This is starting to get attention on liberal blogs and elsewhere: It appears that earlier this year, Palin took heat for standing by and giggling on the air while a radio host called her political foe, Alaska State Senate leader Lyda Green, a "bitch."

Palin was taken to task in a January 2008 editorial in the Anchorage Daily News...

Gov. Sarah Palin really stepped in it when she appeared recently on the show hosted by two admiring radio personalities, Bob and Mark of KWHL.

Bob used the b-word to describe Sen. President Lyda Green, who is no friend of the governor. Instead of saying she objected to her supporter's making such a juvenile and inappropriate insult, she giggled nervously...

She came off looking immature herself, almost high-schoolish. It was conduct unbecoming a governor.

According to ADN columnist Dan Fagan, who slammed Palin in the wake of the radio appearance, Palin also didn't object when the host called Green a "cancer," even though Green is apparently a cancer survivor:

Early on in the conversation before Palin started to crack up, Lester referred to Sen. Green as a jealous woman and a cancer. Palin, who knows full well Lyda Green is a cancer survivor, didn't do what any decent person would do, say, "Bob, that's going too far."

In the same column, Fagan said that the ADN had posted audio on the site (we can't find the original link), so presumably this can be considered solid. There's some purported audio of the exchange on YouTube, but we haven't yet verified its authenticity.

Palin, who also recently said she didn't like Hillary's "whining," reportedly apologized to Green after the whole thing blew up into an uproar.

We already noted this in today's roundup, but if anything deserves its own thread, this one does.

Check out how a top McCain adviser is now defending the decision to put Sarah Palin within reach of controlling the most powerful military in human history, despite McCain's own frequent claim that national security experience is essential in our next commander-in-chief...

Mr. McCain's advisers said Friday that Mr. McCain was well aware that Ms. Palin would be criticized for her lack of foreign policy experience, but that he viewed her as exceptionally talented and intelligent and that he felt she would be able to be educated quickly.

"She's going to learn national security at the foot of the master for the next four years, and most doctors think that he'll be around at least that long," said Charlie Black, one of Mr. McCain's top advisers, making light of concerns about Mr. McCain's health, which Mr. McCain's doctors reported as excellent in May.

Um, how reassuring. Better start cramming quick, Ms. Palin, the master's wisdom may not be accessible for much longer, and tragically, no one has yet thought to write it down for posterity...

Late Update: Ana Marie Cox: "HURRY, Sarah Palin, HURRY -- YOU MUST LEARN ABOUT IRAN NOW! THERE IS NOT MUCH TIME LEFT!"

New Obama Ad: Regardless Of VP Pick, McCain Just More Of The Same
The Obama campaign has a new ad on national cable, responding to Sarah Palin's selection as John McCain's running mate. The ad says regardless of McCain's pick for vice president, he still just promises more of George Bush's agenda:

Obamas And Bidens In Ohio Today
The Obama-Biden ticket is continuing their Rust Belt bus tour, stopping today in Ohio. Earlier this morning they attended a public memorial for the late Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones, and tonight they have a rally in Dublin scheduled to begin at 6:45 p.m.

GOP Ticket In Pennsylvania Today
John McCain and Sarah Palin are campaigning today in the town of Washington, Pennsylvania, a small suburb of Pittsburgh.

Palin: Global Warming Isn't Man-Made
In an interview with the right-wing site NewsMax, Sarah Palin gave a scientific pronouncement that goes against John McCain's own stated position as well as most credible scientists. On global warming: "I'm not one though who would attribute it to being man-made."

Palin Pick Gives McCain Financial Boost
Jonathan Martin reports that Sarah Palin's selection was able to give John McCain a boost in excitement and fundraising. A campaign aide says they took in about $4.5 million yesterday, a very impressive number.

McCain Adviser: McCain Will Live Long Enough To Teach Palin Foreign Policy
Here's what long-time McCain political aide Charlie Black told the New York Times about concerns over Sarah Palin's inexperience: "She's going to learn national security at the foot of the master for the next four years, and most doctors think that he'll be around at least that long."

GOP Senator Gordon Smith of Oregon has found yet another way to tie himself to Barack Obama as he seeks re-election in this blue state, the Oregonian reports.

Smith has been running this ad for a while, replaying news footage of his dramatic turn against the Iraq War from right after the 2006 election:

It turns out his campaign bought ad time with local cable providers for it to run on CNN last night, at the first commercial break right after Barack Obama's acceptance speech.

Smith has previously run ads linking himself to Barack Obama and John Kerry, but this whole pattern seems to be getting even more ridiculous by the day.

John McCain and the Republican National Committee are significantly expanding the map of their ad spending, and have now reserved ad time in North Carolina and statewide in Virginia, as well as in new markets in many other states, according to a Democratic operative familiar with national ad buying.

The expansion is significant, because it suggests that the McCain team is less confident in its chances in Virginia and North Carolina than it once was. Obama is advertising statewide in both places. More broadly, the expanded buy suggests that the McCain team is being forced by Obama's wider advertising map to play on a broader playing field than it had hoped to.

Here, according to the Dem operative, is a list of the new states (with markets in parentheses) that McCain and/or the RNC have reserved air time in for the week beginning on September 1:

North Carolina (Raleigh, Greensboro)

Minnesota (Minneapolis, Duluth)

Virginia: (Norfolk, Richmond, Roanoke, Tri Cities, Harrisonburg, Charlottesville)

With the exception of national ads, neither McCain nor the GOP had been up in those states until now. McCain had previously been advertising in a small corner of Virginia, to reach the D.C. market; he's now moving to expand into all those new Virginia markets above, suggesting that the Republicans see gains by Obama in the state.

That's not all. McCain and/or the RNC are reserving ad time in new markets in states they were already up in, according to the Dem operative. Here they are:

Iowa (Omaha, Ottumwa, Quincy)

New Hampshire (Portland, Burlington)

New Mexico (El Paso, Amarillo)

Nevada (Salt Lake)

It's unclear precisely where in the above new markets the McCain team is advertising and where the RNC is booking time; all the above markets, however, have now been booked by one of the two. The McCain campaign didn't return a request for comment.

The expansion -- which of course could be subject to change -- could be partly due to a desire to dump primary funds before McCain is the nominee. But it also clearly suggests a shift on the GOP's part to deal with the Obama campaign's aggressive advertising in 18 states.

Today in Ohio, new McCain veep pick Sarah Palin made a big play for Hillary voters by referencing her now-famous "18 million cracks in the glass ceiling" quote.

But Newsweek reports that back in March, at a Women and Leadership event held by the mag, Palin's view of Hillary wasn't quite as charitable:

Once onstage, together with Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano, Palin talked about what women expect from women leaders; how she took charge in Alaska during a political scandal that threatened to unseat the state's entire Republican power structure, and her feelings about Sen. Hillary Clinton. (She said she felt kind of bad she couldn't support a woman, but she didn't like Clinton's "whining.")

Via Politico. Imagine how surreal it's going to be when Palin evokes Hillary's name at the GOP convention -- and the arena cheers for her.

If you all dig up more past examples of Palin dissing her new heroine, please send along.

That's the estimate of how many people watched Obama's acceptance speech last night, according to Nielsen -- and that doesn't include people who watched on PBS or C-Span.

That's more Americans than watched the Olympics opening ceremony, the season finale of American Idol, or the Oscars.

That was quick. This morning, an ad from Sarah Palin's 2006 gubernatorial campaign featuring an endorsement from scandal-plagued Alaska Senator Ted Stevens was available on Palin's campaign Web site.

We were able to access it ourselves by clicking on the link:

...but now the Stevens ad has already been scrubbed. The link is no longer on her campaign site.

Luckily, the ad featuring Stevens and Palin is still available for your viewing pleasure!

Ah, the miracles of YouTube...

Barack Obama and Joe Biden have just released a new statement on McCain's pick of Sarah Palin that's noticeably praiseworthy and focused on its historic nature, in sharp contrast to the Obama campaign's earlier statement hammering her for "zero foreign policy experience."...

"We send our congratulations to Governor Sarah Palin and her family on her designation as the republican nominee for Vice President. It is yet another encouraging sign that old barriers are falling in our politics. While we obviously have differences over how best to lead this country forward Governor Palin is an admirable person and will add a compelling new voice to this campaign."

Obama's and Biden's allusion to barriers falling comes after Palin, at an Ohio rally today, made an aggressive bid for Hillary voters by referring to Hillary's well-known "18 million cracks in the glass ceiling" remark.

Today's Gallup tracking poll shows Barack Obama continuing to enjoy a convention bounce, and it may still be growing.

The numbers: Obama 49%, McCain 41%, well outside the ±2% margin of error. Yesterday, Obama was up by a 48%-42% margin, after having fallen behind McCain by two points in Gallup just as the convention was beginning. This morning's Rasmussen poll had Obama moving into a 49%-45% lead.

Note that this is a three-day sample that is just starting to take into account the impact from Bill Clinton's full-hearted endorsement of Obama, and we have yet to see any polling from after Obama's big speech last night.

Obama campaign spokesperson Bill Burton blasts out a statement on McCain's pick of Sarah Palin as Veep, and it's a direct hit:

"Today, John McCain put the former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience a heartbeat away from the presidency. Governor Palin shares John McCain's commitment to overturning Roe v. Wade, the agenda of Big Oil and continuing George Bush's failed economic policies -- that's not the change we need, it's just more of the same."

By any reasonable measure, the choice of someone as back-up commander-in-chief who has two years of experience running a small-population state should render McCain's primary campaign argument -- that Obama's alleged lack of commander-in-chief readiness is too risky in a dangerous world -- not just moot, but a running joke among political reporters and pundits alike.

McCain's surprise choice of Sarah Palin is a gamble that picking a solid conservative and non-Washington insider with a bit of a reformist record will outweigh the clear downside: That choosing someone with only two years in high office as back-up president undermines attacks on Obama's alleged lack of commander-in-chief readiness.

By any reasonable measure, Palin's resume should render it all but impossible to argue that Obama is too inexperienced for the gig of leader of the free world.

Palin has been in higher office as Governor of Alaska for exactly half the time Obama has been in the Senate. Before that, she served only two full terms in the City Council, from 1992 to 1996, before running for mayor of Wasilla.

To put this in perspective, Wasilla had a population of only 7,738 people as of 2004. By contrast, as TPM's Eric Kleefeld calculates, Obama's State Senate district had roughly 210,000 people -- about 27 times the number Palin repped in lower office.

Nor has Palin been tested in the grueling arena of national politics. She'll be forced to face off in a debate against Joe Biden, who's been in the Senate nearly 20 times as long as Palin has held higher office; Biden is well known to diplomats in world capitals.

On the plus side for McCain, Palin brings some much-needed "estrogen to the ticket," as one Obama hand remarked to us.

She's the sweetheart of Alaska: Attractive, young (44), a hockey mom, feminine and strong (beautiful and a member of the NRA!). Palin could appeal to a generation of women who respect strength and independence in women, but don't necessarily identify with the feminist movement. She has also managed to achieve higher office while coming across as someone who puts family before career.

There's a powerful maternal narrative, too: In April, she elected not to have an abortion when she discovered that her baby had Down's Syndrome. And for good measure, she also has a son in the army named "Track" who's set to deploy to Iraq.

Read more »

CNN is reporting that a "senior campaign source" confirmed McCain's pick of the Alaska governor.

First thought: If McCain's entire campaign is premised on the idea that Obama lacks the commander-in-chief readiness for the presidency, how on earth can he possibly continue to make this argument when he's chosen Palin, who's been in high office only two years (half the time Obama has been a Senator) as a back-up commander in chief?

More soon.

Another major tracking poll is showing the start of a convention bounce for Barack Obama. The latest numbers from Rasmussen: Obama 49%, McCain 45%, with a ±2% margin of error, up from a 47%-47% tie yesterday.

Bear in mind that this is a three-day rolling poll that stopped sampling some time yesterday -- meaning we've only just begun to see the impact of Bill and Hillary Clintons' speeches, and no impact at all from after Obama's big victory speech last night.

Yesterday's Gallup poll also showed a convention bounce, with Obama taking a solid 48%-42% lead.

Stay tuned for today's Gallup tracking poll, due at 1 p.m.

