"30 Best Quotes" from the GOP convention.

As seen by John Hawkins, with #1, #5, and #14 coming from Mike Huckabee. Was Huckabee that good? Here's the #1 quote:

“The Democrats say we ought to give Barack Obama credit for trying. That sounds like the nonsense of giving every kid a trophy for showing up. Friends, we’re talking about leading the country, not playing on a third-grade soccer team! I realize this is the man who got a Nobel Peace Prize for what he would potentially do, but in the real world, you get the prize for producing something, not just promising it.”

I don't think the Democrats are saying "we ought to give Barack Obama credit for trying," and the everybody-gets-a-trophy trope is hackneyed. It was a reasonably spiffy quote though, like something Rush Limbaugh would say ad libbing on his show in any given hour.

By the way, speaking of what Democrats say, I can easily picture Democrats calling that quote racist. Why? For comparing Obama to children. Why doesn't somebody review each speech with an eye toward eliminating things like that? The Democrats in my head — whom I can hear giving their spin on any and everything — are saying: Because they really do want to reach white people in that residual racist part of their brain.

Live-blogging Day 2 of the GOP Convention.

6:03: Ayla Brown — the erstwhile "American Idol" contestant and daughter of Senator Scott Brown — sings the National Anthem.

6:07: "Please release each one of us from ego"... part of the invocation, given by a Sikh.

6:08: The color guard are amputee veterans, which we see because they're wearing shorts, earning a new, immediate exception to my "men in shorts" rule.

6:10: A bombastic tribute to Ron Paul. "No, no, I'm not going to be elected," he said to his wife. "To be elected, you've got to be like Santa Claus." Rand Paul says one thing he likes about his father is the lobbyists don't even bother to come by his office.

6:29: I found it hard to watch Mitch McConnell. I almost got out my sketchbook and pen, though, because his face says "Caricature me!" So I moved from C-SPAN over to CNN. (I'm recording both, and also Fox News.) They had an interview with Paul Ryan, in which Gloria Borger prodded him about how he felt when, as a 16-year-old boy, he discovered his father dead. Ryan moved on to how you have to live knowing you could die at any time, so Gloria asked why he didn't live fast and run right away for President. He said there were others who could do that job, but he was the only one would could father his young children. Gloria did not proceed to ask why then is he taking on the VP slot, but I guess that's a very short campaign period and, frankly, once you get it, it's a lot less work than chairing the House Finance Committee. Then Piers Morgan was interviewing Michele Bachmann, and the 2 of them agreed that Ann Romney was just lovely and then enthused about the "miracle" of the 2 of them agreeing, which Wolf Blitzer then echoed, sending me back to C-SPAN which was showing the on-stage entertainer, a horrifying aging rock singer who was belting the line "I'm back in the game" over and over.

6:30: Rand Paul: "You know when the Supreme Court upheld Obamacare, the first words out of my mouth were 'I still think it's unconstitutional.'" Pushed to reflect, he reflected, and he still thinks it's unconstitutional. "The whole damned thing is unconstitutional." Meade says, "He said 'damned.'" And then, more seriously: "What we have here is crazy old Ron Paul" — and Meade makes a Ron Paul face — "morphing into Rand Paul."

6:50: Video of the Bushes, 41 and 43, and their wives, Barbara and Laura. So they weren't entirely banished from this place. They are circumspect, yet charming, claiming their place in history without seeming the slightest bit arrogant. Old Bush even does his Dana Carvey imitation imitation: "Not gon' do it. Wouldn't be prudent."

7:00: John McCain. Why is he here and not George Bush? McCain lost. Bush won twice. Meade says: "Because Bush is through with politics." McCain gives a paean to foreign wars in the cause of freedom, and the crowd's response is tepid.

7:50: Danny Gokey — another "American Idol" person. Another Wisconsin person.

