Eamonn Fitzgerald's Rainy Day

Having dipped his nib in venom, Christopher Hitchens turns to those would "paint the Palin family as if it were Arkansas on ice or Tobacco Road with igloos and Inuit." Then, the deadly stroke:

Very well, she possibly has had her Troopergate and even trailer-park moments. But whom exactly did the Democrats drown in moist applause, for two nights running, in Denver? The most dysfunctional family ever to occupy not the vice-presidential mansion but the executive one. It's hard to imagine that there will be any more unwanted pregnancies or shotgun weddings when or if the Palins move to the Naval Observatory on Massachusetts Avenue, whereas with the Clintons, the very thing that made all Bill's friends turn white and pee green was that they made him the president, and he still wouldn't stop. For me, it is astonishing that the Democrats have been babbling all week as if this point isn't just waiting — indeed begging — to be made in riposte to their "opposition research."

Woe unto those who pursue the foolish strategy of making a martyr out of Sarah Palin. The media has already gone from being seen as a pillar of truth to a partisan bully and Obama, much to his cost, has become so obsessed with Palin that he's fallen head over heels into the trap of campaigning against her, thus allowing McCain to make hay while the sun shines. Tide's turned, my friends.