Suspended Campaigns...

Now this, I think, is a legitimate reason to suspend a campaign.

Barack Obama has announced that he will be cancelling his campaign events for two days to fly back to Hawaii to visit his ailing grandmother, whose health has reportedly taken a turn for the worse.

But to me, this differs from McCain's much touted "suspension" of his campaign over the bailout bill in several important ways. There is something useful Obama can do, his grandmother isn't going to suddenly fail moments after it looks like she's going to recover just because Obama sticks his nose in.

And more importantly, I don't expect Obama to make any political hay out of this, or even to try. He announced this with little fanfare, just enough to let people who had been planning to attend campaign events he was no longer going to participate in change their plans.

I predict little further mention of it by Obama, except to answer questions asked of him. I also predict ads from the McCain camp claiming that Obama wouldn't suspend when it was "important", and that this shows a lack of proper priorities on Obama's part.

And if I'm right, and we see that, just keep repeating "these are what real family values look like" until the lie is transparent.

Liam.