2 long, joyous parties for the political parties

ST. PAUL — So that is that. The Republicans have named their ticket. The Democrats have named their ticket. The political conventions are over for another four years.

Two months from yesterday, barring another "Florida," we will have elected a new president.

I've spent two weeks straight at first Denver for the DNC and then St. Paul for the RNC, which represents a personal transformation for me since two weeks ago I didn't know what DNC and RNC meant (Democratic National Convention and Republican National Convention for the still uninitiated, bless you).

It was by far the longest stretch of political-watching in my lifetime. And I have some observations:

• The cable news networks, especially Fox and MSNBC, should be ashamed, calling what they do journalism. They don't present the news, they slant it. They're as objective as a Chinese gymnastics judge. (I know I should have known this before, but I never paid this much attention.)

• If the conventions decided the election, start referring to Denver as "Mr. President." Denver was Michael Phelps, St. Paul was the rest of the world. Denver's downtown was packed from dawn to dusk, reminiscent of Salt Lake during the Olympics. The weather was perfect, the Democrats were loud and enthusiastic, and celebrities were everywhere.

In St. Paul, the weather was hot and humid and after that it turned cold and rained, the only celebrity sighting was a statue of Charlie Brown, and I failed to ascertain an actual downtown. (Note to Republicans: If you win the White House, DO NOT put whoever chose St. Paul in charge of anything that involves people going to it.)

• If it came down to a gang fight, the winner would be ... the media. There were about 6,000 actual delegates, including alternates, at each convention. There were 15,000 members of the media (counting set-up crews and the guys who get the NBC guys their coffee) at each convention.

• I still have no idea what the delegates do.

• Nothing is spontaneous. All those "Obama" and "Change" and "McCain" and "Country First" signs were printed months ago and handed out at the door, with explicit instructions on when and how to use them.