It's quite a chaotic scene here - huge, 2-hour wait to get through security. People are still filing in and the line outside still snakes (I'm told) a mile or more.

One inside, you need at least a graduate degree in statistics to figure out where you sit with any given credential. And then outlets, internet...

All that quasi-settled, the atmosphere is electric. Richardson is speaking now, and used the line 'John McCain pays hundreds for his shoes, but we're the ones paying for his flip-flops.' Not bad.

Can't wait to see Stevie. Hoping he plays "As." I've seen him live once, and he's incredible.

How does it look on TV?

Update [2008-8-28 20:50:0 by Josh Orton]: Al Gore up! On McCain continuing Bush/Cheney policies: "I believe in recycling, but this is ridiculous."

Update [2008-8-28 21:21:24 by Josh Orton]: Stevie!

Update [2008-8-28 21:21:24 by Josh Orton]: Wes Clark comes on the stage as part of the program - buried among a dozen other military figures.

Update [2008-8-28 21:24:25 by Josh Orton]: Gen. Clark walks on and off the stage without saying a single word. Unbelievable.

Update [2008-8-28 21:47:52 by Josh Orton]: Playing Springsteen's great "Born in the USA" in the arena. Taking this song back from Ronald Reagan's misappropriation in the 80's.

We're heading over to Invesco Field shortly. Word is the line is huge already. We don't anticipate having internet access and/or power supply so I'm going to be twittering the speech HERE.

Consider this a convention open thread in case we don't post for a while.

Go Barack!

A Jewish friend of mine alerted me to a new ad from John McCain, which aired just before Bill Clinton's speech last night in the Baltimore market. The McCain campaign describes the ad buy as "in key states" but my friend suspects it might better be described as "in Jewish markets."

Try to contain your disbelief but the ad takes comments Barack made about Iran completely out of contexst to portray him as soft on Israel.

Watch it:

Newsweek does some fact-checking:

McCain's new ad...quotes Obama saying that Iran is a "tiny" country that "doesn't pose a serious threat." It implies that he fails to see Iran's threat to Israel.

The picture changes dramatically when Obama's full quotes are considered:

Obama actually said of Iran, Cuba and Venezuela: "These countries are tiny compared to the Soviet Union" (emphasis ours).

Likewise, he said those countries don't pose a serious threat to the United States "the way the Soviet Union posed a threat to us." Obama has also said in speeches that Iran is Israel's greatest threat, and a serious threat to the region, and he has discussed its sponsorship of terrorism.

Does the timing of this line of attack on Barack portend a Lieberman VP selection? It's all the buzz here in the tent. The argument for: it will completely obliterate the "more of the same" narrative against McCain and it will dilute Obama's post-partisan message. For me, the argument against is more compelling: it would completely alienate the far right. We suspect McCain's choice will be leaked tonight in order to undermine the impact of Barack's speech. What do you think?

Joe at AMERICAblog catches an interview Harry Reid did with the Nevada-based pundit Jon Ralston:

"I just think he doesn't have the temperament to be president," Reid told Las Vegas Sun columnist Jon Ralston during the taping of "Face to Face," in Denver on Wednesday. The show airs on a Las Vegas, Nev., cable channel.

"I've served with the man 26 years," Reid said. "Do I have the ability to speak with experience about someone who has abused everyone he's dealt with? Someone who does not have the temperament to be president, who's wrong on the war, wrong on the economy, wrong on nuclear waste. What am I supposed to do? Walk around talking about what a great guy he is? I don't believe that. .... "

"There isn't a Republican serving in the Senate that's happy he's the nominee. Now, they're all supporting him, but I'll tell you they have told me. I've had Republican senators tell me they don't think they'll vote for him," Reid said.

When Ralston asked if Reid thought it would be "dangerous" to let McCain be president, Reid answered: "Well, if you said it, I wouldn't correct you."

"Is that right?" Ralston asked. "You really think that?"

"That's right," said Reid, who predicted that Democrat presidential candidate Barack Obama would carry the battleground state of Nevada by 5 percentage points.

And there's no chance the "temperament" charge from Reid was an accident: he just repeated the point in a meeting with bloggers this morning.

