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Barack Obama's remarks Monday in Flint, Michigan, via Marc Ambinder.

Well, how about Gov. Palin? She's you know, an up and comer from Alaska. She - they're starting to run an ad now saying she opposed the bridge to nowhere. Well now, let's get the facts clear here. When she was mayor, she hired a Washington lobbyist to get earmarks

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said she wouldn't address questions about Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's (R) foreign policy experience in a recent interview with CNN.

Liberals have questioned Palin's experience since she was named to the GOP ticket, though Cindy McCain suggested last week that Alaska's proximity to Russia gave Palin perspective on foreign policy matters, drawing more fire from Palin's critics.

Rice said that, as secretary of state, she would not involve herself in the presidential race, even as CNN's Zain Verjee pressed her to comment on Palin's experience.

A new Opinion Research poll conducted for CNN shows the race between Barack Obama and John McCain tied at 45 percent with third party candidates included. In a straight head-to-head poll the race is tied at 48 percent.

The key take away from the CNN poll is that unlike the USA Today/Gallup poll released today, and many of the tracking polls, it does not show a significant swing of late for either Obama or McCain as the two have been locked within the margin of error since in this poll June.

Libyan President Moammar Gadhafi had glowing praise for Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who last week became the first U.S. official to make a diplomatic visit Libya in decades.

"I admire and am very proud of the way she leans back and gives orders to the Arab leaders," Gadhafi said, reports The Times of London. "Leezza, Leezza, Leezza . . . I love her very much. I admire her, and I

Barack Obama's race is still keeping some working-class voters in Northeast Philadelphia from backing him, reports the Philadelphia Daily News.

"The Dunkin' Donut crowd tells me that we've got everything going for us but Obama," said Mike McAleer, a local party ward leader, during a recent visit to the city by Obama's running mate, Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.). "They can't give me a direct answer. Do I have them right now in the 66th ward? No. But I got 60 days to get them."

When asked what the problem with Obama was, McAleer responded: "It's his color . . . I tell them he's half white and half black. He's got a better perspective for everything in this country."

One voter told Biden that she couldn't vote for Obama.

"I told him I'm not going to vote for him," Carolyn Bauer, 89, said to a Daily News reporter. "Anybody who runs with a guy with a name like that is not going to get my vote. It'd be disgusting to get a man named Barack Obama as president of the United States. No way. I mean it . . . I'm going to vote for McCain and the lady."

Though Obama is a practicing Christian, Bauer said that she didn't believe him.

"He pretends to be a Christian, and he isn't, he's a Muslim," she said.

Government lawyers and those representing Sen. Ted Stevens can't seem to agree on a joint statement citing the status of the criminal case against the Alaska Republican.

So, both sides filed competing statements on Monday and a few subtle differences are worth noting.

Among the gifts that Stevens allegedly received from "personal friends," the government cited a $2,695 massage chair for his Washington, DC home; a $3,200 hand-made stained glass window for his home; and a sled dog valued at $1,000.

Stevens's lawyers chose not to mention the value of the items, simply referring to them as "stained glass," "a dog," and a "chair."

Stevens is accused of seven counts of concealing more than $250,000 of gifts from VECO, a now-defunct Alaskan oil-services company. He has pleaded not guilty, and the trial is slated to begin later this month and could conclude before Election Day. Both statements Monday repeat those basic charges, with Stevens's lawyers proclaiming his innocence.

-J. Taylor Rushing

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said that both of the presidential campaigns are reacting responsibly to the government plan to rescue mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

"Yes, I think Barack Obama and John McCain are saying pretty close to the same thing," Schumer said on CNBC Monday. Schumer was responding to praise in the same interview by former Treasury Secretary John Snow for both presidential candidates, whom Snow sees as looking for a "real solution" to the crisis that won't hurt taxpayers.

Schumer added: "They might, should each be president, have a different solution -- somewhat different solution. But I think they realize and just about everybody realizes that the first job is to stabilize these markets."

Schumer also said that the plan to stabilize markets will have broad congressional support.

"[Treasury Secretary Henry] Paulson went out over the weekend to reassure all of us that there is not some grand scheme as to what should be put in place after the markets are stabilized; that they were going to, if you will, punt that to the next administration," he said.

Schumer also said that the first job of the government right now is "to prevent this recession from heading further south."

"I think there's a broad middle here," he said. "There'll be some on the far left who say, you know, 'Just go after the high-ups,' and there'll be some on the far right who say, 'Get the government out now to let things crash.' Neither of those would serve us very well right now as a country, as a world, and as citizens, bond holders, mortgagers or taxpayers."

President Bush has high praise for Sarah Palin, calling the Republican Governor of Alaska an "inspired pick" to be John McCain's running mate.

"I find her to be a very dynamic, capable, smart women who, you know, it really says that John McCain made an inspired pick, to me," Bush said in a interview on Fox that will air Tuesday morning.

"She's had executive experience, and that's what it takes to be a capable person here in Washington, D.C. in the executive branch."

Bush added that he sometimes misses being on the campaign trail, "but everything comes to an end."

John McCain leads Barack Obama in the latest USA Today/Gallup poll 50 percent to 46 percent among registered voters. The Arizona senator trailed by 7 percent in the same poll heading into the Republican Convention.

Among likely voters, the GOP nominee is polling even stronger at 54 percent to 44 percent.

This is McCain's best showing in the poll since January.

From The Trail:

With time running out on its push to register thousands of new voters in Virginia, the Obama campaign is picking up the pace. State election officials told the campaign Friday that 49,000 new voters signed up in August, a sharp increase from the 36,500 who signed up in July and the 28,000 who registered in June.

On face value this seems to be good news for the Barack Obama campaign, which has been making a push to register new Democrats in the state. But Virginia does not record new voters by party registration so how much this helps or hurts the Democratic presidential nominee won't be known until election day.