It's show time! It is the season for smiling candidates wearing silly hats, kissing babies, for rousing shirt-sleeve speeches, whispered scandals, hot dogs and beer, bimbo eruptions, emergency midnight strategy meetings, briefing books, promises of Utopia, and negative TV ads. (A negative TV ad is an ad that tells an ugly truth about your candidate).

In other words, it's a presidential election year.

As we come down to the wire, most polls show that the Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. Barack Obama, is still leading his rival the Republican presidential candidate, Sen. John McCain, by a few points. Obama selected Sen. Joe Biden for his vice presidential running mate. His choice was met with a long ho-hum.

McCain picked Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska, as his running mate. In a long campaign in which lethargy was being replaced by growing apathy, McCain has surely livened things up and let a fox in the henhouse by picking a woman as his VP.

By all accounts Palin is a staunch conservative, a Washington outsider from America's last frontier who can dress game, clean rifles, ride snowmobiles and fish through the ice while she raises five children, one with a serious disability, while running the state. Her husband of many years works for a living. At a relatively young age Palin has a formidable resume of real accomplishments. (Back to you, Barack.)

She has had executive governing experience as a mayor and as the governor of a state. McCain has made a brilliant political move.

Will the millions of women who would have voted for Hillary Clinton simply because she is a women use the same logic and vote for Palin? Will Palin's conservatism bring back home those conservatives who were not satisfied with McCain's conservative record? Has the gilt flaked off of the Obama lily?

Now is the time for all aspiring armchair political strategists to make their bones by predicting who will get Air Force One as their private family jet for the next four (maybe eight) years.

Here is mine: I predict that McCain will win the presidency in a landslide that will make the 1972 race between Richard Nixon and George McGovern look like a close-run race.

Obama badly needed a high-profile, well-known running mate to his right to counter his own radical left liberation extremism, and who would be acceptable to independents. In my opinion, Biden is neither. He is almost as far left as Obama who is rated the most liberal senator in the Senate.

Palin, 44, was 9 years old when Biden first went to the Senate, so while Biden is a fixture in Washington, he blends into the wallpaper. Except for political junkies and a few hair-transplant surgeons, he is virtually unknown outside the Beltway.

Palin is equally unknown, but that will quickly change as the All-American mom becomes known.
As Obama continues to demonstrate the Peter Principle by soaring high above his level of competence and provided McCain does nothing to scare the horses, the outcome is a forgone conclusion. McCain's selection of Palin as his running mate only strengthens the likelihood of my prediction coming true.

Jack Chesney
Oakwood

Why does an 8-year-old need a cell phone?
I read Arturo Corso's Aug. 10 column about giving an 8-year-old a cellphone and was appalled. What in the world does an 8-year-old, or even a teenager, need with a cell phone? It is just undue expense and they do not know how to properly use and respect one.

My daughter was in college before she was handed one for emergencies only. I told her I better never get a bill, so she worked and paid for her own. Does the 8-year-old pay the bill? If not, take it back.

My housekeeper said the biggest mistake she ever made was giving her 14-year-old a cell phone, computer, iPod and all those other expensive things. By the time the girl was 16, her mama was replacing all the stuff.

You are not teaching the child the right way and will someday regret giving her all this stuff at such a young age.

Dora Sumner
Cleveland

Illegal workers stealing jobs from our citizens
One can only pray that the recent enforcement action aimed at illegal employment, illegal immigration and the theft of Americans' identity by illegal aliens will soon be repeated many times here in Georgia.

Local newspapers in Mississippi have been reporting that legal workers in the recently raided Laurel, Miss., transformer plant were cheering and applauding as ICE agents led the 595 black-market workers away.

Media reports from Mississippi tell of long lines of Americans and legal workers lining up to apply for the newly created job openings. Just one quote from a new job applicant in Laurel: "We have wanted these jobs for years, but the company would not hire us."

Lashonda Dase, a local shopkeeper was quoted in Mississippi's Clarion-Ledger newspaper on the company officials and the nearly 600 wage thieves being busted: "You're basically keeping 600 people who are legal to work here from working. That could be 600 households, 600 children who've been suffering."

While illegal-alien handlers howl about "family separation" if their constituents get caught committing crimes, Dase reflects the sentiment of the huge majority of Americans when she speaks up for our own well-being and that of children of lawful residents in America. Ms. Dase made her observation in English.

With each day's headlines bringing more news of job shortages, layoffs and government budget cutbacks, these innocents in Laurel, Miss., apparently haven't read the memo from the open borders lobby on quiet, politically correct surrender when illegal foreign workers steal their jobs and lower their wages.

While we should all applaud the arrest of the illegal workers, the real celebration will come when we see the defiant but well-connected campaign donating company officials who illegally hired the illegal workers do the perp-walk into court -- in Georgia.

D.A. King
Marietta

But while I was sitting there watching my kids, I noticed a little boy and a concerned father, who was standing as close to the rink as he could without actually standing on it, trying to coach his son on skating. Then out of nowhere this wonderful Skate Country employee by the name of Eddie came by and grabbed the boy's hand and proceeded to teach him how to skate.

I could tell that Eddie had eased the father's mind and that the child felt comfortable with him right away. It just warmed my heart that this man took the time to notice and care about what was going on with this child.

It restored my belief in people, and makes me feel proud that we still care about each other, whether it be family, friend or stranger.

Lexie Copeland
Gainesville