"There is now a live stream of bears gathering to eat salmon at Brooks Falls in Katmai National Park."

Lovely! It's not dark yet in Alaska, so you can see the bears right now.

Why doesn't the word "Alaska" appear in this NYT column perceiving that Sarah Palin has some ideas liberals should like?

Anand Giridharadas seems surprised by a speech she gave recently.

[I]n contrast to the sweeping paeans to capitalism and the free market delivered by the Republican presidential candidates whose ranks she has yet to join, she sought to make a distinction between good capitalists and bad ones. The good ones, in her telling, are those small businesses that take risks and sink and swim in the churning market; the bad ones are well-connected megacorporations that live off bailouts, dodge taxes and profit terrifically while creating no jobs.

Strangely, she was saying things that liberals might like, if not for Ms. Palin’s having said them.

“This is not the capitalism of free men and free markets, of innovation and hard work and ethics, of sacrifice and of risk,” she said of the crony variety. She added: “It’s the collusion of big government and big business and big finance to the detriment of all the rest — to the little guys. It’s a slap in the face to our small business owners — the true entrepreneurs, the job creators accounting for 70 percent of the jobs in America.”

Palin's entire political career was built on this very strangeness. Liberals don't know it because they willfully blinded themselves to anything good about Palin, so they could continue to feel good about themselves as they targeted her for destruction.

Here are the comments on Giridharadas's column, and many of them say — I'm paraphrasing — ever heard of the time she was Governor of Alaska?

Giridharadass's last line is: "No one knows yet whether Ms. Palin will actually run for president. But she did just get more interesting." She's always been interesting like that. You just weren't looking. 

The mysterious orange goo found in Alaska is... eggs!

But what creature's eggs, we don't know.

The eggs were found on at least one roof and in buckets set all over the village to collect rain water. City Councilwoman Frances Douglas said the gooey, slimy substance was widely spread in streaks along the Wulik River and the lagoon, which is a half mile wide and six miles long. Orangey water was reported from as far away as the village of Buckland, 150 miles southeast of Kivalina....

Even village elders don't recall anything like it, said Douglas, who has lived all her 44 years in Kivalina. She remembers temperatures were colder in her childhood, gradually rising over the years. She wonders if that has anything to do with the invasion of the eggs.

"With climate change, anything can happen, I guess," she said.

No, I think it sounds more like aliens. Come on. You're the one that said invasion. Unless! Unless! Aliens are causing climate change!

"The Undefeated" — that movie about Sarah Palin — unwittingly shows why she's not a good candidate for President.

As you know, I saw the movie last week and thought that as a movie, it was pretty bad. It's a separate question — though Palin fans have a hard time seeing it — whether the movie supplies us with material that is convincing on the subject of whether Palin should run for President.

The material — which impresses some people, even to the point of getting confused into thinking that the movie is good — shows Sarah Palin's rise to power in Alaska and her excellent achievements and immense popularity as governor. The problem is that all of this happened in the context of boldly and bravely challenging the corrupt Republican establishment. This made her very popular with Democrats in Alaska. She worked in a bipartisan way, mainly to extract money from oil and gas resources in Alaska, and that was popular with everyone, pushing her ratings above 80% in Alaska. She was raking in money for Alaskans and challenging the big corporations (and their inside dealings). What's not for Democrats to like?

But once McCain brought her in as the vice presidential nominee and she launched into ripping up Barack Obama, her ratings plummeted in Alaska. And non-Alaskans never got up to speed about the things that had made her popular in Alaska. Can the movie make up for that now? I don't see how.

Suppose Palin-haters or Palin-non-lovers went to see this movie and absorbed the information about what originally made her so popular in Alaska. They aren't going to start liking her. Even if they were fair enough to recognize her early achievements, those achievements don't translate into the presidential realm. Where are the big corporations with ties to corrupt Republicans that she's going to fight now?

More importantly, Governor Palin's greatness came through working with Democrats! How would President Palin work with congressional Republicans? It can't happen now. What made her great in Alaska is now lost. It was lost in Alaska, after the '08 election, which is why — the movie shows this — she had to resign as governor.

