GOP Congressman: Calling Obama "Uppity" Wasn't Racist
Rep. Lynn Westmoreland, a Georgia Republican, released the following statement in defense of his having called Barack Obama "uppity": "I've never heard that term used in a racially derogatory sense. It is important to note that the dictionary definition of 'uppity' is 'affecting an air of inflated self-esteem --- snobbish.' That's what we meant by uppity when we used it in the mill village where I grew up."

Democratic Ticket In Pennsylvania Today
Barack Obama and Joe Biden are separately campaigning today in Pennsylvania, a big swing state that they must retain in the Dem column if they are to win the election. Obama will be talking about the economy at 10 a.m. ET in Duryea, while Biden will be Ironworkers Local Union in Philadelphia at 10:15 a.m. ET and then campaigning in Langhorne at 2 p.m. ET.

McCain And Palin In Michigan And Wisconsin
John McCain and Sarah Palin are campaigning today in Wisconsin and Michigan, courting two swing states that have voted for the Democrats by very narrow margins in the past two elections. They have a meet and greet scheduled for 12 p.m. ET in Cedarburg, Wisconsin, and a rally at 6 p.m. ET in Sterling Heights, Michigan.

Palin Cramming On Foreign Policy -- With Lieberman
The Washington Post reports that Sarah Palin is taking a crash course in foreign policy in preparation for her debate with Joe Biden. In a sign of things to come, one of her top tutors is none other than Joe Lieberman.

Poll: Palin Viewed Favorably, But As Lacking Necessary Experience
A new ABC News poll has some good news and bad news for Sarah Palin. The good news is that she has a solid 50% favorable rating in the wake of her speech Wednesday night -- but she also gets 50% saying she does not have the right experience to step in as president, compared to 66% who say Joe Biden has the right experience.

Poll: McCain Way Ahead In Alaska, Thanks To Palin
A new survey from Alaska pollster Ivan Moore shows that John McCain's selection of Sarah Palin is helping him to easily retain this state for the Republicans. McCain leads Barack Obama by a 54%-35% margin, after previous polls had shown a much closer race.

Wilson Sisters Of Heart To McCain Camp: Cease And Desist
The McCain campaign's decision to play the classic rock song "Barracuda" at their convention last night, in honor of Sarah Palin's nickname in high school, has earned them a cease and desist letter from the band Heart, who strongly object to McCain's politics. The McCain campaign has previously gotten in trouble for using songs from Jackson Browne and even Congressman John Hall, a liberal Democrat and former rock musician supporting Barack Obama.

Now this is something: A new poll of Alaska from local firm Hays Research has Barack Obama ahead in this deep-red state -- a place that has voted Dem only once, in the LBJ landslide of 1964.

The numbers: Obama 45%, McCain 40%, with a ±4.9% margin of error. Other recent polls from Rasmussen and Research 2000 have given McCain the lead here, so this poll might be an outlier.

On the other hand it's only the seond poll that we've seen from a respected local firm -- a poll conducted in July by Ivan Moore gave McCain a bare three-point lead -- so it might be an early sign that John McCain will have to work hard to hold on to a state that most Republicans can count on winning easily.

In that spirit, the Obama camp also announced today that they picked up the endorsement of Jim Whitaker, the Republican mayor of Fairbanks.