You know, I don't think people on this site really appreciated how much John McCain would work for them. Ordinary, normal people. But he gave solid, concrete examples of the people he would work for in his speech last night.

The AP and Reuters report that Bush and Cheney are not attending the Republican National Convention in St. Paul due to Hurricane Gustav.

The President's unpopularity and Obama's supergluing of Bush to McCain had led to speculation this would happen. Bush may look for some other method to deliver a speech (perhaps pre-recorded). Cheney, on the other hand, will be out of the country starting Tuesday in perhaps the most extreme attempt to hide a negative in modern political history.

Obama's first advertising response to Palin?

Hey, look at the guy at the top of the ticket.

I never, ever, ever should have switched over to Fox. But I couldn't resist. I couldn't help myself.

What do you do when your main story line about disunity gets crushed by a passionate speech that enraptures the entirety of the convention?

Come up with a new story line? No, that would take effort.

Let's just pretend it fits our previous story line and run with it.

He is a pleasant man, who, without any important qualifications for the office, would very much like to be President.
-Walter Lippmann

However, the question becomes... She couldn't do anything more, but did it work? How effective was this speech in convincing her hesitant supporters to join Obama and the Democratic Party in November?

Well, the strategy worked. Kind of. I'm assuming.

Obama's decision to keep the VP decision to himself as long as he did was obviously a wise one, since this afternoon was a litany of "got the call that he would not be VP, according to Democratic sources" stories. Then, once Biden was (allegedly) contacted, we knew. Actually, we basically knew when the Secret Service showed up. That was kind of a biggie.

For all the showmanship, the only error may have been not releasing the text message at 7ish, for two reasons: to preserve the "you heard it first" narrative and to allow for all types of homemade Obama/Biden signs tomorrow. Que sera sera. The text is out now (apparently, I don't have a cell, but it's on the Obama '08 homepage).

But while trolls and McTrolls and both PUMAs and several genuinely disappointed Democrats mourn the passing of their favorite candidates nascent VP bid, I thought I'd give ten reasons why I'm not displeased with Obama/Biden.

Water, kind of essential for life, has become a central theme in Colorado and the surrounding region following McCain's remarks and Romney's follow-up.