Democrats were central to Sarah Palin's greatness: That is the argument in the movie. If that is true, there is no greatness upon which to build a presidential bid.

During the last episode of "Sarah Palin's Alaska," TLC put up this teaser for its special "Kennedys' Home Movies."

Yes, they are both TLC shows, but why did TLC think the people watching a show about Sarah Palin and her family would be susceptible to a show about the Kennedys? (Meade raised this question in the comments to the post earlier today about "Sarah Palin's Alaska.")

Your first thought might be that it doesn't make much sense because liberals love the Kennedys and conservatives love the Palins. But let's assume TLC isn't run by idiots, that they know how to appeal to viewers. If you had to argue that a good chunk of the "Sarah Palin's Alaska" audience would like to watch "Kennedys' Home Movies," what would you argue?

I'd say: Not all American TV-watchers are strongly grounded in one political party or the other. These people are not cemented to abstract ideology. They may feel their way into politics through personalities. Or they may not care that much about politics at all and simply enjoy peering into the family lives of celebrities, and politicians are a special, elite breed of celebrity, like royalty. The Kennedys have been, for many people, America's royalty, and the Palins may be the new royal family that people who like that sort of thing like.

Obviously, there are differences. The Kennedys posed as European-style aristocracy, and the Palins present themselves as working-class Americans. But both are very much big, colorful families with a strong sense of geographical place — Massachusetts/Alaska — and a mesmerizingly beautiful and feminine woman to fascinate us. Both families have a lot of children who we get to see looking robust and active in outdoor settings — especially boats.

There's a romanticism of the family about it all. I'm not saying that's good. It's a point of entry by which political opinion seeps into a certain very common type of American brain. And it happens through television. Pay attention.

***

By the way, what do you think of the crazy culture clash that is Johnny Cash singing the Beatles ("In My Life") over home movies of the Kennedys?

"That's pretty cool. I love the open buckles and how they pick up the silver of the tin foil/duct tape..."

Comments on a Sartorialist photo from the scene of the NYC blizzard:

Awesome! I love the boots, but it's the duct tape in classic silver that made me take notice. It just goes to show that even a homeless person or city worker or whoever this person is can accessorize with wit and style, given what's available to them....

Whoever this person is, there's always a slight line between what's ridiculous and what's considered "fashionable"...nowadays it seems that everything can work and be "cool"! ...

I battled with this photo. It affects the emotions in that it could be of a homeless or an eccentric person. Maybe you could have indicated that the guy is a construction worker. It comes close to the bone....



I was outside today photographing snow in Central Park, and let me tell you – this is a smart idea to tape your pants to your shoes! Of course, it is also sad because this picture is most likely of a homeless person, and this isn't a good time for them. Either way, the silver cheers up the idea, if only a little bit...

Why would people be offended with this being a homeless person? Scott's blog isn't just about girls in bandage dresses and high-heels. He takes photos of people coming from ALL aspects of life. Homeless or a billionaire, both are worthy of a photograph. Good golly, you picky, whiney people.

I hate snow falling in my boot tops and have thought of doing this several times. Also, interesting how many people who posted earlier equate functionality with homelessness.

uhh...sorry this isn't creative or stylish at all. If it was deliberate, maybe it'd be cool, but it's just a homeless guy keeping warm. Oh how avant-garde! Not really....

20-inches of snow, people. Add to that the mountains on curbs where you could easily sink in to your mid-thigh. Duct tape dude has the right idea.

Ha. Angst-ing over duct tape in New York City. Meanwhile, in Alaska....

"The caribou that waited too pliantly in the cross hairs is doomed to become stew for Palin and an allegory for politics."

"The elegant animal standing above the fray, dithering rather than charging at his foes or outmaneuvering them, is Obambi. Even with a rifle aimed at him, he’s trying to be the most reasonable mammal in the scene, mammalian bipartisan, and rise above what he sees as empty distinctions between the species so that we can all unite at a higher level of being."