Report: McCain Veep Isn't Romney Or Pawlenty -- Who Is It???
John McCain is holding his big event at 12 p.m. ET today in Dayton, Ohio, where he will announce his running mate. MSNBC is reporting this morning that it won't be either Mitt Romney or Tim Pawlenty, the two previous frontrunners -- with the last-minute speculation now focusing on first-term Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.

The Obamas And Bidens In Pennsylvania Today
Barack Obama And Joe Biden, plus Michelle and Jill, are starting on their swing-state bus tour today, starting in Pennsylvania and then continuing over the next few days through Ohio and Michigan. They open tonight in Beaver, Pennsylvania, with a rally at 7:30 p.m. ET.

John McCain Turns 72
Today is John McCain's 72nd birthday. His best present: A whole lot of media hype today over his VP pick.

Report: Chartered Plane Leaves Alaska For Dayton
Jonathan Martin reports that a chartered airplane left Anchorage last night, with the destination being Dayton, Ohio -- the site of John McCain's vice-presidential announcement today. This has led to a lot of speculation that Palin is the pick.

GOP Considering Convention Delay
The Washington Post reports that the Republican Party is considering a delay to its national convention, in light of the expected landfall of Hurricane Gustav down in the Gulf Coast. Bear in mind that a convention has so many logistical complexities that it cannot be rescheduled, only have days and speaking slots completely chopped off -- which would seriously damage the GOP's efforts at staging a good pep rally.

Cindy McCain's Half-Sister: I'm Dead-Seat Against John And Cindy
In another soap-opera development in Cindy McCain's life, her estranged half-sister Kathleen Hensley Portalski says she's voting for Barack Obama. Here's what Portalski had to say about Cindy, who has described herself as an only child and refuses to acknowledge Portalski: "I question whether Cindy is someone I'd want to see in the White House as first lady."

The ultimate irony of tonight's speech may be that John McCain's attacks on Obama as a celeb lighweight may have actually forced Obama to make a stronger, more grounded, and more politically-effective speech than he otherwise might have.

Obama proved tonight -- again -- that he's one of the few most gifted public communicators of the last generation. But this time, he proved it by not excelling in soaring rhetoric or delivering a speech that will be remembered for the ages. Rather, he recognized that tonight's speech didn't have to be an effort to join the Rhetorical Hall of Fame.

Obama has been getting hammered for weeks now by Republicans as a puffed-up showman who loves the sound of his own voice when it fills stadiums. This clearly created some consternation among Dems and Obama advisers, and Obama adjusted accordingly.

No question, Obama hit plenty of emotional and rhetorical high notes as he ran through his bio and promised a tough fight with the Republicans. But the speech was strong because of its specificity -- because it laid out a detailed case as to why he's the right choice, and McCain's the wrong choice.

Indeed, the McCain campaign's response shows that the speech was effective. It said nothing whatsoever about the specifics that were in the speech. McCain's response could have been written before Obama ever delivered his speech:

"Tonight, Americans witnessed a misleading speech that was so fundamentally at odds with the meager record of Barack Obama. When the temple comes down, the fireworks end, and the words are over, the facts remain: Senator Obama still has no record of bipartisanship, still opposes offshore drilling, still voted to raise taxes on those making just $42,000 per year, and still voted against funds for American troops in harm's way. The fact remains: Barack Obama is still not ready to be President."

Obama's speech was effective precisely because he adjusted to the circumstances created by the weeks-long relentless attack on him by McCain and the GOP. As a result, Obama made the choice between him and McCain as clear as he could have. How about that?

Video soon.

Late Update: Ben Smith aptly points out that the McCain campaign's sneering response to the speech seems at odds with the McCain ad released earlier today that promised to lay off the negativity for this special day.

One noteworthy nugget in his speech: Obama delves into his biography and directly takes on McCain's "celeb" sneer attack.

Obama runs through the story of his mom, who raised him and his sister and once needed to turn to food stamps; his work organizing on the South Side of Chicago on behalf of laid off steel plant workers; and his grandmother, who made tough economic choices and "taught me about hard work."

Then Obama hits the celeb line...

I don't know what kind of lives John McCain thinks that celebrities lead, but this has been mine. These are my heroes. Theirs are the stories that shaped me. And it is on their behalf that I intend to win this election and keep our promise alive as President of the United States.

It must be said that that's artful. It's mocking, rather than defensive. Rather than saying, "No, I'm not a celebrity, as McCain says," he's saying, "McCain's silly buffoonish celeb attack shows that he's the one who's out of touch with what ordinary people want from a president right now."

The speech pads this out with an extensive populist attack on McCain, and a detailed explanation of what Obama will do differently from McCain on the economy.

Good.

To Chairman Dean and my great friend Dick Durbin; and to all my fellow citizens of this great nation;

With profound gratitude and great humility, I accept your nomination for the presidency of the United States.

Let me express my thanks to the historic slate of candidates who accompanied me on this journey, and especially the one who traveled the farthest -- a champion for working Americans and an inspiration to my daughters and to yours -- Hillary Rodham Clinton. To President Clinton, who last night made the case for change as only he can make it; to Ted Kennedy, who embodies the spirit of service; and to the next Vice President of the United States, Joe Biden, I thank you. I am grateful to finish this journey with one of the finest statesmen of our time, a man at ease with everyone from world leaders to the conductors on the Amtrak train he still takes home every night.

To the love of my life, our next First Lady, Michelle Obama, and to Sasha and Malia -- I love you so much, and I'm so proud of all of you.

Four years ago, I stood before you and told you my story -- of the brief union between a young man from Kenya and a young woman from Kansas who weren't well-off or well-known, but shared a belief that in America, their son could achieve whatever he put his mind to.

Read more »

The challenge for Al Gore is that criticizing the Bush years inevitably becomes a discussion of the 2000 election and a condemnation of the decision not to elect Gore (or not to grant him a big enough electoral victory so it couldn't be stolen from him).

But Gore directly embraces this aspect of the discussion, saying directly that we made the wrong choice in 2000. He evokes people's regret about choosing Bush over him as a way to infuse the current choice with even more emotional urgency:

Eight years ago, some said there was not much difference between the nominees of the two major parties and it didn't really matter who became president. Our nation was enjoying peace and prosperity. Some assumed we would continue both, no matter the outcome. But here we all are in 2008, and I doubt anyone would argue now that election didn't matter.

Take it from me, if it had ended differently, we would not be bogged down in Iraq, we would have pursued bin Laden until we captured him. We would not be facing a self-inflicted economic crisis; we would be fighting for middle-income families. We would not be showing contempt for the Constitution; we'd be protecting the rights of every American regardless of race, religion, disability, gender or sexual orientation. And we would not be denying the climate crisis; we'd be solving it.

Today, we face essentially the same choice we faced in 2000, though it may be even more obvious now, because John McCain, a man who has earned our respect on many levels, is now openly endorsing the policies of the Bush-Cheney White House and promising to actually continue them. The same policies all over again?

Gore's full speech after the jump.

Late Update: Here's video of Gore discussing 2000...

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Okay, a bit of a different post from your usual Election Central fare. Since we're listening to Stevie Wonder right now at the convention, here's another Wonder tune for anyone who's worried about how this election is going to turn out (one of my faves):

We've still got time to kill until the main event, so enjoy.

Some excerpts of Obama's speech have just been sent out by the campaign, and they suggest that tonight Obama will do what he's done to such great effect for the last 18 months: Insist that his audience think big; demand that we do better than we think we can.

And he'll fuse that demand with a sharply-worded critique of the GOP and its performance over the last eight years, as well as of McCain's policies.

"America, we are better than these last eight years," Obama will say. "We are a better country than this."

As he has many times in the past, Obama will demand that his audience see this election as a momentous historic choice, similar to other moments where the road of history has forked -- a reading that of course recommends him, but also has the virtue of being entirely accurate.

"We meet at one of those defining moments -- a moment when our nation is at war, our economy is in turmoil, and the American promise has been threatened once more," Obama will say.

Obama will argue that to choose the Republicans will be to take the wrong road at this crossroads of history.

"This moment -- this election -- is our chance to keep, in the 21st century, the American promise alive," he'll say. "Because next week, in Minnesota, the same party that brought you two terms of George Bush and Dick Cheney will ask this country for a third. And we are here because we love this country too much to let the next four years look just like the last eight. On November 4th, we must stand up and say: `Eight is enough.'

Obama, as expected, will also laud Bill Clinton's presidency, and hold it up as a yardstick of what the Democratic Party thinks of as progress.

"We Democrats have a very different measure of what constitutes progress in this country," Obama will say. "We measure progress in the 23 million new jobs that were created when Bill Clinton was President -- when the average American family saw its income go up $7,500 instead of down $2,000 like it has under George Bush."

Obama will counter attacks on his national security readiness with the familiar evocation of Roosevelt and Kennedy.

"Don't tell me that Democrats won't defend this country," he'll say. "Don't tell me that Democrats won't keep us safe."

"As Commander-in-Chief, I will never hesitate to defend this nation, but I will only send our troops into harm's way with a clear mission and a sacred commitment to give them the equipment they need in battle and the care and benefits they deserve when they come home."

More excerpts after the jump.

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Obama campaign manager David Plouffe had a sharp response to McCain's nice-guy congratulatory ad:

"A very nice gesture," Plouffe said. "We wish more of his ads took that tone."

Actually, Plouffe could have said, "We wish more of his ads took that tone -- including today, the day McCain is saying is so historic."

After all, earlier today McCain released a Web ad using the words of fellow Dems during the primary to attack Obama. Separately, the Republican National Committee blasted out a bunch of press clips deriding Obama's speech platform as a "God-like setting" and an "Obama temple."

What happened? Wasn't today supposed to be special?

Okay, this is interesting: The Obama campaign is now running ads responding to the Swift-Boating Obama-Ayers spot at a significantly faster pace than the original spot itself is running.

It's yet another sign that the Obama campaign is dead serious about sinking real resources into real media buys responding to such attacks, thus using rebuttal ads to saturate the local markets where the attack spots are running.

On August 26th -- the last date for which info is available -- the American Issues Project, the group behind the spot tying Obama to the former Weatherman, ran the ad 304 times in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Virginia.

On that same day, the Obama campaign aired its response ad some 550 times -- nearly twice as many times -- in those same four states.

According to Evan Tracey, who tracks national ad buys for the Campaign Media Analysis Group and supplied us with these numbers, this shows that the Obama campaign's response is overtaking the ad itself in frequency.

"If current trends continue, Obama will be drowning out those ads," Tracey says.

The numbers tell the story. AIP has run the Ayers spot a total of 730 times overall as of the end of the 26th. Obama started running his response ad later, but it has already run nearly as many times overall -- 643. And on the 26th, Obama's ad ran significantly more times -- indicating that he's now running his response at a higher pace, Tracey says.

"Obama won't be outgunned. That's one of the advantages of having money," Tracey concludes. "The Obama campaign is not afraid to deviate from its national message to put out these local fires."

So here's the ad the McCain campaign has been hyping all day -- it's a spot that will run during tonight's speech in which McCain, directly addressing the camera, congratulates Obama for his achievement:

"Senator Obama, this is truly a good day for America," McCain says, adding:

"How perfect that your nomination would come on this historic day. Tomorrow, we'll be back at it. But tonight, Senator, job well done."

The McCain campaign is releasing this spot seemingly designed to counter his growing image as the negative campaigner in this race on a day when there's no way to detract from the overwhelming historical resonance of Obama's appearance in any case.

Full script after the jump.

Read more »

Priorities, priorities.

Check out this Karl Rove quote buried in a Fox News article about the threat Hurricane Gustav poses to the GOP's convention plans:

"The Republicans can't seem to get a break when it comes to August and when it comes to the weather," said Rove, a FOX News analyst. "I know this is being thought a lot about in Washington and at the White House and discussed and I suspect they will monitor it carefully and figure out what to do."

Yeah, Katrina (which hit in August 2005) was really rough on those Republicans, no question about it.

Special thanks to TPM Reader AC for the catch.

Barack Obama might just might be getting a convention bounce, if today's Gallup tracking poll is to be believed.

The new numbers: Obama 48%, McCain 42%, outside the ±2% margin of error. Just two days ago, Gallup had McCain up 46%-44%.