You hear "John McCain is my good friend, but..." line from many Dem Senators as a pretext to criticism the Republican candidate. But no such qualification from the Majority Leader: Reid told Lieberman he "can't stand John McCain." But more than that, I think now is precisely the time to begin introducing this aspect of McCain's personality - right when the traditional media is discovering the same thing:

McCain's Prickly TIME Interview

For years, John McCain's marathon bull sessions with reporters were more than a means of delivering a message; they were the message. McCain proudly, flagrantly refused direction from handlers, rarely dodged tough questions and considered those who did wimps and frauds. The style told voters that he was unafraid, that he had nothing to hide and that what you see is what you get. "Anything you want to talk about," he promised reporters aboard the Straight Talk Express in Iowa back in March 2007.

...so when TIME's James Carney and Michael Scherer were invited to the front of McCain's plane recently for an interview, they were ushered forward, past the curtain that now separates reporters from the candidate, past the sofa that was designed for his gabfests with the press and taken straight to the candidate's seat. McCain at first seemed happy enough to do the interview. But his mood quickly soured. The McCain on display in the 24-minute interview was prickly, at times abrasive, and determined not to stray off message.

McCain, now with a shot at winning, is not acting well under pressure. And when that happens, as Reid acknowledges, he's dangerous.

Over the weekend I asked if the Associated Press' Washington Bureau Chief Ron Fournier, who previously held months of talks with the McCain campaign about taking a senior level position with the committee, was moonlighting for the McCain campaign. In short, an "analysis" piece by Fournier read like straight talking points for the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.

Both MoveOn and FireDogLake launched action items to try to pressure both the AP and its subscribers to act responsibly with regards to Fournier and force him to recuse himself from covering the Presidential campaign. At least one newspaper, the Star Tribute of Minneapolis and St. Paul, took notice, and although they were not particularly happy to have been inundated by the emails from MoveOn members, they seemed to agree with the sentiment.

Having said that, these letter writers raise a legitimate point. Fournier was in discussions about joining the McCain campaign and was pretty cozy with Karl Rove while he was still in the White House. So when he wrote in a news analysis that that the selection of Joe Biden as Barack Obama's running mate showed a lack of "self-confidence," I wonder who was doing the analysis: the AP bureau chief or the man romanced by the McCain campaign?

If he were writing for the opinion page, no problem. As the head of the AP's most important bureau -- directing reporters and determining coverage - it's troubling.

It's time for the AP to own up to its mistake and tell Fournier to either recuse himself or step down from his position. There's already one Fox News in the world -- we don't need another one sending stories over its wires to every newspaper in the world.

Tuesday was primary day in Alaska and, well, there was a little event going on that diverted our attention, so I wanted to give an update of Tuesday's results.

• On the House side, Alaska House Minority Leader Ethan Berkowitz easily dispatched Diane Benson in the Democratic primary. Whom he will challenge in November, however, is still uncertain and won't be decided for a few weeks.

  In the primary for the state's lone House seat, [GOP incumbent Don] Young led Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell by 152 votes, or 0.16 percent, with 99 percent of precincts reporting Wednesday. [...]

  "We're not going to finish counting absentee and [provisional] ballots until Sept. 5," said Gail Fenumiai, director of the state Division of Elections. "We have thousands of absentee ballots to be counted."

  Once the counting is finished, she said, a state board will spend seven to 10 days reviewing the results, a step that is part of every contest, regardless of the margin. The results will be officially certified by Sept. 16 or 17. Only then can the loser request a full recount, which would take at least a few days to complete.

  Considering the recent polling, we should hope that Swing State Project is right when they project the absentee ballots to expand Young's lead but interestingly, they're also reporting that Young has refused to rule out running as an independent if he loses.

• On the Senate side, Road to 60 candidate Mark Begich officially became the Democratic nominee for the Senate from Alaska and indicted incumbent Ted Stevens became -- for now -- the Republican nominee having won 63% of the vote among a 7 candidate field.

  Considering Begich is up 18% in the Pollster trend estimate, it's possible that Stevens will be pressured out of the race, which would mean the Alaska Republican Party would get to choose a replacement candidate, so it's important to continue to support Mark Begich over at our Road To 60 ActBlue page.

Dang, the nation is hearing today that alongside Obama's speech tonight, that McCain will be announcing his VP pick. Apparently, his VP choice will be informed today, and announced tomorrow in Ohio at 10 AM.