That's Maureen Dowd. She's going there. Into the realm of violent metaphor, visualizing shooting the President. It's an amusing riff, but it's an image I would self-censor.

In any event, I agree with a lot of her mockery of "Sarah Palin's Alaska":

Sarah checked her freezer at home before she flew 600 miles to the Arctic, trying to justify her contention that she needs to hunt to eat. Wasn’t it already stocked with those halibuts she clubbed and gutted in an earlier show?

“My dad has taught me that if you want to have wild, organic, healthy food,” she pontificated, “you’re gonna go out there and hunt yourself and fish yourself and you’re gonna fill up your freezer.”

For the price of all that plane-flying, couldn't you just mail-order a freezer-full of meat?

Did you watch "Sarah Palin's Alaska"?

I watched for about 20 minutes. I might have been interested in a reality show — more like "The Osbournes" — where we see some semblance of everyday life in this unusual family, but — as the title warns us — it's more of a travelogue — with Sarah Palin talking almost constantly. They went fishing and saw some bears. Sarah said "wow" and "oh my gosh" a lot. They fished, Todd caught fish, and Sarah complained that Todd caught all the fish. Why shouldn't Todd catch the fish?

Here's the Television Without Pity forum for discussing the show. I love the stern moderator's rules:

What’s on topic in this thread?

• Things you saw on the show.

What’s not on topic here?

• Politics
• Bristol's appearance on DWTS
• Politics
• Your personal judgements about Palin's fame/family/career
• Politics
• Posting to tell us that you're not going to watch.
• Politics.

In other words, this isn’t a thread to snark on Palin at will. Please take extra care to follow the rules of the board and the special rules for this thread. If you don’t pay attention to the rules, and treat this as a general thread given to you to bash or praise Palin or your fellow posters, you will be warned. Thanks.

Good rules!

"Who is this woman, this fruit bat in fleece and Gore-Tex, clenching the side of the rock face above a glacier..."

"... screaming 'Tahhd! Tahhd!' at her husband, piercing the tranquillity of the Alaskan paradise?"

The Washington Post staff writer — Hank Stuever — doesn't know what to make of Sarah Palin's reality show.

You're flipping channels and you randomly land on "Sarah Palin's Alaska"... It's a show about . . . hmmm.

About a busy mom with a sporty husband. Their many offspring run from a soldier son in his 20s down to a mentally disabled adorable toddler and an unexpected grandson with curly blond hair. But quick enough it seems to be a show about a woman who fancies herself as something of a nature enthusiast who wants to take advantage of the short-but-sweet Alaskan summer. So is it about the li'l town where she lives? Is it about flowers and birdies and double rainbows? Is it like "Northern Exposure" meets "An American Family?"

You still don't know....

Stuever is imagining "you" flipping channels and arriving at this show, but for "you" to have this reaction, "you" would need not to recognize the celebrity or the celebrity-at-home genre of reality show. Maybe 10 years ago, this hapless "you" would have puzzled over a show like that, back before "The Osbournes" was the next big thing. But now? Come on, "you" is dumb!



(Mumbled "fuck" warning.)

How misspelled can a write-in vote for Murkowski be before it shouldn't be counted at all?

Joe Miller is arguing for 100% correct spelling.

Lt. Gov. Craig Campbell, who oversees Alaska elections, has indicated that he will accept minor misspellings of Murkowski's name as long as the "voter intent" is clear.

Intent of the voter. Ah! That brings back delightful memories of the Bush v. Gore recount.

Miller is overdoing it. Clearly, they've got to count stuff like "Murakowski" and "Murkowsky" and "Murcowski" and even "Mercowsky." But where's the line? What about "Merssky"? Or "Murk."? What about "Lisa"? That's dimpled chad territory, no?

