The IHT writer interviews a bunch of Catholics in Scranton to highlight the back-and-forth about abortion and voting that happens among the Catholic faithful — if not their leaders — while showing at least some of them swinging toward McCain (and one being racist). Although the Church regards the practice of abortion as a sin, excommunication isn't exactly standard practice for the women of Catholic faith who have had them, since you can cross your legs and — as a friend of my mother's did in high school — wear a hat in the pew and never tell the priest about your abortion. For politicians, on the other hand, it's another story. In the last few years, players in the Church hierarchy have begun vociferously pushing the idea that not only are women who get abortions and the doctors who perform them going to hell, but that the politicians who support the right of non-Catholic women to believe that abortion is not wrong — and Catholic women who believe that the Pope is wrong — are also going to hell.

Joe Biden, for instance, was warned by a local bishop not to try to go to church in or around Scranton, Pennsylvania (his hometown) as he will be denied Communion. Conservative Catholic groups have called for all pro-choice Catholic politicians to be treated similarly in an effort to pressure them to choose their religious faith over their constitutional responsibilities. (Even Catholic writer and professor Douglas Kmiec was denied Communion (i.e., excommunicated) for having the audacity to support Barack Obama because he and Obama believe that Obama's pro-woman, pro-sex ed policies can actually reduce the incidence of abortion by reducing the economic hardships faced by pregnant women...and the number of pregnancies altogether. Shocking, I know.)

Amusingly, as I like to keep repeating, former McCain surrogate Carly Fiorina recently claimed that it is the Democrats who are trying to hold women hostage to the party on the issue of abortion. Well, I'll be damned if too many Democrats go around using their actual pulpits to actually damn people to actual hell (assuming there is a hell to which one can be damned, but Catholics believe there is). Actually, I guess I'll be damned anyway.

In addition to Biden, many politicians — Nancy Pelosi, Tim Kaine, John Kerry and Ted Kennedy, for instance — are practicing Catholics. As such, they are asked to believe that abortion as wrong. And as politicians sworn to uphold the Constitution of this country, they are asked to commit to this leetle thing we like to call the separation of church and state (and to represent the views of their constituents). When your religious values conflict with your responsibilities as a politician, that's a difficult thing to handle. Most do so in the same way that my mother does: they believe that abortion is wrong, but don't believe their religious views should be forced on people who don't share those beliefs. That's called being "pro-choice."

Abortion Issue Again Dividing Catholic Votes [International Herald Tribune]
Denied Communion For Backing Obama [Andrew Sullivan]
Abortion's Foes — On Both Sides Of The Aisle [Wall Street Journal]

MEGAN: Hey, what's up? Is it weird that I'm not hungover but I feel enough out of it that I might as well be?

SPENCER: Can you believe that the District of Columbia revoked my driver's license just because I decided not to pay a ticket that I got in New Jersey a couple months ago?

MEGAN: Quite honestly, kind of. I know other people who have gotten their licenses revoked for that kind of thing. I always winced a little when you mentioned that, but everyone knows I'm a goodie two-shoes except when it comes to D.C. parking tickets. And then I'm a soulless, conscienceless scofflaw.

SPENCER: You, I know, have a system in place for [redacted] when you accumulate tickets. Ingenious

MEGAN: Shhhh. Anyway, so, doesn't it feel to you like this VP picking process has gone on forever? Like they're just playing chicken with one another?

SPENCER: According to Adam "Ad Nags" Nagourney, it all ends as early as tomorrow:

Mr. Obama had not notified his choice — or any of those not selected — of his decision as of late Monday, advisers said. Going into the final days, Mr. Obama was said to be focused mainly on three candidates: Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana, Gov. Tim Kaine of Virginia and Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware.

I say no to Bayh, maybe to Biden, and yes to Kaine. Tell me what you think

MEGAN: Well, I'm on record as feeling like Bayh is just a Washington climber who never, ever wants to have to go back to Indiana, and I'm betting he ends up with a cabinet job, but then I saw this rumor that an Obama staffer said it was him to CNN plus screencap of the now-pulled story and I got a little worried. I have no idea why he'd pick Biden, honestly, I want to believe he's just a red herring. I couldn't believe Kaine would saddle the state with a Republican governor by leaving (who would then get to run for a term of his own, bypassing Virginia's term limit law), but then I remembered he's a politician.

