Well, she's got grit, that's for sure.

This whole time we've been thinking that the narrative is experience vs. non experience. I criticized the Biden pick over it, as I wasn't not sure how it fit in. Damn near everyone criticized the Palin pick for the same reasons. I guess for me, there was a sense that things weren't what they seemed, and we'd have to wait for her to talk to be sure. Typically, narratives aren't set until the convention. This has just been such a long and painful campaign cycle, it felt easy to jump the gun.

I thought there might be experience and woman issues as major story lines. What I missed though, is something that I think Steve Schmidt deserves a whole lot of credit for. The narrative is neither of these things, at least, primarily.

The plot has turned into small town America vs big cities.

I had all but forgotten the "they cling to guns and religion" comment. That was truly a turning point for the Obama/Hillary showdown if you put it on a time line. I think it was Peggy Noonan who said there are ~250 cities with 100k or more, and 100k or more cities with 10k or less.

To put it in geek terms, small towns are the long tail in American politics.

So what does this mean for the race? No idea. All I know is McCain stands a much better chance today than he would have with a tradional pick. There are about 60 days left until the election though. Lot's of things can happen, and some of the dirt being thrown at Gov. Palin may very well stick. We've yet to see any real polling numbers on any of this but should start to get a better idea in a week or two.

National polls don't matter much, instead watch polling in Ohio, Colorado, Nevada, Penn, and Virginia. Penn is a long shot for republicans, it'll be more about trying to force Democrats to spend money and time defending it. Indiana and Minnesota are other long shots for both parties. To give you an idea of how close this election is, if everyone voted Today, Obama would win by less than a state. If Colorado, which has traditionally been republican and is now on the fence, again votes republican, McCain wins. This isn't the landslide a lot of folks like to pretend it'll be.

I should say, since I have a lot of friends who are over the top Obama supporters, that I'm fascinated by the guy. I keep his 2004 DNC speech on my ipod, after he gave it I immediately read his first book and then when his second book came out, I read it that week straight through. I love his story, I love his charisma, I love his feelings towards community. I just simply disagree with his view on the role of government, and I'd be a hack if I didn't acknowledge that.

Most folks take that to mean that I was going to vote McCain anyway. Perhaps, but truth be told if a pollster called and asked, I likely would have said Bob Barr. I was thinking it may very well be a protest vote kind of year. What I needed to see from McCain was vintage McCain, not robotic scripted awkward McCain. Picking a vp out of left right field that infuriates so many people? Now, that's more like it. McCain is supposed to be unpredictable. That's part of his charm. And truth be told -- I'm just as annoyed with what the GOP has done lately as everybody else. I think most fiscal conservative types are.

We'll see how all this plays out. I'm just thrilled that no matter what happens, a history changing ticket wins. We've come a long way.

If anyone is interested, downtown Orlando will be visited by Mayor Giuliani Monday morning.

Doors open at 9:45am and it's a free event.

225 South Garland Ave.
Orlando, FL

Regardless of whether or not you like the Clintons, one thing that's generally agreed on by everyone is Bill Clinton's calm, cool, collected approach (publicly) when campaigning. Town halls were made for this guy.

NY Times has an article talking about Bill Clinton's campaign antics and his tendency to lose his temper while campaigning for his wife. It's an interesting read, if you're into that sort of thing.

I've been watching the "fascinating" Iowa Caucus coverage. The Iowa Caucus is an event that comes before their nomination convention, and winning it carries no immediate delegates. Basically, everyone shows up to a public place, stands next to the fold out table of their favorite candidate, and raises their hand. It comes across as one step above a straw poll, just held at a much more crucial time. I guess its a little more formal than that, but.. I feel sorry for the people who had to work tonight and couldn't attend -- basically, they get no voice.

We sure do put a lot of stock into it though. It's seen as the ultimate spring board into the New Hampshire primary (the first actual primary).

To give you an idea of just how small the Iowa Caucus actually is -- the total state wide turnout is less than just the Republican turnout in Miami Dade County in '06. Or try this -- there have been more absentee ballots requested in the state of florida by Republicans already for '08, than the entire turn out of both parties in Iowa. (I use republican numbers just because that's what I have access to, serves as an illustration for both parties).

Here's where it gets even crazier -- over $50 million was spent in Iowa just on T.V. ads. Compare that to 2004, when $9 million was spent on TV ads in Iowa. Most of the campaigns have hundreds of people on the ground in Iowa. Hillary Clinton's camp said they had 5,000 people just to drive people to the polls (I'm sure they were volunteers, but.. just pointing out the amount of focus put into it).

So much attention, and so much money, for absolutely zero delegates, with New Hampshire right around the corner (the 8th?). Only one candidate rejected the notion of Iowa outright -- Rudy. He spent today campaigning in New Hampshire and Florida instead of Iowa. In years past, this would have been seen as completely crazy. This year the primaries are so close together, it's only a little crazy. If it works, will Iowa start losing importance? I mean, the entire thing seems incredibly silly. Why are we still doing this in 2008? Isn't it supposed to be the future?

Anyway, the biggest story of today is that a black man won an Iowa Caucus. He didn't just win. He spanked Clinton and Edwards. Iowa is a state thats something like 95% white. We're not a perfect nation, we have our share of problems, but it would seem to me that we're certainly making progress.

The next story is Huckabee. Huck was outspent 10:1 in Iowa by the Romney campaign. Romney has been on the ground for over a year in Iowa and has spent the most money there. Losing after that much effort seems like it speaks volumes. We'll see if voters in New Hampshire agree.

Speaking of Huckabee -- Anyone see Chris Wallace call Ed Rollins (Huck's chariman) out onto the carpet? Ed went on about how Huck didn't go negative and how that helped him win, then Chris asked him if the blog post on townhall.com was true and that they were planning on going negative in south carolina but making it look like they weren't (sneaky politician crap). Ed admitted that the blog post was true, and then man, I thought Ed's head was going to explode. Chris basically proved that Huck's campaign wasn't all that innocent in how they went about the whole pulling-the-negative-ad-but-we're-still-going-to-give-it-to-the-press-anyway thing. As far as politics go, thats about as good of TV as it gets. I'm sure a dozen people will post it on YouTube tomorrow.

UPDATE: That was quick.