I understand why the presidential race take up so many pixels ("column-inches) doesn't quite work on the web) but maybe we should hear about challengers like Elwyn Tinklenberg at times other than when their opponents do something really stupid. I'm really not trying to sound smug, but I say this as someone who dug deep to help financially before Bachmann became a fixture on Larry King. More challengers of dreadful incumbents could use help, and maybe some good embattled incumbents could use help too. This is part of how we get the big Democratic majorities that can overcome the Republican/conservative Democrat alliance.

I'm looking at the amounts I've donated already this election season and how much I have left, and other than the two House candidates challenging Republican incumbents in Minnesota (one of whom is Michele Bachmann --- how much would anyone donate to get rid of that embarrassment), I've been saying this has to be it. Now I find Martin and Noriega are up front on opposing telecom amnesty. I already donated to Darcy Burner partly on the same issue (and on that "" t-shirt) but now I'm thinking I have to dig even deeper. I suppose lots of good candidates to donate to is a good problem to have.

I recall getting to e-mail with a reporter for an Ohio newspaper in 2004 about why the election fraud stories weren't getting mainstream coverage, and I think I'm close to quoting what he said, "You don't see Kerry saying anything about it, do you?" Isn't Dana Priest the reporter who won a Pulitzer for the Walter Reed story? It looks like this is just what journalists have in their heads. How it got there I have no idea, but it appears to not be new.

I agree Obama backed off the Georgia story quickly when it worked well for McCain. Even more than debating who invaded who, the fact so little attention was paid to McCain's contact with the Georgian government before the war is what bugged me. Someone told Georgia an invasion of South Ossetia would be quick and easy, with no risk of Russian retaliation. It's classic neocon blundering. I believe the specific neocons were McCain and his adviser Scheunemann.

On the other hand, this might be this year's Quemoy and Matsu. No one remembers those? That's my point.

This picture is clearly racist, but may I suggest we be careful about the ageist images we use of McCain. I ask everyone on my side of the political spectrum to stop comparing McCain to Grandpa Simpson, and similar such humor. When we're McCain's age, we'll want to be judged by what we can do and who we are in total.

How great is that to have a candidate in the general election mention the murders of labor organizers in Columbia? Could it be, we'll have a president who absorbs some liberal (real, not corporate) media? Obama's a Salon reader maybe? McCain seemed just short of breaking out in mocking laughter that Obama would care about human rights. I suspect that is actually McCain's attitude.

I did a count on the new polling graphic at TPM Election Central, and 13 Republican seats are in danger compared to no Democratic seats. That definition includes lots of optimism, but take out the stretches like Maine and Texas, there are still about six seats likely to flip and about four toss-ups. So who can blame the RNC for looking at the Senate? Let's get that filibuster-proof majority folks, and we'll get a lot better health care plan, election reform, infrastructure work, tax reform, etc.

Remember how the price of crude oil dropped when Bush lifted the executive moratorium on new offshore leases, and the right credited Bush with popping the speculators' bubble? What nonsense. Oil has fallen sharply because the economy has gone into the crapper, causing people to cut back where they can, plus people who don't have goods to ship or jobs to commute to don't burn oil, and .... oh right, Bush did lower the price of oil.

Maybe some wingnuts found out what it's like to have that stupid line used on them.

Even if you're a jerk, how do you win a seat in a safe district for the other party just because of a scandal, and then go get a scandal of your own? Unless Mark Foley is trying to get back in, I suggest we give up on this seat. Maybe Mahoney could drop out and another candidate could run, just like Foley did, but that didn't work for the Republicans in a seat gerrymandered to favor them.

I won't be wasting my limited campaign donations on this one.

I was at a fundraiser this afternoon with a group of Democrats clustered together, and despite the variety of ages, most of us remember elections past as one disaster after another, all the way back to being unable to believe that nutjob Reagan could win, and surely he wouldn't win twice after all he pulled. We remember the thefts of 2000 and 2004, and of course, this being in Minnesota, we talked about how many people still have Wellstone lawn signs and bumper sticker. Wellstone's death two weeks before the 2002 election and the way his seat was lost especially makes us expect something terrible to happen when election season comes along. So forget the landslide, because we're still refusing to believe the polls that tell us something good.

Of course, that seems to be motivating us to pound the pavement and scrap for every last vote.