Barack Obama needs to convince voters that he understands them and leave the dirty work to his surrogates, says Representative Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, who's also chairman of the DCCC.

Before Obama accepted the Democratic nomination in Denver last night, I asked Emanuel, a famously bulldoggish veteran of the Clinton White House, if the Democrats were being sufficiently aggressive in going after John McCain.

“The best line was Hillary’s line about the Twin Cities, you know, frick and frack [McCain and Bush] over there—you can’t tell them apart,” said Emanuel, who was surrounded by aides on the floor of the Invesco field.  read more »

DENVER—Here's David Paterson and City Councilman Hiram Monserrate in the lobby of the Sheraton last night after the Obama speech, where Monserrate seemed happy to get to the side of the man who made him the Democratic nominee (and favorite) for a State Senate seat.

Back in June, Paterson named the incumbent Monserrate was challenging, State Senator John Sabini, as head of the state's Racing and Wagering board, ending their primary fight, which looked like it was going to be a tough race for Sabini.

Right before this picture, Paterson was horsing around and insisted on switching roles. He put his chief of staff, Charles O'Byrne, in the shot, as the blind governor tried to take the picture.

It didn't seem to work out. Paterson put the viewfinder up by his eye, but fell into hysterics multiple times before he handed the camera off to someone else.

DENVER—Former Hillary Clinton bundler Robert Zimmerman, one of Al Gore's biggest supporters, said last night on the floor of the Invesco Center that watching the former vice president "brings back many wonderful memories."

"I remember the first global warming lecture, reading the draft of his anti-war speech," Zimmerman said, as Gore delivered the line, "I know something about close elections."

"I think of the good times,"Zimmerman said.

The Obama campaign is not giving an inch when it comes to John McCain choosing Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate. In a statement released a few minutes ago, there was no warm language about the first female Republican vice presidential nominee, just a straightforward hit. From Obama spokesman Bill Burton:

"Today, John McCain put the former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience a heartbeat away from the presidency. Governor Palin shares John McCain's commitment to overturning Roe v. Wade, the agenda of Big Oil and continuing George Bush's failed economic policies -- that's not the change we need, it's just more of the same.  read more »

Sarah Palin looks like a great pick for John McCain, says Kornacki, but it's also very risky.

John McCain's V.P. pick, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, said the job of running mate is "unproductive" in an interview last month.

She was endorsed by Ted Stevens when she ran for governor.

She's conservative, has only been governor for two years, and is three years younger than Obama.

Here's an op-ed about polar bears Palin wrote for The New York Times last January.

Here's the biographical video shown at Invesco Field before Barack Obama spoke last night.

Al Gore spoke, and said voters face essentially the same choice they did in 2000.

Obama's speech last night took aim at McCain and George W. Bush.

Here's that  read more »

Multiple media outlets are reporting that the Alaska governor, "a self-styled hockey mom and political reformer," will be John McCain's running mate. The official announcement will be at noon in Ohio.

While we're waiting to find out whether this can possibly be true...
Here's what it looked like for the Obama (and Oprah) fans in the box behind section 103 at Invesco Field.

No slave to trends, he.

What kind of day has Tim Pawlenty had? The kind where your value on the Intrade Republican vice-presidential future markets shoots up by more than 50 points -- while your chief opponent's stock plummets by 31. The Minnesota governor is now trading roughly where Joe Biden was just before word of his selection by Barack Obama broke.