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The wire services are all reporting that John McCain has picked Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate.

Leaving aside the controversy surrounding the firing of an Alaska state trooper and the possibility that this pick will bring the bribery trial of Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Internet Tubes, to the fore, I love how this brings things full circle.

The dumb Republicans have picked someone who couldn’t even serve because Alaska wasn’t a state when she was born! It’s not even part of Amaruka!*

It’s far away and weird (a really really long way from Martha’s Vineyard) and I bet she doesn’t even have a birth certificate! And if she does it’s fake.

Most Americans consider Alaska to be exotic. And cold. Very, very cold. Does anyone really think the Beltway press corpse will follow someone back to Alaska during winter break? My crystal ball is getting an anti-freeze flush, but this could go down as one of the most bizarre and disastrous vice-presidential picks in history.

*Actually, I’m just lying. Bad habit I picked up in Clark County.

MORE– Logically this means John McCain’s parts are now in a testicle lockbox. Did you hear that voice? Sarah Palin should make me a sandwich.

In October of 1988 I met a cute redhead at a party in Hell’s Kitchen.  She was prim and proper and looked for all the world like the perfect Republican… except for the big “Mike Dukakis” button on her lapel.  It was this irresistible contrast the sparked me to strike up a conversation, and it was that conversation that ultimately led to this:

Tonight at the Invesco Field I had the opportunity to sit down next to Gov. Dukakis, shake his hand, show him that picture of my daughter, and personally thank him for the campaign that made her possible.  As overwhelmingly emotional as the entire night has been, that was undoubtedly my personal highlight.

I’m on the field at Invesco field, but have no power, no Internet, and an overwhelmed cell phone network that keeps dropping in and out, but I’ll post as best I can… which possibly might be not at all. We’ll see.

FYI, as a sure thing for Obama, Washington did not get a great location–way in the back, audience left. But at least it’s not as bad blood red state Wyoming, sitting right behind us.

Oh to be a swing state.

Ever wonder how FOX News host Megyn Kelly, the highest paid news anchor on television (if you’re comparing dollars earned per syllables spoken), manages to provide such insightful commentary?  Clearly, it’s the endless hours of preparation.

For example, even while the crowd around her loudly cheered Sen. Joe Biden following his vice presidential acceptance speech, Kelly never lost her focus or concentration.  What a dedicated professional.

I don’t know if the TV cameras caught it, but I couldn’t help notice Michelle Obama wiping the tears from her eyes during Beau Biden’s moving introduction of his dad.

The delegates here may love Hillary Clinton, but her husband Bill just got the biggest reception of the convention. By far.

A couple of western governors stopped by the Big Tent today to chat with the bloggers, and not surprisingly, I managed to get in the first question with both them.  Above is an unedited clip of Gov. Brian Schweitzer of Montana, who appears on the verge of breaking out into superstar status after his incredibly well received speech last night.

Coming up later, a video interview with our very own Gov. Chris Gregoire of Washington.

While Goldy iPhlogs from the Pepsi Center, I’m in … um … Idaho Falls, Idaho.

I’d like to say I’m heading home because once it became apparent that the media frame of Clintonites tearing limbs off Obama delegates was more hype than fact, I was so bitterly disappointed that I couldn’t take any more. But the truth is much more boring. I got really sick starting yesterday morning, and owing to some risks of medical complications, I decided to take an uncharacteristically prudent (albeit difficult) course of action and drive back to Seattle.

Goldy and Darryl are, of course, holding down the fort admirably. I had to console myself this afternoon with the Grand Tetons.

UPDATE [Lee]: From the Daily Show last night…

The media didn’t get the drama they wanted (a floor battle, or at least some loud whining), but they got some drama nonetheless, as Hillary Clinton entered the hall to ask on behalf of the New York delegation, that Barack Obama be nominated by acclamation on a voice vote.  And surprise… he was.

I’m guessing it was pretty compelling TV.

That is, assuming Washington gets a chance to cast its votes, which given past history, I can’t imagine we’ll get to the W’s… especially after Arkansas voted unanimously for Obama.  (Well, technically, WA already did cast its votes, 68-26 with 4 absent, but they probably won’t get the chance to announce it.  That’s kinda the point.)

Not much of a floor fight, is it?

UPDATE:
FYI, Clinton released her delegates this morning, so the cynical amongst you will say that the fix is in.  Or, you know, it might be described as a display of Democratic unity.  But that’s not a very compelling story, is it?  So lets just stick with the former.

