Forget the Redeem Team.  Forget the nine-year old Chinese gymnasts. When you look at the medal count on a per capita basis, that Australians are the best athletes at the Olympics by far. The population of their country is only twenty million and they have, as of now, thirty-three medals, almost half of China’s total with their population of 1.3 billion.

Maybe I was watching through biased glasses (we all do) but I couldn’t agree more with John Podhoretz when he wrote of the Rick Warren/Saddleback event last night: “If John McCain can perform during the three debates the way he is performing tonight with Rick Warren, he will win this election.”

No kidding.

And it wasn’t just because McCain was good and Barack Obama was ineffectual and ill-informed.  (Others have said Barack is infected by reactionary post-modernism.  I’m not so sure I would give him that much intellectual credit.  It might  simply be expedient political vacillation.)

No, it was something more extreme and I think more important:  John McCain is the single most prepared person to be President in my lifetime - and I ain’t young. [Didn’t you vote for JFK?-ed.  I’m not that old.  But you did go to college when he was in office.  Okay, okay.  Don’t rub it in.] Last night McCain exhibited a grasp of the issues and an ability to communicate them extempore in a concise manner that were exceptional.  Unlike the frequently bumbling Bush and the evasive Obama, he knew precisely what to say on the big issues - Georgia, radical Islam, energy.  He puts to mind the legendary Presidents of a more distant past - Teddy Roosevelt, Truman, Eisenhower - and carries with him a pride to be American that surpasses even Reagan for me, because it is fraught with that personal history we all know.

And, of course, if you care about the ability to cross party lines or about the courage to stick with your opinions  when they are unpopular, McCain has demonstrated that more than any politician of recent memory.  It was ironic that the only example Obama could cite of when he had done such a thing was when he had worked with John McCain on ethics reform (in an instance when Obama apparently crumped out).

But this is not about Obama.  What happened last night is this:  An election that the pundits had told us was about whether the public was ready for Barack Obama suddenly became about acknowledging John McCain.

A new Rasmussen Poll quoted on Drudge shows 47%  favor government mandated political balance on radio and television (a lower number favors these mandates for the Internet).  Of course the mandated “balance” they are talking about is between those hoary  concepts “liberal” and “conservative”.  Meanwhile, considerable polling data from other sources (including Pajamas Media) indicates the majority of Americans do not identify with either of these ideologies. In other words, more people in reality are political hybrids, American pragmatists, if you will. What about equal time for them?  Not likely. Too hard to quantify.

What the absurdly named Fairness Doctrine holds for us then is one long perpetual Hannity & Colmes Show, a tedious debate for the lowest common denominator between two increasingly stultified and stultifying ideas that we have been debating from time immemorial to less and less effect. Genuinely original thoughts under this peculiar doctrine would have little chance because they didn’t fit the tired mold.  No fairness.  No equal time. Socrates, you’re out. Galileo, sayonara.  Al Franken and Ann Coulter, you’re in.

My daughter isn’t the only one to chortle about Bob Costas’ pathetic hairpiece.  Practically everyone I’ve talked to has commented.  But trust a ten-year old girl to observe that men who are bald should admit it. [Does that mean they shouldn’t wear hats?-ed.  Wisenheimer.]

But that’s not the worst of Costas who has spent a great deal of time excoriating George Bush, but has devoted nary a word - at least when I’ve been listening - to the activities of the Chinese government, which - even though some self-described progressives at MoveOn, etc. feel otherwise - is nowhere in the ballpark of the CCP.  In fact, if Bush were, MoveOn et al would already be in jail.

Of course this is not the world of Bob Costas, which seems to revolve in great degree around women’s beach volley ball. [Maybe that’s the reason for the rug.-ed. I told you what my daughter said.] NBC’s coverage is notably chauvinistic, focusing almost exclusively on American events, so that viewers miss entire sports, some of which would be interesting to see.  Oh, well.  I’m sure this has been focus grouped to death.

When I was a blogger at the ‘04 Republican Convention, I was feeling very weird (almost out of body) since I had, until that time, never voted for - or even considered voting for - a Republican for President and I was about to pull the lever for Bush. In the midst of this, I was noticed by an old radical-liberal journalist buddy who grinned at me and wagged his finger, saying “You’ll be back!” (meaning back to the liberal fold, of course).  I felt a sharp tinge of guilt.  Maybe he was right.

Now that all seems ridiculous.  Back to what? There is no there.  Or, to once again paraphrase the great Preston Sturges:  “Lberalism is not only dead, it’s decomposed.”  (He was speaking of “chivalry.)

The ongoing Edwards comedy reminds me of all this. It is redolent of the old Roman legal principle “Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus” not just because Edwards is lying all over the place like a Shakespearean fool, but because the lie easily metastasizes from sex to his self-important pronouncements about the poor while building himself a 28000 square foot house (not your garden variety Mother Teresa).

