Don't want to miss out on the latest in politics? Start each day with The Post Politics Hour. Join in each weekday morning at 11 a.m. as a member of The Washington Post's team of White House and Congressional reporters answers questions about the latest in buzz in Washington and The Post's coverage of political news.

Washington Post national political reporter Anne E. Kornblut was online Wednesday, July 23 at 11 a.m. ET to discuss the latest in political news.

The transcript follows.

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Archive: Post Politics Hour discussion transcripts

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Anne E. Kornblut: Hello everyone, and welcome to the chat! Glad you could join...please send in any and all questions.

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Washington: Do you really think the story about the McCain guy was front-page news? I mean, it's not like he sold McCain a house for a sweetheart deal, or raised hundreds of thousands for him. This a man who gave the maximum he could, but didn't have a direct tie to McCain ... unlike the situations with Clinton and Obama. Is this just another McCain hit piece?

washingtonpost.com: Big GOP Donor Faced Trouble Back Home (Post, July 23)

Anne E. Kornblut: I'm going to revert to the old reporter standby -- We don't write the headlines! -- with a twist, which is, we don't decide what's front-page news. I actually thought it was a really interesting story...and have no doubt that my colleague Matt Mosk (who's great, make sure you read his stuff) has equally tough reporting on Obama in the pipeline.

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Bennington, Vt.: I see that McCain just canceled his press availability this morning. ... Do you think that this a case of "watch out what you ask for" and an attempt to minimize his flub this morning on the timing of the surge? Certainly the campaign focus has been all Obama, all the time, but is McCain foolish to complain, rather than wait patiently for the next (inevitable) flub from the candidate under the spotlight? It seems to me that in a "change" election, the "change" candidate usually benefits when the sitting party remains the focus of the campaign.

Anne E. Kornblut: McCain has had quite a week, hasn't he? I'm going to post this one and then another on this same topic. And then we can all discuss.

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Finksburg, Md.: Good Morning Anne and thanks for taking my question. The buzz this morning is that Senator McCain might select his running mate to counter the positive press coverage Sen. Obama is receiving during his trip overseas. The polls might indicate that these two are in a close contest, but I have to wonder if this premonition about a possible story isn't just a reality check by the McCain camp.

Do you think that those running the McCain are essentially indicating they are really getting plastered by Obama and are desperate to find ways to get some attention on their guy? If so, could that tactic backfire, as with the stories surfacing on Sen. McCain's substantive gaffes on a nonexistant border in the Middle East and reference to Putin as the president of Germany?

washingtonpost.com: The Fix: McCain Veep Pick -- Feint, or For Real? (washingtonpost.com, July 22)

Anne E. Kornblut: OK, here's the other thought on this subject. I will say: if I'm the McCain campaign, I would definitely like to change the subject. To what is another matter. Certainly not the surge-timetable gaffe (is that what we're calling it? no surge-gate, please). Anyway. Thoughts?

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Washington: When candidates end their campaign and endorse another, it is customary to release their delegates. It is my understanding Hillary could release them and still continue to raise money to retire her debt. Why hasn't she done so?

Anne E. Kornblut: As far as I know, delegates and debt have nothing to do with each other -- she'll be retiring her debt for many, many years to come. But when it comes to delegates, the truth is that losing candidates do not actually always release them, unless their votes are needed, and not always even then until the convention. I may be mistaken here, but I believe John Edwards has retained control of his. Care to challenge me, anyone?

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Floris, Va.: Anne E: At this time in 2007, Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani were both considered to be unstoppable in their quest for their party's nomination. In your view, what went wrong?

Anne E. Kornblut: Um, I could write a doctoral thesis on one of their candidacies, let alone both. And they're very different people who ran fundamentally different campaigns (and Clinton got far closer to winning, while Giuliani went nowheresville). But I guess the parallel in their situations is that they both overestimated how much being the frontrunner would give them -- or not.

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McCain's no-good, awful, very-bad week: Note to self: If I ever run for president and decide to stake everything on my understanding of one thing, I should familiarize myself with the basic facts about that one topic. I should be especially careful to do this before I say something like this about someone who got it right: "I don't know how you respond to something that is such a false depiction of what actually happened." How about you?

