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Air Force One instead of putting his feet on the ground gave critics an opening to argue that he was indifferent to the suffering below. He later set the standard for what not to do in a disaster when he infamously patted the back of former Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Michael Brown, telling him he had done a "heck of a job, Brownie," as tens of thousands languished at New Orleans' convention center.
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• It's the mantra we will hear endlessly in the coming weeks: Americans face a "stark choice" come November. It is a choice, as President Barack Obama has said repeatedly, "between two fundamentally different visions" for our country. Or as newly anointed Republican nominee Mitt Romney has said from the stump, "President Obama's vision is very different -- and deeply flawed."
• It may all sound like the kind of rhetoric we hear every four years. But this year, analysts, polls and even the politicians themselves keep telling us: The "visions" really are more acutely divergent because our differences as Americans are, too.
• So how do these opposing world views look through the eyes of the voters who will choose?
• Look no further than a neighborhood Chick-fil-A restaurant to see how our contrary notions about just one topic -- gay marriage -- played out this summer. Perhaps you were one who stood in line to buy a sandwich in support of the chain whose president spoke out against same-sex marriage. Or, rather, you may have reposted a picture that made the rounds on Facebook comparing those protests to others, long ago, against school integration and "race mixing" with a tag line that jeered, "Imagine how stupid you are going to look in 40 years."
• On this and so many other issues this election year, it seems harder to find that middle-ground gray when our debates seem so very black or white.
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• TOLEDO, Ohio (AP) -- In his warm-up for the Democratic National Convention, President Barack Obama is tangling with a couple of rivals, only one named Mitt.

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