ADDED: A poll:

How strictly would you judge the write-ins?
	Miller's right. The spelling must be perfect.
	It must be phonetically accurate or only 1 or 2 letters off.
	If you can tell it was meant as a vote for Murkowski, it should count.
pollcode.com free polls

After the break, a second poll:

Now, be honest:
	My preference for Miller influenced my choice on the first poll.
	My preference for Murkowski influenced my choice on the first poll.
	I gave a neutral, principled response to the first poll.
	Honestly, I can't vouch for how my mind worked.
pollcode.com free polls

"Just hours before the final deadline, more than 100 Alaskans came out Thursday to file as write-in candidates..."

"... in an effort to thwart Sen. Lisa Murkowski's bid to retain her Senate seat."

"How Lisa Murkowski (might have) lost."

Explaining Joe Miller.

"It is because I love Alaska this much... that I feel it is my duty to avoid the unproductive, typical, politics as usual, lame duck session..."

"How does that benefit you? No, with this decision now, I will be able to fight even harder for you, for what is right, for truth. And I have never felt like you need a title to do that."

Here's the transcript — as printed in Huffington Post, missing innumerable commas and periods, because you wouldn't want to interfere with the incoherent-rant feeling HuffPo readers crave when the speaker is dumb, crazy Sarah.

Let's watch the whole thing:





ADDED: The Politico's headline is "Sarah Palin resigns, blasts press, 'starlets.'" Now, here's the text in the speech with the word "starlets":

Let me tell you, Alaskans really need to stick together on this with new leadership in this area especially, encouraging new leadership... got to stiffen your spine to do what's right for Alaska when the pressure mounts, because you're going to see anti-hunting, anti-second amendment circuses from Hollywood and here's how they do it. They use these delicate, tiny, very talented celebrity starlets, they use Alaska as a fundraising tool for their anti-second amendment causes. Stand strong, and remind them patriots will protect our guaranteed, individual right to bear arms, and by the way, Hollywood needs to know, we eat, therefore we hunt.

In the effort to make Palin look bad, Politico exposes itself as a poor (or dishonest) reader. Palin doesn't "blast" "starlets" at all. She says that "They use these delicate, tiny, very talented celebrity starlets..." Who are "they"? "Anti-hunting, anti-second amendment circuses from Hollywood." She's talking about powerful media elites, not the "delicate, tiny, very talented" young people they use to convey their message.

It's compelling when a beautiful woman (Palin) seems to criticize other beautiful women (the starlets), so it's important to get it straight. Palin is — or at least appears to be — conveying her own message, but the starlets she criticizes are — as she puts it — used by others. Also, the starlets are "delicate" and "tiny," but Palin is... oh, maybe she too is delicate and tiny! But she is minimizing them, both in their individual agency and in their size. Now, there's implicit criticism in there, but she is blasting Hollywood generally, not the starlets. She's needling the starlets a bit.

"Do you think Palin has ruined Alaska as a symbol of the untrammeled frontier for future filmmakers and novelists?"

"No. Hopefully, she fades from memory quickly."

Hope won the election, it's true, but that is one hope that will not be fulfilled.

IN THE COMMENTS: Dust Bunny Queen:

I don't get the connection between Sarah Palin, Alaska as an "untrammeled frontier" (whatever that means?) and making a film about a woman and her dog.

Seriously, these people -- the interviewer and interviewee -- are deranged and irrelevant. They wouldn't recognize an untrammeled frontier since I doubt they are ever more than 15 minutes from a Starbucks.

Don't understand what "untrammeled frontier" means? What is a "trammel," anyway?

1. A shackle used to teach a horse to amble.

2. Something that restricts activity, expression, or progress; a restraint.

3. A vertically set fishing net of three layers, consisting of a finely meshed net between two nets of coarse mesh. 4. An instrument for describing ellipses.

5. An instrument for gauging and adjusting parts of a machine; a tram.

6. An arrangement of links and a hook in a fireplace for raising and lowering a kettle.

Now, what are we supposed to picture being done to a frontier?

Greta Van Susteren interviews Sarah Palin.

You can watch it all here. It was a relaxing, friendly interview. I noticed:

1. Palin thinks bloggers probably live in their mother's basement and wear pajamas ... at least the bloggers who said maybe Trig was not her baby.

