Some in blog-land are talking about Palin fatigue, tired of the endless barage of "Sarah did this" and "Sarah did that," with little attention on McCain and the issues.

But a recent op-ed by Katha Pollitt in The Nation brings up some questions we need to ask her, and some final things we need to ask ourselves==maybe questions Charles Gibson should have asked:

"Count me as a feminist who never believed that being PTA president meant you could be, well, President. The more time we spend on dippy ruminations--how does she do it? Queen Bee on steroids or the hockey mom next door? how hot is Todd, anyway?--the less focus there will be on the kind of queries that should come first with any vice presidential candidate, and certainly would if Palin were a man. Questions like:

• Suppose your 14-year-old daughter Willow is brutally raped in her bedroom by an intruder. She becomes pregnant and wants an abortion. Could you tell the parents of America why you think your child and their children should be forced by law to have their rapists' babies?
• You say you don't believe global warming is man-made. Could you tell us what scientists you've spoken with or read who have led you to that conclusion? What do you think the 2,500 scientists of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change are getting wrong?
• If you didn't try to fire Wasilla librarian Mary Ellen Baker over her refusal to consider censoring books, why did you try to fire her?
• What is the European Union, and how does it function?
• Forty-seven million Americans lack health insurance. John Goodman, who has advised McCain on healthcare, has proposed redefining them as covered because, he says, anyone can get care at an ER. Do you agree with him?
• What is the function of the Federal Reserve?
• Cindy and John McCain say you have experience in foreign affairs because Alaska is next to Russia. When did you last speak with Prime Minister Putin, and what did you talk about?
• Approximately how old is the earth? Five thousand years? 10,000? 5 billion?
• You are a big fan of President Bush, so why didn't you mention him even once in your convention speech?
• McCain says cutting earmarks and waste will make up for revenues lost by making the tax cuts permanent. Experts say that won't wash. Balancing the Bush tax cuts plus new ones proposed by McCain would most likely mean cutting Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security. Which would you cut?
• You're suing the federal government to have polar bears removed from the endangered species list, even as Alaska's northern coastal ice is melting and falling into the sea. Can you explain the science behind your decision?
• You've suggested that God approves of the Iraq War and the Alaska pipeline. How do you know?

Is this what's going to happen to us come November? If some Sept. 11 video at the RNC doesn't scare us, perhaps a little guilt will work just fine.

My friend Leighton recently put David Hasselhoff's social network site on his Facebook page. Now that David Hasselhoff's daughter is at the UA and we'll be seeing the Hoff around town more often, shouldn't we all join his social network page? Shouldn't we?

Was this Rita Pavone ditty sponsored by the U.S. Potato Commission?

Don't care. Dance anyway.

I recommend pretending there's a potato sitting next to you. Seems to work well for Rita, too.

I curse the day my son stopped watching Sesame Street!

I want to point out this interesting (?) little piece from Vice magazine on French photographer Erwan Fichou's pictures of people who've made sweaters from dog wool.

I am not sure how these sweaters would feel in the January desert--or even if I'd want to wear a sweater made from the hair of dawgs.

Gotta love those Feminist Avengers. Check out what happened to the sign a little later...

The new issue is here, online and ready for readers! Feel free to comment on his contents here.

No YouTube Mexican this week. You may recall Gustavo is on strike. To that, I say: Whatevs!

During McCain's speech last night, his biggest applause lines came when he mentioned Sarah Palin...

(Editor's note: Our parent company, Wick Communications, sent reporter Katie Evans to the Republican National Convention. While there, she caught up with one prominent local McCain delegate, state Rep. Jonathan Paton. Here's Evans' story.)

ST.PAUL, Minn.--As Arizona state Rep. John Paton watched Alaskan Gov. Sarah Palin give her speech Wednesday night at the Republican National Convention, he felt vindicated.

"I had secretly hoped they were going to pick her (for the vice presidential nomination) in the first place," said the representative for District 30.

And seeing Palin speak, he said, was exciting.

"My biggest reaction is that last night, John McCain's chances for being president just basically crystallized," he said. "I've never seen energy like that in a room. And the reports I'm getting from back home, people are just ecstatic about that speech."

Paton said Republicans are pumped in a way he's never seen before--at both ends of the party. He said Palin has helped unify the Republicans, and he believes her pick alone started the process.

"There was a lot of in-fighting going on," Paton said. "Palin lit a fire under everybody, and now they're kind of excited about it."

He said he thinks the criticism Palin has faced since being picked as the vice presidential nominee has "really just started amplifying the energy," and he thinks it was a contributing factor to the reaction Palin got as she walked onto the convention stage for the first time Wednesday, receiving about two minutes of nonstop cheering.

"Then you saw the different speakers," Paton said. "(Rudy) Giuliani was basically like a prosecutor making his case, and when he finished, to be honest with you, she could have read from the phone book, and people would have been happy.

"All that energy just exploded after she started speaking," he added. "It was unbelievable."

He said he was glad he wasn't McCain, who has to try and top her speech when he gives his acceptance speech tonight.

"I think that the biggest burden is for John McCain to hit it out of the park after that," he said. "What a tough act to follow."

What started as a "slow convention," Paton said--with the first day being stripped down to strictly business as Hurricane Gustav made landfall on the Gulf Coast--really built in excitement over the four days.

One amazing moment for Paton, he said, was the delegates casting their votes for McCain's nomination Once it got to Nebraska, all the states passed so that Arizona's delegates could cast the deciding vote.

"What was so cool was this lady from Texas was sitting behind me, and she said 'Why are all these people passing?'" Paton recalled. "I turned to her and said, 'Because they want Arizona to be the state that brings him over the top.'"

Then the woman asked Paton why.

"Because that's John McCain's state," he replied.

And Paton said it was a great moment to watch.

"That's really cool to watch (Arizona Secretary of State) Jan Brewer stand up there and say what she had to say, and that was what pushed them over was our state," Paton said.

"What's so cool about it is a year ago people were leaving him for dead, basically," Paton said. "I was one of the few guys that was publicly supporting him, even under all that.

"To see this day happen, it was really exciting, it was vindicating, I think, for a lot of his supporters."