Anne E. Kornblut: I'm liking this note to self. I don't do firm predictions, but this ordeal over when the surge happened could wind up being a major obstacle for McCain -- there's nothing worse than being hit in your supposedly strongest area. As John Kerry saw four years ago...

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Memphis, Tenn.: We now know that not only does McCain not know the difference between Sunni and Shia, but he also doesn't know the timeline of the surge he praises every minute of the day. Isn't it about time that the media stops referring to foreign policy as his biggest strength?

Anne E. Kornblut: And another on this point...

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Austin, Texas: It appears Bob Novak has once again been used by a senior aide to a highly placed Washington politician, this time to put out the apparent lie that McCain was going to announce his vice presidential pick this week. Two questions: When will Novak learn to recognize he's being used (or does he recognize it and just play along)? When are reporters and journalists going to start burning sources who lie to them or abuse their trust?

Assuming this turns out to be a ruse, I'd love to see Novak on Sunday morning saying: "John Doe is the guy who told me that. He told me on a not-for-attribution basis, but if he respects me so little that he's willing to lie to me so that I'll put his lies in print, then I'm not ethically obligated to respect the terms under which he told me those lies."

Anne E. Kornblut: Oy, I don't even know where to begin on this one. Let me just say, see my earlier reference to not making predictions. We are, of course, in the business of trying to best anticipate what's going to happen next -- and to help voters make decisions along those lines. But these kinds of trial balloons are best used when better sourced. That said, there are still three days left in the work week; maybe the McCain campaign will surprise us yet and Novak will turn out to be right.

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Garfield, N.J.: What's this thing with McCain and Czechoslovakia? If your 71-year-old grandparent kept calling your spouse "Jim" after you corrected him three times that the name was "John," what would you conclude? Answer: That he disliked your spouse.

Anne E. Kornblut: I guess there are other conclusions that could be drawn as well (for some reason, a LOT of people call me Annie, and I don't think it's that they're using my first name and middle initial "E."). But, yes, this is part of an emerging theme...

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Alexandria, Va.: So is the Enquirer report on Edwards's late night jaunt getting any play in the mainstream media, or are they in wait-and-see mode until they see what pans out?

Anne E. Kornblut: Did I already use up my "oy" quotient for this chat? I'm not touching this one at the moment. Does that make me a bad reporter?

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Seattle: Thanks for having us, Anne. I'm still trying to get my head around McCain's statement yesterday that "(Obama) is trying to lose a war to win a campaign." Isn't George W. Bush still President? Doesn't it look like al-Maliki is planning for Iraq to be a free and stable country? I seem to have missed where Gen. Petraeus saluted Sen. Obama on the tarmac. Where does McCain get this?

Anne E. Kornblut: And another on McCain's foreign policy...I think what McCain meant is that Obama is not being helpful to the side that he (McCain) believes does want to win the war, i.e. he's helping lose it. But that does leave aside the fact that the Iraqis are mapping out their own timetable for US troop withdrawal -- which, you're right, is a little tricky for McCain.

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Playing Novakula: Let's face facts: The Iraqis want a withdrawal, and that's the popular sentiment in America also. All of a sudden, the only rationale for McCain's entire campaign is gone (silly as it always was), and he's royally screwed. So what else is there for him to do now but try to work the media for attention in any way he can?

Anne E. Kornblut: To be fair, all candidates try to work the media any way they can. But, yes, thank you for this...

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Fun Question...: Among the traveling press, which campaigns were known for providing the best meals/snacks? I'm sure all that traveling is a good way to wreck a healthy diet.

Anne E. Kornblut: Thank you for mentioning my greatest obsession. I must say, the Obama campaign has done pretty well in providing real, actual vegetables the times I've been out with him recently (as opposed to fried mozzarella, a campaign staple). We had to work on the Clinton folks, but by the end they had abandoned their tins of spaghetti (so much fun to eat on a bus!) and were doing more vegetables as well. I'll defer to my colleagues on the McCain bus to make generalizations about the food there, but I remember one time being with him in 2000 when his campaign offered sushi, and the traveling Bush contingent refused to touch it (Bush himself refused to sushi as "bait.").

