Or maybe the cable network's program guide editor knows something interesting about how Kathleen Sebelius' husband likes to be addressed. Or how Bill Clinton will be known for the next eight years! Anyway, CNN already has not only the gender but also the NAME of the VP. [CNBC via Huffington Post]

Barack Obama has a half-brother who lives in a shack and hasn't spoken to the candidate in years. Just like in The Onion the other day! Ha ha ha! Except this one lives in Kenya and lives on less than a dollar a month and is too embarrassed to admit to people that he's related to the American presidential candidate. Plus side for Obama: George is too far away to embarrass him like Roger Clinton or Billy Carter. Downside: His brother lives in a shanty town on Kenya. Barry Hussein met young George Hussein Obama back in 2006 for the first time since they were children. They haven't spoken since. "I am good with my fists," George Obama reports. All in all, we liked the wacky Onion story better! [Daily Telegraph]

A screaming headline on Drudge, and a new Zogby poll showing McCain pulling ahead of Obama by five points means one thing only: media meltdown. Barring an Obama VP pick, this poll is certain to lead tonight on Chris Matthews, CNN and the rest of cable news – even though it's just one single data point that (for now) contradicts other polls, and even though Zogby's methods and accuracy are controversial at a minimum. ("The house of sand and Zog," Mickey Kaus memorably mocked.) It's one number, scarcely different from the last month's worth of data. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't be way more worried. The Cocoon Frank Rich isn't worried. His Sunday column takes comfort in the race's underlying stability:

At last, pollster John Zogby's methodologies will be rigorously examined by Valley engineers. The latest monthly Reuters/Zogby poll puts John McCain ahead of Barack Obama in the presidential race — 46 to 41 percent. Prior to this, Obama had come out ahead each month, most recently scoring a 7 percent lead in July's poll. Zogby himself attributes the flip to McCain's aggressive campaign to discredit Obama. Valleywag editor Owen Thomas surely blames Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg. Personally, I'm looking forward to the many, many posts, comments and tweets explaining how this is just not happening.

The Daily News and the Post today both led with goofy excitable front page stories on Michael Bloomberg's threat to cover our bridges and skyscrapers with hideous power-generating windmills (both front pages: "WINDY CITY"). Both mention that Bloomberg dined with millionaire windpower enthusiast T. Boone Pickens. Page Six also reports on how Rudy Giuliani ignored the advice of Pickens, "a leading advocate for alternative energy," during his failed presidential run. Pickens just did a conference call with Harry Reid. And he just met with McCain. And he's got a book out! The oil billionaire-turned-pseudo-environmentalist is everywhere. And so we ask, upon learning that Obama's met with him too: what the hell? Why is everyone playing nice with the evil old jackass? We'd expect him to informally advise Giuliani. Pickens, the old oilman, is a longtime funder of Republicans. He very very famously is responsible for those Swift Boat people who lied about John Kerry. He's spent the last 30 years ensuring that his business-friendly Republican friends remained in power, and now the old man spends millions pushing... wind power? Alternative energy? It almost sounds like environmentalism! Why waste time trying to convince Republicans to... act like liberals?? The oilman has given up oil, you see. Now he's investing millions in wind power and natural gas. Both are less environmentally terrible than petroleum, but his magic windmill plan does not seem to us to be very viable. Because there's a lot of wind in those big empty plains states, yes, but not any people. So transporting this power across the entire country adds even more to this power's price tag and enriches T. Boone and his investors yet more! But merits of his plan aside, the question is why Democrats like Reid and Obama are giving the jackass the time of day and legitimizing him as anything other than a zillionaire who thinks the presidency and now the energy policy of this country are his to buy. Start a think tank or something dude, don't just get all "rogue vigilante billionaire crisis-solver"! And further, why the hell aren't anyone but random columnists and Cato Institute libertarians examining his plan seriously and reporting on his conflicts of interest? Hell in a week's worth of stories entirely about how important famous elected officials are meeting with Pickens, only today's Obama stories even mention the Swift Boat Veterans. What the hell, T. Boone Pickens. Just because you're rich doesn't mean everyone has to take you seriously.

If Barack Obama is swarmed like this in the red state of North Carolina where he's four points behind, how is he going to make it out of Denver alive?? No one even cares that he's gone "quietly negative" with a secret terrorist propaganda campaign against poor John McCain, who complains he was sucker-punched by someone stooping to his level. God, Obama really is just like Paris Hilton. (Photo via Getty Images)

It looks like the smart money is on Delaware Senator Joe Biden for Obama's running mate. Mark Halperin's already announced it in his typical cryptic way (after erasing his "if I don't know the selection it hasn't happened yet" post from last night): "Bo knows," he says, which probably refers to Biden's son, Beau, though why Beau would know is unknown. Why would Obama choose Biden? Our theory is that Obama just likes Biden. He's a funny guy. But is it a terrible choice? We think it is! But we'd love to be wrong! Pros and cons (mostly cons), below. The official line is age, experience, and foreign policy expertise-Biden matches up well against McCain by outdoing him on most of his strengths besides the "tortured for five years by homos" thing. But with Biden comes the history of saying insane and inappropriate things and, you know, the plagiarism. (We said he matched up well with McCain!) And hey, let's look at some of our favorite moments of Biden saying something insane-taken entirely from his recent run for the presidency! July, 2006:

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has Facebook cofounder Chris Hughes working for his campaign, text messages and email alerts set up, 1,349,295 supporters signed up on Facebook, Silicon Valley's money in his pocket, and a fresh Google-esque brand image manufactured. But the Grand Old Party gets the tech youngs, too, OK? Hence BarackBook.com, on which you can read Barack's "Friend Feed" and learn, for example, that "Barack Obama is now friends with Jodie Evans," whom you may be shocked and alarmed to learn is an anti-establishment, anti-war activist! Anyway, according to its legal disclaimer and joke explainer, BarackBook.com "is a parody of Facebook.com." See a screen grab, below.

With the possible exceptions of various sarcastic asides by John Dickerson and Jack Shafer, online journal of contrarianism Slate has run like one intentionally funny piece in its 100 year history-this examination of Chuck Klosterman jacket photos by Doree-so we're not entirely sure why they keep trying. Humor is not really your bag, Slate! Today we received an ominous email from Slate's indefatigable flack: "Slate V Spoofs Lolcats: Polcats—What if Barack and Hillary Wuz Kittehs?" It might go... a little something... like this: Click to view Slate, this is the kind of idea we get at like 4:30 p.m. on a Friday and we think better of before we even finish the email pitch to Blakeley. This is apparently the kind of idea you decide to publish as an actual book so our advice is probably falling on deaf ears.

Timesmen Nagourney and Zeleny say Obama's found a running mate. But he has only told his closest advisers. And not the person he chose, even! Who is either Evan Bayh (ugh), Tim Kaine (eh), or Joe Biden (!). He will text you, his supporters, whenever he decides to make his announcement. Last night political expert hack loser Mark Halperin said Nagourner and Zeleny (and Drudge!) were all flat-out wrong but now he must've have been informed that they're right so he took his post down and replaced it with something about how Joe Biden is the guy (and when it turns out to be Bayh he'll take that down too.) Morning! [NYT]

From right to left, Sutter Hill Ventures's Greg Sands, Zynga CEO Mark Pincus, Barack Obama, Pincus's new wife Alison Gelb Pincus, Craigslist founder Craig Newmark and "the girlfriend," Eileen Whelply. We know you can do better, so crack wise in the comments and we'll make the best one the new title. Friday's winner was sample032 for "Who killed my electric car?" (And not just because he showed up to the happy hour in Mountain View.) (Photo by Steve Jurvetson)

• The Obama campaign is marshalling the full power of the fashion industry to get ahead: A long list of designers—definitely including Derek Lam, Isaac Mizrahi, Tracy Reese, and Diane von Furstenberg and possibly including Beyoncé, Russell Simmons, and Vera Wang—will be creating official merchandise like totes and t-shirts. [WaPo]

Barack Obama made his last scheduled visit to San Francisco and the Bay Area this weekend, since he can rest assured that even if proved a card-carrying member of the walking undead, area voters would shuffle off to vote for him in November, regardless. So why bother? Because he wants brains money! And he got it, with a single-event record $7.8 million according to venture capitalist and cub campaign reporter Steve Jurvetson of Draper Fisher Jurvetson, who along with his wife Karla Jurvetson have pitched in $9,200 so far, the maximum allowable. The photograph gives me reason to suspect that Obama might reach across the aisle — and the penumbra which separates the living from eternity — for a running mate, and Zombie Ronald Reagan is available we hear. (Photo by Steve Jurvetson)

The only news that actually happened during that unprecedented Saturday debate at the Saddleback Church is that John McCain spent the Obama-questioning portion of the evening in his bus instead of the "cone of silence." Then, when Andrea Mitchell mentioned this on TV the next morning, his campaign sent out one of those furious letters that NBC News head Steve Corpus keeps getting from various outraged candidates. Of course the story was confirmed by CNN and Rick Warren and Kit Seelye but no matter. The entire debate was already a pointless exercise with a predetermined winner, designed to help McCain appeal to the wary nut vote and make Obama look good just for showing up. What's funny about this "debate" before cartoonish Stuart Smalley-esque touchy-feely evangelical megachurch pastor Rick Warren and his million followers is that we know Obama's gone to church every week for years and the closest we've seen McCain to worshiping Yahweh is when that North Vietnamese prison guard he borrowed from the Solzhenitsyn anecdote scratched that cross in the sand. (Amusingly, this plagiarism was first noted by the right-wingers of Free Republic back when Conservatives hated McCain for being a MAVERICK.) But what matters, obviously, is not actual religion conviction-or even the facade of conviction that actual church-attendance lends-but kowtowing to morons. McCain, who first bit his tongue to appeal to his party's idiots about five years ago and has not yet let up on it since, won the debate by proudly announcing that he has the moral authority to recognize and personally wipe out evil in all its forms, while Obama foolishly went for the "humble and meek" vote. The pundits will probably call it his "complexity" problem but he actually erred in sounding like a real Christian. McCain, not even sure which denomination he is supposed to pretend to be, only had to assuage these politically exhausted evangelicals that, like Republican presidents before him, he would ban abortion forever and shut down the ACLU and make it a crime for newsreaders to not wear flag pins. And, while everyone rightly says Obama "lost" the debate, it also happened on a Saturday night during the damn Olympics, and as we already said, just showing up for the photo-op was more or less the entire point of his attendance. Hooray for Michael Phelps! Click to view