The pollster's analysis points out there is a lag in polling as we wait for the bounce -- a given day's poll release doesn't include sampling that might reflect any reaction to speeches from the night before, so it took us until today just to see any impact from Hillary's Clinton's speech on Tuesday.

As such, we haven't yet seen the impact of Bill Clinton speech last night, and we'll need to wait for Saturday to see the impact from Obama's tonight -- and we're already seeing a bounce in Gallup..

A caveat: The Rasmussen tracking poll doesn't have any bounce yet -- Obama and McCain are tied at 47%-47%, not significantly changed from the past few days.

There's yet another round of rumors today to the effect that Colin Powell is being seriously considered as McCain's Veep.

So we checked in with his spokesperson, Peggy Cifrino, who told us that the answer is definitely, positively, and unequivocally NO!

"There is absolutely no truth to this whatsoever," Cifrino emailed us.

When we asked if Powell had been vetted, she continued: "He is busy with his own life and has said repeatedly that he has no interest in being a vice presidential candidate. He has NOT filled out any vetting papers and there is just no truth to this."

Hmmm. That might mean that the answer is No. Unless...

To our knowledge, this new ad from the South Carolina Republican Party is the first ad to focus exclusively on McCain's POW captivity.

The spot is set to run in Minneapolis starting tomorrow and through the GOP convention, a South Carolina GOP spokesperson confirms. It hits directly back at Obama for his criticism of McCain's number-of-houses flub:

"This is the story of a John McCain home you might not know about," the ad opens, and follows with footage dramatizing McCain getting shot down. After showing shots of a prison cell, the spot continues:

"This is where John McCain was starved, beaten, tortured, and maimed for life. So the next time Barack Obama talks about one of John McCain's homes, remember this one."

The spot suggests that surrogates in the states will soon start pushing the POW-POW-POWing in earnest, in a way that even McCain himself might not be willing to do.

( Via Palmetto Scoop.)

Late Update: South Carolina GOP spokesperson Rob Godfrey emails that the spot will run on cable in Minneapolis-St. Paul beginning tomorrow and will run through the GOP convention. I've edited the above to reflect this.

This is starting to get more and more attention today: In an interview with the Dallas Morning News, a health care policy adviser to John McCain appeared to suggest that anyone with access to an emergency room effectively has health insurance.

The adviser, John Goodman, who is not paid by the McCain campaign but is widely quoted as one of the campaign's advisers and an author of McCain's health care policy, offered the following solution to the health care crisis to the paper:

"So I have a solution. And it will cost not one thin dime," Mr. Goodman said. "The next president of the United States should sign an executive order requiring the Census Bureau to cease and desist from describing any American -- even illegal aliens -- as uninsured. Instead, the bureau should categorize people according to the likely source of payment should they need care.

"So, there you have it. Voila! Problem solved."

The problem with this analysis, according to an expert quoted in the article, is that people without insurance are less likely to seek non-emergency-room care, which ultimately drives up the cost to the health care system.

In the interview, Goodman elaborated by suggesting that the truly uninsured are those who are denied care.

"So instead of producing worthless statistics that people fling around in vacuous editorials and pointless debates, the Census Bureau should produce meaningful numbers, identifying all of the sources of funds people will draw on if they need medical care," Goodman concluded.

More on this in a bit.

Late Update: The McCain campaign is now saying that Goodman is not an adviser. Oddly enough, there were multiple press reports in the past few months identifying him this way that have yet to be corrected.

Late Late Update: Here's a statement from the McCain campaign saying that this guy was an adviser, but no longer...

Mr. Goodman volunteered his advice to the campaign in the past. However, his philosophy on health care -- and especially on the urgency of the problems faced by 45 million uninsured Americans -- are clearly out of step with John McCain. Earlier this summer the campaign informed Mr. Goodman that his advice was not required and requested that he not identify himself as being associated with the campaign in any way, including as a volunteer. John McCain could not disagree more strongly with Mr. Goodman. John McCain believes that addressing the problem of the nation's uninsured is one of our most pressing national priorities. That's why the McCain plan will, for the first time, bring health coverage within the reach of every American.

POW-POW-POW hyperinflation alert!

In an interview with KDKA radio in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, John McCain POW-POW-POWed when asked about charges that he's an elitist who's out of touch with the American worker on kitchen-table issues.

McCain: Well you know I have town hall meetings all the time, everywhere across this country, and I hear from people....

And in all due respect my friends, I know what it's like to not have a house, I know what it's like not to have a kitchen table. I know what it's like not to have a table or a chair. For five and a half years, I sat in a cell with nothing but concrete floor and three boards to sleep on.

This underscores again the degree to which the McCain campaign wants the discussion about the economy to morph into a conversation about character, rather than a discussion of, you know, actual policy differences. Dems say McCain's policies show that he's out of touch with the real needs of working people. McCain replies that his POW past shows he knows what it's like to struggle, which he hopes will settle the question of whether he's out of touch or not.

Once that question has been settled to McCain's satisfaction, there's no longer any need to meaningfully engage in an argument about what our understanding of what it's like to struggle should lead us to actually do to alleviate people's economic problems on a policy level.

John McCain gave an odd interview to Time magazine in which he got testy and irritable when asked to define the word "honor"...

There's a theme that recurs in your books and your speeches, both about putting country first but also about honor. I wonder if you could define honor for us?

Read it in my books.

I've read your books.

No, I'm not going to define it.

But honor in politics?

I defined it in five books. Read my books.

This is pretty interesting, because in many ways the word "honor" is central to McCain's political persona and his campaign's efforts to draw a contrast with Obama.

McCain has repeatedly said that our goal in Iraq is for the troops to return with "honor." The McCain campaign's main premise has been to suggest that his motives are honorable while his opponent's are suspect. He's repeatedly promised an honorable campaign, too -- even as his campaign regularly accuses Obama of treason.

So asking McCain to define "honor" seems like a fair question.

Shorter McCain: Who the heck are you to ask me to define the platitudes that my entire campaign is built on?

Many of you wrote in last night to say that John Kerry's speech was actually the sleeper hit of last night's festivities -- and many of you wanted a thread for it.

Well, ask and ye shall receive...

Where was this man in 2004?

Anyone wondering how Joe Lieberman would impact John McCain's chances among Jewish voters could do worse than looking at this new Mason-Dixon poll in the state -- it finds that twice as many voters are less likely to support McCain with Lieberman as Veep.

Twenty-seven percent of voters in Florida, where there's a large concentration of Jewish voters, say they're less likely to back McCain with Lieberman on the ticket. Half that -- 14% -- say they're more likely. Fifty-six percent say Lieberman's presence would make no difference.

Polls have shown that Lieberman on the ticket would even hurt McCain in his home state of Connecticut. If Lieberman hurts McCain in Connecticut and Florida, where the heck would Lieberman help him?

Tonight: Obama's Acceptance Speech, And Good Weather
Barack Obama will give his big speech tonight at Invesco Field, ceremonially accepting the Democratic nomination before a packed football stadium on the 45th anniversary of Martin Luther King's "I Have A Dream" speech. And Nature seems to be on his side: The weather forecast for Denver tonight predicts mild temperatures and no precipitation that might have ruined his outdoor speech.

Obama And Biden To Embark On Bus Tour After Convention
The full Democratic ticket of Barack Obama and Joe Biden, plus their wives Michelle Obama and Jill Biden, will be heading off on a bus tour through three key swing states after the convention is over. The first stop is tomorrow in Beaver, Pennsylvania, with the tour set to also take them through Ohio and Michigan.

McCain In Ohio Tonight
John McCain will be traveling to Ohio tonight, where he's expected to kick off a pre-convention campaign swing that will include the announcement of his running mate. Press reports indicate that McCain has made his final decision of who his running mate will be, leaving us all to await the announcement.

Report: Rove Worked To Stop Potential Lieberman Veep Pick
Jonathan Martin reports that Karl Rove himself, concerned over John McCain's ability to hold on to the conservative base, approached Joe Lieberman and asked him to tell John McCain not to pick him for vie president. Lieberman reportedly turned down the request.

Connecticut Delegates Demand Lieberman Be Punished
The Hill reports that many Connecticut's delegates to the Democratic Convention are adamant that Joe Lieberman be punished by the Democratic Party for his support of John McCain. "I can't wait until we expand our majority in the Senate so he can be stripped of his committee," said Jennifer Just, a delegate from Woodbridge.

Bobby Rush: Obama Became A Better Pol After I Beat Him
Illinois Congressman Bobby Rush, who easily turned back a primary challenge in 2000 from an unknown state senator named Barack Obama, told Roll Call that the 2000 race made Obama a better candidate: "He took the loss very seriously and the it taught him a little bit about humility. And I believe that it serves him well now -- having a humble spirit."

Terry Mac: I Might Run For Governor Of Virginia
Terry McAuliffe, who made his name this campaign as one of the most vociferous and entertaining spokespeople for Hillary Clinton, is apparently considering a run for governor of Virginia in 2009. If McAuliffe runs he will likely have to face a couple candidates who are already lining up support, but nobody can say he isn't energetic on the stump.

After Joe Biden's speech, Obama made a surprise appearance at the convention and hailed the Biden family while offering strong words of praise for, and reconciliation towards, both Clintons, on the last night that he'll be in the same venue as the two of them.

Obama's appearance was made possible by the fact that he's appearing elsewhere tomorrow -- at Invesco Field -- so an appearance here didn't risk shattering any of tomorrow's expected magic.

Obama's relaxed but rollicking appearance, coming after the good-natured and down-to-earth speech from Biden, was excellent political theater, projecting the sense that the extreme tensions of the primary have finally broken and the Democratic family is raucous and united, and full of energy.

Obama offered strong, but hardly over-the-top, praise to both Clintons.

"If I'm not mistaken, Hillary Clinton rocked the house last night," Obama shouted in a relaxed tone, while the two Clintons applauded.

Obama then offered a brief but powerful testament to Bill Clinton's presidency -- a moment that Bill and many others have been waiting for -- in the words of Bill himself.

"And just in case you were wondering, I think President Bill Clinton reminded us of what it's like when you've got a president who actually puts people first," Obama said, as Bill beamed. "Thank you, President Clinton."

It'll be interesting to see whether Obama offers a more extensive testimonial to Bill's presidency tomorrow. For now, suffice it to say that this was a very successful piece of political theater from a man whose extraordinary skills at public communication continue to astonish.

Meanwhile, Biden's speech was surprisingly tilted towards a populist economic critique of Bush and McCain, given that tonight was billed as national security night -- another sign that Biden's populist cred will allow him to be the lead attack-dog on the economy. Full text of Biden's speech after the jump.

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Bill's ability to frame the big choices in a campaign is legendary, so it's worth looking at his speech's framing of the choice in this election:

The choice is clear. The Republicans will nominate a good man who served our country heroically and suffered terribly in Vietnam. He loves our country every bit as much as we all do. As a Senator, he has shown his independence on several issues.

But on the two great questions of this election, how to rebuild the American Dream and how to restore America's leadership in the world, he still embraces the extreme philosophy which has defined his party for more than 25 years, a philosophy we never had a real chance to see in action until 2001, when the Republicans finally gained control of both the White House and Congress. Then we saw what would happen to America if the policies they had talked about for decades were implemented.

Note Bill's formulation on the patriotism question: "He loves our country every bit as much as we all do." That's not a defensive formulation. It's not: "We do love our country as much as he does." Rather, it starts from the premise that Dems are patriotic.

Bill also leads people through what they've heard about McCain -- he's made terrible sacrifices on behalf of his country; he has shown signs of unorthodoxy -- to the conclusion that there are big choices lurking beyond those character issues: What to do about the economy, and how to relate to the rest of the world. Once the character issues are taken off the table, the choice on the bigger issues is clear: Between the party that made a hash of things on these big questions, and the one that has succeeded on them.

Bill Clinton did two things in his speech: Offered a full-throated endorsement of Obama's readiness to do the job he did; and harnessed the emotional power of nostalgic memories of his own victory and presidency in order to galvanize Democrats and swing them fully behind Obama.

Bill sought to dispel questions about Obama's readiness by linking Obama's experience of presidential politics directly to his own: Bill, too, was tarred as too youthful and unready to lead America in a dangerous world...

My fellow Democrats, sixteen years ago, you gave me the profound honor to lead our party to victory and to lead our nation to a new era of peace and broadly shared prosperity.

