More than this year's American Idol finale and the Olympics Opening Ceremonies.

That's a creditable viewership, but I would have expected more than that, considering the hype of the stadium-setting and the media/national adulation.

Tuesday night my wife started getting nausea and throwing up, unable to stop. She was having bad bad stomach cramps, and I thought it was food poisoning or that flu going around. She even asked me 'do you think it's appendicitis?' and I said something like, does the pain go through to your back? and she said no, so I declared her appendicitis-free, like an idiot.

I will NEVER, NEVER doubt my wife's judgement about her own body again. I used to think she was kind of a hypochondriac, but no more. Yes, I realize I was being a bullying prig, and it took me almost losing my wife to convince me. The guilt is amazing, but necessary.

So I called 911 when she couldn't walk, and after a few hours of pain in the ER, they finally gave her some anti-nausea and morphine, and did some tests and yeppers she had an inflamed appendix. Acute appendicitis. They took it out at 230 in the morning, and she left that evening about 800pm.

She's tottling around with a bloated belly (from the gas they injected into her from the laproscopic procedure), and her muscles sprung like crazy from all the heaving. But she's in a lot better shape than before, and I am so happy to have her still around.

Could the condescension and the pandering inherent in the Palin pick tip them [moderate Republican women] ever so slightly toward Barack Obama?

At MyDD.

I was disappointed again by the lack of substance, sometimes not even a mention of the issues I care most about.

On abortion, all he said was one sentence - and that was to the effect that women should avoid unwanted pregnancies.

On Iraq, all he said was that the position he once articulated is now the position held by Bush and Nouri al-Malaki. To me, that is not a plus. I want our troops to begin withdrawing on day one of a new administration - not dragged out over a minimum of a year and a half - and even then it's iffy.

He didn't even mention the erosion of civil liberties under the Bush administration - the Patriot Act - FISA. How could he, I suppose. He voted for them. But he could have said that he would try to reverse the most egregious parts of these assaults on our civil liberties. He could have called them what they are. UnAmerican.

Personally, when I hear a democrat talking about "Russian aggression", I get nervous. I don't think the situation is as black and white as Bush and Condi have painted it. But he does, apparently.

Then, at the end, for some reason that escapes me - I don't know what he was thinking or not thinking, he brings up the march on Washington and does not mention Dr. King. My eyes practically bulged out of their sockets.

So - I don't have a clue about where he is on anything.
I also think Biden has a screw loose. He sounds rational for awhile - and then says something that makes no sense - not even grammatical sense. Like the ridiculous quote that the republicans have been airing in which he says, "I'd be honored to run with or against John McCain". WTF?

About a year out from the 1992 election my local paper, the Seattle Times, printed a list of the issues they thought would be important in the upcoming election. They named foreign policy, the economy, etc. and, toward the bottom of the list "women's issues*" -- the asterisk referred to a list in tiny 4 point type at the bottom of the page; "abortion, health care, social security, child care, education."

For people who don't know what it's like to wear a skirt - STFU about wearing a skirt.  Just S.T.F.U.

There was a very recent ballot issue defeated in Alaska that would end the aerial killing of wolves for good where 75,000 citizens voted to pass it. It was defeated with the efforts of SCI, while Sarah Palin chucked in $400,000 in state money to influence the outcome of that vote.

Is this ethical that a state can supply money, which is ultimately taxpayer's money, to help influence the defeat of a ballot issue?

Personally, I wouldn't want my tax dollars going to advertisements to defeat issues here in Michigan that I want to uphold.

Others talk about raw diets etc, but my dog doesn't like bones which are important for plaque.

She does like rawhides, but I'm not sure how healthy those are.

Prudence (yeah, I know... sigh) but she's a great dog.  Here's my dog and cat.

  Dear Friends,  

John McCain rolled the dice with his VP pick today - in an attempt to woo women voters.

But we cannot gamble with women's lives.