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Mt. Lebanon, Pa.: Hearing on Iraq & Aghanistan Defense Contractor Oversight on C-SPAN 3. Sen. Byrd of West Virgina just asked: "How many minutes has passed since Jesus was born?" Now, like all of us, I've watched some pretty bizarre happenings in Congress courtesy of C-SPAN, and most of them were unscripted moments ungoosed along by Milbank. But this one isn't going to die in my memory until my own lights go out.

I suspect that Sen. Byrd's lights need a good de-spidering and cleaning. And to think he's the chairman of this committee ... I can't even imagine what lesser lights on this panel are thinking -- giving that word a generous bandwidth of meaning. Just thought I'd passed this on to you in this long summer without presidential news: sprinting contender or lame duck. "Good words to you," as John Ciardi used to say when closing his radio show on poetry. Thanks much.

Anne E. Kornblut: Thank you for this -- I somehow missed it (the perils of not having enough C-Span screens on one's desk). Byrd is quite an interesting duck, isn't he?

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Oak Park, Mich.: What is this surge gaffe that everyone is talking about?

washingtonpost.com: Obama campaign: McCain flubs on Iraq timeline (AP, July 23)

Anne E. Kornblut: The link to the story is here attached, thanks to my colleage at the washingtonpost.com -- basically, McCain puts the surge as happening before the Sunni awakening, when it had actually started before the surge. Here's an excerpt:

"Because of the surge we were able to go out and protect that sheik and others. And it began the Anbar awakening," McCain said, referring to the U.S.-backed revolt of Sunni sheiks against al-Qaida in Anbar province. "I mean, that's just a matter of history."

The problem with McCain's statement _ as Obama's campaign quickly noted _ was that the awakening got under way before President Bush announced in January 2007 his decision to flood Iraq with tens of thousands of additional U.S. troops to help combat violence.

In March 2007, before the first of the additional troops began arriving in Iraq, Col. John W. Charlton, the American commander responsible for Ramadi, a city in Anbar province, said the newly friendly sheiks, combined with an aggressive counterinsurgency strategy and the presence of thousands of new Sunni police on the streets, had helped cut attacks in the city by half in recent months.

McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds said late Tuesday, "Democrats can debate whether the awakening would have survived without the surge ... but that is nothing more than a transparent effort to minimize the role of our commanders and our troops in defeating the enemy, because to credit them would be to disparage the judgment of Barack Obama and praise the leadership of John McCain."

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Arlington, Va.: I'm noticing this more and more with campaign strategy. John McCain is frequently lambasting Barack Obama for whatever he does, says or believes in. Hillary Clinton did the same thing. Yet I barely have noticed Barack Obama resorting to the negative campaigning tactics of either opponent! Is it possible that Obama's taking of the high road has earned him a lot more respect among voters? I'm increasingly of the belief that, after eight years of negative politics, voters are weary of polarization and are in need of something to hope for. As such, I think Obama really has touched on something the American populace desperately needs right now: hope.

Anne E. Kornblut: A word from a (wary) believer...thank you for this.

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New York, N.Y.: So apparently Barack got $25 million in donations in one single day in June. Gee, I wonder why he opted out of public campaign financing? False media narratives aside, McCain always was going to be well-funded -- Republican corporate money has nowhere else to go, and no one wants to waste it on Congress. The point is that Obama will have enough money to not be overwhelmed by GOP corporate dollars, and can now run the campaign he wants on even terms. Has that ever happened to the Democrats before?

washingtonpost.com: The $25 million is not as it seems; see the third answer in yesterday's Post Politics Hour discussion with Matthew Mosk.

Anne E. Kornblut: Let me refer you to my colleague Matt Mosk's chat on this one....but to your larger point, Democrats are, indeed, thrilled that they're going to have such a good financial arsenal this time around.

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Hampton, Va.: McCain's "only rationale"? You're crazy. Obama is a tax-and-spend liberal with very questionable associations. His"only rationale" is his charisma. No experience, poor judgement (Wright, Rezko, Ayers, the surge) ... I can't believe you agree with this nonsesne, Anne.

