Obama's e-mail about WGN-AM
Text of the e-mail the Obama campaign sent to supporters:

Obama's speech tonight will be profound. That's the basic difference between Obama and all others this year. He has the ability, at certain crucial moments, to reach us all. I could have titled this diary entry "No Fear", because lack of fear is what Obama brings to the table on a daily basis. It's an interesting contrast to the Republican party and it's new puppet, John McCain.

Obama has no puppet master. That concerns just about everyone. "How can we rein this guy in?" You can't. Obama's gonna do what Obama's gonna do. And every day is a breakthrough day for all involved.

Obama is being punished for messing with people's control issues.

Watching Joe Biden's speech, it got to me last night, how respectful everyone is being to John McCain.  He's always described as "a friend" or a "respected colleague" or a "hero.'  And finally it just got to me.  Jon McCain is no hero.

Follow me below the fold, as I explain in more detail how I came to my conclusion that John McCain doesn't deserve to be considered a hero.

(also posted at Booman Tribune)

Woohoo! Barack Obama and Joe Biden are the official democratic ticket. Bill passed the torch, so to speak, and Hill's magnanimous motion during her state's roll call vote might finally put an end to the tradmed's insipid "Was it enough of an endorsement?" meme. But what about tonight?

Reports have been circulating for weeks that Bill is pissed off. The suggestion was that Bill felt the Obama people had not shown the proper deference toward him.

Everyone was worried about Bill’s speech - would he really embrace Obama? Or was Bill still to so upset about being slighted that his support would be merely lukewarm.

According to thepage.time.com, Pawlenty gets "super tough" on Obama and the Democrats...

I've been thinking about George Lakoff's ideas on framing the debate, as presented in "Don't Think of an Elephant" and I think about solar power and wind power more than I think about food.

I just heard that there was a big fight in Minneapolis over drilling in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge, ANWR. The rank and file and the "machers" of the Republican Party, the people I call "Republicanista," want to drill in ANWR. John McCain, their presumptive standard bearer, wants more offshore drilling. He wants to drill in Alaska, and in California, Florida, New Jersey, and everywhere else. McCain, however, is opposed to drilling in ANWR "at this time." (Be very careful when a politician says "At this time." This phrase, "At this time" when used during a political campaign, means "At this time during a political campaign.")

We are all quite aware of just how amazingly disciplined the Republicans seem to be when it comes to memes and talking points.  It's almost as though someone sat them down and explained to them at length why it is so important for them to constantly repeat the same negative characterizations over and over again if they want to successfully 'define' the Democrats as defective and undesirable.  It is my sincere hope that we Democrats will be able to do something similar during the next couple of months.  I am convinced that we will be able to win a big, BIG victory this November if we can find a way to persuade the vast majority of politically informed Democrats all across the country to repeatedly say the words, "They [the Republicans] are misrepresenting the truth..." as something of a mantra between now and election day.

Yesterday, I posed this riddle as a comment, and the response was quite positive.  It was suggested that it get greater exposure, and so I am making it a diary.  This was going to be a short diary, because there's a simple answer to this riddle.  However, I like to put some content in the diary like one is supoosed to do.  You will have to go below the fold for the answer while I go off on a tangent.

On Tuesday, Paul Begala posted an article on the Huffing Post (that's what I call it because that's often what I think they must be doing over there), in which he called for the Democrats to go seriously negative on McCain.  Now I don't have much of a problem with that, but he said something else that struck me as odd.  He claimed that after Hillary suspended her campaign he sent a check to the Obama campaign with the memo "FOR NEGATIVE CAMPAIGNING ONLY" on it.

Hmmmm

I remember, way back at the end of January, when John Edwards had dropped out, wondering who to support. And I supported Barack Obama. The reasoning was more cynical than I would like, but I do want to win - it was because his relationship with the media was going to be better than anything Hillary could hope for. Not a very bold prediction there, but there you go.

However, I made some further predictions based on who was the most viable in each party. Let's revisit the one that matters now, shall we...

