Look out for the crusty old D.A.

Hey, can you believe it? McCain's failure to check out Sarah Palin is blowing up in his face.
All snark mostly aside, things don't look good for the Republicans' VPILF-in-waiting. The relatively minimal amount of hurricane damage in NOLA has allowed the national press to turn its attention squarely back to Palin today. Unflattering information about her -- trying (and failing) to fire her supposed asshole brother-in-law, endorsing Ted Stevens then condemning him when the FBI showed up with supoenas for all of his files and friends, the pregnant and unwed teenage daughter, the fishy story about her water breaking in Dallas but being able to keep her legs crossed all the way to Anchorage without anyone noticing that she was even pregnant, etc. -- is snowballing down the aisles of the Republican convention.
And the National Enquirer has sent the guys who busted John Edwards up to Alaska to give the Governor a full-body cavity search.
What will happen? Well, I've got some speculations on that and none of them include a happy ending.
First of all, Palin is toast. If she were in good shape with the campaign and the party, she would have spent today visiting live on all of the cable news shows and giving "exclusive" interviews to the network news shows. All we know is that she is supposedly in St. Paul. I'm guessing she is in a hotel suite getting grilled by McCain's handlers about all of the dumb shit she and her husband haven't disclosed yet. They will convince her to come clean about everything, as she doesn't appear smart enough to realize that the handlers will use to send her back to Juneau with her mouth taped shut.
Secondly, every Republican's favorite security blanket, former Sen. Fred Thompson, suddenly bumped Rudy Giuliani out of the prime speaking slot tonight. Thompson, a decent character actor and wildly indifferent presidential candidate, will give Palin a cursory mention before lighting into Obama and Biden. All of the GOP talking heads will immediately hail his remarks in the same light as Lincoln's Second Inaugural.
The fun will start Wednesday morning, I expect the cable news shows to begin crackling with rumors of a "draft Fred for VP" movement taking hold on the convention floor. If that trial balloon is not shot down by the mouth breathing evangelicals and neanderthals like Pat Buchanan by nightfall, look for a dramatic withdrawal announcement by Palin sometime before Thursday morning.
Should my scenario play out, McCain will get a temporary bounce of five or six points and almost draw even with Obama. That "surge" will slowly erode throughout the rest of this month and give way to freefall after the first debate on Sept. 29.
Or not.