Don't let your friends, family and co-workers be fooled: Alaskan Sarah Palin is a dangerous right-winger who lacks the judgment to lead.

In 2000, Palin endorsed Pat Buchanan for President. Yes, that Pat Buchanan.

In 2006, Palin ran for Alaska Governor on a message of change - and then turned out to be just another corrupt Alaska politician who's now under investigation in her own state.

She's no Hillary Clinton. She's Dan Quayle in a dress.

Women voters who care about equal rights, choice, family and other issues, will not see a partner in Palin.

Help us fight for these issues by electing Democrats up and down the ticket. Click here to donate today:

https:/secure.fladems.com/page/contribute

She is lockstep with Bush and McCain on issues important to women. Every one of them. That's scary.

The corrupt trio of Ted Stevens, Don Young, and Lisa Murkowski all raised campaign money for Palin.

John McCain claimed that Barack Obama lacked experience. Then he picked a VP who has just 20 months at the helm of a state with a population smaller than the city of Jacksonville, and zero foreign policy experience. Palin would be a heartbeat away from the presidency.

Barack Obama is ready to lead. Last night he showed us what the next American President will look like. He and Joe Biden will deliver change we need.

The stakes are too high to risk another four years of the same. If you have $25, $50 or $100 to spare, please contribute today to the Florida Democratic Party's campaign to elect Democrats up and down the ballot. We're on the verge of major change in Florida, but we need your help.

Contribute today.

Sincerely,

Congresswoman Karen L. Thurman
Chair, Florida Democratic Party

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Oh.

For me, it's a myriad of emotions watching the video. Pride. Joy. Inspiration. Enthusiasm. Sadness. Confusion. and lots more.

If you enjoyed the video as much as I have, you might want to send a few words of gratitude to it's makers: Hollywood-based producers and long-time Clinton family friends, Harry Thomason and Linda Bloodworth-Thomason. They also produced the awesome 1992 Democratic Convention film, "The Man From Hope."

I, for one, am trying to figure out the instrumental music bed at the end of the video.

And if you're curious, this is other music you heard in the video and pre- and post-speech.

• The Kinks -- "You Really Got Me"
  
• Lenny Kravitz -- "Are You Gonna Go My Way"
  
• Tom Petty -- "American Girl"
  
• Big Head Todd and the Monsters -- "Blue Sky"

No one was hurt.  But puh-lease everybody, when you are driving - DRIVE for goodness sake.  The two buses my kids ride had an accident apiece last year.  One was weather related and the other wasn't, neither were the bus driver's fault.

Going to have to check the police blotter for the accident we saw on the way home.  3 police cars, the wail of EMV sirens after we passed and someone sitting on the guard rail with their face in their hands being comforted by someone else.  ???  No major damage to either vehicle.  Injury?  Death?  Pedestrian?  

Katrina vanden Heuvel and scholar Adolph Reed, Jr. They've both weighed in recently on how well Obama is serving the left -- with very different conclusions:

"The Obama nomination sets the stage for a sea-change election, one that could not only elect a Democratic President and increased reform majorities in both houses of Congress but also mark a clear turn from the conservative ideas that have dominated our politics for three decades." -- "Progressives in the Obama Moment," Robert L. Borosage & Katrina vanden Heuvel

"Obama's style of being all things to all people threatens to melt under the inescapable spotlight of a national campaign against a Republican. It's like what brings on the downfall of really successful con artists: They get themselves onto a stage that's so big that they can't hide their contradictions anymore, and everyone finds out about the different stories they've told different people. And Obama's belonging to Wright's church in the first place was quite likely part of establishing a South Side bourgeois nationalist street cred because his political base was with Hyde Park/University of Chicago liberals and the foundation world." --"Obama No", Adolph Reed, Jr. THE PROGRESSIVE, May, 2008.

As always, there's the rebroadcast or you can go to pbs.org and check under the Moyers' progam link for watching on your PC.