Mr. Russert regrets that his name will not be in contention for vice-president this year.

I regret it, too. The loss to us all - not as a fantastical potential veep, but as the straight-arrow newsman that he was - is incalculable. I am so sad.

Tim, I'm glad you got to see your son graduate, and I'm glad you got to see the first genuine fifty-state primary in our nation's history, and I'm so, so sorry you won't be here to shepherd us through November.

GET SERIOUS. McCain's entire campaign for the past two weeks has been endless criticism of Obama's charity work, where he happened to be on a couple of boards with a man who had been violent thirty years earlier, when Obama was eight years old. No accusation that Obama himself engaged in any misconduct at all while they worked on a REPUBLICAN grant to improve public education in Chicago.

So why is Cindy McCain's charity work off-limits? When her criminal conduct undermined the very purpose of that charity? When the only reasons she's not doing ten years in a federal pen are that she's wealthy, well-connected, and white?

McCain insists that past associations are important. So, what about his current association by marriage -- MARRIAGE, not just sitting on a board that met a few times a year for a few hours -- marriage to a woman who stole drugs from a charity for sick people, lied about it, and conspired (unsuccessfully, thank heaven) to try to get the whistleblower charged with a crime?

Cindy McCain stopped being a civilian bystander in this campaign when she stood up at a rally October 7 and lied that Obama had voted against her son Jimmy, a soldier in Iraq. When she launched that dishonest broadside, she became a combatant and her past became fair game. And, even without that, by McCain's own standards, his intimate, contemporaneous, and ongoing association with a thieving drug addict who tried to cover her crimes by ginning up the prosecution of an innocent man matters a great deal.

As to hypocrisy, have you seen the Republican position on drug offenders? Except for, you know, Rush Limbaugh, or Jeb Bush's daughter, or John McCain's wife.

Matthews shouldn't let Armey back on the show until Armey sends a written apology to Walsh, and agrees that his first words on air will re-iterate that apology.

Since that's not likely, hey! Ban him from the show permanently. A guest who sinks to racial, ethnic, gender, religious, disability, or orientation to insult other guests, instead of answering their logic, deserves a permanent ban.

I'm sorry Matthews wasn't on the ball here. Can you imagine if Armey said to Bob Herbert, "Boy, I'm glad you're not my slave, so I wouldn't have to listen to that prattle all the time!"

Kudos and kisses to Bob Herbert for blowing the whistle when Matthews didn't.

So, hey, I'm sure John McCain was not thrilled about the very public 2008 speculation that he was romantically linked to a blonde lobbyist, a near-twin to his current wife.

But now you've linked him to blond lobbyist, which I'm sure he likes even less.

You must mind not just your p's and q's, but your e's as well, Salon.