Republican convention set to get underway tonight in St. Paul — minus nixed-speaker Rudy and his 9/11 Tourette’s. That and other political news of the day in today’s TPM Election Central Morning Roundup.

Associated Press again rides to McCain’s rescue, reports that Palin was thoroughly vetted, after all.

I think TPM Reader JL may be on to something …

Just a thought, and I doubt I’m the first to think it. Watching that surprising video of Cambell Brown taking Tucker Bounds to the cleaners’, I wondered if perhaps what I was really seeing was a mainstream press that is furious with McCain for having embarrassed them. Even if Palin drops out by the end of the week, and Pawlenty or Romney or whomever gets on board and we begin take two of the entire thing, I can’t imagine that the press will have retained their abiding love of McCain. After all, they’re the ones who nurtured his straight-talkin’-maverick image, and now he has appeared to throw it in their faces. They probably had reporting packages ready to go for all of the other VP possibilities, and nothing for Palin. So it wasn’t just the GOP brass McCain was flipping off with this pick–it was his “base,” the media. My overall sense of yesterday’s coverage was that covering him just wasn’t any fun anymore. And those feelings might well last into November.

I think the reason may be slightly different. A lot of Washington reporters have spent a decade loving John McCain. Just a few days ago a friend of mine who was once among the courted explained to me just how different and successful McCain was in the courtship. Off the cuff, frank, entirely accessible. Because of all that, a lot of these people got heavily invested in the maverick and straight-talker image. I’ll be honest: back in 2000 and probably until 2002 I was pretty invested in it. Why a lot of people have held on through the last half dozen years of contrary evidence is another question. But the Palin pick is that paradigm-breaking piece of evidence that takes you from ‘maverick’ to ‘reckless’ or worse. And claiming that Palin has ‘military command’ experience as head of the Alaska National Guard gets you from “straight talker’ to ‘bullshit artist’.

I think you get a feel for the breakdown in this exchange between CNN’s Campbell Brown and McCain’s Tucker Bounds last night on CNN …

The Republican Convention is segueing from Hurricane Gustav to John McCain today. As RNC Chairman Mike Duncan put it on a conference call currently underway with reporters, “We continue to monitor the situation along the Gulf Coast. … but we’ll be hearing a lot about John McCain.”

The decision to proceed with a full schedule today was made early this morning, according to campaign manager Rick Davis. Today’s theme, under the banner of “Country First” (which is emblazoned throughout the convention hall), is “Who is John McCain?”

President Bush will speak to delegates via a satellite hookup. Former Sen. Fred Thompson (R-TN) will give a speech titled “The Courage and Service of John McCain.” The evening’s featured speaker is Sen. Joe Lieberman, whose speech is titled “The Original Maverick.”

That means Rudy Giuliani is getting bumped from his speaking slot tonight to make room for some of the events delayed from Monday, but Davis says they are trying to reschedule Rudy for Wednesday night.

Back early in the Bush administration, Sarah Palin and Jack Abramoff shared a lobbyist.

With the proviso that tracking polls are very sketchy indicators of of where a race stands, today’s results from Gallup and Rasmussen appear to show a clear trend. Gallup has Obama moving to 50% for the first time ever, with an 8 point margin over John McCain (50% – 42%). Meanwhile, Rasmussen has Obama at 51% with a 6 point margin when ‘leaners’ are factored in (51%-45%).

I cannot stress too much that tracking polls are very volatile, susceptible both to statistical news and ephemeral wobbliness in candidate support.

But in line with a number of regular polls out in the last 24 hours, they show a clear trend. Obama’s bounce appears to be continuing and expanding during the RNC. And if you look closer at the numbers, the trend is not so much McCain losing support as a clear movement of hitherto undecideds into Obama’s column.

Sarah Palin has managed to dominate the news — and the buzz here in St. Paul — despite Obama’s speech to 75,000 in Denver, a Gulf Coast hurricane and the Republican National Convention. We review the various reactions to the Palin selection from the Republican side:

Full-size video at TPMtv.com.

From Bloomberg …

Former Texas Senator Phil Gramm, who stepped aside as John McCain’s campaign co-chairman in July after an uproar over comments that those worried about the U.S. economy are “whiners,” today revisited that sentiment.

“If you’re sitting here today, you’re not economically illiterate and you’re not a whiner, so I’m not worried about who you’re going to vote for,” Gramm told supporters of McCain at a Financial Services Roundtable event in Minneapolis on the sidelines of the Republican National Convention.

McCain Campaign Manager Rick Davis: “This election is not about issues. This election is about a composite view of what people take away from these candidates.”

Todd Palin, husband of Sarah, was a member of the secessionist Alaska Independence Party from 1995 through 2002. That’s the information we just got from the Alaska Division of elections.

Probably not coincidentally, 2002 was the first time Sarah Palin ran for statewide office in Alaska.