8:00: Rob Portman, the short-list guy who came up short. "We need Romney/Ryan and we need them now." He seems perfectly fine, but I am glad he was not Romney's choice. There's some insurmountable dullness about him, no matter what he says, no matter how enthusiastically.

8:31: Another VP also-ran, Tim Pawlenty. He's reading jokes. For example: Obama is "the tattoo President" — it seemed cool at the time, but you look at it and say "What was I thinking?"

9:15: Huckabee and Rice both gave very long speeches that were neither bad nor good. Here's some text from Rice's speech.

9:19: Biggest cheer of the night comes when Gov. Susana Martinez says: "I carried at 357 Smith & Wesson Magnum" (referring to her experience, as an 18-year-old, working for her parents security guard business, protecting the Catholic church at bingo times). She's a good speaker. A nice edge of passion in her voice. With toughness.

9:29: Both Meade and I thought: We may be looking at the first woman President of the United States.

9:30: Paul Ryan. Meade says: "He looks like a young JFK only healthy." I'm struck by this quote, directly attacking Obama: "I have never seen opponents so silent about their record and so desperate to keep their power. They've run out of ideas. Their moment came and went. Fear and division is all they've got left."

9:40: As Paul Ryan expresses his love for the state of Wisconsin, the C-SPAN camera closes in on Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, and we see there's a tear rolling down his cheek.



That was pointed out by Meade, who confesses to a tear of his own.

9:55: Paul Ryan gives a moving tribute to his mother, who, as a new widow, commuted 40 miles a day to Madison — to my school, the University of Wisconsin — to learn the skills she used to build a new business and a new life in which her happiness was not just in the past and to become his role model. After a long ovation from the crowd, Ryan moves into what will be the greatest iteration of what has been the convention's them: You did build that. He says:

Behind every small business, there's a story worth knowing. All the corner shops in our towns and cities, the restaurants, cleaners, gyms, hair salon, hardware stores — these didn't come out of nowhere. A lot of heart goes into each one. And if small business people say they made it on their own, all they are saying is that nobody else worked 7 days a week in their place, nobody showed up in their place to open the door at 5 in the morning, nobody did their thinking and worrying and sweating for them. After all that work and in a bad economy, it sure doesn't help to hear from their President that government gets the credit. What they deserve to hear is the truth: Yes, you did build that!

11:10: Ryan did a brilliant job. It was much more than a fine speech and an excellent delivery. He embodied that speech. We saw a brilliant candidate.

Trump won't run.

I'm posting about this for some reason, even though I didn't see the point of posting that Huckabee won't run. What does a man have to do to get attention for not doing something?

"Donald Trump is now tied with Mike Huckabee for first place when Republicans are asked who they support for the GOP presidential nomination in 2012..."

A new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll.

ADDED: "Wow, what's happening to Mitt Romney?"

Huckabee takes sides in the Michelle v. Sarah food fight.

Sarah Palin took a very gentle shot at Michelle Obama... on the subject of dessert:

In her TLC show Sarah Palin's Alaska, the former GOP vice presidential nominee is seen opening cupboards in search of chocolate, marshmallows and graham crackers, asking "Where are the s'mores ingredients?"

"This is in honor of Michelle Obama, who said the other day we should not have dessert," Palin said.

Mike Huckabee, famously once quite fat and actually pretty fat again, opined:

“With all due respect to my colleague and friend Sarah Palin, I think she's misunderstood what Michelle Obama is trying to do... Michelle Obama's not trying to tell people what to eat or not trying to force the government's desires on people... She’s stating the obvious, that we do have an obesity problem in this country."

Well, he's not running for President against Michelle Obama. He's running (potentially) against Sarah Palin. Ironically, Sarah Palin is the one who's thin.

Now... is it true that Michelle Obama isn't "trying to tell people what to eat" and "not trying to force the government's desires on people"? Is it true that she's only "stating the obvious, that we do have an obesity problem in this country"? I don't know why Michelle Obama looks better if she's simply "stating the obvious" fact that there are a lot of fat people in this country. If it's so obvious, why point it out? And it's rude to do nothing more that point out that people are fat.