SPENCER: I heard about that. If he picks Bayh, the left will go fucking firecrackers. My friend Max even set up a facebook group against Bayh, and these guys already feel seriously dissed by Obama after FISA.

MEGAN: I miss Sebelius speculation.

SPENCER: Let's talk Kaine in a second. Why would he pick Biden? Biden, writes Jon Cohn in TNR — an honest man at a dishonest magazine — has that foreign policy expertise and that pugilism:

If Biden is the choice, I think it would speak well of Obama's judgment. Biden has a deep and impressive resume: Not only is he the guy who orchestrated the defeat of Robert Bork back in the 1980s, but he can also claim among his legislative accomplishments the Violence Against Women's Act, which is no small feat. He's smart, articulate, and is a bona fide expert on foreign policy: In other words, he's certainly capable of assuming the presidency in an emergency, which is really the most important criteria of all.

Joe Biden also has a good critique of TNR, for that matter. Four years ago I went to interview him for a piece about Kerry's counterterrorism strategy for TNR and he was trying to figure out whether I wanted him to say that Kerry would take a more targeted, al-Qaeda-centric approach or would just kill all the Arabs "Your magazine," he said (this is from memory), "has to figure out whether it's liberal or neoconservative, already."

MEGAN: Ha, this douchebag and his syncophants (one of whom emailed me last night to castigate me, by the way) are suing to get the VAWA thrown out as unconstitutional. Also, I love that he said that to you.

SPENCER: Oh shit i have to read that post! PS, don't fucking Twitter while we're doing Crappy Hour. You forget I'm on your feed!

MEGAN: I was waiting for you to type! I don't dislike Joe Biden, I honestly could see him as Secretary of State, but I really don't think this election is going to be won on foreign policy issues with the economy in the crapper.

SPENCER: Biden: I like the pugilism a lot. Don't expect it to be won on foreign policy. Picking Biden would be to tamp down McCain's only (if you believe the polls) advantage, leaving him with nothing while Obama kicks his ass on the economy

MEGAN: And he's a great speaker. But Delaware? And your friend Jon's right about that bankruptcy bill, that was a huge giveaway to the credit card companies... and sponsored by Arlington Congressman/wife-beater Jim Moran. He'd like me to come to his women's issues forum with Donna Brazile. Maybe if I bring a small, African American child he can smack him for the crowd.

SPENCER: That's a dream, man! I'm really equivocal on Biden. He voted for the war, though he calls it a mistake. In reality, he didn't want to vote for the war, he was terrified of getting smeared as unpatriotic like he did after he voted against the first Gulf War and this was a year after 9/11.

MEGAN: I see your point, but I think Kaine's a trade-up. Plus, bonus Catholic points, since Obama isn't going to win a ton of evangelical votes.

SPENCER: Now: Tim Kaine. I know nothing about him and like him!

MEGAN: That's pretty much Tim Kaine's advantage right there.

SPENCER: He's white and dimply and Virginian and I guess kind of liberal and didn't vote for the Iraq war, so that works for me. You, my friend, are the Virginia resident among us, so make the case. How liberal is he?

MEGAN: The eyebrows are killer, though. With all the smack Sebelius took for her response to the State of the Union, I can't believe no one brought up his.

SPENCER: A bunch of activists on a listserv I'm on seem to think he's unacceptably less-than-deep-blue.

MEGAN: He's a serious Catholic, I'm guessing that freaks some liberals out. But he's a serious Catholic seriously personally opposed to capital punishment who nonetheless denies clemency requests to prove that the Pope ain't the boss of him, or something, so I don't love that about him. That part makes me miss Mario Cuomo.

SPENCER: How is he as a governor?

MEGAN: I mean, I think he's been a pretty decent politician, the legislature here is pretty right-wing and he's successfully pushed stuff through and kept crap from going through. He's been pretty good on transportation issues, which are huge up here in NoVa, but were he not on the short list, I would guess that he'd be remembered as a serviceable but not spectacular governor unless he does something crazy at the end of his term.

SPENCER: Yeah, northern VA is all wine-swilling assholes like you. Jesus CHRIST if I make my Windy deadline this morning it'll be a miracle...