Together, we prevailed in a campaign in which the Republicans said I was too young and too inexperienced to be Commander-in-Chief. Sound familiar? It didn't work in 1992, because we were on the right side of history. And it won't work in 2008, because Barack Obama is on the right side of history.

During the primary, the Clintons sought to turn Obama's youth and inexperience against him; at a time when McCain is attacking Obama's readiness daily, and even using the words of the Clintons to do this, Bill sought to dispel these attacks by evoking Democrats' nostalgia for his own successful triumph over similar attacks 16 years ago.

Again and again, Bill attested to Obama's commander in chief readiness -- something that Hillary questioned during the primary, leaving her hamstrung and unable to make the case Bill did tonight.

"He has shown a clear grasp of our foreign policy and national security challenges," Bill said.

Bill also attested to Obama's toughness, something that Hillary also questioned aggressively during the primary.

"He will choose diplomacy first and military force as a last resort," Bill said. "But in a world troubled by terror; by trafficking in weapons, drugs and people; by human rights abuses; by other threats to our security, our interests, and our values, when he cannot convert adversaries into partners, he will stand up to them."

At a time when some Democrats are still struggling to come to terms emotionally with Obama's defeat of Hillary, Bill also conferred the emotional power of his 1992 victory and presidency on Obama's candidacy by using one word: "Hope." It's a word that of course evokes Bill's famous "still believe in a place called hope" line and links it directly to Obama's "politics of hope."

Barack Obama will lead us away from division and fear of the last eight years back to unity and hope. If, like me, you still believe America must always be a place called Hope, then join Hillary, Chelsea and me in making Senator Barack Obama the next President of the United States.

It's hard to imagine a better one-two punch for Obama than Hillary yesterday and Bill today. This presidential race is dramatically different than it was a mere 24 hours ago.

As Hillary did last night, Bill hits the key point at the very start: There should be no doubt whatsoever that he's 100 percent behind Barack Obama.

Bill makes the point by revisiting Hillary's successful speech last night.

"Last night, Hillary told us in no uncertain terms that she is going to do everything she can to elect Barack Obama."

After a pause: "That makes two of us."

Bill then does again what Hillary did last night: Try to corral the passions unleashed by Hillary's candidacy and swing them behind Obama, by bringing up the now-emotionally-charged 18-million number.

"Actually, that makes 18 million of us," Bill said. "Because like Hillary, I want all of you who supported her to vote for Barack Obama in November."

Bill then comes through where he needed to: Offering a full-throated endorsement of Obama's readiness to do the job he did.

"Everything I learned in my eight years as president, and in the work I have done since in America and across the globe, have convinced me that Barack Obama is the man for this job."

Bill Clinton enters to the same Fleetwood Mac song that was the theme of his 1992 campaign.

"That campaign generated so much heat, it increased global warming," Bill says of the Democratic Primary.

Clinton aides start leaking details to the Associated Press about Bill's big speech tonight, promising that Bill will unequivocally argue that Obama is ready to assume the job he did for eight years:

Former President Clinton, setting aside his own criticism and ambivalence, planned a full-throated endorsement Wednesday of Barack Obama as a leader ready to confront any challenge....

Clinton aides said that in his prime-time speech the former president would argue forcefully that Obama is prepared for the domestic, foreign and national security challenges that will arise in the coming years.

If this proves true, it means that the task of vouching for Obama's commander-in-chief readiness -- which Hillary didn't directly vouch for, as Republicans pointed out -- has been granted to Bill. Hillary, after all, had questioned Obama's national security preparedness in a high-profile way, making it harder for her to offer a strong endorsement of it yesterday.

Bill, by contrast, was not as directly vocal on this subject during the primary. So he's less hamstrung from making the case now. And since he was president himself, he's uniquely qualified to discuss what the job entails and vouch for Obama's preparedness for it.

One other tidbit:

The wide-ranging, roughly eight-minute speech also focused on Democrats' policy achievements, including Clinton's own.

Clinton's task tonight will be to argue convincingly that Obama is well positioned to pick up where the last Democratic president left off, without appearing to be flacking his own accomplishments too aggressively. It's been widely reported that Bill feels that his achievements were given short shrift by Obama, so observers will be scrutinizing every syllable that comes out of Bill's mouth for signs that he's trying to reopen the discussion over his own presidency.

On the day that Obama makes history by becoming the first African American to be nominated by a major political party, the McCain campaign launches an attack that also draws on history -- relatively ancient history -- pointing out that ...

... forty years ago today, former Weatherman Bill Ayers was arrested for protesting the activities of the Democratic National Committee.

"For those Democrats who are too young to have a proper appreciation of their party's history," goes the McCain camp's statement, "which likely includes most of Senator Obama's supporters, we direct your attention to a memorable moment in DNC history that shows how the current nominee really is connected to the party's past as much as its future."

Here's the response from the Obama camp, where spirits are high today:

That's a picture of young Barack Obama, seven years old, about the same time that Ayers was arrested.

Gotta say, this was a really bad day for the Repubs to rely on history for an attack as petty as this one.

Hillary Clinton has just taken to the convention floor and moved to end the ceremonial roll call vote, officially nominating Barack Obama for president.

"With appreciation for the spirit and dedication of all who are gathered here, with eyes firmly fixed on the future," Hillary said, "in the spirit of unity, with the goal of unity, with faith in our party and our country, let's declare together in one voice, right here, right now, that Barack Obama is our candidate and he will be our president."

Hillary then formally registered her motion, which then passed as expected, followed by Nancy Pelosi announcing that Obama has informed the convention that he accepts the nomination -- making Obama the first African-American to be nominated by a major party for president.

Late Update: Here's the video:

You've no doubt heard about the GOP's valient efforts to make an issue today out of this Reuters story reporting that Obama will make his Thursday speech before a reproduction of "an elaborately columned stage resembling a miniature Greek temple."

The Republican National Committee blasted the news out to reporters under the title "audacity watch." Lots of wingers have been chortling about this, too. We assume the idea, if you can call it that, is to suggest Obama believes he's a Greek god or something like that. You know, celeb meets the ancient Greeks. Get it?

But of course, as Ben Smith notes, in 2004 Bush accepted his nomination before a backdrop of Greek revival columns, too. Here's an image:

This 2004 ceremony, of course, would have been partly produced by none other than the RNC.

A new round of polls today shows a continued close race in four key battleground states that all voted for George W. Bush in 2004, but there is reason for cautious optimism about Barack Obama.

A new University of Akron poll shows Ohio to be tied: Obama 40%, McCain 40%. The internals show just how important Democratic unity is for Obama: Only 45% of people who voted for Hillary Clinton in the Ohio primary say they'll vote for Obama, with 29% going for McCain and the rest undecided -- but as this poll totally predates Hillary's big speech at the convention, this could change.

And a new round of CNN polls in three Western states shows Obama generally doing quite well:

• He's up 53%-40% in New Mexico, well outside the ±4% margin of error.

• He's up 49%-44% in Nevada, with a ±4% margin of error -- contrary to other recent polls that have McCain ahead here.

• However, McCain is given a slight edge in the potentially pivotal state of Colorado: McCain 47%, Obama 46%, with a ±4% margin of error. This poll was taken partly during the Dem Convention in Denver, so it's still possible that the convention in its entirety can produce a local bounce.

Late Update: In addition, the CNN poll has Obama up 48%-43% in Pennsylvania.

At a press conference today, Rudy pulled a bit of a whoopsie, saying: "This is not the time to have somebody who has no executive experience as President of the United States."

That's a bit off message, because McCain himself arguably has no serious executive experience -- certainly not recently. The only thing the campaign claims as exec experience was his role running a Navy unit of 1,000 people, a role which some have seen as constituting that sort of background, though others have disputed this.

But McCain's political career from 1982 onwards has been entirely in the legislature. And guess who didn't think McCain's Navy work constituted executive experience only a few months ago? Why, Rudy didn't, that's who!

In January of 2008, Rudy was asked by Larry King whether he thought he was more qualified in national security than McCain. "I do, Larry, because of my executive experience," Rudy said

"But after all, as a senator, John one is one of a hundred," Rudy also said, adding: "I had to make decisions."

The kicker: At today's presser, Rudy also alluded to quotes from other Dems during the primary questioning Obama's readiness to be president -- just as Rudy himself, as we have seen, did of McCain.

The House GOP campaign committee's new batch of ad reservations clearly shows that the GOP has completely given up on even trying to regain the House -- they're just doing their best to limit another big loss of seats.

We've obtained the details of the reservation from a Republican source, and it sure does make for interesting reading. Of the 14 district targeted this round, only three of them are actually held by Dems, making up barely over one-fifth of the total money set to be spent on offense.

By contrast, the Dems' TV reservations for this Fall put about two-thirds of their projected spending on offense against the GOP. That's a huge, huge disparity in the Dems' favor, and portends more massive gains for them this Fall.

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On Fox News just now, Howard Wolfson unleashed a broad attack on MSNBC and its top on-air personalities, slamming the network's coverage of Bill and Hillary, hitting back at Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann for using his work for Fox to question his Democratic credentials, and blasting MSNBC as having been "taken over" by "antics."

The broadside from Wolfson, who has until now mostly refrained from publicly critiquing MSNBC despite months of deep unhappiness within Hillaryland about the network's coverage of her, is a declaration of open war against MSNBC and two of its most visible political commentators that likely will only escalate from here.

"I'm not gonna take any lectures on how to be a good Democrat from two people who spent the last two years relentlessly attacking Bill and Hillary Clinton everyday," Wolfson said on the air moments ago, when asked by the Fox anchor to respond to some criticism of Wolfson on MSNBC yesterday.

Wolfson's decision to unload on MSNBC was triggered by some particularly barbed comments about Wolfson from Olbermann and Matthews yesterday. Matthews slammed Wolfson as Fox's "little toy soldier," while Olbermann joked that Wolfson is Fox's "Tokyo Rose."

"I think it's unfortunate that a news organization with a great tradition like NBC has been taken over by those kind of antics," Wolfson said.

Shortly afterward, he added, "Nobody has spent more time over the last two years attacking Democrats than Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews, and I'm just not going to get lectured on how to be a good Democrat from them."

In a brief interview with me, Wolfson said he decided he couldn't let such comments go unanswered anymore.

"I've let previous comments like this pass," Wolfson said, "and I wasn't gonna stand for it anymore. I've spent my entire adult life working for Democratic causes and candidates and I'm not gonna have my credentials challenged."

As I reported some months ago, Wolfson was one of several top Hillary advisers who privately complained to MSNBC brass about the on-air treatment of Hillary, but unlike some other top Hillary supporters didn't make his gripes with the network publicly known. No longer.

Fox News has been publicly feuding with MSNBC, and in a topsy-turvy twist, Wolfson, a lifelong and loyal Democrat, has now lobbed a heavy bomb -- from Fox's side, though it was on his own behalf.

Late Update: Here's video...

(The following is an interview of Senator Joe Biden, conducted by Josh Marshall in early Summer 2004.)

Josh Marshall: There's several points I wanted to touch on, and a number of these -- if you can answer them descriptively, or prescriptively I'd be interested in both. One of the main points of the piece, a hypothetical Democratic administration 9 months from now, what the continuities and discontinuities would be with where Clinton left off in 2000. I mean obviously the chessboard has moved all around, and that's a given, but on an issue like North Korea, an issue like Iran, the Atlantic relationship and so forth, and broad kind of questions about how you mix diplomatic muscle and military force. What would you identify as the main continuities and main discontinuities? Again, either descriptively or prescriptively.

Joe Biden: I wouldn't even try. I wouldn't. I don't think you can connect those dots prescriptively or descriptively. I think it is a false -- I think the paradigm is the wrong one. I mean I think it is literally impossible to suggest how the policies of the Clinton administration would be continued, augmented, changed, morphed, discarded in the year 2005. The world has fundamentally changed since he left office and the damage done to our relationships around the world, coupled with the emergence of what was a perceived threat -- but even the Clinton administration never fully contemplated knowingly the potential consequence of a serious international terrorist organization coordinating a lethal attack against the United States. There isn't anybody who wrote about it.