Like every other brand seemingly desperate to court the dressing-up-as-animals-to-have-sex market, the Barack Obama and John McCain campaigns have purchased lots in Second Life. The virtual world's few active users aren't bothering to visit. Which is probably a blessing, because the best chance for the projects to gain publicity is for griefers to show up with pooping cats and flying penises.Scratch that last one: Even the winged-phallus contingent has given up on Second Life and moved its penile protestations back into the real world. Internet politics has yet to prove it can reliably turn up voters willing to put on pants and leave the house to vote — the Second Lifer group on Barack Obama's social network has made all of 6,652 calls and raised $19,355.66.

While reading an article on Slate, I stumbled across this display ad from the Obama campaign (rather well placed by Google's DoubleClick, I must say). In it, supporters are promised that they'll "be the first to know Obama's VP via email." It's an interesting ploy. For starters, however many millions who sign up would all be the "first." What about the kids these days, who everyone keeps telling me hate email? You can also sign up to receive a text message. Also "first" to know will be campaign followers on Facebook and Twitter — you can put that item in a tech publication's story budget right now. What about the press gaggle that follows Obama wherever he goes? Rest assured, the New York Times and CNN will know long before any emails, wall posts or tweets go out, because the names of the possible running mates need to be judiciously leaked in order to gauge public and media reaction. So the ad is disingenuous. What's really going on here?The Obama campaign just wants your email address — and your name and zip code. That way they can let you know who the vice presidential candidate is and mine all sorts of personal data about you. Emails and phone numbers can be checked against other campaign databases. Everything from your demographic profile to your income range can be determined to better determine the feasibility of asking you for donations, and how much to ask for. Which all gives a whole new meaning to the ad's "personal touch."

BusinessWeek wonders if American newspapers could learn anything from the success of Europe's biggest newspaper, Germany's Bild. Which, you may recall, is the paper for whom resourceful journalist Judith Bonesky (pictured, and "heh") staked out Barack Obama at the gym. (Attracting the attention of Maureen Dowd, who got to ask the politician she once described as "diffident debutante" [and a butterfly! -ed] if he thought it "creepy that she described his T-shirt as smelling like 'fabric softener with spring scent.'") "It's tempting to credit Bild's double-digit profit margin solely to sensationalism," concedes BW. How entrenched-old-media; we would never do something stodgy and dismissive like that! Instead we sought out someone German-speaking, who explained the subtler points of the Bildstyle:

Oh hi there, Mr. Senator! Presidential maybe-too-hopeful Barack Obama was on vacation this week in Hawaii, looking fitter than he was just a few months ago. Perhaps too fit?? Weight loss, especially during a stressful time, is suspiciously Un-American-it's the French that smoke Gauloises and furiously pace the Champs-Élysées, withering down to cowardly nothings. We enter eating contests at Cracker Barrel and bathe in that weird orange cheese from those snack pack things. This is highly unsettling.

What the world has been eagerly awaiting for so many months now: fresh photos of a shirtless Barack Obama, via the AP. Taken during his vacation to Hawaii this week, the health conscious can rest assured that he has just as little body fat as his doctors said he did. Now you'll have to hope and pray that John McCain doesn't decide to take a vacation of his own anytime soon. After the jump: more photos of Obama frolicking in the surf as well as firm evidence that the Illinois senator is both losing weight and extremely loyal to blue bathing suits.

Good news! You thought the career of Mark Penn, scurrilous bastard Clinton pollster and world's worst PR guru, was finished? You thought he'd never ineptly manage the press strategy of another big Democrat again? Especially after those wonderful, wonderful Clinton campaign memos all got dumped on the Internet this week? The joke, as always, is on you, where "you" means "common sense and the hope that the Democratic party won't once again shoot itself in the foot." If Barack Obama chooses Even Bayh as his running mate (please, no, not The Ethanol Ticket), Penn's back on top! "For years, Penn and his wife, Nancy Jacobson, have been close advisers to Indiana Senator Evan Bayh." He'll lose this one for us yet! We'd be happier with fucking Biden. At least he's poor! [Atlantic, Photo-illustration]