (he’s my choice), despite taking himself out of the race.

Kaine, too.

Bayh is certainly safe.

But, if you’re correct that the names being floated are to throw us of, then I would not rule out a safe dark horse like Chet Edwards

Bryan Sells replied Today @ 11:27am

I thought long and hard before leaving Edwards off my list of four surprise picks. His brand isn’t strong enough to make people say “wow!” They’d just say “who?”

michael o. allen’s very long rejoinder Today @ 11:35am

which could be a selling point.

The Times story is wrongly assumes that the presidential candidates want publicity from their vp choices. why would they want publicity?

The most obvious tack is to do no harm. Biden, for instance, even without his awkward jab about Obama being “clean”, would be a harmful pick.

Bayh and Kaine not so much.

Edwards, Chet not John, unless he too has busloads of illegitimate children that he fathered with illegal immigrant prostitutes, would fit the bill of boring but safe vp pick (he even looks like a vp).

And he might even help you.

Today @ 11:47am, Bryan Sells wanted to know:

Fair point. But if Obama’s not seeking publicity, then why’d his campaign leak the “short list” story last night? Why has his campaign been hyping the veepstakes for weeks?

michael o. allen then meanders Today @ 12:04pm

because, as you pointed out in your first post today (which scared me, by the way), Obama is not always the sure-footed candidate that some of us who drank the kool-aid a long time ago (I count myself as one of these) would like to think he is.

I think full-throated economic populism, with jobs and rebuilding America’s infrastructure as the linchpin, is the message that’ll give him the office he seeks. And that’s exactly the message that Obama will not deliver. Obama seems to want to hew close to the middle of the road, thinking the Republican brand is so degraded that even a black man saying not much of anything could coast into the presidency.

I don’t believe that.

I think Americans are taking a hard look at McCain and would give him the presidency in a bat of an eye if he does not seem too crazy. If all that is wrong with McCain is that he’s too old, too incompetent, and sometimes gets lost in his own words, America would take a pass on Obama’s apparent brilliance and stick with McCain.

Obama needs to give people a reason to vote for him. Charisma is not going to do it. Being miles and miles more intelligent than the other guy is not going to do it. You’ve got bring more to the table.

The Democratic world may soon wake up with a text or email from the Obama campaign announcing his choice for VP. Drudge, the NYT, and other media outlets have been abuzz this evening with the story of Obama’s “short list” and impending announcement.

The names being floated are Bayh, Biden, Kaine, and Sebelius. Kaine would be my pick, but I think they’re all head fakes. The stories out tonight have the distinct feel of a carefully scripted campaign leak. So why leak at all?

The answer? To make the actual announcement more surprising and newsworthy.

So who, then, would generate that kind of buzz as a surprise pick? There are a lot of people whose pick would be surprising, but very few whose selection would really grab the headlines:

Clinton
Gore
Webb
Hagel

My gut tells me that Webb and Hagel are the least likely of the four.

What’s your guess?

Like any serious political junkie, I watched the entire Saddleback forum on Saturday night.  My assessment, in a nutshell:  Obama sounded like Dukakis; McCain sounded like Reagan.  If I were a McCainiac, I’d be giddy with excitement.

There has been a rope-a-dope meme bouncing around the internet over the last few weeks.  Democratic-leaning pundits have guessed that the Obama campaign’s weak performance over the last few weeks might have been an attempt to get McCain to shoot his negative-ad wad early.  Then the Obama campaign would come out strong after the convention.

I think that Obama’s awful performance on Saturday casts serious doubt on that theory. Obama was obviously unprepared or prepared badly.  More likely the latter.  He gave long, professorial responses (just like Dukakis) where he should have and could have delivered short, coherent, on-message response.

This makes me think that the weakness we’ve seen in the last few weeks as Obama has dropped like a rock in the polls is no rope-a-dope maneuver but actually the result of a lousy campaign.