I made a speech on September the 10th to the Press Club. I laid out in great detail what it was I thought we should be doing and how this administration was squandering the opportunity to deal with this threat of terror. But the truth was that I don't think that anybody contemplated -- I didn't anyway -- contemplated how not only the psyche of the country but the psyche of the world was changed by that event. And now so many pieces have been moved on the chess board, there are no straight lines -- I don't see, anyway. I could better answer the question in suggesting you ought to think how a Kerry administration would divert from or be -- or have continuity with a Bush administration

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It looks like the Obama campaign is wielding a sharp editing pen over the speeches Dems are giving at the convention.

Dennis Kucinich, for one, found one of his more barbed raw-meat partisan quips consigned to the cutting room floor:

The Obama campaign struck just one line from his speech, which slammed the Republicans and the Bush administration, according to a Democratic source.

That line, addressing Republicans, read: "They're asking for another four years -- in a just world, they'd get 10 to 20."

To be fair, calling for McCain, Bush and Cheney to be thrown in the slammer isn't exactly in sync with Obama's message of new politics and bipartisan reconciliation.

Here's an advance look at the latest film about McCain's wealth from Robert Greenwald and Brave New Films, the same outfit that did that recent video about McCain's McMansions.

This one reveals another big McCain property asset that's gotten little if any attention, reporting that McCain owns a parking lot in Phoenix, AZ, that the film claims is worth between $1.4 million and $2.4 million:

It's been blurbed here and there that the McCains own a parking lot, but this film airs footage and adds that it's being rented to the Arizona Diamondbacks, who charge fans $10 each (not all that expensive, really) to park there.

It's unclear how much potency this will have as a populist hit, but Brave New Films is trying to maximize it by tying it to his number-of-houses gaffe, reporting that "McCain's parking lot is worth over $1 million more than the average American home."

We're going to be digging into examples today of media figures desperate to find some way, any way, of arguing that Hillary's speech yesterday was in fact a tacit non-endorsement of Obama.

And here's a doozy of the first order. CBS News actually called up body-language experts and got them to say that her gestures "belied" her strongly-voiced support for the Illinois Senator. Said one expert...

"One of the things that you see is she has very limited hand gestures. And we look for hand gestures to tell us what's important. So, when we see them out, when we see them up, this is significant. And we saw them just a few times last night, but not enough. This was not an impassioned speech."

Breaking: Secret footage reveals Hillary delivered non-endorsement by blinking it in morse code!

Just awful.

There's a bit of buzz this morning about the fact that anonymous Hillary advisers supposedly suggested to The New York Times that her speech last night was partly driven by the fact that she would run for president in 2012 should Obama lose, and to that end wanted to preserve goodwill within the party.

For instance, MSNBC's political team, headed by Chuck Todd (one of the best and fairest in the biz), wrote this morning that it was an example of her "staff" screwing her over by leaking stuff anonymously that trampled on the speech.

This strikes me as a major jumping of the gun, however. The Times passage in question, by Patrick Healy, reads:

Mrs. Clinton is almost certain to run for president in 2012 if Mr. Obama fails this time, several Clinton advisers said Tuesday, and any such plan could possibly founder if the Clintons' negative feelings show through this year.

Reading anything into this is a serious reach. Everyone knows that the term "adviser" is a notoriously slippery one. Most political reporters have spoken to lots of people who call themselves "advisers" to Hillary who are anything but. MSNBC's team knows this full well, but nonetheless for some reason calls this a reference to her "staff."

And it's hard to know what this Times reporting even means, if anything. It's perfectly possible that the Times reporter introduced the topic by asking an "adviser" or two if she might run in 2012 if Obama lost and got an offhand "yeah, probably," in return.

Was Hillary's speech partly motivated by a desire to maintain good standing in the party with an eye towards the future? No doubt, but to inject this hint of ambition and scheming into the coverage based on the paraphrasing of a few anonymous "advisers" is a crappy thing to do.

The new McCain ad released this morning attacking Obama on Iran rips Obama's words out of context so egregiously that it amounts to a distortion at best and an outright smear at worst.

The ad's narrator says: "Obama says Iran is a 'tiny' country. 'Doesn't pose a serious threat.' Terrorism? Destroying Israel? Those aren't serious threats?"

The quote where Obama supposedly said that Iran "doesn't pose a serious threat" was delivered by him on May 18, 2008, according to the date flashed by the ad itself.

But in juxtaposing that truncated quote with "terrorism" and "destroying Israel," the ad badly distorts what Obama actually said that day, and more broadly, also distorts Obama's position on Iran.

Here is the full May 18th Obama quote, as supplied by the McCain press release itself:

"Strong countries and strong Presidents talk to their adversaries. That's what Kennedy did with Khrushchev. That's what Reagan did with Gorbachev. That's what Nixon did with Mao. I mean think about it. Iran, Cuba, Venezuela -- these countries are tiny compared to the Soviet Union. They don't pose a serious threat to us the way the Soviet Union posed a threat to us. And yet we were willing to talk to the Soviet Union at the time when they were saying we're going to wipe you off the planet."

Very clearly, Obama didn't say that Iran doesn't pose any serious threat. Rather, he clearly said that Iran doesn't pose a serious threat to us the way the Soviet Union posed a threat to us.

What's more, Obama didn't simply say Iran was "tiny," as the ad suggests, in a clear effort to hoodwink viewers into thinking that Obama sees Iran as no threat at all. Rather, he said it was tiny compared to the Soviet Union.

These serious distortions are also at odds with Obama's actual positions on Iran. Obama has said that Iran is a threat to Israel.

For instance, on June 4, during a speech to AIPAC, Obama said: "There is no greater threat to Israel -- or to the peace and stability of the region -- than Iran."

Obama has also clearly said that Iran is a threat in the sense that it's liked to terrorism, despite the ad's suggestion that Obama doesn't see terror as a threat.

During his June 4th AIPAC speech, Obama said of Iran: "Its support for terrorism and threats toward Israel have increased."

Nothing like a bracing dose of lies to get your day off to a good start, huh?

New McCain Ad: Obama "Dangerously Unprepared" To Deal With Iran
The McCain campaign has a new ad out, which the campaign says will run in "key states," attacking Obama as "dangerously unprepared to be president" and confront the threat of Iran. The ad -- and it's a good question whether this will seriously run anywhere -- seems tailor-made to counter today's Dem convention theme of national security:

Tonight: Bill Clinton And Joe Biden To Address Convention
Tonight's theme for the Democratic Convention is national security, but two speakers in particular will get the most attention: Bill Clinton, who will have the tough job of following Hillary's speech for unity from last night, and Joe Biden, whose role will be to tear into John McCain as Barack Obama's running mate.

Obama In Montana Today
Barack Obama is campaigning today in Billings, Montana, a state that has been improbably brought into contention this election season.

McCain Off The Trail Today
John McCain does not have any announced public events for today.

NYT: Obama Camp Falling Short Of Fundraising Goals
The New York Times reports that the Obama campaign's fundraising totals, while impressive, are not enough to truly make it worth the time and effort he has to spend on fundraising in order to make up for the public money he has foregone. A source of the problem: Anemic fundraising from former Hillary Clinton donors, who only give about $4 million in June and July.

Don Young Just Barely Ahead In Alaska Primary
After a close vote count all night long, scandal-plagued GOP Rep. Don Young of Alaska seems to be just barely fending off primary challenger Sean Parnell -- which would drastically raise the Dems' chances of winning this seat in a deep-red state. With 97.9% of precincts reporting, Young is ahead by 145 votes out of nearly 85,000 between the two of them, and only nine precincts have yet to report.

Poll: McCain Ahead In Florida
A new poll of Florida from Strategic Vision (R) gives John McCain a 49%-42% lead in this big swing state. Recent polls have all given McCain the edge here, though his lead in this poll is a bit bigger than in the others.

Poll: Freshman Dem Faces Tight Race In Deep-Red District
A new SurveyUSA poll shows freshman Dem Congressman Chris Carney, who won his rural Pennsylvania district in 2006 thanks to the incumbent's scandals, is in a very tight race against his Republican opponent. Carney has 49% against GOP nominee Chris Hackett's 45%, within the ±4% margin of error.

A key challenge for Hillary was to persuade her supporters that the raw passions unleashed in them by her candidacy are about something larger than her, and are instead about the causes and goals and people she -- and the Democratic Party in general -- stand for.

Hillary took on this challenge head on, with this line addressed directly to her supporters:

I want you to ask yourselves: Were you in this campaign just for me? Or were you in it for that young Marine and others like him? Were you in it for that mom struggling with cancer while raising her kids? Were you in it for that boy and his mom surviving on the minimum wage? Were you in it for all the people in this country who feel invisible?

Hillary also made this same point a bit earlier, telling her supporters that the same motives that drove them to support her will find fulfillment in backing Obama:

Those are the reasons I ran for President. Those are the reasons I support Barack Obama. And those are the reasons you should too.

One of the strongest lines came a bit later in the speech, when she bestowed on Obama one of her strongest sources of authority: Health care, which was a flash-point during the two during the primary.

I can't wait to watch Barack Obama sign a health care plan into law that covers every single American.

The line was delivered with total sincerity and conviction.

Finally, Hillary concluded by raising the stakes higher than anyone possibly could have hoped for, telling her supporters and Democrats that the fate of our country -- and the fate of all of our children -- all demand the election of Obama.

Nothing less than the fate of our nation and the future of our children hang in the balance.

I want you to think about your children and grandchildren come election day. And think about the choices your parents and grandparents made that had such a big impact on your life and on the life of our nation.

Hillary hit a grand slam by any measure. Will it put the "rift" talk to rest?

Late Update: It can't be overstated how badly Democrats, at this juncture in the campaign, needed an adrenaline boost like the one Hillary provided tonight. Her full-throated and unequivocal endorsement of Obama sets the stage for an equally powerful, or perhaps even more powerful, speech from Obama on Thursday that closes the unity circle among Dems and makes the compact complete.

It's all but certain that he'll deliver, and that moment will be a cathartic one for many Democrats -- even more cathartic than this one was.

Late Late Update: Looks like the wingnuts have scrounged up a way to keep up the "rift" talk after all...

Late Late Late Update: Up-is-downism at its best from Bill Kristol, who figures out a way to describe Hillary's speech as a "shockingly minimal" endorsement of Obama...

Hillary kicks off her speech immediately hitting the key point: She is a supporter of Barack Obama, and there will be no questioning this fact; Obama must win the presidency for the sake of the future.

I am honored to be here tonight. A proud mother. A proud Democrat. A proud American. And a proud supporter of Barack Obama.

My friends, it is time to take back the country we love.

Whether you voted for me, or voted for Barack, the time is now to unite as a single party with a single purpose. We are on the same team, and none of us can sit on the sidelines.

This is a fight for the future. And it's a fight we must win...

You haven't worked so hard over the last 18 months, or endured the last eight years, to suffer through more failed leadership.

No way. No how. No McCain.

Barack Obama is my candidate. And he must be our President.

The somewhat corny introductory vid, starring Hillary as feminist Rocky, actually packed emotional power. I think this is a reminder that the months and months that Hillary spent continuing her campaign even when her loss was all but assured built up a tremendous amount of power around her persona.

Ironically, though much of that time was spent attacking Obama in ways that were seen as potentially destructive, the strength of her persona built up over that time will now be seen to be giving Obama a vital boost.

Late Update: Full text of her speech here.

...wasn't really the keynote speech of the convention at all. It was the warm-up to the main event of the evening, which is coming soon.

Warner made some noise yesterday about possibly sounding a "bipartisan" message that would upset his partisan audience, causing consternation among some Dems who worried that Warner might undercut efforts to draw a sharp contrast with McCain.

Warner, it's true, didn't really draw a meaningfully sharp contrast with McCain, though he uncorked a few predictable lines about us not being able to afford four more years of Bush policies.

But rather than ideologically stiff-arm the left, Warner, who has succeeded in a historically red state by playing the role of post-partisan technocrat, sounded mostly predictable bipartisan tones that weren't at all out of sync with Obama's talk about reaching across party lines to get things done, etc., etc.

Full text of Warner's speech here.

If you've been watching cable news today, you've seen pundit after pundit hyping the division between the Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. But the prize for desperate pimping of the Dem-division meme goes to Chris Matthews, who literally asked a Hillary-land insider to reveal her secret scheme for "restoration of the Clinton presidency."