Anne E. Kornblut: The beauty of my job is that I get to see both sides! What's interesting is that both sides (and this was actually pretty true in the Democratic primary) is that the rivals see each other as mainly empty suits -- Obama's people view McCain as overstating his experience, including on foreign policy, which the earlier writer said was his only rationale; McCain's view Obama as you describe.

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Chicago: If you're Bobby Jindal, don't you sit out this trainwreck of an election and wait for better days ahead? I think that by 2012 most of the country will be ready to throw the Democrats out of office anyway. In addition, he'll be more seasoned and better-known after four years of the right-wing pundits touting his candidacy.

Anne E. Kornblut: That's a very interesting thought. He does have the luxury of time. And he occupies a big job currently. I don't know how real the Jindal rumors are, but stay tuned...

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Framingham, Mass.: While on my way home from work in New Hampshire, I happened to drive past the McCain "Straight Talk Express" campaign bus. I knew he was in New Hampshire yesterday, but where was the bus going? It was in Massachusetts, and I can't help but think there's no way McCain was stopping in this bluest of blue states.

Anne E. Kornblut: You didn't chase it down the highway to see where it was going? What kind of citizen-reporter are you? Ok, I just asked my colleague Mike Shear, who covers McCain full time, and he says that although McCain was, in fact, in NH, he then flew back to Baltimore afterward, which means the Straight Talk was probably en route to its little Straight Talk vacation in the sky, or wherever campaign buses go to rest.

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Washington: Technically, convention delegates can vote for whomever they choose. It is a courtesy for the nominee to give the vanquished the opportunity to release delegates. The delegates like it too, because it symbolically means their candidate has satisfied the policy interests that caused them to support someone other than the eventual nominee in the first place.

The 1980 Democratic Convention was marred by a rules fight because Carter Delegates were committed 100 percent to voting for Carter on the first ballot. Ted Kennedy's campaign fought to have the rule changed first in committee and then on the floor. If Kennedy had had the support to take the nomination away from Carter, then he would have won the rules contest; he didn't, but some believe that the divisiveness played a role in Carter's defeat. So the rules were changed.

Anne E. Kornblut: Thank you...

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Chicago: Thanks for taking my question. With respect to McCain's surge "gaffe" I think the really interesting aspect is CBS's decision to edit McCain's answers (at least initially) to eliminate the "gaffe" being made at all. What do you think of that decision by your on-air competition?

Anne E. Kornblut: I wasn't aware they had done that. Let me check it out. You guys are really stumping me today!

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Stone Harbor, N.J.: I fully expect to see one or two of the female reporters attending Obama's news conferences to faint. The men might also swoon, but are more apt to have tremors in their legs. Now really, what do you think about the media's coronation of this man?

Anne E. Kornblut: Isn't this the same press corps accused of letting the war happen and being in love with John McCain?

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Rockville, Md.: The fact is that McCain bet his election on being right on the surge; now Obama has a neat sleight-of-hand in saying "don't rehash the past, we all want to leave Iraq now." This overlooks the clear difference in leaving after we won, or in retreat after a defeat. That is a clear distinction that many who have soured on the war would just as soon not see, so Obama's formula is very popular, but not so true. As for the timeline, the prototype of the surge was tried in Anbar Province. That may explain why some may see it as part of the surge, even though they used troops already in-country and tested the idea of gaining Syuni support.

Anne E. Kornblut: If you're not already working for the McCain campaign, perhaps you should be; this is the best counterargument I've heard so far today on his remarks, i.e. the gaffe, but also on his overall policy. He has had a very difficult time so far arguing that "the surge worked" -- or at least Obama has had a ready answer. Thank you for this.

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Warrenton, Va.: I think THune would be a great pick for McCain -- he doesn't do much geographically, but in recent times that hasn't really been an issue. He's young, good-looking, and entered the Senate at the same time as Obama. I think it would make Obama look vulnerable and even more inexperienced with a vice-presidential nominee with the same lack of credentials and experience as the Democratic presidential nominee. Any thoughts?

Anne E. Kornblut: Personally, my favorite thing about Thune is that his 2004 campaign stickers said "Thune!" Complete with an exclamation mark. We haven't had a good exclamation mark candidate in awhile.

