Slate's generally excellent Jack Shafer today offers an impassioned defense of Matt Drudge's continued importance. Among his claims:

If you could access only one home page for breaking news and chose Washingtonpost.com or CNN.com over the Drudge Report, you'd be a blockhead. His newswire-meets-tabloid sense of story—hysterical and playful at the same time—links to both what you need to know and what you want to know, and he updates more frequently than conventional media sites do.

When last we left John McCain's running mate, she was accusing the media of violating her First Amendment rights.

Maybe it's the relief of getting to the end of the campaign, but today, Sarah Palin is in a more conciliatory mood today. From her post-voting remarks, via CNN.com's The Ticker:

Asked if she had any regrets about the campaign, Palin bemoaned “the state of journalism today.

I have a running argument with a friend about which anti-Obama attacks are racist. For example, I thought the McCain camp's Obama-disrespects-Palin ad played on toxic racist sentiments involving black men and white women. My friend didn't see it.

So I'd be interested to hear what readers think of Fox News's coverage of pro-Obama excitement in Kenya, his father's country of birth.

Got an e-mail this morning from none other than Newt Gingrich, who urged me to stick it to the media by going to the polls. Because, he explained, the media don't want conservatives to vote:

The latest tactic in this elite media campaign has been to declare the presidential race over in an effort to discourage some voters from going to the polls.

At a moment when liberals and conservatives seem to have irreconcilable versions of reality--and the media deluge is so overwhelming that it's hard to separate spin from truth--FactCheck.org provides an absolutely vital service.

But I wonder: did FactCheck go too far in saying that Sarah Palin has been the victim of "sliming"?

It would look bad, period, if Gustav hammered New Orleans and environs while the Republicans waxed ecstatic over John McCain's impending nomination. And it would look especially bad since the current Republican president didn't exactly dazzle the last time a hurricane ravaged the Gulf Coast.

But to make matters even worse for those charged with figuring out whether the RNC should happen or not, the theme for the first day of the convention happens to be "Service."

I don't expect Rush Limbaugh to acknowledge that George Bush had his own "temple" back in 2004 when he's chortling over the "temple" Barack Obama used last night. But if actual journalists are going to report this particular GOP talking point--which, of course, is just a variation on the old Obama-as-narcissist theme--they really ought to note that fact.