Politics - AP

DENVER - John McCain's risky choice of Gov. Sarah Palin gives him a running mate who doubles down on his maverick image, may appeal to "hockey moms" and other women, and counters Barack Obama's aura of new-generation change. But he may have undercut his best attack on the Democrat.

MONACA, Pa. - Barack Obama's spokesman fired off a fast criticism of Republican John McCain's new running mate Friday, but the Democratic candidate himself quickly stepped in to offer her congratulations and praise.

BOSTON - John McCain's search for a running mate was remarkable in that it was carried out in secret, concluded with a bang and conducted in sharp contrast to the freewheeling style of his early presidential campaign or his hard-charging Navy days.

JUNEAU, Alaska - In two short years, Sarah Palin moved from small-town mayor with a taste for mooseburgers to the governor's office and now — making history — to John McCain's side as the first female running mate on a Republican presidential ticket.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's reputation as a crusading reformer after pushing through higher taxes on oil companies has been tarnished by revelations that members of her staff tried to have her former brother-in-law fired from his job as an Alaska state trooper.

WASHINGTON - Kathy Melkey stands astride some of the fault lines between Barack Obama and John McCain.

Long before Denver, the drum roll of history began: If Barack Obama could capture the Democratic nomination for president, he would deliver the biggest speech of his life exactly 45 years after Martin Luther King Jr.'s immortal "I Have a Dream" address.

DENVER - Forgive some of the 84,000 people amassed at Invesco Field Thursday if their thumbs are a bit weary by the time Barack Obama takes the stage for a triumphant acceptance of his presidential nomination.

DENVER - Republican John McCain shook up the presidential race with his surprise choice of little-known Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate on Friday. Democrat Barack Obama, entering a crucial stage of the campaign fresh off his historic nominating convention, began a tour of battleground states.

DENVER - The rooms of the modern American household have always crept into campaigns. Politics makes strange bedfellows, for one. The living-room war ended Lyndon Johnson's political career. And everyone keeps saying the economy's headed for the toilet.

DENVER - A generation after Ronald Reagan famously mistook Bruce Springsteen's music for uncritical patriotism, Democrats claimed "Born in the USA" on Thursday for the theme it was meant to project — to describe a splintered country they say desperately needs new policies and new dreams.

DENVER - Barack Obama cast his presidential nomination as proof that no dreams are too high, savoring a historic moment for himself and the nation Thursday before setting out on a difficult struggle to break another barrier for a black American.

WASHINGTON - Katrina was a natural disaster that turned into a political one for the Bush administration. Gustav, now on course for the Gulf Coast almost three years to the day since that hurricane struck, could offer the chance for redemption or point-scoring in the presidential campaign.

NAME — Sarah Heath Palin.

DENVER - John McCain tapped little-known Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin to be his vice presidential running mate on Friday in a startling selection on the eve of the Republican National Convention.

WASHINGTON - Barack Obama's promise Thursday to work to "end our dependence" on Middle East oil within a decade may be good political rhetoric when Americans have been paying $4 a gallon at the gas pumps, but the goal likely would be difficult — perhaps impossible — to achieve and flies in the face of how global oil markets work.

DENVER - The focus of the presidential campaign shifts to Republicans on Friday as GOP candidate John McCain is set to introduce his running mate at a rally in Ohio.

DENVER - The once-decried free trade deals of the primaries have been all but abandoned as political boogeymen.

WASHINGTON - Two airliners were one minute from colliding when one of the planes turned away from the other over the Caribbean this week, federal authorities said Friday.