Here's Michelle Obama looming over some little boy as Barack Obama signs the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act. Looming large. You decide what's obvious. Or ask Huck, the arbiter of obvious. I just want to note that this bill seems to be about telling people what to eat and forcing the government's desires on people. (Forcing the government's desires on people? That sounds weirdly rape-y.)

But as the school-nutrition bill evolved, the first lady became involved in the sometimes messy world of legislative sausage-making to help push it through. 

This government that forces its desires on us pushes through with a messy sausage. Yikes. The imagery. Avert your eyes.

Anyway, what's in that bill? It's not about telling us what to eat? The linked article says it "will set national nutritional standards for public schools, boost funding for low-income meal programs and advance [Barack Obama's] wife’s campaign against childhood obesity." And in those "national nutritional standards," do the kids get s'mores or not? I don't know, but I see that as Obama signed the bill, he said:

“Not only am I very proud of the bill... but had I not been able to get this passed, I would be sleeping on the couch.”

Is it cool for the President to pose as pussy-whipped?

Mike Huckabee deploys the passive voice.

In a statement about Maurice Clemmons, the man wanted in the shooting of 4 police officers. Boldface added:

He was recommended for and received a commutation of his original sentence from 1990, this commutation made him parole eligible and he was then paroled by the parole board once they determined he met the conditions at that time.

These things just happened to Clemmons, according to Huckabee, who, as Arkansas governor, was the giver of the commutation that Clemmons received.

He was arrested later for parole violation and taken back to prison to serve his full term but prosecutors dropped the charges that would have held him.

Bad prosecutors.

Jon Voight is not happy with Barack Obama.

And some folks are not very happy with Jon Voight.

"Using mind control techniques developed on his home planet, Obama has unleashed an army of seductresses..."

"... in order to eliminate the men who stand in the way of his reelection in 2012. Based on the timing of the Sanford and Ensign affairs, it appears he launched the offensive before the first primary of 2008. I know this seems like a far-fetched theory, but it will seem a lot more plausible should Huckabee or Pawlenty ever hold the confessional press conference."

"Republicans typically nominate someone familiar who's run for president before..."

"...such as Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bob Dole, and John McCain. But since the party appears to be in trouble right, Republicans might want to do what Democrats typically do, and look for a fresh face..."

The unfresh faces — tied at 21/22% each in a new poll — are Huckabee, Romney, and Palin. 2012 prospects look dreary — except to the even more dreary extent that Obama is a miserable failure.

Sarah Palin is the frontrunner for 2012.

Say the odds-makers.

Hot Air comments:

Barring a catastrophic first term, The One will be heavily favored for reelection, leading young’uns like Jindal and Palin to bow out and bide their time until 2016.... Mitt might run since he’d be 69 and facing a crowded, charismatic field in 2016, but unless he stands a real chance to win, I figure he’ll pass too in the interest of avoiding further expense and aggravation. Result: A Huckabee-Pawlenty snoozefest....

I think it's impossible to make much of a prediction this far out, but I certainly hope Obama does well. Not too well. Unlike many people who voted for Obama, I dislike change.

(Ugh. Just added the "2012 campaign" tag. Made a mental note to use it sparingly this year.)

Here's the post where I collect my favorite quotes from the past year.

This is an annual feature of the Althouse blog. I go though the whole year of posts and pick out the quotes that I like best.

"I have so many opportunities from this country. I just don't want to see us fall backwards, you know?" Hillary Clinton, tearing up for the ladies in New Hampshire.

"It was a creed written into the founding documents that declared the destiny of a nation. Yes we can. It was whispered by slaves and abolitionists as they blazed a trail toward freedom through the darkest of nights. Yes we can...." Barack Obama.

"We know how to talk about eatin' fried squirrel." Mike Huckabee.

