I’m making it offical. This is my current obsession. I literally had tears streaming down my face when I saw it the first time. It may have been in small part because I’d had a few beers, but it never, never stops being funny.

I’m watching the Greta Van Susteren interview with Sarah Palin and just got really frustrated when she got on the subject of feminism.

“I consider myself too, a feminist, whatever that means, I consider myself a ‘feminist for life’… I would like to see more of these feminist women open their minds instead of being narrow minded…I’d like them to be bold and brave and explore someone like me… a conservative who believes that government isn’t the answer to all of our problems.”

She then calls abortion a “litmus test” – which is funny, because her pro-life stance says that government should dictate to women exactly how they should solve the problem of an unwanted pregnancy. That doesn’t make sense. But I guess that’s not news.

So here Sarah, just in case you were wondering, this is the definition of Feminist, via Webster’s.

Main Entry: fem·i·nism

Pronunciation: \?fe-m?-?ni-z?m\

Function: noun

Date: 1895

One: Even though it’s a week after Halloween, I’m still thrilled that my “Obooma” pumpkin made it onto YesWeCarve.com.

Two: Did I not call how awesome the story of Ann Nixon Cooper, the 106-year-old Atlanta woman who was voting for Obama was? Because Obama seemed to think so. (And Ta-Nehisi Coates does too.) Barack must be reading my blog.

Last night, as the election results came in, D.C. was a brilliant circus. At the corner of 14th and U, where the race riots erupted 40 years ago this year at the news of Martin Luther King Jr.’s death, there was as conga line of people weaving through the streets cheering “Obama! Obama!” over and over. An older black man walked through the crowd, two tear-tracks shining on his cheeks.

Waving Kenyan flags, rainbow flags, and beating pots and pans, people were hugging and slapping hands, cars were honking and out cruising the streets, drummers were playing, and crowds danced on top of bus shelters holding a cardboard cutout of Barack. We were woozy with possibility. Witnessing history.

We walked a few blocks north to get a cab, getting bear hugs from a couple who were standing next to their car, its doors splayed open. The radio blasted the old Sam Cooke anthem from the Civil Rights movement, its lyrics yearning, striving. “It’s been a long, long time,” Cooke opines, “But I know, a change is gonna come.”

I’m an objective journalist, but even I have to admit that I got a little misty-eyed when I saw the story of an 106-year-old Atlanta woman who cast her vote for Barack Obama. The woman witnessed the Civil Rights movement and remembers a time when she wasn’t allowed to vote because of her race. She went to vote early today, she says, because, “I ain’t got time to die.”

Political campaigns are always quick to blame the media for tinkering with their messages (though they should remember, without them, there would be no message at all). But I was pretty shocked to see the reaction of the crowd at yesterday’s Sarah Palin rally, as described by Dana Milbank in The Washington Post. He writes that “Palin’s routine attacks on the media have begun to spill into ugliness…”

In Clearwater, arriving reporters were greeted with shouts and taunts by the crowd of about 3,000. Palin then went on to blame Katie Couric’s questions for her “less-than-successful interview with kinda mainstream media.” At that, Palin supporters turned on reporters in the press area, waving thunder sticks and shouting abuse. Others hurled obscenities at a camera crew. One Palin supporter shouted a racial epithet at an African American sound man for a network and told him, “Sit down, boy.”

Really redefines the idea of attacking the media doesn’t it? Scary stuff.

I’m rabidly watching the DNC this week, stomaching as many political anachronisms from Chris Matthews as I can handle, and so far I’ve been impressed. I loved Michelle Obama’s grace and adored those little girls (can they please campaign with him more often?), and I was bowled over by how spirited and inspiring Hillary’s keynote address speech was last night. Whether people believe her or not, she’s working to unite the Democrats, and lines like “No way, no how, no McCain,” and her Twin Cities riff were right on target. With Bill’s speech tonight, and the stadium-shaker that I assume Obama will give Thursday, the campaign is invigorated and hopefully paving the way towards Pennsylvania Ave.

But with all the campaign hubbub, I’m in the midst of a smaller campaign of my own: My mom. Mom went red the last two elections (for which I’m still a bit upset) so I was glad to hear that she was back in the blue column this year, and that Hillary was her pick. But after Hillary fizzled out, my mom wasn’t done. I’ve called her repeatedly to gauge her thoughts on the convention and the election, and she’s still smitten, and still undecided. And so, while I watch the pundits parse out every single word of the speakers utters, I look to my mom for how women like her are reacting. And its fascinating and frustrating at the same time…

(Photo: bbc.com)

I’m watching Jon Stewart grill Scott McClellan right now, and Scott looks just as uncomfortable and dishonest as he did in his press secretary heyday (though at least he’s not nearly as shellacked in pancake makeup as he was on Meet the Press). Despite the way that his book, What Happened, has saturated the media over the past week and exposed all kinds of (obvious) ills within the White House administration, I can’t help feeling like there’s a hollowness in the way he speaks about his “awakening.” For one, he’s smiling a whole lot more than you’d expect someone who is being skewered by his former colleagues to be smiling. And it’s kind of an eerie smile.

The Post’s Dana Milbank did a great job summarizing the catch-phrases that McClellan has used over (and over) again to explain his eventual enlightenment, and perhaps it was the catch phrases, or the book’s title, but it kept reminding me of this clip of the incredible Fred Willard in the folk music mockumentary: A Mighty Wind.