McCain Gives Qualified Endorsement to Iraq Timetable  —  First the Iraqi government gave Senator Barack Obama a boost by seeming to embrace his proposal for a 16-month timetable for withdrawing American troops from Iraq.  Now could Senator John McCain, who built his candidacy in large part …

Microphone Picks Up Private Conversation Between Obama and British Leader on Need for Vacations and ‘Thinking’ Time  —  At British Parliament today, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, met with Tory Leader David Cameron.  —  Seemingly unaware of an enormous fuzzy boom mike held by ABC News' Eric Kerchner …

McClellan: Fox News Commentators Use The ‘Talking Points’ That The White House Sends Them  —  On MSNBC's Hardball last night, host Chris Matthews asked former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan if he saw “FOX television as a tool” to get the White House's “message out” while he was in the Bush administration.

One world?  Obama's on a different planet  —  The senator's Berlin speech was radical and naive.  —  SEN. BARACK OBAMA said in an interview the day after his Berlin speech that it “allowed me to send a message to the American people that the judgments I have made and the judgments …

When a Candidate Seeks That Presidential Look  —  LONDON — He stood in the shadow of the Temple of Hercules, held forth at the Élysée Palace and convened a one-man news conference here on Saturday outside No. 10 Downing Street, all with a simple aim: to make a one-term senator …

Blogging's Glass Ceiling  —  FOR two days last week, many of the men's bathrooms at the Westin St. Francis Hotel here were turned into women's bathrooms.  The stalls on the second floor were lined with note cards featuring nurturing messages like “You are perfect.”

Analysis: US now winning Iraq war that seemed lost  —  BAGHDAD (AP) — The United States is now winning the war that two years ago seemed lost.  —  Limited, sometimes sharp fighting and periodic terrorist bombings in Iraq are likely to continue, possibly for years.

Beer: It's What's For Dinner  —  Beer is back, regaining a large lead over wine as America's favorite alcoholic beverage after wine threatened to close the gap around 2005.  Fascinatingly, I see no plausible way of correlating this “beer track"/"wine track" data with anything happening in politics.

Oil prices and economic fundamentals  —  Oil was selling for $123 a barrel on May 7, and that's where it closed this week.  Sounds like a calm and rational market, except for the fact that just last week it was going for $145.  —  Spot price of West Texas Intermediate in dollars per barrel.

Barack and the Hispanics  —  Back during the primaries, everyone kept formally admitting that it was wrong to engage in the form of inference “candidate X lost group A in a primary, and therefore he's likely to lose group A in a general election against candidate Y of the other party” …

A Step Back From Enviro Lunacy  —  Sometimes public opinion doesn't flow smoothly; it shifts sharply when a tipping point is reached.  Case in point: gas prices. $3 a gallon gas didn't change anybody's mind about energy issues. $4 a gallon gas did.  Evidently, the experience of paying …

Candidates Narrow Lists of V.P. Prospects  —  Both presidential candidates are closing in on their selections of running mates — with the timing and atmospherics of their announcements complicated by the opening next month of the Olympic Games.  —  Before leaving on his overseas trip …