MEGAN: Actually, if Obama takes Virginia and Colorado, he can lose Florida or Ohio. And, I'm sorry, McCain's best feint on getting a Virginian on the ticket was Eric Cantor, so...

SPENCER: HAHAHAHAHA if McCain has to get a Virginian it will speak desperation. Not like the bravery of choosing Joe Lieberman!

[McCain's] top contenders are said to include Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. Less traditional choices mentioned include former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge, an abortion-rights supporter, and Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman, the Democratic vice presidential prick in 2000 who now is an independent.

MEGAN: I'm actually amazed that there's not a single Southerner on McCain's short list.

SPENCER: Joe, Joe, Joe! Make the GOP ticket the most jowly of all time! If McCain goes with Lieberman, I reverse my choice and hope Obama picks Biden, just because Biden will tear the living shit out of Lieberman in any debate.

MEGAN: Oh, fuck yeah, that would be popcorn and beer time watching that! At what point in the race do you think Lieberman would start undermining McCain the way he did Al Gore?

SPENCER: Not even SLIGHTLY and here's why. Lieberman is animated by the classic neoconservative grievance of rejection by his first love, the Democratic Party. Jacob Heilbrunn's book goes into this pathology in detail. And honestly, I have to admit I understand it, given my inability to let go of this whole TNR shit. That's why Lieberman has been such an eager attack dog for the right ever since he lost his primary in 2006 — he wants, and wants badly, to redress what the left did to him. He's not actually rightwing. He's anti-anti-left, and ferociously so.

MEGAN: Well, you know, if you want to be a hawk, don't expect a bunch of doves to come flocking to you.

SPENCER: He's obsessed with his own transcendent righteousness. Whatever, if Obama is going to tell me who the pick is by texting me, then McCain will announce his pick by telegraph-machine. A cavalcade of whimsy!

• Nancy Pelosi said aloud today what everyone knows implicitly and no one ever acknowledges: when the right-wingers talk about "San Francisco values," they're condemning San Franciscans for not spitting on the LGBT community with a wink and a nod. Tolerance is so for liberals. [HuffPo]
• Speaking of the intolerance of the right, an inspector general's report has unsurprisingly concluded that Monica Goodling and Kyle Sampson inappropriately used political considerations when hiring at the Justice Department. Goodling asked interviewees what they liked most about Bush, what their stances on abortion were and, in one case, refused to renew a prosecutor's appointment believing him to be gay or at least, very metrosexual. Hey, it was 2006, that phrase was still acceptable! [Washington Post]

• Not to dwell on Bushies, but, um, one of them called the Iraq War "fucking stupid." He helped design a counterinsurgency strategy that relied on more than boots on the ground that we've partially ignored, but he is an Aussie after all. That accent doesn't translate well into "Texan." [Washington Independent]
• What translates a little easier is a McCain adviser promising conservatives that McCain won't really push a greenhouse gas plan because candidates always promise stuff they won't deliver on. Here's hoping he says that about McCain, oh, another couple of hundred times between now and November. [Think Progress]
• Hillary Clinton's totally hitting the trail for Obama once she gets done catching up in the Senate, Terry McAuliffe swears. And he's, like, totally reliable. [CNN]
• John McCain had another mole removed today, which reminds us to always wear sunscreen and that John McCain is really old. [CNN, John McCain Is Really Old]
• Obama is reportedly seriously vetting Virginia Governor Tim "not Mc" Kaine for the VP slot, but Tim just makes us wonder what is up with the eyebrows of Virginia's past 3 governors. They're really bushy and strange. It is becoming a great way to handicap the Governor's race down there, though. [Washington Post]

MOE: So should we slog through the Veeps today? is anything else happening?
MEGAN: Yeah, we can start with veeps, want to go Dem or Republican firsties?
MOE: I'm sending you TNR. I will admit to having not read long past Ed Rendell, but I'm calling it up again.

MEGAN: Yeah, I sadly read all of those this weekend, including David Frum's bullshit piece on "how" McCain should choose a Veep (hint: even the ones that don't win go on to be President some day, what a terrible thought) and that ends with this gem:

I have my own personal nomination for vice president for McCain. It's Rudy Giuliani, precisely because he shares the vision of a practical, reforming, war- winning Republican Party that inspires John McCain, plus the stronger-than- usual grounds for hoping that he might be the rare candidate who can make a difference in an essential state—in this case, New Jersey.