"A cartoon character is how I see myself and it's worked for me for 40 years. I would rather be a cartoon than a genius!" Dolly Parton.

"Because I'm an ordinary person, I thought that they meant, 'What's your biggest weakness?' If I had gone last I would have known what the game was. And then I could have said, 'Well, ya know, I like to help old ladies across the street. Sometimes they don't want to be helped. It's terrible.'" Barack Obama.

"In addition to keen intelligence, integrity and a rare authenticity, you exhibit something that has nothing to do with age, experience, race or gender and something I don't see in other candidates. That something is a creative imagination which coupled with brilliance equals wisdom. It is too bad if we associate it only with gray hair and old age. Or if we call searing vision naivete. Or if we believe cunning is insight. Or if we settle for finessing cures tailored for each ravaged tree in the forest while ignoring the poisonous landscape that feeds and surrounds it." Toni Morrison raved about Barack Obama.

"Doesn't it seem like she's being pimped out in some weird sort of way?" David Shuster, talking inanely about Chelsea Clinton.

"Listen, I'll never forget you. You were the only guys who would listen to me for a couple of months. Do you think I'd ever forget you?" John McCain, on the phone with the bloggers.

"I am not saying goodbye to you. I only wish to fight as a soldier of ideas." Fidel Castro stepping down as president of Cuba.

"I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother." Barack Obama gives a speech about Jeremiah Wright.

"I don't get too high when I'm high, and I don't get too low when I'm low." Barack Obama, explaining that he has "the right temperament for the presidency."

"Oh, damn. Where did you come from? I’m white. I’m entitled. There’s a black man stealing my show." The Rev. Michael Pfleger channels Hillary's inner voice.

"Oh, this is so terrible: The people they want her. Oh, this is so terrible: She is winning the general election, and he is not." Bill Clinton channels the media's inner voice.

"Maintain." Bloomberg flips out.

"I've been to 57 states." Best Obama gaffe.

"Ladies, doesn't it all sound too familiar? Once again, a woman is told to put her dreams aside to benefit a man, to benefit a party of men. Obama, a freshman senator who has paid no dues, is treated like anointed royalty; while a hard-working woman who has battled her entire life to break the glass ceiling is treated like a leftover meal, and thrown down the garbage disposal. You know how this feels. You've been in Hillary's shoes. You've seen the pretty boys that come in the office, almost no experience. They glad-hand the boss; they take credit for your work, talk a good game with real specifics, and then what happens? They get promoted while you, the hardworking backbone of the office, are told to go fetch the coffee or set up meetings for these dweebs that couldn't carry your bra if they had to." Rush Limbaugh channels the feminists.

"We now know who the Democratic nominee will be." Tim Russert, speaking prematurely, on May 26. 18 days later, he died, prematurely.

"My name is such a vanilla, white-girl American name." Ashley Holmes, self-renamed Ashley Hussein.

"This was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal." Barack Obama at his most megalomaniacal.

And this is the moment when I hit the wall. This gets us through the first half of the year. You'll have to wait for Part 2.

Barbara Walters interviews Rush Limbaugh.

Hot Air has the video -- and highlights the line "I love Sarah Palin" (adding "How does Huck expect to compete with her among the base when Rush, Hannity, Ingraham, et al. are head over heels for her?"):



Here's what Rush himself said about the interview on his Friday radio show. First, there's this observation about the difference between TV and radio:

[O]ne of the reasons, ladies and gentlemen, I am not enthusiastic about television is that it drives me nuts getting feedback every time I'm on television. When I had my own show, I would go home, I'd check the e-mail, whatever, and nobody was ever satisfied. Everybody always had a complaint. I never get complaints about this radio show. I never have people say, "What you shoulda said was… and why did you let 'em ask that? You shoulda thrown it right back in their face." I said, "What's the point? What's the point?" Nobody is ever satisfied with television because all that matters is how you look and nothing else matters. Nobody remembers what anybody ever says on television. I give you Obama. It's how you look; it's how you come off.