Matthews, who was grilling longtime Hillary aide Lisa Caputo, actually asked:

"What is the current Clinton plan to regain the White House for the family? I mean, if Barack Obama wins this general election, he will no doubt be renominated by the Democratic party in four years -- how can the Clintons get back the White House if Barack does win?"

Caputo was so taken aback by the question that she got flummoxed on the air and laughed: "Oh Chris, how can you ask that question, for God's sake?"

A deflated Matthews rejoined: "So there's no more plan for a Clinton restoration, of a Clinton presidency? I'm serious. Why are you laughing?"

So many reasons, Chris, so many reasons. . .

The Obama campaign's ad responding to the Swift-Boat spot tying him to William Ayers, formerly only confirmed to be running in Ohio, is now running in Virginia, too, according to Democrats in the state.

The ratcheted-up response suggests that the Obama camp recognizes that the spot tying him to the former Weatherman requires a more aggressive and broader counterattack.

The Obama campaign didn't publicly release the response ad, in keeping with its strategy of keeping its counterattack against the Swift-Boating under the national radar. Obama aides won't publicly confirm where their response spot is running.

The group running the Ayers ad, which is bankrolled by a single Texas billionaire, put $2.8 million into the spot, and it's running in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Virginia. The Obama camp is broadening the geographic reach of its response.

In addition to Camp Obama's response being up in Ohio, and now, Virginia, we now also have unconfirmed reader reports that it's also up in Michigan, too.

Along with all the convention hoopla going on tonight, there's also a big primary race you should keep an eye out for: The Republican House primary in Alaska, where the result could have a huge effect on whether the Dems are able to pick up a seat in a deep-red state.

Congressman Don Young, who has represented this state for 35 years, has become involved in scandal after scandal over the last few years, giving many the feeling that his time may be up. And he's facing a tough primary challenge from Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell, who has received massive financial help from the Club For Growth.

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Yesterday I noted that Joe Klein had sat in on a focus group of 21 undecided voters and had discovered that character questions were way more important than issues in determining their presidential pick.

It turns out the focus group also tested responses to the "celeb" ad. I emailed Klein to ask him for details on what it showed, and he got back to me with a really interesting response.

For these voters, at least, it was unclear whether the comparison to Paris and Britney was working -- but the focus group did show that the "celeb" hit is effective in setting up the negative message that followed.

"it was fascinating and really depressing," Klein emailed. "The images of Paris and Britney came up too quickly for people to really respond on their dials, but the rally in Berlin set them rolling and it prepped them for the negative message in the last 10 seconds of the ad -- I think it was about drilling."

"So the `celebrity' ad wasn't about the celebrities, it was about the Berlin rally and gas prices," Klein says.

Interestingly, Obama's chief response ad didn't test anywhere near as well as the "celeb" ad itself, Klein says: "Since the focus groupers hadn't really picked up on Paris/Britney, they had no idea what Obama was actually responding to."

So for this handful of voters, at least, in the ads the "celeb" sneer is functioning as a softening up mechanism for the punch that follows. That's probably how the McCain team views the race more broadly, too: The celeb campaign is all about a long-term softening of Obama in advance of the ratcheted-up negative campaign that's coming this fall.

I have no idea whether it will work, but this strikes me as an interesting way of thinking about the McCain team's primary attack line.

Fun fact: It turns out that the daughter of the wealthy GOP Texas oilman funding the Ayers-Obama Swift-Boating ads is a financial backer of Barack Obama.

Serena Connelly -- the daughter of billionaire Harold Simmons, the sole person bankrolling the ad campaign tying Obama to the former Weatherman -- is a prolific Democratic donor.

She $2,300 to Obama, maxing out for the primaries, in two installments in April and May of 2007, according to OpenSecrets.org. She also gave a total of $3,750 to Hillary on various dates throughout 2007.

More on this from AccountableAmerica, that new outfit being run by former MoveOn chief Tom Mattzie.

As I've noted before, it's impossible to write an item about former Hillary supporter Ed Rendell without using the word "blunt," and this blunt assessment of Obama from Rendell certainly won't quiet the talk of tensions between the Hillary and Obama camps:

"He is a little like Adlai Stevenson," Rendell mused. "You ask him a question, and he gives you a six-minute answer. And the six-minute answer is smart as all get out. It's intellectual. It's well framed. It takes care of all the contingencies. But it's a lousy soundbite."

"We've got to start smacking back in short understandable bites," he said, noting "Everybody is nervous as all get out. Everybody says we ought to be ahead by 10, 15 points. What the heck is going on?"

Coming from the rough-hewn Rendell, the Stevenson comparison is presumably not meant as a full-throated compliment.

Rendell also said some good things about Obama, however, saying that by the end of tonight Obama will have locked down 95 percent of Hillary's supporters and predicting that the selection of Joe Biden as veep will gain Obama two points in Pennsylvania.

Late Update: In retrospect, it really isn't fair to cast this as a sign of Hillary-Obama tensions. Rendell's just giving voice to sentiments some Dems are expressing privately, and for Rendell the line between private and public is a bit blurrier. My brain is addled with too much MSNBC.

Here's a development that really bears watching: In stark contrast to John Kerry's 2004 campaign, the Obama team has developed a very aggressive response to the growing Swift-Boating apparatus that is targeting the Illinois Senator -- but crucially, the Obama camp is striving to keep the counterattack as low key as possible.

The approach, which is taking shape daily in response to the attacks, contrasts most obviously with Kerry's in its aggressiveness. But it's also different from Kerry's approach in another, equally important way. The Obama campaign is doing whatever it can to keep the return fire from spilling into the national media, whereas Kerry, when he did finally respond, did try to win the argument with the Swift-Boaters on a national level.

When Kerry belatedly released his first major response to the 2004 Swift-Boat Vets, it took the form of a high-profile ad that pinned the negative attacks directly on Bush. The ad was released to the national media and landed on page one of The New York Times.

By contrast, when the Obama campaign yesterday started airing an ad responding to the now-notorious Swift-Boat spot tying Obama to former Weatherman William Ayers that's running in four battleground states, it put up the ad only in Ohio and didn't alert the news media. It's still unknown whether the Obama camp intends to air the ad in the other three states.

The Obama approach represents an effort to get around the conundrum that bedeviled Kerry and that such attacks present to campaigns. Rather than choose between doing nothing and launching a high-profile response that risks granting the attack national media attention, the Obama campaign is striving for a middle ground: Aggressive but localized and low-key responses that the campaign hopes won't drive the national dialog.

"It's a savvy approach," says Evan Tracey of Campaign Media Analysis Group, which tracks national ad buys. "If you get into a conversation using the national media, it elevates these stories. The Obama campaign is trying to avoid having these debates on the national level, and wants its unfettered response only in markets where the attacks are being played over and over."

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Uh oh. Today's Gallup tracking poll finds John McCain with a slim edge over Barack Obama -- the first time ever that McCain has led in their tracking poll since Obama sewed up the Democratic nomination June.

The numbers: McCain 46%, Obama 44%, with a ±2% margin of error.

A caveat: This poll was conducted almost entirely before last night's big convention speeches by Michelle Obama and Ted Kennedy.

This is causing some consternation in Dem circles today:

Former Gov. Mark Warner plans to offer a lesson in Virginia-style bipartisanship to thousands of hardcore Democrats in his convention keynote speech Tuesday night.

"There may be parts of the speech that aren't going to get a lot of applause," Warner said Monday, "but I've got to say what I believe will get our country back on the right path."...

For Mark Warner, who is seeking the Senate seat of retiring Republican John Warner, a red-meat speech that would bring the party's most passionate warriors to their feet in Denver would undermine a carefully cultivated image at home that has given him a strong lead in statewide polls and a lopsided fundraising advantage.

It's hard to say from the AP's reporting what exactly Warner is going to say. But the chatter in Dem circles is that if Warner does undermine the power of the Dems' partisan message tonight to some degree, it could muddle efforts to draw the contrast with McCain as sharply as is necessary.

With yesterday's convention largely a Teddy-Michelle love-fest, and Clintons speaking today and tomorrow, more sharp contrasting with McCain is what's called for right about now. Not less.

John McCain is cranking up his attacks on Obama's internationalist approach to foreign policy by giving a speech today that hits Obama for not giving America enough credit for winning the Cold War -- which according to McCain reveals that Obama has confidence in himself but not in his country.

McCain's argument -- to be delivered at 1 P.M. at the 90th Annual American Legion National Convention in Phoenix, Arizona -- is based on some rather aggressive parsing of what Obama actually said. McCain is faulting Obama for saying in his Berlin speech that the Cold War proved that there's "no challenge too great for a world that stands as one."

The problem with Obama's formulation, in McCain's view, is that it doesn't hog enough credit for America. McCain alludes to this and to Obama's self-confidence in order to push the memes that Obama is too puffed-up for his own good and harbors views of our great land that are suspect in some way. Here's what McCain says in the prepared excerpts:

My opponent had the chance to express such confidence in America, when he delivered a much anticipated address in Berlin. He was the picture of confidence, in some ways. But confidence in oneself and confidence in one's country are not the same. And in that speech, Senator Obama left an important point unclear. He suggested that the end of the Cold War proved that there was, quote, "no challenge too great for a world that stands as one."

Now I missed a few years of the Cold War, as the guest of one of our adversaries, but as I recall the world was deeply divided during the Cold War -- between the side of freedom and the side of tyranny. The Cold War ended not because the world stood "as one," but because the great democracies came together, bound together by sustained and decisive American leadership.

All of this is more than an academic debate. For the sake of our own security, and the defense of our values in the affairs of the world, American leadership is critical.

You caught McCain's POW-POW-POWing in there, we trust.

To Obama, there are limits to what American power can accomplish, so genuine cooperation with other nations is in our interest. To McCain, there are no limits to what American might can achieve, and any calls for internationalist cooperation that fail to include the caveat of American "leadership" are tantamount to an admission of weakness -- a lack of "confidence."

More McCain excerpts after the jump.

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Wow -- a leading Republican appears to have just inadvertently admitted that the GOP's spin machine set up to counter Barack Obama during the convention is a propaganda machine spewing nothing but lies.

The GOPer in question is Colorado GOP chairman Dick Wadhams, who accidentally made the admission when describing the GOP's war room in Denver set up to hammer Obama during convention week.

Wadhams described the GOP's outfit thusly to the Denver Post: "Just consider this the Ministry of Truth."

Um, as anybody who has ever read George Orwell knows, the Ministry of Truth exists to disseminate false propaganda about how great the ruling regime is, continuously rewriting both history and the present-day facts in order to maintain total control over the population.

"The Ministry of Peace concerns itself with war, the Ministry of Truth with lies, the Ministry of Love with torture and the Ministry of Plenty with starvation," Orwell wrote. "These contradictions are not accidental, nor do they result from ordinary hypocrisy; they are deliberate exercises in doublethink."

In another sign that the Obama campaign wasn't just crying wolf in its warnings about the coming Swift-Boat attacks, the pro-war group Vets for Freedom is sinking over a million dollars into a new ad that hammers Barack Obama for his Iraq stance and his purported refusal to acknowledge the service of American troops.

In keeping with the GOP message that Obama is insufficiently respectful of the military, the spot features Iraq veterans proclaiming that "I am the Surge," and calls upon Obama to recognize their success:

This comes on top of another new ad from the "American Issues Project," financed by a right-wing oilman, tying Obama to former 60s radical Bill Ayers.

This new ad will air in Denver this week, in Minnesota next week, and from there in the swing states of Colorado, Michigan, Ohio and Virginia for four weeks, at a total cost of $1.1 million.

A new round of swing state polls from Quinnipiac reminds us just how high the stakes are at the Democratic convention. Barack Obama's leads in Ohio and Pennsylvania have slipped, leaving with slim leads in both states, while John McCain has taken the lead in Florida.

The numbers, compared to two months ago:

Florida
McCain (R) 47% (+4)
Obama (D) 43% (-4)
Margin of error: ±3%

Ohio
Obama (D) 44% (-4)
McCain (R) 43% (+1)
Margin of error: ±2.8%

Pennsylvania
Obama (D) 49% (-3)
McCain (R) 42% (+2)
Margin of error: ±2.8%

From the pollster's analysis: "Eight weeks ago, Sen. Barack Obama was on top in all three of these key swing states and that would make his election almost a sure thing. Times have changed and the election is now very much a tossup in these states. Sen. Obama needs this convention to give his campaign a jump start."