But is it fair, as I do in the headline, to tarnish Obama with the Edwards brush?  Isn’t Barack legitimately a liberal or a leftist or something?  Isn’t there some ideology there? Well, frankly, I think not.  The only ideology, if you can call it that, is to attract a certain number of brain-washed (mostly by the MSM) voters. Obama statements have already morphed completely into “McCain lite.”  On energy, foreign policy, trade, etc. he is saying essentially the same thing now as McCain has been saying for months. There is, in Obama’s case, quite properly no there there.  So is his ideology essentially a lie?  Is there such a thing as liberalism anymore?  Is there some place for me to go home to as my old friend suggested at the ‘04 Convention?  Where is it?

Check out their latest headline - Russia peacekeepers to stay in breakaway provinces.  [Not even scare quotes?-ed.  Not even.]  (ht: Mike Reynolds)

Mickey Kaus has for months done a brilliant job of tracking the Edwards Affair and I’ve, belatedly, agreed with everything he said… but this….?  “Would it really hurt Obama if John Edwards went to Denver? The more he publicly defends himself, the more honest and upright he makes Obama look by comparison. And the smarter he makes Democratic primary voters look.”

If I were Obama and Co. I’d want to Edwards as far from the Dem convention as possible. Maybe South Ossetia.  In his personal life, Obama might look squeaky clean compared to Edwards.  But there’s something even more treacherous than adultery that could pollute the mile-high atmosphere of Denver–a kind of callow hollowness [typo corrected, but I’d love to claim credit for a pun] and inexperience that could be associated with modern liberalism and the Democratic Party. After all, both Edwards and Obama have been media image guys, long on veneer but short on substance.

But it’s safe to say we’ll never find out who’s  right - Mickey or I.  You don’t have to be Jimmy the Greek to know there’s little chance Obama will allow Edwards to suck up any of the air in Denver.

UPDATE:  If you really want a reason Obama would have to be out of his mind to let Edwards anywhere near the DNC, this is it -Wolfson: Edwards’ Cover-up cost Clinton the nomination.

Will the Redeem Team redeem? So far so good as they cruised past China in their Olympic opener (watched by ths fanatic on streaming video at NBColympics.com).

Better yet, best player for the Chinese team - the one who looked NBA level (besides Yao Ming, of course) - was Sun Yue.  He just signed with another team that has something to redeem.

UPDATE:  According to Sparks star Lisa Leslie (my daughter’s favorite and one of the best female basketball players ever) “Kobe is the Man at the Beijing Olympics.”(seen here in stands for women’s game)

AND SPEAKING OF SPORTS: One of my favorite performers has died in a sporting manner that is truly scary.  (I try to get on my elliptical machine at least four times a week.)

We all have sympathy for Elizabeth Edwards, but her statement on the Daily Kos is pretty bizarre. Let’s hope she’s lying, because if she isn’t, as Lee Stranahan points out, she was willing to let her husband run for President after she knew he just had an affair - putting at risk the Democratic Party and all that Two Americas palaver they espoused. Talk about arrogance and stupidity or both.  Of course, if she knows it’s all BS and she’s still covering up for her husband, well, we’re all entitled to our personal Stockholm Syndromes.

Meanwhile, the spectacle of the mainstream media suddenly doing wall-to-wall coverage of the subject they wouldn’t touch is hugely entertaining, especially the formerly silent CNN (Eason Jordan News Network) paying more attention to the scandal than nuclear war. (Even so, they got some facts wrong. Rielle Hunter is 44, not 42, and she moved from New York to LA, not vice versa as the news network said.)  Of course the big winner here is the National Enquirer who have shown themselves to be far superior reporters to the drones of the MSM. Of course, that’s no surprise.  They beat everybody during the OJ trial.  [How quickly they forget.-ed.  That’s because they want to.]

MEANWHILE, one of the few remaining reporters at the Los Angeles Times had this to say: Several newspapers, including the Los Angeles Times, had been pursuing the story prior to Friday. Oh, really?  As I recall some nitwit editor over there was telling his bloggers not to report the story but to “Keep rockin’” (how sophisticated).  No matter.  There won’t be anybody left working at the LAT in a few years anyway. In fact, the absurd see-no-evil reaction to the Edwards Affair will be seen as a benchmark in know-nothing journalism by the MSM and one of the last nails in their coffin. Too bad most of their soon-to-be unemployed reporters are not good enough to get jobs at the National Enquirer. [What about PJM?-ed.  No comment.]

In his lengthy and supposedly final apologia pro vita John Edwards, the former Senator admits his affair with Rieille Hunter but denies he is the father of her child.  Note the language from lawyer Edwards: “I am and have been willing to take any test necessary to establish the fact that I am not the father of any baby, and I am truly hopeful that a test will be done so this fact can be definitively established.”

Como se dice?  Why “hopeful”?  Samples of the Senator’s and the child’s DNA are readily available.   Am I missing something? Hot Air says Edwards is ready to take a paternity test.  Given this language, I’m not so sure.

MEANWHILE: They let the lunatics out of the asylum. (via Deceiver.com)

QUERY: What happens to those people still driving around with “Kerry/Edwards” bumper stickers on their cars? [I’ve seen a lot of them in your neighborhood.-ed. Yeah, they’ve been on so long I don’t know if they’ll come off.]