Well, Rush's style has evolved on the radio, and it's not so good on TV. I watch the radio show on the webcam sometimes, and I can see what the problem is. He puts his body into producing that voice. He doesn't worry about how it looks. It's all about producing the sound. And it doesn't look relaxed and natural. You can see the effort. It's tiring to watch it, but for listening, it fits the material perfectly. I think he's wrong in saying that TV is only about how you look, but his demeanor is so radio that when he's on TV, we're distracted by the unsuitable visuals. People on TV have honed their style. Walters is brilliant at what she does, and Rush ought to admit that great TV technique really is something, just as his radio voice is.

Next, he complains at length about the way they edited his answer about how much money he makes in a recession. They chose to air the funny line -- "I just choose not to participate" -- and to skip the economics lecture -- which is that all he gets is a percentage of what the show brings in. He claims they took it out because it didn't fit their script. They want to portray him as someone who's cold to the suffering of others. (Barbara stresses that he grew up rich.) He's right but only part right. They were also making him more interesting.

Rush goes on to emphasize that he -- and none of the other "10 Most Fascinating People" -- got Barbara laughing: "We were yucking it up and having a good time." I noticed that he had a strategy of laughing. He responded to almost every question by laughing. He also uses laughing a lot on his radio show. There's a difference between saying funny things that make us laugh and using your own laughing as a form of communication. Be aware: Rush loves to laugh in the face of liberals, to give the impression that whatever they say is plainly foolish. If Barbara laughed along with that, I suspect that she was following her own strategy, letting him feel like the 2 of them were just having a good time, so he'd spill something she could use. Rush said "There was nothing really confrontational about it." Ah, yes. How do you think Barbara does what she does? She helps you get comfortable. He saw that too, because he goes on to say: "The whole thing was a challenge."

Hmmm. Contradiction. It wasn't confrontational, but it was a challenge? That, my friends, is a typical Rush change of direction. He doesn't admit he's wrong when he sees he's wrong. He just starts saying something else. As a law professor, I'm very familiar with that technique. I know you can do it. You realize you're saying something that is wrong or off for some reason. You can either: 1. Shift to getting it right and pretend there was never a problem, or 2. Stop and deliberately point out the problem -- look, that's wrong and here's why -- and then go on to get it right -- to openly show your work as you get to the right way of putting it. I understand why commentators and politicians protect themselves by using #1, but I think #2 is the ethical approach.

Gallup says Republicans want to see Sarah Palin run in 2012.

Sarah, first, followed by Mitt and Mike.

The political news of the day.

1. Obama's Attorney General: Eric Holder -- "a centrist on most law enforcement issues, though he has sharply criticized the secrecy and the expansive views of executive power advanced by the Bush Justice Department."

2. Ted Stevens finally goes down to defeat. The new Senator from Alaska is Mark Begich. The Dems now have 58 seats in the Senate, 2 short of filibuster-busting power.

3. Hillary might say "no" to SOS: "The Clinton camp’s effort to downplay her interest in the post might simply reflect her need to create an alternative storyline if the deal falls apart for other reasons, including the possibility that insurmountable problems arise during the vetting process, Democrats not connected with Clinton cautioned. Another possible motivation: Pushing back against the perception that she’s at the mercy of Obama’s team."

4. No Beau.

5. Joe won't go.

6. Draft Sarah.

7. Ayers airs his pent-up thoughts: "Not only did I never kill or injure another person, but the Weather Underground in its six-year existence never killed or injured another person... We did something that was extreme. Some of you would call it not only extreme but kind of nuts. You might call it off the track. You might call it crazy. You might call it defying of common sense. It was certainly illegal. To call it terrorism stretches the definition of terrorism to everything you don't approve of."

8. Remember Jerry Brown? He's now the California attorney general and he's seeking constitution review of Prop 8 in the California Supreme Court. He's looking for "certainty and finality in this matter."