Late Update: On the other hand, it's worth noting that Obama's lead in Pennsylvania is unchanged since last month, suggesting that he's ahead by a stable margin in a state is historically very close.

Newsweek digs into yesterday's news about a possible plot to assassinate Barack Obama and confirms the arrests:

A law-enforcement official familiar with the investigation has told NEWSWEEK that three men are now under arrest in connection with an inquiry into a possible plot to kill Barack Obama. The official, who asked for anonymity when discussing sensitive information, said the three men presently face firearms and drug charges filed by police and prosecutors in Arapahoe County, in the Denver suburbs. The FBI and the Secret Service are deeply involved in the investigation, although no federal charges have been filed to date. The official added that it was unclear at present how real the plot was; further investigation could prove that it was an empty threat, or that the suspects were flakes or loudmouths.

The piece has another key nugget of news at the end:

Wednesday evening, the FBI confirmed the identity of one of the suspects: Tharin Robert Gartrell. A source familiar with the investigation said that Gartrell and the other two suspects were believed to be white supremacists. The real question now is whether the men were in position to carry out any kind of threats against the candidate -- or whether they were trying to impress girlfriends, the source said.

It's unclear exactly how well nailed-down this is -- the mag writes that the three were "believed" to be white supremacists -- but it's unlikely the mag would have run with this if there weren't some basis for doing so.

Late Update: The Los Angeles Times adds still more, reporting that "in the rented vehicle of Tharin Gartrell, a 28-year-old convicted felon, they found two high-powered scoped rifles, ammunition, sighting scopes, radios, a cellphone, a bulletproof vest, wigs, drugs and fake IDs."

And another of the men wore a Nazi swastika ring and is named "Adolph."

The U.S. Attorney's office says there was no credible threat to Obama, but that of course doesn't necessarily mean that this wasn't a real plot.

Tonight: Hillary's Big Speech
Hillary Clinton will be giving her much-anticipated convention speech tonight, in which she rallies her own supporters to Barack Obama's candidacy. Expect Hillary to talk about the values her campaign stood for, and how Barack Obama will uphold those ideals and John McCain opposes them -- but expect the press to scrutinize it endlessly for some sort of hidden message or insufficient enthusiasm.

Obama In Missouri Today
Barack Obama is in Kansas City today, with an event scheduled to begin at 12:15 p.m. ET. Obama is touring targeted swing states before he officially accepts the Democratic nomination in Denver -- he was in Iowa yesterday, is in Missouri today, and will be in Montana tomorrow.

McCain In Arizona And California Today
John McCain is campaigning today in states that aren't expected to be closely contested. First he's addressing the American Legion convention in Phoenix, Arizona, scheduled for 1 p.m. ET, and then he will travel to California, with a scheduled arrival in San Diego at 8:45 ET.

Ex-Hillary Delegate Turned McCain Supporter: McCain Is For Roe!
At an RNC-sponsored press conference yesterday, former Hillary delegate turned McCain commercial star Debra Bartoshevich claimed it would be okay if McCain became president because he's against overturning Roe v. Wade. In fact, McCain has said multiple times during this campaign that he wants Roe overturned, and she cited a 1999 quote that he's been running away from ever since he first said it.

Some Hillary Supporters To Leave Convention Before Obama Speaks
The Washington Post reports that several top Hillary Clinton advisers will not be staying in Denver for Barack Obama's Thursday night speech -- not exactly a sign of enthusiastic support for Obama. Most notably, Terry McAuliffe will be leaving Denver after Bill Clinton speaks on Wednesday.

Feds: Man Arrested For Threatening Obama Did Not Pose Credible Threat
Authorities say a heavily-armed man arrested in the Denver area on suspicion of making threats against Barack Obama is not a cause for serious concern. "We're absolutely confident there is no credible threat to the candidate, the Democratic National Convention, or the people of Colorado," said U.S. Attorney Troy Eid.

On the day that Hillary's set to address the Dem convention, the McCain campaign goes up on the air with a new spot that evokes her most controversial ad hitting Obama -- the 3 A.M. spot:

McCain's ad opens with the Hillary spot's 3 A.M. question and segues into a montage of images reminding you that it's a dangerous world out there. It then airs footage of Hillary delivering her now-infamous line about McCain's "lifetime of experience" and her claim that all Obama brings to the commander-in-chief's desk is a 2002 speech.

"Hillary's right. John McCain for President," the spot says, in an apparent effort to hint that she thinks McCain is the better pick (she has, of course, repeatedly endorsed Obama).

The McCain camp is trying to keep Dem division alive and well by evoking two of her harshest primary criticisms of Obama right on the eve of what is likely to prove her highest-profile pitch to embittered supporters that the time has come to get behind the Dem nominee. Full script after the jump.

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No need to say more than this: Watching Teddy Kennedy's robust speech tonight, it's hard to imagine that there was ever any doubt that he'd appear at the convention this evening...

Michelle Obama, who just wrapped up her speech, throws a big sop to Hillary and her supporters, and makes a broad-based pitch for female support, quoting a line directly from Hillary's concession speech in which Hillary alluded to the 18 million cracks in the glass ceiling her candidacy created.

"I stand here today at the crosscurrents of that history -- knowing that my piece of the American Dream is a blessing hard won by those who came before me," Michelle said, adding...

People like Hillary Clinton, who put those 18 million cracks in the glass ceiling, so that our daughters -- and sons -- can dream a little bigger and aim a little higher.

Michelle humbled herself before Hillary here, casting her own presence on the stage as the result of the work of pioneers like Hillary before her -- even though they faced off against each other in bitterly adversarial camps only weeks ago.

The speech overall was a clear success. It was perfect in tone -- she came across as modest and self-effacing but simultaneously driven and unabashedly bullish on her husband's chances and talents. Full script here.

Late Update: More of our take on her speech here.

The Michelle rollout continues with this new video, just blasted out to supporters by the Obama campaign, of Michelle prepping backstage for her big speech and giving her little girls tongue-in-cheek advice to come out and praise her performance. . .

The vid underscores two of Michelle's goals here tonight: To soften her and make her a more mainstream figure, and to deflect attacks on the Obamas as intoxicated with their "celebrity." The "celeb" sneer ads, and the criticism of Michelle's claim that she's proud of her country for the first time, are both all about painting the Obamas as too puffed up for their own good, and here Michelle's nervousness and mock advice to her kids shows her modest and reserved side.

As for the need to soften Michelle, earlier tonight Rev. Eugene Rivers was on Hardball with Chris Matthews and really drove home that imperative. "They're the Huxtables!" he told Matthews, "What could be more American than the Huxtables?"

In my memory, Claire Huxtable wasn't the softest of characters. Still, softening is clearly the goal here, as is evidenced by Michelle's cuddling with her children and effeminately describing the stage as "full of color and light."

John McCain POW-POW-POWs yet again to deflect criticism of the number-of-houses crack, this time during a taped segment with Jay Leno that's set to air later tonight:

"You've got enough of those," Leno cracked. "You need a white one, too." Later, he asked McCain: "For $1 million, how many houses do you have?"

At that, McCain got serious, saying he had been imprisoned for five-and-a-half years during the Vietnam war, and that "I didn't have a house. I didn't have a kitchen table. I didn't have a table."

Dunno, seems to me that there's a pretty severe risk for McCain in POW-POW-POWing on Leno, of all places. McCain is already drifting dangerously close to late night comedy territory when he POW-POW-POWs in serious settings.

From the Rocky Mountain News:

Law enforcement authorities have arrested two men, and several law enforcement sources say the investigation is looking into whether the men intended to harm presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama.

According to multiple sources, Aurora police made a routine traffic stop Sunday morning at 2:38 a.m. The Secret Service says two rifles were found in the car along with methamphetamine. Another law enforcement source says he was told at least one of the rifles was a "sniper rifle."

A second source told CBS4 Investigator Brian Maass authorities told officers they are concerned they may have come upon a possible "assassination plot."...

The Secret Service, ATF and the FBI are all involved in the investigation. A Secret Service spokesman says the agency is concerned by the proximity to the Democratic National Convention and the items found in the man's car.

Late Update: The Rocky Mountain News has since added some more detail to the piece that makes it seem less serious, including that one suspect was found with methamphetamine.

TPM's managing editor, David Kurtz, will be bringing us live interviews of key players from the floor of the convention, and in his first, he gets Virginia Senator Jim Webb to talk in some detail about one of the key subplots of the campaign: Obama's problems with Appalachian voters.

Webb makes some interesting points, observing that the changing demographics of Virginia are a "microcosm" of the demographic shifts going on nationwide, a trend that may favor Obama...

Webb also predicted that the "southside" of Virginia, where the manufacturing sector has taken a hard hit, could decide who wins the state, vowed to campaign aggressively for Obama among Appalachian voters, and predicted that several Republican areas in the region were on the verge of tilting Democratic.

We'll be bringing you plenty more interviews and video footage straight from the floor of the convention right here.

Some advance excerpts of Michelle Obama's convention speech have just been sent out by the campaign, and her mission tonight will clearly be to demystify the Obamas' background, biography, and heritage, and to deflect attacks on Obama's supposed "celeb" self-regard.

In the speech, Michelle offers a nod to the fact that the Obama's don't come from the central casting that has produced past presidential couples, as the Obama camp has put it in the past. "Each of us also comes here tonight by way of our own improbable journey," she says.

Michelle will seek to make Americans more comfortable with the Obamas by talking about the values that both Obamas were raised with, and are raising their own children with, as well as discussing the Obamas' shared experience of childbirth. Notably, Michelle will say that Obama hasn't changed since she first met him, an apparent effort to deflect attacks on Obama as intoxicated by his own "celebrity."

From the speech:

"And in the end, after all that's happened these past 19 months, the Barack Obama I know today is the same man I fell in love with 19 years ago. He's the same man who drove me and our new baby daughter home from the hospital ten years ago this summer, inching along at a snail's pace, peering anxiously at us in the rearview mirror, feeling the whole weight of her future in his hands, determined to give her everything he'd struggled so hard for himself, determined to give her what he never had: the affirming embrace of a father's love."

We'll be blogging the convention right here, so stay with us. More Michelle speech excerpts after the jump.

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The proprietor of this blog going to keep hitting this point until it becomes a media meme or until he gets carted away by men in white uniforms, whichever comes first.

This afternoon, John McCain described Barack Obama as "very honorable," suggesting that his criticism of Obama was confined to their "differences."

Later this same afternoon, the McCain campaign, hitting Obama for his ties to former Weatherman William Ayres, charged that Obama "chose to launch his political career at the home of an unrepentant terrorist" and said Obama had defended "his long association with a man who says he didn't bomb enough U.S. targets."

So McCain thinks these are the things an "honorable" person does, apparently.

On the other hand, McCain himself wouldn't approve of his own campaign's message about Obama and Ayers and has been forced by external events to wage a vicious and negative campaign against his own wishes. So there's nothing to see here. Sorry to have wasted your time.

The McCain campaign today effectively endorsed the tactic used in an ad Swift-Boating Obama for his ties to former Weatherman William Ayers -- but four months ago McCain unequivocally pledged to join the Democratic nominee in condemning such attacks during the general election.

McCain made the promise to Chris Matthews during MSNBC's so-called "College Tour" in mid-April, during which each candidate was quizzed at length before an audience of college kids...

McCain was asked by Matthews whether he would "sit down with the Democratic nominee" and "agree there will be no outside attacks." Matthews further asked McCain directly whether he would "agree up front" to "condemn any attack like a swift boating" as the nominee.

"Would you do that?" Matthews asked.

"I would love to do that," McCain replied, to loud applause.

It gets better. McCain went on to suggest that calling on such groups to stop the attacks basically works.

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The McCain campaign has just seized on Obama's response to the third-party Ayers spot to launch a direct attack on Obama's ties to the former Weatherman.

From McCain spokesperson Brian Rogers:

"The fact that Barack Obama chose to launch his political career at the home of an unrepentant terrorist raises more questions about Senator Obama's judgment than any TV ad ever could. And the fact that he's launching his own Convention by defending his long association with a man who says he didn't bomb enough U.S. targets tells us more about Barack Obama than any of tonight's speeches will."

