A Ticket Treat: Palin, Biden, Obama, McCain; Not here, not now

We could try to make this into a real obvious political item, noting how many dogs and cats and birds and a ferret Republican presidential candidate John McCain has as pets, and how that makes him more popular in a poll of America's pet owners.

And how Democrat Barack Obama doesn't have any pets but says he will surely get a dog of some kind after the election.

But instead, hey, it's a Saturday afternoon. We're in between debates. Some people are getting entirely too heated over this election thing.

For a change of pace, let's just watch this video that simply reminds us of laughing.

-- Andrew Malcolm

While you're in a good mood, why not go to Twitter here and register for free instant alerts straight to your cell of every new Ticket item the moment it's published?

Now accepting your political photos on LATimes.com

OK, this is the official announcement from LATimes.com. Now there are official pages here for politics fans to post their own photos of their favorite candidates in action.

If you were at Gov. Sarah Palin's rally in Carson last Saturday, surely someone got a cellphone photo of the world's most famous hockey mom. Send it in. But it doesn't have to be the candidate. Got a special handmade sign? A favorite political button? A political scarf on your dog? A T-shirt? A bumper sticker you spot while parked on the 101?

Whatever.

Go to the respective sites below. Check out what's there. (Alas, John McCain fans, not much.) Then, upload your own photo. The Ticket's special friend Lindsay will take special care of having it displayed for each day's millions of LATimes.com readers to see.

Your dog will be hired for fashion shoots. You'll get rich. He'll get famous. And we can say we knew you when you were absolutely a worthless nothing.

For fans of Barack Obama and Joe Biden, the exciting senator from tiny, meaningless Delaware, go here.

For fans of McCain and Palin, go here.

If we get some really good pix, we might even publish some on The Ticket. (So if you're Wanted somewhere, probably better not to participate.)

--Andrew Malcolm

Speaking of The Ticket, you can still go to Twitter and sign up for free automatic and instant alerts of every new Ticket item flashed directly to your cell.

Naming dogs for presidents --2 George Bush, 20 Bush and 37 Reagan

One of the great joys of the Web -- and, we hope, of The Ticket -- is the serendipity, never knowing exactly what you'll find to read or watch as you beachcomb online.

Bet you didn't expect this item on dogs. Los Angeles County dogs. But stick with us, there is a political angle.

LATimes.com database producer Ben Welsh has done an incredible of researching L.A.'s Top Dogs registered in the county. What breeds are most common, what names, all searchable by ZIP code? How common is your dog's name or breed in the county, or your own neighborhood?

All right, it is embarrassing that the most common dog registered in the county is the Chihuahua. But a real close second are real dogs, Labradors.

Anyway, it's fun reading. There are pit bulls named Angel and poodles named Rocky. What do you think is the rarest dog in the county? (The Alaskan klee kai, which is a miniature husky. There's only one here.)

But the politics part involves all the dogs named for presidents. There are, for instance, 81 Arthurs, 20 named Bush, two named George Bush (a chow and a pug), eight Grants, a couple of Hardings, 37 Reagans and 388 Madisons, the most popular presidential moniker.

There's one miniature schnauzer named Donald Rumsfeld. There are 419 dogs named Elvis, which could go over on the pet blog, L.A. Unleashed, or maybe better yet over on Soundboard, the music blog. And 1,020 dogs named Kobe. But they no doubt belong over on the Lakers blog.

Oh, and the county has one dog named Barack. He's a Rottweiler. And he belongs right here on The Ticket.

-- Andrew Malcolm

PETA offers pet advice to the Obamas: Save a shelter dog

Barack Obama is supposed to have something like, what, 300 economic advisors. But as yet his family doesn't have one single pet.

Unlike two out of three American households, there's no dog or cat or other living creature in the Obama home. Nothing. As Hillary Rodham Clinton knew, having a dog is an integral part of the commander-in-chief test. No dog? Likely no White House.

Obama says he has promised his two daughters a dog after the election. And there's been all kinds of speculation and on-line voting about what kind of freaky-looking purebred they might get.

Well, today PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) offered itself as advisor to the Obamas on what kind of pet to get. Even though no one remembers asking.

In a letter to the couple at the Federal Building in Chicago, PETA President Ingrid Newkirk said:

"No one needs to tell you that this country is proud to be a melting pot and that there is something deeply wrong and elitist about wanting only a purebred dog. Millions of great American mutts -- the dog that should be our national dog -- are set to die in our nation’s extremely overcrowded pounds and shelters for lack of good homes.

"Compassionate people nationwide are choosing to adopt a homeless pound puppy -- a grateful refugee from a society that has not always treated the true 'underdog' kindly -- rather than cater to special interests who do not have dogs' interests at heart.

"Adopting an animal not only saves a life but demonstrates compassion, and the companion-animal overpopulation crisis deserves attention from all Americans.

"Every animal purchased from a breeder or a pet shop takes a home away from a needy animal at an animal shelter, waiting and hoping for a chance at the American dream of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."