9. Huck's being mean to Mitt.

10. Do we have to keep thinking about Al Franken?

"Obamans think the smartest veep pick for Senator McCain would be ... MIKE HUCKABEE."

So that means it's the dumbest, right?

Or is Huckabee a better VP candidate?

He saves lives!

Huckabee...

... idiot.

You know, there is a big problem with believing you're a comedian.

Live-blogging the Texas and Ohio primaries.

6:15 ET: Let's just get this post set up. And I wanted to let you know that I'm going to be doing some commentary on C-SPAN at 8 ET and 9:30 ET. Meanwhile, here's Jonathan Alter's Newsweek analysis saying there is no way that Hillary can get enough delegates, even if you project the rosiest possible results for her in all the rest of the primaries.

So no matter how you cut it, Obama will almost certainly end the primaries with a pledged-delegate lead, courtesy of all those landslides in February. Hillary would then have to convince the uncommitted superdelegates to reverse the will of the people. Even coming off a big Hillary winning streak, few if any superdelegates will be inclined to do so. For politicians to upend what the voters have decided might be a tad, well, suicidal.

And here's a WSJ piece trying to figure out what Hillary needs tonight to keep going:

Should the senators split the states' contests -- or if Sen. Clinton wins, but only by narrow margins -- the debate will turn to how to interpret the results. Two smaller states, Rhode Island and Vermont, also vote today. Clinton aides have started to imply that even just one big win today would allow her to claim she had broken Sen. Obama's momentum, justifying a continuing competition....

"We expect on Wednesday the momentum of Sen. Obama will be significantly blunted and new questions will be posed as to whether he is the right candidate for the Democratic Party," said Mark Penn, Sen. Clinton's chief strategist, in a conference call with reporters. "Then this nomination will go straight to the convention."

7:20: I've just been setting things up here with the webcam and the lighting. Now, I need to check out what's going on, so I'll have something to say.

7:28: Obama's victory in Vermont is declared, but we're very close to the time when they will spill the exit poll results on Ohio. Exciting!

7:30: CNN won't call the Ohio race on the Democratic side. It's "competitive," we're told and I take that as bad news for Hillary.

7:32: The CNN exit poll shows that 59% of the Democratic voters were women, which ought to help Hillary. It also seems to skew old, which should help her. The Texas primary ends at 8, and then the Texas caucus starts at 8:15. Both my sons are caucusing in Texas, so I may get some photos and first-hand reports. I should add that McCain has been declared the winner in Ohio and Vermont.

7:43: Politico on how Hillary could come back. And here's Dana Milbank on Clinton "moving the goalposts." "My husband didn't get the nomination wrapped up until June" — she keeps saying that.

7:54: CNN is showing 60 to 38%, Hillary over Obama, in Ohio. But it's competitive! Keep watching! Only 1% of the vote in.

8:08: My son John is waiting in line for the caucus at Red River Church in Austin, TX. The line looks long to him.

8:25: I just did my first of 2 little bits on C-SPAN. Did anyone watch?!

8:46: John is reporting from the caucus, which he just got out of at 7:46 CT. The pews in the church were completely filled up. A party leader addressed them, saying it was "historic" and "we've never seen anything near this level of interest." There were lots of kids there. And some dogs. It pretty much seemed like voting, except that you could see what people around you were writing down. The party leader who directed them to come up to the tables to write down their choices said: "You can come up and it will be like taking communion." John heard someone chide him for saying that, but it wasn't clear whether he was kidding.

9:18: Congratulations to John McCain for clinching the nomination. Now, here's Mike Huckabee, conceding. He will "do everything possible to unite our party and to unite our country." He observes that the 2 most dignified campaigns are the ones in the Republican Party. A nice little speech, which isn't over, but it's down to the list of thanks, so I'll publish this update.

