Cindy McCain: STEPHANOPOULOS: But she has no national security experience. McCAIN: You know, the experience that she comes from is what she’s done in government, and remember, Alaska is the closest part of our continent to Russia. It’s not as if she doesn’t understand what’s at stake here. I lived in New Hampshire for over a decade.  Right next to … Read More

McCain: "You know it just wouldn’t be appropriate to have a festive occasion while a near tragedy or a terrible challenge is presented in the form of a natural disaster." True, that. Pictured above: Bush presenting McCain with a birthday cake — August 29, 2005, a couple of days after Katrina hit and people were still drowning….

First polls on Palin show women aren’t drawn to her: The first national polls on John McCain’s pick of Sarah Palin yesterday came out today from Rasmussen and Gallup — and contrary to what the GOP probably hoped, she scored less well with women than men. Here’s a finding from Gallup: Among Democratic women — including those who may be … Read More

From a March 2007 interview: ABM: We’ve lost a lot of Alaska’s military members to the war in Iraq. How do you feel about sending more troops into battle, as President Bush is suggesting? Palin: I’ve been so focused on state government, I haven’t really focused much on the war in Iraq. I heard on the news about the new … Read More

The buzz this morning is that McCain has picked 44 year old Alaska governor Sarah Palin to be his vice-presidential candidate on the Republican ticket for the White House in November.  In fact, CNN just went with the story minutes ago. Never heard of her?  Me neither. But already, I see a problem. McCain is, in case you haven’t noticed, … Read More

Wow. I had high expectations for Obama’s acceptance speech.  I wasn’t worried about him meeting those expectations, but I never — never — thought he would exceed them. I knew he would have lofty rhetoric about "politics as usual" and finding common ground among the diverse political views of the nation, especially his appeal to independents and Republicans (for example, … Read More

From Denver: Denver’s U.S. attorney is expected to speak on Tuesday afternoon about the arrests of four people suspected in a possible plot to shoot Barack Obama at his Thursday night acceptance speech in Denver. All are being held on either drug or weapons charges. One of those suspects spoke exclusively to CBS4 investigative reporter Brian Maass from inside the … Read More

Random thoughts as they occur to me about Day 1 of the DNC convention: *  I’m just (half)watching the live stream.  Can’t stand the commenters and pundits on CNN and MSNBC. *  Love the band.  Doing lots of Earth Wind & Fire *  Nancy Pelosi really is a poor speaker.  Plastic, stumbling, maudlin. *  Wow.  They really gave the shaft … Read More

Straight talk: NOT Straight talk:

Yeah.  I’m one of the millions awaiting a txt message, telling me Obama’s Veep choice. And I agree with this guy: I think we’re ALL about to get rickrolled.

Seriously. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said in an interview Wednesday that he was uncertain how many houses he and his wife, Cindy, own. "I think — I’ll have my staff get to you," McCain told Politico in Las Cruces, N.M. "It’s condominiums where — I’ll have them get to you." Very VERY quick response from the Obama camp…. Actually, I … Read More

*  Lots of foreign policy experience.  This is good except that Obama has made hay of the argument that "experience" necessarily means one is right.  After all, Biden voted in favor of the Iraq invasion; Obama didn’t.  Obama was right; Biden wasn’t.  So bringing Biden on board for his "experience" seems to make Obamma’s lack of experience seem more like … Read More