All right, that last paragraph is gonna cost Obama the Westminster and American kennel club votes and the support of all those puppy farms in the Midwest.

But it's a very good point. Why not give a new home to a homeless critter? Set an example for other families. Talk about the American dream. And, like gas, those purebred-pup prices have gotten way out of control anyway.

John McCain, the Republican nominee-to-be, doesn't have to worry about such selections. As The Ticket recently reported, even before running for the White House, he had three mutts, a cat, two turtles, three parakeets and a ferret sharing his Arizona home. As one result, a recent poll shows the Navy veteran leading, 47% to 32%, among pet owners.

What do you think -- purebred or mutt for the Obamas?

-- Andrew Malcolm

Photo credit: Stephan Savoia / Associated Press

Pet-lover McCain finds the scent of their votes; petless Obama lags

Americans like their pets. Two out of three of our homes have pets, a whopping 163 million dogs and cats living as full family members.

And Americans like their presidents to have pets too, mainly dogs. Apparently voters think it says something about the chief executive's character or something. Try to think of a president who didn't have a dog run out to greet him at the helicopter. Even the jerk in "Dave" had a prop dog.

So while he's out jogging toward the middle of the political spectrum, the petless Sen. Barack Obama may want to stop off at Pets 'R Us well before November.

He's promised to get some kind of dog after the November election. But everyone knows about politicians' promises.

Meanwhile, Sen. John McCain, who has a full menagerie in his Arizona home, is building a lead among pet-owning voters, according to a new poll by the Associated Press-Yahoo News. McCain leads Obama 42-37 among pet owners and is especially strong among dog owners, perhaps because he's got about three of his own, including Ginger, above.

McCain also has a cat, two turtles, three parakeets and a ferret (good thing he doesn't live in California). Talk about a unity ticket.

It's amusing to picture the urban-dwelling, Ivy League lawyer Obama, surrounded by sunglassed Secret Service members, out walking his Maltese on Chicago's South Side and bending over by the curb for the pick-up with a plastic bag on his hand.

Obama does lead McCain 48-34 among non-pet owners. But alas for him there are many fewer of them in these 57 states.

Our blogging colleagues over at L.A. Unleashed have the full political pet story. And the Swamp has its own version too here.

--Andrew Malcolm

Photo credit: Stephan Savoia / Associated Press 

Top of the Ticket, the start of Year Two

On this, the first anniversary of our Top of the Ticket blog, we are reminded of the mercurial, unpredictable nature of U.S. politics -- part of what makes what we do so fascinating.

Our goal -- one of us on the East Coast and the other on the far more important or at least less humid West Coast -- was to write about Campaign '08 virtually around the clock.

Our second-ever posting, 12 months ago today, previewed an upcoming L.A. Times/Bloomberg Poll; later in the day, we detailed the results of the nationwide survey. The findings were in line with other polls of the time.

In the Republican presidential race, which then seemed the most likely to last deep into the primary season, Rudy Giuliani was perched in first place. His lead wasn't overwhelming, but it was strong enough that he appeared certain to remain a major contender.

His liberal record on social issues loomed as an obvious liability within his party, but his tough-on-terrorism message was attracting substantial support from moderates and GOP-leaning independents.

His major headache among rivals last June was an as-yet-undeclared candidate who was riding a wave as the great conservative hope -- Fred Thompson. He ran a strong second in the poll.

Lagging far behind were John McCain and Mitt Romney, each barely with double-digit support. In our preview posting, we were especially scornful of McCain, noting sarcastically (and foolishly, as it turned out) that in the poll, he found himself "in heated competition with the 'Don't Know' category."

Meriting no mention from us was Mike Huckabee, one of several back-of-the-pack candidates barely earning any support across the country.

The Democratic race, at that point, seemed so much more cut-and-dried.

Hillary Clinton was the clear front-runner; Barack Obama was just as clearly ...

Hillary and Barack invade the real dreams of millions

Over these past eight busy political months, loyal Ticket readers have come to expect the unexpected here. We've had nearly-naked hotties 4 Ron Paul. We've had Republicans voting for Hillary Clinton. And the usual boxers vs briefs question. We've even had a U. S. Senator tapping his foot in a men's room.

But this morning's opening primary election day item may top them all. It's about how our presidential politicians literally reside in our subconscious.

Let's say you're in the mall and Hillary walks up and says she's had another argument with Bill and needs a hug. So you hug and she asks if you voted for her and you say yes, even though you didn't, because she looks sad.

Suddenly, you're at the railroad station, but the train is just....

The eyes have it

A loyal Ticket reader in Maryland thought she saw a resemblance between these two hunters.

And when you put them together like this, we see what she means.

Can you recognize these four eyes and two famous fellows?

For the identities, click the Read More line below.

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Photos: Associated Press

Ticket Takings: Cute dogs and politics, the real choice

For the last couple of days many thousands of readers on LATimes.com have flocked to the compelling story that emerged from the 132d Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show at Madison Square Garden the other night.

