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What Gertrude Stein said about her hometown Oakland could also be said of Sarah Palin. "There is no there, there." Sarah Palin is simply without substance.

She even tried to humanize her image, saying that despite her views against same sex marriage she didn't judge people and had a diverse group of friends. However, when moderator Gwen Ifill asked Palin if she was in agreement with Senator Biden, who'd said he was against all forms of discrimination against same sex couples but did not support gay marriage, Palin would only repeat what Biden said about gay marriage. Perhaps because she realized that her key supporters -- the evangelical right wing -- might already be choking on their fried chicken wings because of her attempt to say something pleasant about a group of people they consider an abomination.

One of the major outcomes of the attacks of 9/11 is the clear contest between forces that believe that the world civilization so based on trust can endure the counter views of the terrorist. The question for me is to what degree do our USA national reputation and organizing principles engender trust and freedom.

Barack (Lets reason together) is clearly for recapturing our lost status and McCain wants to extend the tough guy image of the Bush doctrine (Fear US - USA reserves the right to attack first).

This is especially understood - but not excused - in those of my generation and older, both from a black and white perspective.  For blacks its owed to us based on time in the country - as if a quota could make such a tactic make sense or even worse is he black enough to get back what racism over these many years has taken from us. On the other end are whites that figure that any black person smart enough to become President must be smart enough to take back from them all the advantages that they have accumulated.

Spare me any more drivel about the high-mindedness of John McCain. You knew something was up back in March when, in his first ad of the general campaign, Mr. McCain had himself touted as “the American president Americans have been waiting for.”

Evidence? John McCain needs no evidence. His campaign is about trashing the opposition, Karl Rove-style. Not satisfied with calling his opponent’s patriotism into question, Mr. McCain added what amounted to a charge of treason, insisting that Senator Obama would actually prefer that the United States lose a war if that would mean that he — Senator Obama — would not have to lose an election.

Mr. Obama has to endure these grotesque insults with a smile and heroic levels of equanimity. The reason he has to do this — the sole reason — is that he is black.

The rhetoric, once again, masks racism through comparative oppressions - the prevailing misrepresentation of how the black vote, and also the Hispanic vote, supported anti-gay policies on the day that black history would be irrevocably altered.

Gay is the New Black

Offense #1: It presumes that, because we made significant racial progress through the election of Obama, somehow racism has been conquered while homophobia has not been. Obviously, racism hasn't been conquered, or that slogan would have never emerged in the first place.Offense #2: Such a slogan is designed to pit two marginal groups against each other, conveniently ignoring the fact that certain fundamental religious organizations whose congregations are overwhelmingly white were instrumental in enacting Proposition 8 in the first place.

Alegi, 72, said Europeans are appalled by the Republican administration's willingness to set aside conventional civil rights for detainees captured in Iraq or Afghanistan. Ken Sherman, a Hamilton, Ont., resident who was selected as a delegate pledged to Barack Obama, said that when he visits Europe, he uses his Canadian rather than American passport because international anger over U.S. foreign policy. "In the last five years with George Bush, I don't pull out my American passport unless I need it." But Obama's rise has made Sherman, 71, prepared to embrace his American citizenship again. "Something has happened in the past two years that has made me proud to be an American again. People are rising up." Wayne Weightman, a 46-year-old Cambodian lawyer, came to Vancouver to support Barack Obama who, he believes, can revive respect overseas for America.

"It seems to me what our nation needs is more civil engineers and electrical engineers and fewer financial engineers," Volcker said.

For me, the more worrisome moment of the debate came when McCain told a young, black questioner, "You've probably never heard of Fannie Mae." We were doing play-by-play of the debate on our website and I shouted out, "Why not? Why wouldn't he have heard of Fannie Mae?"

But in a moment that caught the attention of people in both parties, he appeared agitated in criticizing Mr. Obama for a Senate vote he cast, referring to his opponent only as “that one.”

Mr. McCain sought to break through by highlighting a proposal under which the Treasury Department would buy up mortgages that had gone bad, and in effect refinance them at prices homeowners could afford

There were no obvious dramatic breakthrough moments by Mr. McCain; indeed, although the two men pummeled back and forth, it was Mr. Obama who more consistently drew sharp contrasts between the voting records and campaign promises of the two.