Trail Mix

by TED S. McGREGOR JR. & r & & r & Pallin' with Comedians & r & & r & Did Sarah Palin do herself any favors by appearing on Saturday Night Live? Not only did she deliver the liberal media darling a huge ratings night, but she also had to take abuse from Alec Baldwin and, later, after a classy skit in which the punch line was "fartface," she shared the stage as they mocked the first dude.





And in yet more proof that the Obama campaign is running circles around McCain, while Palin consorted with the enemy, Obama ran an ad targeted at women in a bunch of swing states on NBC during the show.





What will the Republican base make of such a mashed message? To a former beauty pageant contestant who, as governor, hired an East Coast publicist to pitch her life story to big East Coast media, maybe it's not about the base or even the election any more. Maybe it's all about getting famous.





A Star Is Born


The election cycle always introduces some new talent to the national stage, and this season one blogger is getting lots of notice for his daily reality check on all the polling. Nate Silver, master of www.fivethirtyeight.com, has watched his site go from a first day total of 80 visits to nearly 700,000 hits just seven months later.





Silver started out as a baseball analyst, but now that he's predicting politics, he's rubbing elbows with the likes of Keith Olbermann, William Kristol and even Stephen Colbert.





Banishing Cheney


Little known fact: Vice President Dick Cheney used to pronounce his name the way we do for our local college town. He only switched to "Chain-ey" when too many D.C. types kept calling him that.





However you pronounce it, Joe Biden had some fun with the name over the weekend when he held a rally at Cheney Stadium over in Tacoma. "It's an honor to be here," he said, "and I want to thank you for... temporarily changing the name, from Cheney Stadium to Obama-Biden Stadium... If it was Cheney Stadium, we'd be in undisclosed location. We'd never have been able to find it!"





He Feels His Pain


Did any of Ted Stevens' Senate colleagues show up at his trial over whether he took illegal gifts? Only one, the soon-to-be retired Sen. Larry "Wide-Stance" Craig.