No doubt, they will leak the choice in the late hours, early morning tomorrow in order to try and squash the coverage of Obama's speech. But McCain will get a pass on that swipe from the traditional media, give than the conventions are so compressed.

The McCain bus goes from PA to OH, and then over to MO on Sunday.

Their choices: Huckabee and Romney appear to be out, as they are both at a 'unity' event in MO on Sunday and announced. Lieberman, Pawlenty and Hutchinson are the ones in the running according to the rumors. Hutchinson is the one that I've thought all along is their most potent VP choice, Pawlenty is a safe blah choice, and Lieberman is a potential game-changer, but not safe, as it could go either way.

The next 24 hours are going to be crucial to the contest.

The speech last night from Bill Clinton was the best of the convention. He was on his game. Joe Biden's personal story was very compelling. John Kerry has some moments, but overall it was Clinton and Biden that owned the night. I thought the attacks against McCain were done well. The narrative against "More of the Same" is something that could be picked up by anyone running against a Republican this cycle.

The one thing I'll note, is that if McCain does choose Lieberman, they'll try and turn that against the Democrats with some bipartisan brew. I just can't imagine that Lieberman is the pick, but it would be sorta fun watching the GOP partisans swallow that pill the next week, and there would be nothing that could fire up the netroots more than Lieberman being their VP pick.

Update [2008-8-28 10:56:18 by Todd Beeton]:OK, so now McCain is denying he's made the pick.

John McCain said Thursday he had yet to decide on a running mate.

The Republican presidential candidate has a rally scheduled for Saturday in Pennsylvania, where he is expected to appear with his newly announced vice presidential choice. He said in the interview that he was bringing both former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, two of the leading names on his short list.

But he cautioned against assuming that meant either one would be the pick.

"I haven't decided yet so I can't tell you," he told KDKA NewsRadio in Pittsburgh early Thursday.

That McCain, he's so cagey.

Too many of the Serious People bloviating about the convention in our media are deranged, incompetent, out of ideas, wrong about everything, and they don't care about the little people. Unfortunately, that's not really news, so I guess they get a pass for not covering it, hmmm?

I thought the funniest moment of last night was PBS' Jim Lehrer clarifying that "not all veterans are Democrats." That's obviously true, but General McKinney, Beau Biden and the rest of the Veterans for Obama made such an impressive case, I can't hold it against someone for thinking it needed to be said. But how's the convention watching been treating you, any highlights or press lowlights on your mind?

Update [2008-8-28 6:33:22 by Natasha Chart]: And if the network you were watching didn't show Beau Biden's introduction of Sen. Biden, I recommend it. While he only alluded to the fact that he'll be deploying to Iraq this fall with his Army National Guard unit, he made a point of saying that his father had written the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA).

VAWA told thousands of victims of domestic violence that the federal government had their backs, that they didn't have to stay in abusive partnerships. It's legislation that not only bettered lives, but doubtless saved lives. And it's important that it be brought up not only for its own sake, but in illustration of the fact that feminist and women's issues also include safety in public and private, basic human dignity, access to education, fair pay and health care.

Conservatives would like to equate even women's right to vote with abortion, as if there was only that one issue. An issue that they use to show their contempt for women by saying that our lives are worth less than a single cell and that our moral agency is so poor that we need others to make our medical decisions. An issue spawned of their own racist condescension and lack of concern for everyone who's already been born. An issue that's been easy for them to demonize. 'Oh, those feminist harpies, they just hate babies.'

Why listen to a monster like that, even if she talks about equal pay, children's health care, or getting nutritious food to impoverished new moms? She's a monster, after all. It must be a trick.

When alleged liberals join the fun by reducing women's issues to one thing, albeit a very important one, abortion, they indicate to me that they haven't been paying attention. (Even the reproductive justice debate is broader than that, as we've seen with the Bush administration's opposition to contraception.) When they bring it down to one issue, they show that they have just as one-dimensional a view of feminism, and of women's needs, as conservatives. But the speakers at this year's DNC know better, the Obama campaign clearly knows better, and Joe Biden seems to have known better for a long time.

I have problems with stances that both Obama and Biden have taken on related topics, but their showcasing of several important gender equity issues leads me to believe that in these, they will try to act out of respect and good faith. It's a laudable improvement over the travesties supported by John McCain and the rest of the George Bush Republicans.