Tonight will be a watershed moment in U.S. history. Let the GOP try and spin this as "Obama the celebrity". Let the pundits go on and on about his white problem, about his Clinton problem, about the fact he's running against a POW/Maverick/Saint. Tonight is bigger than all of them. Tonight we'll see history, and I have no doubt Obama will give a speech that will top the many, many excellent speeches we've seen so far this week.

Now that the Clinton-Obama divisiveness line has been definitively laid to rest, the MSM's story du jour -- flogged incessantly, of course, by Republicans -- has shifted to Obama's presumptuousness in staging his acceptance speech tonight at, horrors, a football stadium.

Why, oh why, our oh-so-concerned journalists want to know, would he even risk turning off voters by appearing as a

vanity candidate with charisma and a heavy dose of arrogance, but little substance and not enough seasoning for the White House?

And, to top it all off, Obama has gone and outfitted a stage set on the football field that have become

the fodder for much merriment yesterday, as aerial photos of the stage set made them look like a papier-mache Acropolis.

Republicans, who have taken to ridiculing Obama as "The One," mocked the "Temple of Obama," and advised reporters on what styles of togas they might wear to the event.

More on the flip...

I've been a Democrat for my entire adult life.  Maybe you haven't.  Heck, maybe you're STILL not.  You sure don't need to pay party dues to want what's best for the country and your family.  Even among those of us who share party labels, we have far more powerful things in common.  That said, whether you're a Democrat or not, it's obvious to me that most of us here have been following the convention pretty closely... and speaking only for myself, I've been doing so with escalating enthusiasm as we've seen home run after home run from Michele Obama, Hillary Clinton, President Bill Clinton, and now Joe Biden.  Tonight I'm expecting no less from Vice President Al Gore and of course...batting cleanup...the Next President of the United States Barack Obama.  

So then what happens?

I gave $25 to Barack Obama's campaign today.  For me, at my level right now, just having had to  buy a car, glasses for my kid and deal with the rise in prices for almost everything on a single parent's salary,  I still gave.  And every time I have an extra $25 from conserving food, energy and foregoing non-essentials, I'm going to give it to him, too.

Why?

See below.

I generally do not like using bad events as campaign fodder, but I think passing on this opportunity would be a huge error by the Obama Campaign.

There's much tadoo about why Obama is surrounding himself in "Greek Temple" decor for the Democratic Nomination Acceptance Speech tonight, September 28 2008.

Nationwide there are 2.1 million American Indians of voting age. Native Americans make up only one percent of the total U.S. electorate.

Historically, American Indians have had very low rates of voter registration and turnout. On some American Indian reservations in the western United States as few as 10 percent of all eligible voters are registered.

But in several states the American Indian vote, if mobilized by the Obama campaign, could give a good boost to Obama's efforts to carry the state.

• The biggest target is New Mexico. There are 60,000 registered American Indian voters in the state of New Mexico, making up 9.5 percent of all voters. More than two thirds of those American Indians are registered as Democrats. Only 15 percent are registered Republicans.

As I sat with my grandchildren, my husband, my daughter and her husband, and watched history being made last night, it was almost impossible for me to keep myself from crying.  Why?  Because I began to think back over MY lifetime and remember when bathrooms were labeled "Black" and "white;" when water fountains were labeled "Black" and "white;" when hotels did not service "Black" people; when you couldn't use the bathroom at a gas station; when the back of the bus was where we sat; when our schools received books that white schools threw away; when hospitals were specified "white" or "colored;" when store clerks ignored us until there were no more white people in the store, then we got waited on; when our children were relegated to second-class citizenship just because they were Black; when my beloved grandfather was never "Mr.," he was either "boy" or "Uncle;" when my precious grandmother never heard herself referred to as "Mrs.;" and finally, when we couldn't sit at the lunch counter and order food nor could we try on clothes and shoes at the stores we frequented.  All of this, IN MY LIFETIME!

But this is not to lament the past or blame anyone for it.  This is to praise the future....come....