2. She worked terribly hard concocting some sausage and cheese food for the camera.

3. She thinks well of herself and ill of the media.

4. She had nothing at all to do with any of those clothes you've heard talk about, they were foisted on her, and she prefers her own clothes.

5. In Alaska, they have a diverse economy including cabbages as large as basketballs, and Greta would like you to know that in Wisconsin, the pumpkins are very large. That is, the 2 women got into competitive vegetables.

"Is a 2004 amendment to Alaska's law on Governors appointing replacement Senators void?"

Simon says yes.

Did Sarah Palin just come out in support of the federal marriage amendment?

She says: "[I]n my own, state, I have voted along with the vast majority of Alaskans who had the opportunity to vote to amend our Constitution defining marriage as between one man and one woman. I wish on a federal level that that’s where we would go because I don’t support gay marriage."

Somebody please ask her the follow-up question about the constitutional amendment. There are other things that can be done "on a federal level" to oppose same-sex marriage, and she only refers to amending the Alaskan constitution. These are important distinctions, because it is very hard to amend the U.S. Constitution and equally hard to repeal an amendment.

Nevertheless, this expressed desire to operate "on a federal level" shows no concern for the conventional conservative idea of leaving it to the states. In sliding from talking about what she's done in Alaska to the subject of federal law, she doesn't seem to have any instinct for federalism or perhaps even any awareness of it. And quite aside from any concern about the specific issue of gay marriage or the more general matter of federalism, there is a real absence of structured thinking here.

It's genuinely dismaying.

Sarah Palin's most famous quote and the problem of a quote becoming famous in a misremembered form.

What do you think is Sarah Palin's most famous quote? My attempt to answer gets me to a quote that I know is not the real quote: "I can see Russia from my house." I know that's how Tina Fey spoofed Palin on SNL. The real quote is: "They're our next door neighbors and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska."

So, 3 questions:

1. Do you have a better idea for Sarah Palin's most famous quote?

2. What are some other quotes that are remembered in the wrong form? I don't mean quotes attributed to the wrong person but quotes that are more often stated in a particular incorrect form.

3. Can you think of a word -- a sniglet -- to mean a misquote that becomes more of a famous quotation than the original? Something like pseudo-quote, but better.

IN THE COMMENTS:

1. Zeek says "Palin's most famous quote has to be the pit bull/lipstick joke which was riffed on by Obama and also made the SNL sketch." I agree.

2. Jason comes up with the best answer right off the bat: "I invented the Internet," making Al Gore's "I took the initiative in creating the Internet" shorter, funnier, and more damaging.

3. 2 great responses: "Malapropaganda" (from EnigmatiCore) and "substiquote" (from dcbyron).

"This woman is an Obama-level political natural."

Says Megan McArdle. Indeed.

It's like some bizarre nightmare/dream (depending on your party preference). The Dems had Obama, and then... suddenly Sarah.

It's as if some mad right-wing scientists designed and built an android to counter all the things that Obama is. Can she be real? Can it be that there was this actual human entity, on ice in Alaska, waiting for this moment to be thawed out and set loose in the lower 48?

IN THE COMMENTS: Simon:

Ann, remember Jon Turley's line about John Roberts et fam. at the 7th Circuit Bar meeting last year? "Hydroponically raised by Karl Rove in the White House basement" or something to that effect.

Good memory. Here's Turley:

Roberts is a handsome, perfectly groomed man who looks like he was raised hydroponically by Karl Rove in the White House basement.

Live-blogging night 3 -- Sarah Palin alert! -- of the Republican Convention.

5:43 Central Time: I'm just setting this up so you can get started talking and to let you know that I'll be here -- on what is obviously a very exciting night.

7:48: I'm just settling in for some serious blogging, and the first thing I notice is this open mike eavesdropping on Mike Murphy and Peggy Noonan. Peggy: "The most qualified? No! I think they went for this -- excuse me-- political bullshit about narratives... Every time the Republicans do that, because that's not where they live and it's not what they're good at, they blow it."

