Obama-Biden second fiddle again

For the second day in a row, Barack Obama and his running mate Joe Biden's bus tour of the rust belt has played second fiddle in the media to John McCain and his new running mate Sarah Palin's tour of Pennsylvania.

While I personally think Palin will acquit herself well as a campaigner and debater, the jury is still out, but her star quality and the power of the unexpected has she and McCain in the lead position of the news for the second day in a row.

This is bound to blunt the post-convention bounce in the polls Obama would normally get. In fact, the early polls have him up only 4-8 points, much less than normal and not the cushion a winning Democrat takes into the fall. As it stands right now, the GOP will have a much more joyous, colorful convention than it would have been without Palin, and McCain's the one who could get the big post-convention bounce.

Assuming Palin doesn't stub her toe on the national stage, an unknown at this point, and fades into relative obscurity as vice presidential candiates usually do, McCain would be looking good come November.

Obama, and particularly his surrogates. will haul out the heavy inexperience timber from now until the election, but whether it sticks depends largely on how well Palin plays her role. Without any major miscues on her part, Obama has no room to talk about experience, and it will fade into oblivion as an issue.

In any case, what was shaping up as a dull, boring campaign has been supercharged with Sarah Palin thrown into the mix, and it should be an exciting fall.