MEGAN: The fact that I continued reading the rest of the profiles after that is a sign of my dedication to our readers, for real. Wetlands was less perverse.
MOE: I'm actually reading Frum's piece now. Uhhhh, news you can't use: Garrett Hobart was William McKinley's VP…something something C-Span, VP candidates never deliver voters…blah.

MEGAN: Right. And let's get that Giuliani guy back. Barf.
MOE: Also, how did Mike Bloomberg get on "both Barack Obama and John McCain's vice-presidential shortlists"? Is this true?
MEGAN: I think that's bullshit.
MEGAN: Obama needs a New Yorker? Please. I mean, Bloomie spent 5 minths trying to gin up enough national press to get enough name recognition to make a run at it and couldn't manage. The last thing McCain needs with social conservations already starting to defect is to put a non-Zell Miller, non-Joe Lieberman former Democrat from New York City on the ticket.
MOE: I like this lede re Huck Yeah:

If the first rule of picking a running mate is to risk as little harm to the ticket as possible, then Mike Huckabee shouldn't be John McCain's first choice for veep—or his second, third, or fourth, for that matter.

He is the GOP equivalent of Ed Rendell! Although Ed could probs use some of his dieting tips. And you can file the rest of this piece into "Quirky pol derangedly beloved by numerous members of the media, who have filed away several hundred thousand words of anecdote — and travel expenses — that will go to waste if editors don't redeem this "possible VP" angle in critical pre-Convention window of time.

MEGAN: But didn't you hear? He saved someone's life this weekend. He's obviously ordained by God or something. He's the actual Messiah. What has Obama ever done?
MOE: Um

“I’m glad that Mike was in the right place at the right time and continued to lead by example,” former South Carolina Lt. Gov. candidate Mike Campbell told The Palmetto Scoop. “We all know that [Huckabee] is pro-life, and once again he has lived up to it.”
The newspaper noted that Pittenger apparently suffers from acid reflux, which likely caused the incident to occur. It added that Huckabee, who is also known for losing 110 pounds and promoting healthy living, was trained as an EMT in college and this may not be the first time he’s sprung to action when needed.

Are they subtly suggesting a little experience with bulimia might have saved a life?

MOE: Also, Pawlenty. The thing is called "Extreme Makeover," it addresses his "proletarian chic," and you can't see it on the site, but in print it's adorned by a picture that just makes you think: that is a rather aristocratic nose on that guy.
MOE: But genes can be so deceiving! He likes to perform "headlocks" and go to bars and such.

Pawlenty will be the first presidential running mate to have worn a mullet into middle age.

MOE: Oh my god, and more on the hair.

At 47, he is lean and vigorous, with plush brown hair.

MOE: Plush?
MEGAN: Dude, it's Minnesota. Of course he's all down home like. I love, however, where he's drinking: at an American Legion Hall. The first bar I ever spent any time at at the tender age of 16 was a VFW bar and I am pretty sure they would've served me but I didn't drink and I had to drive home from there but it was shady, dude.
MEGAN: Anyone else think Noam has a man crush on Pawlenty?
MOE: Did you read the Vanity Fair man crush piece? I was going to post on it later. I hate trend pieces that are accurate.
MEGAN: I didn't, but if we're gonna talk man crushes, we should probably talk about Jim Webb now.
MEGAN: Except that the TNR piece is written by a woman. Goddammit, ruins my joke. Oh, well.
MOE: One thing, btw, I totally do not understand is how the "Axis of Arugula" enemies over at Fox News have remained so oblivious to how thorougly their beloved blue collar culture has totally been co-opted by the elite. The American Legion is like, the epicenter of the scene!

MEGAN: Because the Enemies of Arugula are too busy dining at [insert name of trendy NYC eatery here] to bother checking out the American Legion or VFW bar, not that they could get in because you generally have to be a vet or a friend of a vet and, well, you know. Fox News.
MOE: Like right wing blogger Dorothy King re her Obamaconservatism, who is referenced in a Bartlett piece:

Do I now, as a newly minted Obamaphile liberal elitist, have to serve my guests Chablis? Or would any old chardonnay do? Must it be arugula for the salad; or would lamb's lettuce, dandelion and little gems in hazelnut oil be okay? What about desert? I had planned to make a chocolate soufflé cake. But baking ... are Obamacons allowed to bake, or is that too conservative?

