Ross Douthat thinks the candidates have gone all tactical when we want them to be strategic.

If you’re wondering why I was writing about baseball yesterday instead of leaping into the debate over whether John McCain’s decision to suspend his campaign and call for the delay of tomorrow night’s debate was a bold act of leadership, a brilliant piece of political theater, or a pointless, vote-losing stunt, it’s because the baseball season suddenly seems a lot more interesting than Presidential politics.

He agrees with my anonymous commenter that

If the election is going to be won, McCain and Co. have decided, it’s going to be won on trench warfare and intangibles, not substance. From the Obama camp’s point of view, meanwhile, the election is theirs to lose, so why take any chances when you can just meet McCain blow for blow and run out the clock until November?

It’s all very disappointing and a far cry from the transcendence I hoped for back in January

Maybe they’ll skip the silly name-calling that usually passes for political debate in this country and actually debate the issues a little. Wouldn’t that be nice. It might even be educational. Inspirational even.

All that’s left is to agree that it’s both candidates fault. There is no difference between them.

Same as back in 2000.

I need to be careful or you’ll think that I am just cherry picking conservative commentators who think that the Palin pick is a disaster.

And now, an excerpt from my inner monologue, as transcribed while watching various clips from Sarah Palin’s interview with Katie Couric (I can’t link to them; they’re too painful):

But hey, maybe it’s all just effing brilliant rope-a-dope for the Biden debate ….

Ross Douthat

But Sarah Palin’s performance in the tiny vignettes of unscripted dialogue in which we’ve been allowed to see her has been nothing short of frightening — really, as I said, pity-inducing. And I say that as someone who has thought from the start that the criticisms of her abilities — as opposed to her ideology — were much too extreme. One of two things is absolutely clear at this point: she is either (a) completely ignorant about the most basic political issues — a vacant, ill-informed, incurious know-nothing, or (b) aggressively concealing her actual beliefs about these matters because she’s petrified of deviating from the simple-minded campaign talking points she’s been fed and/or because her actual beliefs are so politically unpalatable, even when taking into account the right-wing extremism that is permitted, even rewarded, in our mainstream. I’m not really sure which is worse, but it doesn’t really matter, because with 40 days left before the election, both options are heinous.

Glenn Greenwald

And those are just the ones who thought she might have been a good pick.

If you were going to ask congress for a lot of money to rescue the financial industry what number would you ask for?

$700 billion? Yeah, me too.

But why?

In fact, some of the most basic details, including the $700 billion figure Treasury would use to buy up bad debt, are fuzzy.

“It’s not based on any particular data point,” a Treasury spokeswoman told Forbes.com Tuesday. “We just wanted to choose a really large number.”

Forbes

It’s hard to keep track of exactly what is going on but here’s how I understand where we are are at:

The president - or rather, the treasury secretary - asked congress for a lot of money with no strings attached and no oversight. The dems have negotiated that down to a lot of money with a few strings and the illusion of oversight. The dems have the numbers to pass the bill but Pelosi won’t put it to a vote unless there is bipartisan support in the House. But a handful of conservative  republicans in the house are holding out because they think the bailout is irresponsible.

Did I get that right so far?

So, what is McCain’s angle gonna be?

Here’s my prediction.

By tomorrow, the unpleasant bill that has majority support and backing (more or less) from the house and senate and the White House (and McCain and Obama) will suddenly morph into a completely unpalatable bill that is supported by the republican minority but not the dems. The president and John McCain will switch over to support the new CRAZY bill and blame the dems (and Obama) for holding the American people hostage.

Not unlike what happened with the immigration bill.

Interesting study, if you have teenage children:

Among sexually active teens, actual condom use bears no relationship to intention to use a condom or belief that using condoms is a good idea. The only factors in their study that correlate with using condoms are buying and carrying condoms.

Cognitive Daily