The big difference between Palin's and Obama's respective qualifications for president is that Obama won the nomination of a major party and Palin was just handpicked. Obama had to prove himself to millions of voters, over and over, in debates, town halls, organization, against several recognized political heavyweights (Clinton, Biden, Dodd, Edwards). Palin, conversely, hasn't proven anything on the national stage yet. Judging by her quotes on the topic so far, she doesn't even seem to understand what the VP of the United States actually does. It's an insult to Obama's massive and unlikely achievement so far to equate the two.

yes, because the passion for her in the Democratic party was so great, it would have been a very wise and gracious move by Obama.

not, however, because the Republicans have successfully co-opted anything with McCain's irresponsible, purely political pick of Palin. If anything, it seems likely that Obama's not picking Hillary will be seen in retrospect as baiting McCain into his disastrously inappropriate choice and further paving the road to the White House for Obama.

It speaks very poorly of McCain's judgment to name a VP nominee who not only doesn't have any foreign policy experience, but apparently hasn't ever even thought about what the United States is and what role it should have in the world.

Anybody who equates her with Obama -- someone who earned the votes of 18+ million Americans through a grueling process against a lineup of heavyweight opponents, someone who is a constitutional law expert, someone who's thought and written deeply about America's role in the world -- reveals himself as a mindless hack. If a majority of Americans buy their line of BS in November, we really will be heading toward Idiocracy, and Palin would make its appropriate leader -- a frightening prospect.

Hardly seems fair for Alan Ball to be on that list. He deserves to head a much smaller 2nd list of new dramas that actually have some promise. I'd add Sons of Anarchy and Fringe to that list.

90210? Knight Rider? Good Lord -- those shows were crappy the first time around.

Simon Baker and Rufus Sewell are talented actors; it's a shame to see them stuck in what seem like just 2 more mostly generic CBS procedurals. The Mentalist might have some promise if they're carefully ambiguous about the whole psychic thing.

RCP lists it as one of the toss-ups right now. as are Virginia, Colorado, New Mexico, and Nevada.) That's all Obama supporters were claiming in the fight with Hillary, and they were right.

(Admittedly, Clinton would have put some other states in play: WV and ARK come to mind.)

Wow. I bike in Boulder and if I'd have seen John Kerry riding along like a pro, I would have fallen off my bike.

The ride up to Jamestown from Boulder is a constant uphill without rest at high elevation, on a somewhat hazardous, twisty road -- in other words, no joke. Many of the hobby cyclists here never tackle it. Someone coming from D.C. or Massachusetts would need to be quite fit to handle it without a few days of acclimation to the altitude. Good for him for being in such shape at his age.

The Shield is a fascinating show, sort of great and sort of trashy, wallowing in rot yet standing brave in moral ambiguity. Way over-the-top but still grounded in grittiness, honest moral complexities, and earned emotion. It's both art and a guilty pleasure.

I've spent most of my life believing that the Republican and Democratic parties were of equal moral standing -- both big tents in which mostly well-meaning people tried to self-govern a bafflingly complex nation. My feeling has been that both sides were equally idealists and cynics, just about different and complementary things, that they were very much two sides of the same coin.

However, right at this moment, it's scary to me what the Republican party seems to be becoming:

1: anti-intellectual and anti-history (habeas corpus, Geneva Conventions, tradition of non-political judicial branch, say what?)

2: ignorant if not contemptuous of the idea of competence in government (2 months of prepping somebody who's never before thought about foreign policy is somehow sufficient for her to serve as president),

3: broadly anti-media (as if a complex democracy could survive for long without a responsible media).

As Joe Biden said recently, "this is not your father's Republican party." The current Republican party, or at least most of the energy in the current Republican party, has the feel of some kind of evangelical-based, fledgling fascism. Like the biblical literalism through which most of its leaders filter reality, this movement flattens, simplifies, de-historicizes, and idealizes or demonizes everything in its path. George W. Bush is just an appetizer for how bad it could become.

in the large-hearted, expansive American tradition of Walt Whitman, Allen Ginsberg, and Bob Dylan.

the good one so that voters can feel good about voting for you, and the creep so that you can slime the opponent without your conscience getting in the way.

Yeah, McCain is approving some of the sleaziest ads in U.S. presidential history, but he's been doing nothing but gaining in the polls in the process. So his creep factor is only a problem if enough of the electorate thinks it is, and apparently they don't. What a country!

By the way, did you hear the knee-slappingly funny joke by that sensitive feminist McCain about why Chelsea Clinton is so ugly? Why exactly does that awful joke get no play, as if it was just one bad incident obviously out of character, yet Obama's "cling to guns and religion" comment is regurgitated endlessly, as if it defines him?