Grand Rapids, Michigan:

Since selecting Sarah Palin as his running mate, John McCain’s rallies and town halls have become electric affairs.  The lines snake out around the block hours in advance and routinely reach over capacity.   In Grand Rapids, Michigan the two participated in their first joint town hall meeting.  Gov. Sarah answered a number of questions.

York, Pa:

Over 2,000 lined up to see John McCain at the York Fairgrounds…..Check back later for an exclusive interview with McCain about the situation in Georgia and the state of the race.

Obama held a rally on the campus of Grinnell College Tuesday in Iowa. Grinnell is a private college of about 9,000 students an hour drive from Des Moines. It’s also where Muriel Gallo-Chasanoff, class of ‘10, studies. Gallo-Chasanoff, as identified last month by the Scarlet & Black campus newspaper, is the student who claimed the Clinton campaign provided her with a question to ask the senator at a Newton, Iowa, town hall.

A media flurry ensued and Senator Obama had a good time with the gaffe at some of his town halls. Often when opening up the floor to questions, the senator would note that “these questions have not been prescreened or preselected.”

When Obama came to Grinnell Tuesday night, it was billed as a straight rally, but after he finished his stump speech, the Senator said he had time for three questions before heading to a second rally in Iowa City.

The crowd of mostly students roared when Obama joked that the questions he was about to take were not “prearranged or predetermined.” It wasn’t until some nearby students pointed in Gallo-Chasanoff’s direction that the senator noticed the student standing in the front row of the rally (the campaign insisted Obama did not know she was there beforehand).

After the event when Obama worked the ropeline, he talked to the student for a couple minutes and, according to the New York Times, she told a campaign volunteer she was not ready to sign a supporter card for the senator.

A group of no less than six reporters approached Gallo-Chasanoff following her brief exchange with Obama, but the press-shy student and some of her protective friends lost us in the dark of a cold, Iowa night.

The first two questions at Senator Barack Obama’s media availability in Nashua, New Hampshire, Monday were about Hillary Clinton’s planted questions flap. He demurred from taking a swing at the frontrunner – instead he said he said it was not his campaign’s practice.

Here’s his response:

But that didn’t stop the senator from poking fun at the issue later in the day. At a town hall meeting in Claremont, New Hampshire, Obama cracked a joke before taking the first question.

Senator Obama also said the national media has been “egging on” the candidate to “kneecap” Hillary Clinton. “I’m not interested in kneecapping Hillary Clinton.”

Kneecapping? Nah – but a little ribbing is just fine.