That's effectively an endorsement of the tactic used in the Swift-Boating Ayers spot (recall that McCain has said he wants a "civil" campaign but that he can't control such third-party activity).

It's also a gloves-off declaration that the McCain team will cheerfully do whatever it can to ensure that Ayers is an issue in the campaign.

Here's video of the ad we reported on below that the Obama campaign is running in Ohio responding to the earlier Swift-Boating spot tying Obama to former Weatherman Bill Ayers...

"With all our problems, why is John McCain talking about the sixties, trying to link Barack Obama to radical Bill Ayers?" the spot says, suggesting that McCain himself is behind the Ayers spot. "McCain knows Obama denounced Ayers' crimes, committed when Obama was just eight years old."

As we noted below, the Swift-Boating group airing the initial Ayers spot, the American Issues Project, has made good on its vow to spend nearly $3 million to run the spot. And it's running in Ohio, Pennslyvania, Wisconsin, and Virginia. It's unclear as of yet whether the ad is running in the other three states where the Ayers spot is up.

The Ayers spot and the size of the expenditure make it tougher to dismiss the Obama camp's warnings about the coming Swift-Boat campaign as mere wolf-crying. And Obama's response ad is another sign of the Obama camp's determination to signal that he won't be Swift-Boated -- both because the Obama camp wants to avoid John Kerry's fate, and because Obama advisers want to signal to jittery Democrats that they're poised to respond aggressively.

The other day, the independent Swift-Boating outfit American Issues Project vowed to plunk down a cool $2.8 million on a slimy and vicious ad tying Obama to former Weatherman Bill Ayers.

Such vows often can be mere bluster designed to get free media and gin up contributions. Not this time, however.

The FEC report from the group is in, and it confirms that the group did in fact plunk down the nearly $3 million to air the ad.

That's a sizable buy. Meanwhile, Evan Tracey, who tracks national ad campaigns for the Campaign Media Analysis Group, confirms to me that the spot is running in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia.

This ad, in short, matters. The Obama campaign apparently realizes this too: They have a response ad up in Ohio that hasn't been released yet.

In other words, the spot tying Obama to Ayers is the real deal -- the first wave of the Swift-Boating that has yet to materialize in earnest.

Late Update: Tracey posts Obama's response ad for you to watch right here.

Joe Klein sat in on an independent focus group of 21 undecided voters and learned some interesting things about their priorities in this presidential election:

Given a list of 31 personal attributes the next President might have and asked to pick the eight most important, "Accountability" finished highest with 13 votes, next was "Someone I can trust" with 12, "honest and ethical" was third with 11. "Agrees with me on the issues" got one vote. They didn't care if the candidate was a Washington insider or outsider. "A dynamic and charismatic leader" got two votes.

It's hard to base any conclusions based on the views of 21 voters, obviously. Nonetheless, this suggests the possibility that the McCain campaign is having some success in shifting this election to one about the character of the two men, and away from the terrain where Obama wants the race fought -- on the issues, and on who possesses the inspirational qualities necessary to galvanize real change in Washington.

The focus group also found that those undecided voters are responding more forcefully to McCain's attack ads than to Obama's. It's hard to imagine that these two phenomena aren't directly linked.

Okay, that hed is an overstatement, but only a slight one. John McCain's double-talk on questions surrounding Obama's patriotism continued today, with McCain telling reporters that Obama is "very honorable"...

"This is a tough presidential campaign we're in," McCain said. "I have a very honorable opponent. There are stark differences between us."

As I argued in today's TPMtv episode and elsewhere, the press is giving McCain a pass on what we're now calling McCain's Patriotism Two-Step. The press is not really holding McCain accountable for the contradiction between his claims that he's not questioning Obama's commitment to his country and his assertions that plainly do just that.

Here you have a perfect example of this. McCain told a bunch of reporters today that he thinks Obama is "very honorable," suggesting that his criticism of Obama is confined to their "differences." So the follow-up question is obvious: Senator, how do you square the claim that Obama is "honorable" with your own assertion that Obama would rather lose the war than lose the presidential campaign and your own claim that Obama's Iraq policies are driven solely by "ambition"?

Who will ask McCain this obvious question?

Former Hillary spokesperson Howard Wolfson appears to officially confirm, on the record, that there's a real rift between Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, writing openly about it in The New Republic today:

There is still work to do on the Bill Clinton front. He feels like the Obama campaign ran against and systematically dismissed his administration's accomplishments. And he feels like he was painted as a racist during the primary process.

Wolfson even goes out of his way to suggest what Obama should do to make Bill feel better:

Senator Obama would go a long way towards healing these wounds if he were to specifically praise the accomplishments of the Clinton presidency in a line or two during his speech on Thursday. That should be painless -- he isn't running against the Clinton legacy anymore, and it would probably be a good idea to remind voters that the last time Democrats were in charge of the White House, we had peace and prosperity. Similarly, he could thank President Clinton for all of the work he did throughout his life to bridge the divides in our country. This is a cause near and dear to the president's heart.

President Clinton has his part to play as well. He needs to offer a strong argument in favor of Barack Obama's candidacy on Wednesday night, and remind everyone why he is one of the most gifted campaigners in our generation between now and November.

What both Clintons say about Senator Obama -- and what Senator Obama says about both of them during this week--can go a long way towards tamping down whatever disunity still exists between the two camps and their supporters.

The Politico reported today on the rift, but senior Hillary adviser Maggie Williams and top Obama adviser David Axelrod issued a joint statement today describing the story as "rumor."

Yet Wolfson, a top Hillaryland insider, appears to be confirming such a rift, at least over two things in particular: Allegations of racism lodged against Bill during the primary, and the Obama campaign's insufficient attention to Bill's accomplishments as President.

Full Obama-Clinton statement after the jump.

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The Republican National Committee sharpens its efforts to sow division among Dems on the eve of the Dem convention, releasing a new, hard-hitting ad that uses footage of Hillary delivering one of her harshest attacks on Obama's inexperience during the primary.

"Senator McCain will bring a lifetime of experience to the campaign," Hillary says in the primary footage aired in the ad. "I will bring a lifetime of experience. Senator Obama will bring a speech he gave in 2002."

"Now Americans must ask ourselves, Should we elect the most inexperienced presidential candidate of our times?" the ad's narrator continues. "Or was she right?"

When Hillary said this stuff it was widely predicted -- accurately, it turns out -- that it would be used against Obama. The RNC, apparently, held off on using this particular footage until the start of the Dem convention, in the belief that they will be effective in sowing more division.

Late Update: Vid added above.

I'm the narrator of this new TPMtv episode, which is all about McCain's Patriotism Two-Step -- the glaring contradiction between McCain's claim that he isn't questioning Obama's patriotism, and the things he's actually saying about Obama -- and the media's general failure to call him on it:

It's really worth a watch: Peerless TPM video editor Ben Craw did a great job digging up examples of pundits saying again and again that McCain really doesn't want to be running such a nasty and vicious campaign against Obama, even though he himself has repeatedly accused Obama of treason and his own campaign has endorsed similar quotes from surrogates. Enjoy.

The Obama campaign goes up with a lighthearted negative spot hitting McCain on the economy:

The ad is set to the old Sam Cooke tune "Wonderful World," and features a singer belting out the lyrics "I'm not up on the economy...don't know much about industry...really can't explain the price of gas...or what has happened to the middle class."

In a fun little twist, the ad shows the infamous hug between McCain and George W. Bush, set to these lyrics: "If I could be just like you...what a wonderful world it would be."

The Obama campaign last week launched a series of brutal hits on McCain on the economy, and the new spot suggests that Camp Obama chose a lighter approach in order to keep up the economic criticism of McCain without trampling on the positive messages that will be emanating from the Dem convention for the next four days.

The campaign says the ad is airing in battleground states, but it's unclear as yet whether the ad will run in the 18 states that the Obama camp had been running ads in. Reports last week indicated that the Obama camp planned to go dark in some GOP-leaning states during the convention. More on this when we know it.

There's been some chatter to the effect that the Obama campaign sent out its text announcing Joe Biden as veep pick at around 3 A.M. on Saturday morning as a tongue-in-cheek reference to Hillary's infamous ad.

Not so, says the Obama campaign. Turns out they rushed out the text hours earlier than intended because CNN had broken the story:

Said senior Obama aide Robert Gibbs: "Had a certain network not blown our cover at a certain time the text message would have gone out in the morning, 8 a.m. Eastern. We told people they would find out from us. When we decided it was going to get out we decided to send the text out."

The notion that the Obama camp would indulge in such a gag at a time when it's working overtime to win over Hillary supporters was always a daft one to begin with.

The McCain campaign is up with another ad designed to foment Democratic division on the eve of the Dem convention, a spot that features a "proud Hillary Clinton Democrat" who says she's voting for McCain:

With Hillary set to speak tomorrow night and Bill scheduled for Wednesday, the McCain team will work hard to push stories about tensions between the Clinton and Obama camps and will aggressively highlight polls suggesting that some embittered Hillary supporters still aren't getting behind Obama.

The script of the ad, which is running in "key states," is after the jump.

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A new CNN poll -- the first national survey since Joe Biden was picked as Barack Obama's running mate -- shows Barack Obama and John McCain tied at 47% each, compared to a 51%-44% lead for Obama from a month ago.

The poll was conducted Saturday through Sunday evening.

From the pollster's analysis: "The number of Clinton Democrats who say they would vote for McCain has gone up 11 points since June, enough to account for most although not all of the support McCain has gained in that time."

Hmm, it looks like the DCCC is playing a bit dirty in the Alaska House race -- they're getting involved in the very contentious Republican primary, sending out mailers that are apparently designed to damage the chances of the candidate who seems like he'd be a stronger nominee.

According to the DCCC's FEC filings, these mailings officially go after both incumbent Representative Don Young and his primary challenger, Lt. Governor Sean Parnell. But the mailers do seem to go after Parnell a whole lot more than they do Young. Check out this example, which the Parnell campaign provided to us at our request. Click on the images to enlarge:

If the scandal-plagued Young wins this primary, the Democrats will essentially have a 99% chance of winning this seat in a deep-red state -- but a Parnell win would make the Republicans actually somewhat favored to hold on. So you can see why the Dems might want to throw some monkey wrenches into things in the final days of the primary.

Three more recent mailers, after the jump.

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John McCain himself is now POW-POW-POW-ing to deflect criticism of his number-of-houses gaffe.

McCain slipped a reference to his war captivity into an interview McCain did with CBS that's airing today. He appeared to be referring to Joe Biden's crack yesterday that McCain has trouble considering people's kitchen table issues because he has to decide which of his own seven kitchen tables to use...

"I am grateful for the fact that I have a wonderful life," McCain said. "I spent some years without a kitchen table, without a chair, and I know what it's like to be blessed by the opportunities of this great nation...So the fact is that we have homes, and I'm grateful for it."

The McCain campaign appears to see that the Dem attacks on the houses gaffe risk being effective as character attacks, in that they are designed to portray him as out-of-touch and even pampered in a way that undercuts his down-to-earth war-hero bio and its intended contrast with Obama as an effete, untested celeb. Hence the frequent response invoking his war service.

But the "McCain-as-POW" currency the McCain camp is printing at such a furious rate -- and throwing wads of at every controversy that comes along -- is now losing value faster than the German Mark after World War I.

POW-POW-POW hyperinflation alert!

John McCain is up with his second spot in two days hitting Obama over his veep choice, this one whacking him for not picking Hilllary:

The spot makes a kind of double-barreled bid for embittered Hillary voters: It fuses criticism of the fact that he "passed over" her with an airing of her attacks on him during the primary, arguing that he didn't choose her because of that criticism.

"The truth hurt -- and Obama didn't like it," claims the ad, perhaps trying to hint at Obama as puffed-up softy who can only brook adulation in the "celeb" vein. The spot will run in "key states"; full script after the jump.

Late Update: Hillary spokesperson Kathleen Strand responds...

"Hillary Clinton's support of Barack Obama is clear. She has said repeatedly that Barack Obama and she share a commitment to changing the direction of the country, getting us out of Iraq, and expanding access to health care. John McCain doesn't. It's interesting how those remarks didn't make it into his ad."

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