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San Francisco: Sen. McCain pledged to run "a respectful campaign." Saying Sen. Obama "would rather lose a war in order to win a political campaign" doesn't seem very respectful.

Anne E. Kornblut: Thanks for the thought. This is one of those things -- one person's respectful campaign is another's hit machine, and by the end of the road, both sides usually think the other side crossed the boundary.

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Princeton, N.J.: Let's see. Obama is a tax-and-spend liberal and McCain is a charge-and-spend conservative.

Anne E. Kornblut: And another...

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To Hampton, Va.: Shouting "tax and spend Liberal" about Obama from the rooftops is not a "rationale" for McCain to be president. Obama is who he always has been -- a right-centrist pragmatist. There ain't a darned thing that's changed about him, and Obamabots and Wingnuts need to take the blinders off their eyes and look around and see what's been there all along. That's Obama, folks. He ain't the Second Coming of Eugene Debs and never has been.

Anne E. Kornblut: and another...

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New Hope, Pa.: It's amazing that nobody has jumped on McCain's bad logic about using the savings from "victory" in Iraq to pay down the debt. We are borrowing the money for Iraq. That's like someone saying "I borrow money for my cigar habit, but when I quit, I'll use the money I save to buy a new car." My kids used arguments like that when they were 12.

Anne E. Kornblut: Clever children.

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San Deigo: Good morning, Ms. Kornblut. Apart from the obvious example of Lyndon Johnson, can you think of any vice presidential candidate who actually helped a candidate electorally? Thanks.

Anne E. Kornblut: You mean helped on the actual electoral map? LBJ is obviously the best example. Kerry had hoped Edwards would do more; Bush obviously won Wyoming, but I don't think that Cheney gets the credit. That is not to say that it couldn't help this year, or in the future -- it's just that candidates have run more national campaigns, and had veeps who helped their broader image rather than a targeted place.

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Media Rants: What do you think of Andrea Mitchell's complaints about Obama being in Iraq and Afghanistan without press with him? I listened to someone on MSNBC stating that the press is there to represent the American people or some such and thought of the past eight years with the Bush administration and lack of press access. I think the Bush administration has shown that a strong-willed president can pretty well ignore the press, and no one will do anything about it -- so if the next president adopts the same tactic, so be it.

Anne E. Kornblut: I like this question; obviously, it is in my self-interest for all presidents, candidates and dog-catchers to take the press everywhere and tell us everything. But that aside, I do agree with Andrea that the press represent the public, and that not giving us access is essentially shutting the citizenry out. Now, in Afghanistan and Iraq, it's slightly different, because they're war zones and Obama was traveling as part of a controlled congressional delegation -- those guys never take reporters. But in general, I could make a strong case that the next president would really represent change if he opened things up in a way Bush never has.

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Austin, Texas: What I found most impressive about Obama's June fundraising wasn't the erroneous $25 million on June 30 that was kicked around and later debunked, it was the small numbers: more than $20 million from persons who have not passed the $200 mark yet and therefore didn't have to be itemized, the average contribution for the month was $68, etc.

That has got to be a level of buy-in (quite literally) among voters that rarely/never has been seen before, and thre is an endless number of times the campaign can go back to these donors (after all, if you gave $25 in June, you probably can do it again in July, August, September and/or October if asked). Does it boggle your mind the way it does mine?

Anne E. Kornblut: It is certainly one of the things the Obama campaign is most thrilled about -- and has helped build their confidence that they can make this work. And I know there are many Clinton folks who wish in hindsight they had tried to work internet fundraising in the same manner early on, instead of only discovering they could match him later.

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Chicago: Do you think Obama could be seen as too big for his own britches by moving his convention speech from a 20,000 seat arena to a 70,000 seat outdoor stadium? I like the guy, but he's not the Pope.

Anne E. Kornblut: Ah, I was wondering when I'd get this question! There are starting to be some is-he-getting-arrogant rumblings, and this is one of the complaints. Do you want to send me an email so I can quote you??

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Philadelphia: Although I love your chats, I have to disagree on the Thune comment. Given that Wellstone died only two years earlier, it was very tacky for a Republican candidate in a neighboring state to use the exclamation-point bumper sticker.