Um, Dorothy: if you really want to pass for bleeding-heart, cupcakes and Pabst! Pretend like you're in Kansas. Ohhhhh, bad pun. Srsly though.

MOE: I didn't even know chablis was supposedly nicer than chardonnay. I just buy this shit by the price point.
MEGAN: Also, wait, isn't Hillary the feminist candidate? Isn't Hillary the one who doesn't bake?
MEGAN: Chablis is like what people drank in the 70s. And it's sweeter. Chardonnay is the new Chablis, it's what people buy when they don't know what to buy or drink or even what they like.
MEGAN: It's 90% mass market, dumbed down, oaked-up crap that people think they're supposed to like.
MEGAN: Wow, I think I might have stronger opinions about wine than I do about VPs. Especially if that VP is Sam Nunn. Boooring. Also not gonna happen.
MOE: That's totes what I thought. Like, chablis was advertised in all those old Cosmos Anna got for us this one time. Regardless, you notice how the last desperate shreds of this phony elitism-populism thing are sort of a theme of this issue? Hence the Jim Webb hardon:

He embodies the liberal fantasy laid out by Thomas Frank in What's the Matter With Kansas?: that blue-collar whites will stop being mad at liberals for frowning at their guns and start being mad at conservatives for raping their pocketbooks.

MOE: Here's the link.

MEGAN: Blue collar white semi-conservatives might well get mad about their pocketbooks, but they vote with our uteri. I mean, they don't vote with their own because they don't have them or would totes never get an abortion, not that they would talk about, anyway. Guns for all, abortions for none! And fuck the economy, that's the Democrats' fault.
MOE: Like, personally, I am liberal as fuck, and my dad is a conservative, and he has fine tastes and reads the classics and knows about wine and shit, and I am the one who clocks in at 7:30 after grabbing an egg sandwich and a Post, and I guess that's how it should be?
MEGAN: Well, I'm not quite as liberal as you I'd say, but I know about wine! And I read the classics. Sometimes. The last book I read the whole way through was The Master and Marguerita and I swear I'm gonna finish Crime and Punishment and Baal and Amerika and Tropic of Cancer this year. I swear. But I won't be voting for McCain, that's for sure.
MOE: Oh my god I just saw that joke in the Gchat screen lolol. Readers, why don't you decide?

Megan: dude. i need an opinion whether I should write this.: Wait, dude, there's an even more horrible takeaway joke from Dorothy: She's trying to say that a world with Obama is a world without chocolate. is that past the line?

No lady, I'm just drooling right now and I'm not sure why…
MEGAN: Fine, I'll bake cupcakes next time I visit. Chocolate ones. Soufflé doesn't travel well.

MEGAN: Ok, we keep getting distracted by other stuff, so let me give the run down on VP as I see it and I'm sure I'll be wrong because I always am about these things, but whatever.
MOE: Um, I'm interrupting the veepstakes magic 8 ball chat just a sec for an obligatory moment in Geraldine Ferraro, oy she is nuts.

Geraldine Ferraro dismissed the idea in a conversation with me last week - noting that these voters had already voted for an anti-abortion rights Republican before: Ronald Reagan. More, she said, these sophisticated voters know that Democrats will keep control of Congress no matter what, blocking any extremist nominees for the Supreme Court.

Oh yes that is some very sophisticated reasoning Ferraro! If by "sophisticated" you mean impenetrably self-sabotagingly warped!
MEGAN: Oh, right, like how the Dems blocked Alito and Roberts? Fucking a, like, she's literally trying out reasons for them not to vote Obama. WTF is wrong with her. Ok, back to veeps.