9:26: Huckabee is still talking. Some woman sold her wedding ring to make a contribution to his campaign. Would you even want that money? I wouldn't. I'd rather not hear about that. But he features it in his speech. Anyway, I note the percentages in Texas and Ohio: Hillary is winning Ohio by a much wider margin than Obama is winning Texas. She's got a 20 point margin: 59 to 39%. And Ohio is the state the candidate needs to win. [ADDED: I mean Ohio seems to be the state to win in the November election.] Huckabee is still talking, running on about the men who died at the Alamo. Finally, he's done. I hear McCain should speak soon. I hear that from C-SPAN, which is telling me to hang around until after the McCain speech.

9:50: McCain is speaking. Given the alternatives, he says, his election "is in the best interests of the country we love." That's a nicely modest way of putting it. He didn't grow up thinking the country owed him anything. But he felt "part of a kinship of ideals" that made him think he owed a life of service. Now, he's working the national security theme. We need to "combat Islamic extremism." On to trade: his adversaries "want to pretend the global economy will go away." On health care, he'll work to bring down costs without "ruining the quality of the world's best medical care." Energy: alternative sources. (He stops to cough. Don't look old!) And he wants to listen. We're "the captain of our fate." "We don't hide from history. We make history." Hope, values, principles, greatness, trust.

10:08: Wolf Blitzer keeps saying Ohio is "very competitive," even while looking at numbers showing a blowout by Clinton. What kind of numbers do you need to see before you stop saying that? Meanwhile, it's 50/48 in Texas. I'd say things look pretty good for Hillary (who also won Rhode Island, as expected). Obviously, she's not going to bow out. So, settle in folks, and wait for Pennsylvania, and all the ugly little globules of mud that will dribble out over the next 6 weeks. How about that Rezko trial? Should be delightful.

10:55: CNN calls Ohio for Hillary Clinton. And Clinton is currently ahead in Texas: 50/48. I'll have some photos from the Texas caucus very soon!

11:01: "Has anyone started calling her The Comeback Kid yet?" says Wolf Blitzer.

11:13: Okay, the pictures from the Texas Caucus are up (in a new post).

11:16: Clinton looks happy. She's all aglow. "For anyone who's ever been counted out, but refused to be knocked out..." She wants to symbolize the fighting spirit. Ohio is special, the key state that must be won if the presidency is to be won, and she's won it. She reels off a list of other states she's won — and it's a surprisingly long list. Obama's run of 11 victories in a row had obscured those victories, which include some awfully big states. "We're just getting started." She makes a big deal out of saying her website address, and the crowd chants it along with her, which strikes me as incredibly dorky. She going to be a fighter and a champion. "We're ready for health care!" "When that phone rings at 3 a.m...." She thanks a lot of people, including the 2 most important people in her life, Bill and Chelsea. Then, she also thanks her mother (an unnecessary slight snub to Mom). She gets a new chant going: "Yes, we will." Get it? "Yes, we can" refers to capacity, but it's not enough just to be able to do something, you have to actually do it.

11:51: Andrew Sullivan is very upset:

To keep oneself from despair....

I just had a Jager shot, and hope to get drunk very soon. So this is my last post of the night. Here's what I'll do in the morning: find out who won the most delegates in the March 4 states, and check someone else's math (yes, I'm not going to get it wrong myself) to see who subsequently has the numbers to win. And then take a deep breath. And say what I think. Right now, emotion clouds the mind. Oh, and Jager.

Chez Althouse, the drinks have been: 1 Bolthouse Farms "Vedge" and 3 waters. It fits with my cruelly neutral viewpoint.

