That suggests an imbalance in the deference quotient between the younger man and the veteran senator — an impression reinforced by Obama’s frequent glances in McCain’s direction and McCain’s studied indifference to his rival.

Whether viewers caught the verbal and body-language signs that Obama seemed to accept McCain as the alpha male on the stage in Mississippi, I do not know.

So McCain came off as the alpha male by…avoiding eye contact with Barack Obama? Really?

This would be astute were it not the complete inverse of what is actually observed in social animal psychology, from feces flingers to feudal farmers.

Is it the king who avoids eye contact with his peasants, or the other way around? Are big hunk monkeys compelled into social deference while totally banging the nerd monkey’s girlfriends, or vice versa?

TPM was initially on the case, providing this reality check from their resident monkey scientist (be this scientist of monkeys or monkey who is scientist I’m not positive):

I think people really are missing the point about McCain’s failure to look at Obama. McCain was afraid of Obama. It was really clear–look at how much McCain blinked in the first half hour. I study monkey behavior–low ranking monkeys don’t look at high ranking monkeys. In a physical, instinctive sense, Obama owned McCain tonight and I think the instant polling reflects that.

David Broder, I want to throw some poo at you!

(Though, to be fair and accurate, I’d probably avoid all eye contact were we to ever meet, as you are the Dean of the Washington establishment and I am the writer-producer of a moderately viewed local hip hop music video television show.)

That’s why I say I, like every American I’m speaking with, we’re ill about this position that we have been put in. Where it is the taxpayers looking to bail out.

But ultimately, what the bailout does is help those who are concerned about the health care reform that is needed to help shore up our economy.

Um, helping, oh, it’s got to be about job creation, too.

Shoring up our economy, and getting it back on the right track. So health care reform and reducing taxes and reining in spending has got to accompany tax reductions, and tax relief for Americans, and trade —

we have got to see trade as opportunity, not as, uh, competitive, um, scary thing,

but one in five jobs created in the trade sector today. We’ve got to look at that as more opportunity.

All of those things under the umbrella of job creation.

The US got some jobs and tried to put some money away, but we got debt that no honest man can pay.

Or is Paulson the chicken man? No no, cause the favor guy blew up the chicken man. So I guess maybe the chicken man is…Saddam Hussein?

And the DA who can’t get no relief? Bush? Maybe that’s too generous. And if Saddam is the chicken man, then it’s really Bush who’s the favor guy; or, at least I suppose, the Bush administration, proper (and thus, Paulson, too).

And the broad putting the makeup on, fixin’ her hair up pretty? I’m thinking…Canada.

Replace the urban slang with an Alaskan accent and some hockey mom/moose hunter jargon and there you go.

There’s no such thing as an iPod. The word “iPod” is a marketing tool for a hard drive with software that plays mp3s. Yeah, doesn’t sound so sexy now, does it you chimps?

Stupid evil corporations and their incessant naming of things!!!!!! Who are they to attach words to products?!?!?!? Where does the greed end?!?!

You chimps!!!!!!!

“We’re going to do a few new things also,” she said at a rally in Cedar Rapids. “For instance, as Alaska’s governor, I put the government’s checkbook online so that people can see where their money’s going. We’ll bring that kind of transparency, that responsibility, and accountability back. We’re going to bring that back to D.C.”

Great idea! If only someone had thought of this earlier!

Oh wait, someone already passed this into law. Some guy named Berock Osama. Or something.

I wonder what happened to him.

All this while forcefully attacking Obama (during the hurricane) over Obama supposedly attacking McCain (during the hurricane).

Three years ago this month, Sarah Palin was in the middle of her tenure as mayor of a city of 8,000 people (a position to which she was first elected with 909 votes), while Barack Obama was inspecting Russian warhead destruction facilities with Dick Lugar, on his way toward passing sweeping weapons nonproliferation legislation.

There’s just no comparison here; Sarah Palin makes Barack Obama look like Colin Powell.

2. Sarah Palin has an entire section on Polar Bears in her Wikipedia profile.

3. Palin once had constitutional beef with Alaska State Rep. John Coghill, R-North Pole, the Gentleman from Santa’s Workshop. (Is America ready for a VP on the naughty list?)

5. She apparently possesses a remarkable ability to autograph impossibly thin wooden dowels. A celebrity we can believe in.

6. Prior to this week, she and McCain were essentially complete strangers; they’d met once before and only spoken twice.

Once and twice! And he trusts her to lead the country, and, like, be the President? Of the country?

And we’re supposed to trust his quickie-rigged confidence in her quickie-assembled Presidential skills, when all we know about Sarah Palin is that she has beef with Santa and a strong associative connection to Polar Bears?

Never thought I’d miss the Mittster. : (

Bad pick, like a runny booger.

The idea that there can be “bad news” for Democrats but “worse news” for GOP betrays a basic failure to understand the nature of electoral politics, namely that it’s a zero-sum competition for power in which only one candidate can win any given race and only one party can hold a majority in any legislative body.

If new polls show public dissatisfaction with Democrats but greater dissatisfaction with Republicans, that’s good news for Democrats.

But I’m not so sure that’s necessarily true.

I imagine if we lived a world in which the Democratic congress had approval ratings in the mid 60s, we’d see a lot more moderate to moderate-leaning Republicans crossing over on key Dem legislation in order to get in on some of that love (ie, perhaps enough to override an S-CHIP veto).

The way things are now (with both parties hitting the mid 20s) there’s just no incentive.

Politics may be zero-sum in each election (one party wins and the other party loses) but not when it comes to actually legislating.

Which should kind of be, you know, the point of politics