It seems that some dog there, Uno by name and beagle by breed, came charging from out of nowhere to overcome all kinds of odds and a century of dog-judging tradition to claim the grand prize of Best in Show. He beat out the beautiful malamute and those prancy dogs and the ones that can't see through their own hair and the ugly boxers who drool.

Out of more than 2,000 dogs assembled there, all primped, pruned and powdered, Uno was Numero Uno in the whole building.

It was as if Snoopy from everyone's childhood had finally gained respect. And who doesn't love Snoopy, even though, c'mon, he's got to be slightly insane to think he's battling the Red Baron all the time?

And as if Uno knew what he'd just pulled off, he was high-fouring his trainer and celebrating as only Uno knows how, by baying away like the moon was right over Manhattan's 34th Street. And the emotional crowd, dog-lovers all, God bless them, gave the lowly beagle a standing ovation, whistling and shouting for him, and some people wiped away tears.

And folks watching on televisions across the country smiled and cried and clapped too. He's a real cute dog, unless you're trying to sleep.

Anyway, for some inexplicable reason that Uno story has been the most-read thing on this website and the most-e-mailed and talked about. While at the same time only a fraction of those readers have also visited this politics blog.

Now, it's a free country. People can read whatever they like. But it should be profoundly distressing to the entire American nation that at a time of international terrorism and economic threat as the United States goes through the divisive process of picking a new president, days later thousands of people are still clicking on an uplifting story about a goofy-looking dog coming from behind to win and not patronizing an excruciatingly well-written collection of some 1,300 political tidbits.

And then those same grinning people also click through, one after another, an entire online photo gallery of 120 photos of Uno with his little pink tongue and his fancied-up fellow competitors. What has America come to?

These web browsers would rather look at a dog with big ears than delve into the intricacies of competing national political campaigns and where and how their campaigns and policies conflict and cross.

But Top of the Ticket readers should know that just because countless thousands want to look at a distant dog more than our political items, we are determined not to stoop to any kind of cheap journalistic tricks to draw an audience. We are not that kind of blog. We earn our page views with information.

We're sticking with our assigned mission as political writers. And like politicians, we promise not to pander to dog-lovers at this crucial time in U.S. history. Politics is far too important to the country for furry animals to become a distraction.

So click the next line to get this morning's Ticket Takings:

Mike Huckabee faces questions on whether he stymied a probe

DES MOINES -- Mike Huckabee's image as an "aw, shucks" kind of guy is taking a hit in a story Newsweek is reporting and that has been picked up by the Humane Society Legislative Fund blog.

Citing new reporting and old stories, Newsweek reports that Huckabee's then-17-year-old son was implicated in the torture and hanging of a stray dog while working as a Boy Scout camp counselor in 1998. David Huckabee was fired from the job, but Newsweek reports that Huckabee, then governor, leaned on law enforcement officials to squelch a request by a local prosecutor for investigative help in the case. No charges were ever filed, and Huckabee denied any inappropriate actions.

Animal cruelty is one of those issues that fires up public outrage, and not just among the PETA set. Just ask Michael Vick. Or, to a much, much lesser extent, Mitt Romney. From a political standpoint, this story could be problematic for Huckabee, raising serious questions about his judgment as a chief executive.

If Huckabee did indeed use his position as governor to stymie a criminal investigation into his son, then expect to see some hard questions both from the media and from fellow Republican candidates. And perceptions of abuse of power can be hard to overcome in the voting booth, no matter how many jokes you tell.

-- Scott Martelle

Mitt Romney takes some heat

The top three finishers in the Iowa straw poll of Republican presidential contenders --- Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee and Sam Brownback --- reaped immediate benefits from their showings: free air time on the Sunday morning chat shows. But if Romney, who won Saturday's contest in Ames, thought he was simply going to bask in his victory during an appearance on "Fox News Sunday," host Chris Wallace disabused him of that notion.

At the start of the interview, Romney was allowed to detail why his win should be seen as a big deal (a contention that remains a bit of a hard sell). Those preliminaries out of the way, Romney got a pretty good grilling on several fronts, including the familiar issue of his reversal on abortion rights, the less familiar topic of his less-than-stellar economic record as Massachusetts' governor and what Wallace aptly termed "the big dog controversy."

Wallace replayed the already widely circulated clips of Romney, during his campaigns for office in Massachusetts, stressing his support for "safe and legal" abortion and his commitment to preserving and protecting "a woman's right to choose."

As he has many times before, and as he will have to many times in the future, Romney made the case that his switch on the issue --- he now strongly opposes abortion rights --- was not a matter of political expediency (i.e., the difference between running in a liberal state and wooing socially conservative Republicans nationwide).

Wallace also threw this at Romney: "Researchers at Northeastern University (in Boston) looked at the economic performance of Massachusetts during the Romney years (2003-07) and said it was one of the worst in the country."

The former governor's initial response: "Well, I've got very different statistics than you do and than they do."

We don't doubt that he does, but politicians generally don't benefit from getting down into the weeds with statisticians. We imagine Romney will be trying out more effective ways to parry such queries as his campaign progresses.

He clearly learned a lesson on one front. ...