The Web on the Candidates

• Watch Along with Bloggers in the Know: If you're following along from home with the Republican National Convention action coming out of St. Paul, you may well want pop on over at some point to C-SPAN's new RNC '08 Convention Hub tonight. The site serves as something of a one-stop shop for major online coverage of the Republican gathering. But beyond that, it also provides useful pointers to what's bubbling up in local blogospheres. Like, saaaaay, the Alaskosphere. Consider devoting a share of your multi-tasking during this evening's address by vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin to tracking the insight coming from bloggers who know her best. (We're playing with the idea of calling the Alaskan blogosphere the "Tundrasphere," instead. Let us know your preference.) Also on the watching along front, the well-crafted official Republican National Convention website has a wealth of useful info, including a detailed schedule of convention events. #

• FISA Breaks into Delegates' Teevee Boxes: The Washington Independent's Ari Melber has a look at how the ever-evolving Get FISA Right online movement is using micro-targeted cable TV ad buys to get their civil liberties message out in St. Paul this week. #

The Candidates on the Web

• Brown Out-of-Bounds on Bounds?: CNN journalist Campbell Brown gave a high-temperatured grilling to McCain spokesperson Tucker Bounds on his contention that Sarah Palin's experience as commander of the Alaska National Guard gives her meaningful foreign policy experience. The video of our media hard at work has quickly become a YouTube hit. One copy of the clip posted by the video wing of the Talking Points Memo empire has gotten more than 285,000 views. Someone less than thrilled with the exchange? John McCain. He cancelled a scheduled interview with the network in reaction. CNN, however, is unwilling to back down: "Campbell Brown did what journalists do... She asked fair and important questions in a respectful way and was simply trying to get a straight answer to a straightforward question."#

• Getting to Know Palin: Politicos are prepping for tonight's Palin speech by pouring over a video of a 2006 gubernatorial debate between Palin, former governor Tony Knowles, and an independent candidate. Palin, we all now know, went on to win that race. Some on the left are spreading the clip in the hopes of inoculating the public in the event that Palin turns in a similarly strong performance in St. Paul tonight. For its part, yesterday the McCain camp sent around a video introduction to their vice presidential pick. Good for them. You know what's not so good for them? The video mostly consists of just excerpts from Palin's speech from Friday. On that point, JohnMcCain.com still has no biographical information up on Palin. By way of contrast, BarackObama.com offers a bio and accomplishment list for Joe Biden -- and a detailed backgrounder on his wife Jill Biden. #

• "Am I Getting Punked Here?": A bitingly snarky "voicemail" left by John McCain asking "Senator Sandra Palin" to be his running mate is near the top of Digg's U.S. Elections section. (via Claire Silberman) #

• RNC DNC BSG: Not sold yet on either the McCain-Palin or Obama-Biden tickets? There is another option: Tigh-Roslin '08! The campaign site for Saul Tigh and Laura Roslin and has some great resources, such as a discussion on whether voting machine manufacturer Diebold is a Cylon front. Beyond the fact that the joke campaign has something to do with the television show "Battlestar Galactica" and that the two featured characters look something like the Republican ticket, I really have know idea what it means. But I'm guessing it might be pretty funny if I did. (via Boing Boing) #

TechCongress and Beyond

• Noting E-Voting: Speaking of Diebold, with election day just 62 days away, it might be worth reserving a spot in your brain now for thinking about how well electronic voting machines will capture the will of the electorate come this November. #

In Case You Missed It...

Nancy Scola (yeah, yeah, yeah, that's me -- I have to find a better way to phrase these self mentions) reports that online wonder Ron Paul drew a crowd to Minneapolis last night that was impressive enough to erase doubts about the Texas congressman's ability to convert his considerable online energy to powerful offline momentum.

Micah Sifry looks at which videos out of last week's Democratic National Convention are picking up steam online, and finds a few surprises. John Kerry's a smash!

And Zephyr Teachout implores journalists to get thee to Godblog Con, a gathering of Christian bloggers happening in Las Vegas later this month.