I thought that if Palin exceeded expectations, she would win hands-down. After the debate I thought we'd see the polls move a point or two McCain's way because Palin managed not to drool on herself or mention gigantic floating heads.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that even though she exceeded expectations, people still got the impression that Biden won the debate. I really haven't had a lot of faith in the American electorate in the past 8 years, but that result speaks volumes about how far we've come.

I still think we might see a little movement toward McCain, but only because of regression to the mean. The campaign can now move on from discussion of the VPs, just like any other presidential campaign.

You need to go straight to the expert, Elephantman. He knows Palin well, and knows just how key she'll be to the whole election.

In all seriousness, from the left wing to you Elephantman, thank you. Helping get Palin picked was the best possible thing you could do for your country. Who says one man can't make a difference?

I'll join other Red Sox fans in stating that the premise of this article is false.

Does anyone have any faith that the underlying problems will be fixed after this bailout? Or will people go back to business as usual until the next bailout?

And what happens when our money's no good anymore? How painful will that be?

Our country is, in fact, going to collapse. The question is when and how badly. With this bailout, the answers are "later" and "worse than it would be now."

I know people in the highest parts of our government like to use television shows to justify their actions (hello Justice Scalia). Hasn't anyone ever watched Behind the Music? The only way to clean up your act is to hit rock bottom.

We've earned this. Let's see it fall and try to pick ourselves out of the ashes now. Or are we too afraid, and would rather let our kids do it?

The Democratic Party sucks.

I argued a couple years ago (2006?) that Jeter was the only choice for MVP. The numbers just bore it out, and I was shocked to see him lose the award.

He's always been overrated, but then somehow everyone agreed he was so overrated that he became underrated.

I'm wondering if that will ever happen to Tom Brady, who has clearly been the second-best QB in the NFL since his arrival on the scene. The Jeter parallels are astounding.

But we know for sure that Jim Bramlett is a racist piece of shit.

I could've sworn the Bartman play happened in the stands, rather than in the field of play. I'd YouTube it if I weren't still at work. Am I wrong?

I'd imagine Adriana Sage would be pretty good with the spread.

Thank you, I'll be here all week.

King, could you throw in the Vegas picks too? Have the money line predict the winner and see how it comes out.

In that case, we should take the public airwaves away from airers of self-interested "journalism." Those are MY airwaves and YOUR airwaves, and they've been given to people who are just leveraging them for profit, to the detriment of you and me.

Glenn, you're saying things that really shouldn't even have to be said. This is disgraceful.

Liberal liberal liberal liberal! 9/11 liberal 9/11! Liberal liberal terrorism liberal liberal.

This is great - E-man's posts are going to get more and more crazy now that his own reputation is invested in the race.

Until Salon gives us the option to ignore users, I may have to go away for a while.

Because it's the Democrats in the Senate who have the most filibusters in the history of this country.

No wait, that's wrong. The Republicans of the 110th Congress have the most filibusters of any 2-year Congressional class in the history of the country. They broke the record in December of 2007, a full year before the end of the 110th.

That's right. The Republicans had more filibusters in one year than any of the previous 109 Congresses had in two years.

But God Almighty should strike down Dick Durbin! Preach on, Brother Elephantman!

The ad hom came my way first. A man complained about having to shave every day. I rebutted that it's a wash at best, since women have to shave a much larger surface area than men have to. I made a point talking about how "they" have to shave "their" legs and armpits, which probably isn't any picnic.

Then D.T. went off on a diatribe including the following: "what's your point? (presumably, it has something to do with how you're so oppressed or something or whatever, blahb lahblah adfinitum"

The ridiculous attitude is doing men no favors, to be sure, but frankly I was more embarrassed by the lack of reading comprehension. The spelling I'll leave alone, but seriously, what a ridiculous post. I felt that the above was at least worth responding to.

Carry on.

You are an embarrassment to our gender.

That's right. OUR gender.

Reading comprehension FTW!

Do you also shave your legs and armpits? Because I can't imagine that's terribly pleasant.

Sure, there's no blade on their necks, but they have a lot more surface area. I'll call shaving a wash.

There is nothing in the world less attractive to me than a woman complaining about how uncomfortable her shoes are.

I understand not every man is like me, but seriously, you're not impressing me. I'm far more impressed with a woman who's comfortable enough in her own skin to say f it, I'm wearing whatever I want.

And likelihood of you being WRONG is 90%.

Must've been all the wedding shopping I've done online this summer.

I didn't imagine the censors would get to them.

If you were interested in my jokes, I guess you'll just have to imagine what kind of joke might be too ribald for Salon.

Sorry.