Hurricane Ike continues to move toward the Texas coast, and most observers believe it will be a deadly storm. More on Ike here, here and here.

The deadly political storm, at least so far as the Democrats are concerned, is still the Sarah Palin VP pick, which has re-energized the GOP base. More evidence of this can be found in this new Gallup poll which shows the Republicans surging ahead in the race for the House of Representatives. Could it really have turned around so fast? Could this be real? I say yes. Why? Because the polling has consistently shown that it isn't just President Bush who is so unpopular, it is also the Democratic controlled Congress. Once John McCain was nominated, and especially when he chose Sarah Palin, he seemed able to separate himself from the Bush Administration, despite the best efforts by the Democrats to the contrary. With that separation, and no connection to any unpopular GOP leadership in Congress (since they don't hold power there), he is now running on his own, with an attractive partner in Palin. This has drawn the curtain away from the Democrats who run Congress and now, paradoxically, makes the GOP seem like they are the party to shake things up in Washington, with McCain and Palin as their new leaders. All I can say is...wow.

Cathy Young says the Palin nomination is a great moment for women, and Ellen Goodman says Palin, like the Zamboni machine, has cleared the ice, creating smooth skating for the Republicans on the issue of working mothers.

Dick Morris and Eileen McGann explain why the Democrats fear Palin so much...

Why do Democrats feel so threatened? They've even stopped attacking McCain and President Bush to launch a vicious and sexist barrage at her that would normally make a feminist angry and a Democrat blush.

Basically, it's this: John McCain only endangers Democratic chances of victory this November, but Sarah Palin is an existential threat to the Democratic Party.

She threatens a core element of the party's base - women.

When an African-American like Clarence Thomas, Colin Powell or Condi Rice rises to prominence as a Republican, he or she endangers the Democratic coalition. So would a Republican labor leader.

And so, above all, does the woman Republican running for vice president.

Democrats can't stomach seeing the feminist movement's impetus for greater female political participation and empowerment "hijacked" by a pro-life woman who espouses traditional values. They must obliterate her, lest her popularity eat away at their party's core.

Bingo.

Did ABC bungle the Sarah Palin interview? Howard Kurtz has a round-up of reaction to the Palin interview.

Bill Kristol thinks that The Washington Post is trying to smear Palin. Perhaps Michael Gerson is more on the point about why the media is having a hard time covering Palin, especially when it comes to her religious faith...

In general, liberal political and media elites demonstrate a religious diversity that runs the spectrum from secularism to liberal Episcopalianism -- all the varied shades from violet to blue. Yet they assume their high church or Mencken-like disdain for religious enthusiasm is broadly shared. It was the sociologist Peter Berger who observed, "Puerto Ricans, Jews and Episcopalians each form around 2 percent of the American population. Guess which group does not think of itself as a minority."

Bingo.

Finally, Charles Krauthammer explains why Obama has lost his aura.