Anne E. Kornblut: Wow, I hadn't even thought of that -- and it certainly didn't occur to me at the time. Fair point, and thanks for making it.

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Washington: The Obama photo ops in Afghanistan were so obviously stage-managed -- the military is not mostly black, so when you see Obama in a throng of all black troops, someone had to arrange that. But you guys in the media dutifully report whatever the Obama campaign tells you. If McCain pulled a stunt like Obama did in Afghanistan, wouldn't you call him on it?

Anne E. Kornblut: It's a good point that this trip was stage-managed -- it certainly was, and has been, and the last thing the campaign needed were bad or ineffective pictures of such a high-profile visit. As to your point about African-American service members -- I'm no military expert, but anytime I have been at events with service members or the few times I've been on military bases overseas, I've certainly seen a large share of black soldiers, so I would tend to doubt that it was somehow engineered. Also, what would be the political advantage of that, given that Obama is poised to win the black vote overwhelmingly?

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West Bend, N.C.: Is former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards still on Obama's short list for vice president?

Anne E. Kornblut: Not that I have heard, but this is a very closely held list, mind you.

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Boston: Isn't the problem with McCain picking someone like Thune the rebuttal it makes to his charge of Obama being too inexperienced to be president? He'd be picking someone to be a heartbeat from the presidency (Moreso then normal even, because of his age) with the same amount of experience.

Anne E. Kornblut: Right, that's a really fair point, and this is one way in which McCain is boxed in -- how does he pick someone vibrant and young who also doesn't undermine his experience argument? Maybe another point for Romney...

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So what's stopping Andrea Mitchell: from buying an airplane ticket like average Americans and doing her job on her own expense account? Nothing that I can think of.

Anne E. Kornblut: And that is exactly what she did -- she went unilaterally. The problem is that once you get into a war zone, it's quite hard to hunt American officials down and ask them questions unless they invite you to. It's up to the campaigns to be open and transparent.

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Kansas City, Mo.: The problem in the end with the surge debate is that people want out -- they don't care that much on who was right then or now on the specifics. If McCain's people are going to try to argue they are correct, I suggest they go over that strategy with President Kerry. He can explain how well that worked on voted for/voted against ... or even the gas tax that Bush's economics guy was much more in favor of then he ever was. I'm afraid the general public doesn't want specifics -- that's why they eat up articles on haircuts, windsurfing and newspapers not running candidates' op-eds...

Anne E. Kornblut: I think there is something to this, as frustrating as it is for the candidates...thank you for pointing it out.

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Washington: No question -- just a thank-you for doing these chats. This seems like a really heavy load of very concentrated, energy-consuming work. It's really appreciated -- you are the sharpest writer at The Post.

Anne E. Kornblut: Thank you! I am going to shamelessly post this -- and add that actually it's really a pleasure to do these. They're a great reminder of how awesome all (or at least most!) of our readers are, and why we bother to go get information for everyone in the first place.

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Too Big for his Britches...: What is your e-mail address? Thank you for the opportunity to be quoted.

washingtonpost.com: Click here to send Anne an e-mail.

Anne E. Kornblut: I guess this is the link, attached...but it's kornbluta@washpost.com.

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Touchy Question: For many reasons, I understand why African Americans are supporting Obama, the first credible African American presidential nominee. However, with Obama already walking a fine line on the race issue, wouldn't he have a hard time helping the African American community for fear of alienating white voters? If he strays too far one way or the other, he's upsetting some group one way or another.

Anne E. Kornblut: There's no doubt that Obama has tried - and is trying - to appeal to both sides of his own racial heritage without alienating the other, and that's no small task.

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"Is he arrogant?": is the storyline GOP operatives have been cookig up for a while. And guess what? From the greeting he gets from the troops in Iraq ... it just won't catch on.

Anne E. Kornblut: A great point, thank you...

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Anne E. Kornblut: You guys are the best. Thanks so much for joining here today -- back in two weeks! Talk to you soon, stay cool out there.

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washingtonpost.com: Upcoming Discussion: Republican National Convention CEO (washingtonpost.com, 1 p.m. ET today)

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