8:11: It's Mitt Romney. He's got a peppy, plastic style. It's hammy in a way that might work from farther back in the room. Down with the "eastern elites"! It's time for sun to rise in the west -- in Arizona and Alaska. Now, he's getting an audience chant going: "It's liberal!" "We need change all right. Change from a liberal Washington to a conservative Washington." Liberals don't understand business. They grow government and dependency. It's "death to initiative." Fight dependency "like the poison it is." "It's time for the party of big ideas, not the party of Big Brother." He does a pretty good job of sharpening up the line between conservatives and liberals and making the conservative side seem better -- especially in economics.

8:28: I'm watching on CNN, with a TiVo assist. I'm keeping up with the speeches. But I pause when a speech ends and then scroll through the commentary when it's time for the next speech. Are the CNN commentators interesting? I don't have time for it all. Let's stop. Here's Jeffrey Toobin saying that bitching about the news media is hypocritical coming from John McCain, because they always used to love him. How come suddenly they seem "hypocritical and biased against him"? Huh? What's hypocritical? That sounds like they were always biased, but they just aren't supporting John McCain right now. What the hell kind of a defense of journalism isn that supposed to be? I mean, I can see why McCain is pissed about it. But it's an embarrassing defense.

8:33: Candy Crowley snags Mitt on the convention floor. She poses a hypothetical. Hey, what if John McCain drops dead on day one, huh? What do you think about that? How is Palin up for it? Mitt responds exactly the way you'd expect: Well, Obama, if elected, would be Prez on day one and how's he going to do it? Yeah, you don't even need a death scenario for that, you know, Candy. Mitt-quote: "The question about experience raises a lot of questions about Barack Obama."

8:36: Now, Mike Huckabee is up. He admits he's disappointed not to be the nominee. But McCain was his second choice, he says. He's got "the character and the stubborn kind of integrity that we need in a President." He thanks the MSM for uniting the Republican Party. Obama "will elevate our taxes and our risk in a dangerous world." He's got a chant he's trying to get going: "You want something to change." But don't forget about the things you don't want to change, like our freedom. He mocks "Barack Obama's Excellent Adventure to Europe." We don't like "European ideas." We like our freedom -- in other words, we don't like big government. This is the anti-dependency message again. It's not what government will do for you, it's what you will do for yourself if government gets out of the way. "The only soap we ever had in my house is Lava." That's a great line. "I'm not a Republican because I grew up rich. I'm a Republican because I didn't want to grow up poor waiting for the government to rescue me." Hey! This is an excellent speech. Much better than Romney's. Nice rhetoric and delivery.

8:46: The digital backdrop -- a flag, I think -- is, on these closeups, just a throbbing red. It's hard on the eyes. They need to blue it up, like normal TV. [ADDED: When Sarah Palin speaks, they just turn if off and have a black background.]

8:51: Huckabee ends with a long, folksy story about a teacher with a lesson to students about how they could "earn their desks." Veterans carrying desks are involved. I respect respecting veterans, but don't really see what's so wonderful about taking little kids and lengthily instructing them about what men have done in far away wars. It's a little too Captain-Koons-Hello-Little-Man for my taste.

8:58: I just corrected a typo in the 8:11 entry. I'd written "It's hammy in a way that might work from father back in the room." My son John emailed me about the typo, and I indicated that maybe it was Freudian, and I really wished I could have Mitt Romney for my dad, and John sends me this pic...



... and reminds me that he always said that Mitt looks like the dad on "The Donna Reed Show."

9:05: It's Rudy Giuliani, and this should be good. He was great at the RNC in '04. (Closeup on Cindy McCain who suddenly has her hair curled. Did the memo go out to soften her up?)

9:07: Rudy is saying that electing a President is basically hiring someone to do a job. He recites McCains résumé. Then we have another man. "He worked as a community organizer." He pauses. Mutters "what?" The audience reacts. Rudy repeats: "He worked as a community organizer." "Maybe this is the first problem on the résumé." And: "He immersed himself in Chicago machine politics." (That's an important line that could take a lot more play.) The audience boos Chicago machine politics. On to the Illinois state legislature where he couldn't figure out whether to vote yes or no. "It was too tough!" "I didn't know about this vote 'present' when I was mayor of New York City." And Sarah Palin couldn't vote "present" as Governor of Alaska. Being able to vote "present" means you weren't in an executive position.

