Jon Cohn has continued to follow the saga of John Goodman, the McCain health care policy advisor, who has said that the ability to go to an emergency room is as good as having health insurance.

First, the McCain camp denied that Goodman was an advisor. Then, after being confronted with evidence to the contrary, they went on to issue what amounts to a non-denial denial and a repudiation of Goodman’s emergency room statement. Here’s the statement to Cohn in its entirety …

Mr. Goodman volunteered his advice to the campaign in the past. However, his philosophy on health care–and especially on the urgency of the problems faced by 45 million uninsured American’s–are clearly out of step with John McCain. Earlier this summer the campaign informed Mr. Goodman that his advice was not required and requested that he not identify himself as being associated with the campaign in any way, including as a volunteer. John McCain could not disagree more strongly with Mr. Goodman. John McCain believes that addressing the problem of the nation’s uninsured is one of our most pressing national priorities. That’s why the McCain health plan will, for the first time, bring health coverage within reach of every American.

Count me as highly skeptical. He’s repeatedly been cited as an advisor. And as I said below, I don’t think that citation gets put on a WSJ editorial without the campaign’s consent, tacit or explicit. Also note that according to Jason Roberson, a business reporter for the Dallas Morning News, Goodman told the DMN that “he helped craft Sen. John McCain’s health care policy.”

Clearly, the McCain campaign wants this guy thrown overboard ASAP. But the sketchy nature of the McCain campaign’s denial makes it clear that he was an advisor of some sort. And the citation in the WSJ, again, makes the denial highly dubious. More significantly, as Cohn notes in his reporting, the idea that Goodman’s views are not in line with McCain’s policy proposals is just not true to anyone who is well-versed in health care policy. They’re actually right in line. As Jon notes, the problem is that Goodman stated explicitly what is implicit in McCain’s plan, and that of other health care policy proposals that define the ‘problem’ in the health care debate as people having too much insurance coverage.

And what about Goodman saying he helped write the policy? Was he lying? Let’s have a bit more on that.

Rep. John Salazar (D-CO): “I’ve been a farmer all my life and when I look out on this crowd I see a silo of hope.”

It just occurred to me: Can you have the traditional final convention night balloon drop at an outdoor venue?

Late Update: Seems we have an answer — jmm.

Okay, while we’re waiting for the main event, how about a parlor game we can believe in? Given the options, which McCain veep choice should Dems be rooting for?

TPM Reader KB writes in: “Whom to root for? Pawlenty or Romney? I know that Romney can be easily mocked, but he seems more crisp on the attack. Would be nice to avoid that and go with the nothingburger Pawlenty. Plus, if Romeny gets passed over Rove and K-Lo will be heartbroken, and Halperin’s sources would have been wrong. Honestly, I’m torn.”

My answer was Romney. As much as Pawlenty strikes me as a wet mop, folks in Minnesota say he’s deceptively lame. Better a pol than he looks. On the other hand, Mitt comes prepackaged with aggressive anti-McCain quotes; he’s a complete freak; and he also has twenty houses. A fringe benefit is he’s laid off a significant portion of the electorate. Of course, if we really want to dream, we can hope for Lieberman. But of those two, I’d say Romney.

What say you?

Late Update: Intrade seems to have little doubt it’s Pawlenty.

In honor of Tim’s possible coronation, here’s our famed Tim Pawlenty, wake me when he’s done, clip reel …

If you’re bummed about not getting a ticket to watch the Obama speech at the Invesco Center, you’ll be happy to know they’re still giving away tickets for John McCain’s veep announcement tomorrow at the aptly-named 12,000 seat Nutter Center.

It’s easy to remember that had a full vote count taken place down in Florida, we might be in the final months of the Gore administration. A lot of what ifs. And in this tear in Al Gore’s speech, he tells us what would have been different — it was a passage in the speech that clearly came from a deep well within …

Click here to view the whole speech.

Though I may just want to watch …

And we’re off …

10:18 PM … Watching how the background actually looks, the Greek temple nonsense seems awfully silly.

10:23 PM … I think — not just in the speech but in the lead-up over the course of the afternoon — the impression of this event, holding it in a stadium, is one of a mass event, an open event, a popular event, not one of grandiosity as many of the critics claimed. (I would structure that sentence better; but I’m trying to listen to what he’s saying at the same time.)

10:26 PM … “It’s time for them to own their failure.”

10:42 PM … “John McCain stands alone.” Very good on framing (sigh, hate the phrase) the debate over Iraq in which everything is trending toward Obama’s position.

10:47 PM … An echo of the 2004 keynote that put him here.

10:50 PM … I think he’s doing a good job inoculating against next week’s attacks (and responding to the earlier ones) without appearing defensive or reactive.

I thought this was a very strong speech. About exactly what was needed. It was a strong speech. He made the case for himself; he laid out clear policy goals; and he aggressively set forth the stakes of the campaign. He made the case against John McCain while not attacking his character — which makes a clear contrast with McCain’s aggressively personal, denigrating campaign strategy.

I’ve heard a few people say that he seemed to hold back from giving the soaring speech he might have given. But I suspect that was intentional and I think a good decision. Meta-themes and tonality form the deeper structure of political communication. And the aim of this speech was not eloquence but strength.

I’ve said myself that Obama’s campaign needs to be more aggressive. They need to hold the initiative, and attack, attack, attack. But attacking doesn’t mean bludgeoning — at least not necessarily. It means making the case and defining the argument. Not running a campaign by reacting — well or not — to your opponent’s attacks. As Paul Begala said in our interview with him a couple days ago, it’s not about rapid response but rapid attack. Personally I might prefer an even more aggressive tack from Obama’s surrogates. But I think here Obama himself had the balance just right.

I also think he made the right decision to directly (and, in the case of the ‘celeb’ meme, explicitly) confront the smears, particularly the attacks on Obama’s Americanness and patriotism. The tone didn’t strike me as defensive or outraged (which is a different side of defensiveness) but more one of what I might call assertive contempt.

At the end of the day, a convention is the most orchestrated — you might say, the most contrived — event of modern political theater. So the moments after its conclusions can give a very illusory impression. But taken that impression on its own merits, for this moment, John McCain looks very, very small. Both in stature and as a person.

Taken as a whole, each day in progression, successive speeches hitting different notes and building in sequence, this convention was very strong.

Meanwhile, the AP hops back on the tire swing.

TPMtv reports live from on the ground at Invesco Field after the speech:

Todd’s referring to this statement put out by the McCain campaign.

This is the last reaction clip we’re going to post tonight. It’s Alex Castellanos’ response on CNN. To understand the significance, you’ve got to know a bit about who Castellanos is — a longtime, street-fighting Republican political consultant with a reputation that compares to Lee Atwater’s in terms hard-edged political warfare. I believe he’s also informally working with the McCain campaign this cycle, as a sort of outside advisor.

Chuck Todd said below he thought Obama’s speech had left the McCain camp speechless. My own take was that the tone of the statement from the McCain campaign was like someone who’d had the wind knocked out of them.

In that context, Castellanos’ response was very telling. He made no attempt to put the speech in any positive context for McCain. Midway through this clip he sounds like an Obama surrogate. And he concludes by saying that “whoever didn’t get picked for Republican VP today may be a lucky Republican.”

In case, you’re tuning in late, here’s my initial reaction.