12:04: My other son, Chris, also caucused in Austin (at McCallum High School). He describes the caucus as extremely chaotic and confusing. He had volunteered to work for Hillary Clinton. He was at the rally in Austin last night, and he drove all over town today putting up Hillary Clinton signs. At one place where they needed people to hold up signs, Bill Clinton made an appearance and shook everyone's hand. Chris was impressed by Bill Clinton's handshaking technique. It's very quick but fully engaged, with an instant of eye contact that leaves you feeling that you met Bill Clinton. There were a lot of schoolgirls at the event — perhaps 6th graders — and they were ecstatic about shaking Bill's hand. They were jumping up and down, almost crying, and saying "I shook his hand!" They were acting, Chris said, the way you would expect them to act if Justin Timberlake had kissed them. Chris contrasted the experience with coming within arm's length of Hillary and Chelsea at the rally last night. They were not shaking hands, but giving autographs, and he didn't have the same sense that he met them, not that he faulted them for that. There was some pushing in the crowd that was infringing on two old women in front, and Hillary came over and told them to stop. Chris said that Hillary and Chelsea looked exactly like the do on television, and that was "surreal." As for the disorganization at the caucus, Chris said that people didn't understand the rules. Could they just sign in and leave, or were they supposed to stay? Staying seemed to have to do with being chosen as a delegate for the state convention [actually it was the county convention], and they needed something like 40 delegates for the 300 voters in that precinct. What were they supposed to do if there weren't 40 caucus goers left in the end? The voters themselves had to "kind of take over and figure out what was happening." And this was in Austin with educated, politically involved caucus-goers, but there are 8,000 precincts in the state. Imagine the confusion on that scale. Caucuses are horrible, he said. Anyway, he ended up as one of the delegates for Hillary at the state county convention.

1:09: And now, Clinton has won Texas — the primary, that is. So the Obamomentum is broken.

For more Althouse, see Instapundit.

I'm writing over there too for a few days. Feel free to comment over here on this morning's posts. So far:

"I GUESS MAKING ONESELF VULNERABLE to two negative stories in forty years is the price of a lifetime of public service."

LAWRENCE LESSIG'S RUN FOR CONGRESS. "The district, south of San Francisco, runs straight through the heart of Silicon Valley, where Mr. Lessig is considered a celebrity, though one who wears glasses and uses phrases like 'net neutrality.'" If you're "considered a celebrity," doesn't that make you a celebrity? Is there some deeper lever of genuine celebrity that I just don't understand?

"IS JOHN MCCAIN BROKE?"

"JIM RUTENBERG, MARILYN W. THOMPSON, DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK and STEPHEN LABATON all show the kind of journalistic chops that made Us such a must-read in doctor's offices and lavatories around the world." Says Captain Ed.

MAJORING IN MIRACLES. Did Obama get sick on the eve of the big debate? Does Huckabee think this is the miracle he'd been hoping for? Unlike Huck, I didn't "major in miracles," but like the Virgin Mary on the grilled cheese sandwich, these works are uninspiring.

AND: Three more:

A BIG CIGAR? THERE?! That seems so wrong.

APHASIA IN THE COMICS.

"IF REPUBLICANS ARE MAKING TOO MUCH of Michelle Obama's gaffe that 'for the first time in my adult life I am proud of my country' -- and well they might, because it could win them the election -- Democrats are making way too little of it."

"Gotta blow my nose here for a second."

Barack Obama blows his nose. And gets applause. And gets a news story about how he blew his nose and got applause. And 1,000 blog posts that link to it. Have we reached peak adulation yet?

By the way, this adds weight to my suspicion that Barack — everyone's calling him "Barack" now — was sick on Tuesday night when he gave that overlong, halting speech. And don't you think — speaking of bodily fluids — that Hillary is salivating over the prospect of a weakened opponent at the debate tonight? Fate has to cut her a break occasionally, you know.

Obama may be reaching near-Messiah heights, but — we heard from Preacher Huckabee — God may twiddle with the election. Has God favored Hillary by smiting Barack with a cold? Has God come through with Huckabee's miracle at last in the form of a NYT story about McCain and that woman, Ms. Iseman?

Huckabee said "I majored in miracles," and I'd like to know if he sees God's hand in that Kleenex and that newspaper.