MEGAN: Republican: It's not going to be Huckabee, I'll bet he annoys McCain and he's no upside with the fiscal conservatives. McCain might swallow it and pick Romney. He won't take Crist (gay), he won't take Jindal (won't pass vetting, I'd bet), he can't take Rice (those naughty lesbian rumors and all).
MEGAN: Side note: John McCain's campaign has the most high-level gay staff and advisers of any campaign so far this year. Oh, and the Log Cabin Republicans who declined to endorse Bush twice, I have it on good authority, will endorse McCain despite his record on gay issues because he once voted against the federal marriage amendment. But he's still not going to take Crist.
MOE: Don't you think Rice's bigger problem is being, um, friends with Bush?
MEGAN: Not when he needs to appeal to Bush's voters. What, like she and he disagree on Iraq?
MOE: No, see: Bush doesn't have any more voters.
MOE: Seriously, I don't think Tom Davis was hyperbolizing.
MEGAN: Anyway, so I think Pawlenty's definitely on the short list. I think he's vetting Carly Fiorina in the press the way he did Rice.
MEGAN: I don't think he was hyperbolizing, either, but I think McCain's going to have to tack right now that Bob Barr's the libertarian, he's going to pick up $$ and voters.
MOE: And even if he did, it is not a prim black brainy Ferragamo-clad warmonger they were voting for.
MEGAN: And who's left on the right? The 27% of people or so that still actually support Bush, and you gotta know those people are not big McCainiacs.

MEGAN: Anyway, so the other thing that Attackerman were talking about this weekend that would probs make sense in McCain's warped mind was Lieberman. And that would be a pro-war, all-war ticket with this semblance of bipartisanship that I think would totally lose and Liebarman's a shitty VP candidate so that's the one I'm sort of rooting for.

MOE: You know, we never hit Rendell, but the lede is all you need. Rendell is appearing at a rally with Louis Farrakhan. Buzz Bissinger is a city hall reporter from the Philadelphia Inquirer following Rendell for six years because he thinks municipal politicians will actually be able to learn something from the experience of Philadelphia or something.

I was writing a book on Rendell at the time. Allowed into his inner sanctum for close to six years, I found Rendell's stance on Farrakhan important and was eager to hear what he had been thinking during the rally. He did not disappoint: "As I sat there, I said to myself, 'Wouldn't it be great if someone burst in and gunned me down, because then Buzz would at least have an ending to his book.'"

MEGAN: Oh, great, just with this campaign needs, two people who the Republicans can associate with Louis Farrakhan. Also, Rendell got on TV last week and said unequivocally (unlike the rest of the Veepstakes candidates) that he doesn't want the gig because he doesn't like working for other people or trying to spin shit.
MOE: So dude, do you think it will be Jim Webb? And if so, does that mean we have to read his books?
MEGAN: I think if it is, we do, but I don't think it will be. I'm sure he's on the short list, but how do they take a 1st term Senator (from a state where the seat might swing back) with no domestic policy experience who is a former Republican with a shitty record on women's issues and make him Obama's VP in this climate?
MOE: Little known fact: Anna's dad is apparently obsessed with Scot-Irish history. And all I know of the climate is that it is hot. And that fucking Geraldine Ferraro is voting for McCain anyway.
MEGAN: A month ago, sure, I can see him topping out the list, no doubt, but I think the surging supposed feminists (I'm sorry, I ain't calling anyone who is threatening to vote for McCain or write-in Hillary to turn the election over to him an actual feminist) who are pissed at Obama over sexism in the media and among some of his supposed supporters makes it much less likely.
MEGAN: But I think he's on the short list. I know Clinton is, though I'm on record as being confused why she'd give up power in the Senate for what is basically a powerless ceremonial role (And HRC-as-VP people, don't give me "VP is head of the Senate" crap, because that's not how it works, Cheney casts a tie-breaking vote once in a blue and doesn't have any actual power in the institution, look it up, thanks).
MEGAN: McCaskill's seat could go red, my Steve mentioned Landrieu but that's the same deal, ditto Klobuchar. Napolitano hates McCain and would totally attack him, which is good, Sebelius for sure. I'm still feeling like Feingold could be a dark horse but am constantly told that he's too liberal (which is actually the point of taking him), Tim Kaine wants it but he has weird eyebrows. Edwards doesn't, Richardson is grabby with the ladies and, fuck it, he really should just announce a shadow cabinet because there's be someone in there for everyone in the Democratic party and no one would be able to vote against every major Democratic figure.