9:17: Barack Obama has never led people in times of crisis. "He is the least experienced candidate for President in at least the last 100 years." He's never led people in anything -- "nada, nothing." Hey, that's unfair! He led the Harvard Law Review.

9:19: And don't forget: He led his campaign for President.

9:23: Rudy says Obama talks about change, but it might be the wrong kind of change. We want the right kind of change. Like, we should drill for oil. The crowd is all: "Drill, baby, drill!"

9:24: The Dems worry that it's politically incorrect to say "Islamic terrorism." They're afraid of insulting terrorists. The big digital screen is used to show a big skyline of NYC.

9:26: The surge was right. McCain got it right and Obama got it wrong. John McCain has taken unpopular positions and political risks. When, Rudy asks, has Obama ever done that? He was for an undivided Jerusalem for one day, only one day, when he was in Israel. The idea is that Obama is a man who played it safe, ingratiating himself in one way after another.

9:31: Palin has had "more executive experience than the entire Democratic ticket combined." He doesn't throw in John McCain and say she's had more executive experience than all 3 of them put together. He mocks the Dems for mocking her for being a mayor of a small town... where they cling to religion and guns. And now she's the most popular Governor in the country with an 80% approval rating. "You never get that in New York City." She fought corruption. She stood up for what is right. She and McCain "are going to shake up Washington." And "how dare they question whether Sarah Palin has enough time to spend with her children and be Vice President. When do they ever ask a man that question? When?!"

9:36: And now! It's her! Sarah Palin! Black skirt. Silver jacket. Oh, when do they ever say that about a man?

9:37: Huge cheers. Cute kid closeup. "Thang-Q. Thang-Q. Thang-Q so much."

9:38: She introduces her family -- her son, who is going to Iraq, her 3 daughters -- the cute youngest waves -- and the baby Trig, the special needs child. And she looks out directly on America, as though she sees all the people who have special children in their families -- and pledges that we will have a friend and advocate in the White House.

9:48: She tells us about Todd, the fisherman, her "guy," and don't forget that Yupik ancestry. She's got a Native American husband.

9:50: She praises small town Americans (like her!). Don't disrespect them! They are the salt of the earth.

9:52: "I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a community organizer... except that you have actual responsibilities." And in small towns, they don't know what to make of a candidate who "lavishes praise" on them when he's around and then, behind their backs, "talks about how bitterly they cling to their religion and guns." Don't talk about us "one way in Scranton and another way in San Francisco." Ouch. John McCain is the same man wherever he goes.

10:00: In power, she fought corruption and government excess. "That luxury jet was over the top. I put it on eBay." "Nearly half a billion dollars in vetoes."

10:11: She's laying into Barack Obama. What is he, once those styrofoam pillars are dragged off the stage? It's all show. And the real plan is the old tax and spend.

10:13: "The American presidency is not supposed to be a journey of personal discovery."

10:19: She retells the story of John McCain, with the emphasis on character and authenticity. Elect "a great man" as the next President, she implores... to fabulous applause. We see the newly-curly-headed Cindy in the audience. She's pumped. The Palin family files out onto the stage. Trig is awakened. No baby would understand what the hell is going on, but he's gazing around at the lights and colors. The pregnant Bristol is there with her hunky hockey boyfriend. And now McCain trundles out. He raises his arms as high as he can to wave to the crowd. His tie is the color of the pantsuit Hillary wore for the DNC. [ADDED: He's sending the secret tie signal.] "Don't you think we made the right choice for the next Vice President of the United States? And what a beautiful family." He leans over to respond to something the little girl said. He shrugs. I guess he didn't know whatever it was that she didn't know.

10:32: Maybe it was: "Are you the next President?"