UPDATE, UPDATE:

Geov and I were making our way down the pedestrian mall from one convention site to another the other day. The hot Denver sun enticed us to take one of the free shuttles that runs up and down the mall. We waited.

It seems the shuttles were temporarily shut down—perhaps something important was happening. We inspected the relatively quiet landscapes for a sign. Minutes later something stirred down the road.

It was a pro-McCain march. And a law abiding bunch of marchers they were, too. As the marchers waited for the light to change, Geov and I snapped photos and debated whether there were more marchers or more bicycle police. (Really…you can see the entire “rally” in the photo.)

Some people waiting for the shuttle next to us started chanting “Four more years! Four more years!”

That prompted one of the bicycle cops to swing around in front of our shuttle stop. He looked at our group through those menacing dark glasses and asked, “Did somebody say ‘four more beers?'”

Standing in line outside the Pepsi Center, I finally learn the deep, dark truth about politics.  Gosh was I naive.  (And Jesus am I unashamed of my crappy videography.)

Brian Baird and Danny Westneat want you to know how great the surge has been and those of us in WA-03 better say uncle!

But now that it appears he was right — that the Iraq war was going better, as he claimed, and President Bush’s troop surge was working — the Southwest Washington congressman is even more of an outcast.

Now nobody much wants to talk to him about Iraq at all.

“After all that extraordinary outrage directed at me, not one person has called me up and said ‘Hey, Brian, it looks like you might have had a point after all,’ ” said Baird, in Denver for his party’s national convention this week.

“We say Bush is so blinded by ideology that he ignores the facts in the real world, and that’s true,” Baird said. “Aren’t we doing the same thing? We’re being just like Bush.”

Meanwhile, as Atrios would put it, “over there:” (props to Juan Cole.)

At least 45 people were killed and 59 injured on Tuesday in attacks, including a bloody suicide and car bomb attack in Iraq’s restive Diyala province, in some of the worst violence the country has witnessed in recent months.

A simultaneous suicide and bomb attack in Diyala province killed at least 35 people. Around 47 people were injured in the attack.

A suicide bomber got out of a car and detonated himself amid a crowd of police recruits standing in front of a police station in Jalawla town, some 60 km northeast of the Iraqi capital, witnesses told a news agency.

Seconds after the man detonated his vest, the car loaded with explosives blew up, the witnesses said.

Yep, only brown furriners being killed, so it’s all good.

Let me put this as succinctly as I can. I was willing and still am willing to entertain Baird’s opinions about what to do in Iraq, and I refused to participate in the public flogging of Baird a year ago. Of course there are reasons not to leave too hastily. But there were also valid reasons to start figuring out how to withdraw troops, and guess what, now we are doing that planning, just ahead of the 2008 election. Go figure.

But the reason Baird’s being shunned isn’t because he had a different opinion on Iraq (or the Schiavo madness, the bankruptcy bill, forestry practices or the FISA sellout) but because he keeps adopting Republican frames, ala Joe Lieberman.

Like, you know, claiming that the surge is a success and painting himself as a victim of the dirty fucking hippies, and then lecturing us about reality. Give me a break.

Sadly, Baird’s Republican opponent in the general election, Michael Delavar, who is sometimes painted as an anti-war candidate, is only anti-war in a completely insane Ron Paul sense. Delavar wants to issue letters of marquee and reprisal to fight the dirty furrin brown people, which worked great against the Barbary pirates, but the last pirate I ever saw was in Orlando, standing next to a giant mouse. Some plan.

I was probably going to vote for Baird in the general election, if for no other reason than people like Delavar who want to run an information age economy based on 18th Century economic practices are kind of scary. I like gold as much as the next guy, but there’s not enough gold in the solar system to back the dollar against our debts to China.

I’ll probably still wind up voting for Baird, but I will certainly be on the lookout for any upcoming go-getters who can run against him next cycle. It kind of pains me personally as I was a volunteer on Baird’s 1996 oh-so-close run against Rep. Linda Smith, when he lost in the end by 887 votes or so.

I know, I’ll be accused of having a “litmus test” when in fact the only test to be in the “big tent” Democratic Party is that you don’t help the other guy put up his tent. Which is exactly what Baird is doing.

At that point you’re on the other team. Not an enemy, but an opponent.