In a speech at the GOP convention, Senator Fred Thompson condemns the media frenzy over the Palin teen pregnancy affair. Read more and see the video.

With Hurricane Gustav bearing down on Louisiana and other US Gulf of Mexico states, the Republican convention in St. Paul, Minneapolis, opened with a truncated schedule with an opening address by US President George Bush being blown off course by the storm. But despite media reports of a somber mood at the convention, our Observer Tim Demuth says the mood at the Xcel Center is anything but gloomy. Read more...

Film-maker Micheal Moore has kicked up a storm by saying that Hurricane Gustav's landfall on the first day of the Republican convention is "proof there is a God in heaven". Read more...

Unknown to him at the time, Democrat Don Fowler was being filmed when he made a joke about Hurricane Gustav, which today reached Louisiana. Republicans have hit out at the politician, who dared to say that if the catastrophe struck when the Republican Convention was due to open on Monday, then God must be on their [the Democrats'] side. See the video.

It's not just razzmatazz at the conventions. On the sidelines of the Democratic convention, the National Democratic Institute (NDI), a Washington DC-based think tank, held a panel on what a Barack Obama presidency could mean for US foreign policy. The answer, according to our Observer Julissa Reynoso, who attended the panel, could be a focus on development - a term that turned distinctly unsexy during the Bush years. Read more...

Not far from Denver's Pepsi Center, but far enough from the heavy politico and media hitters at the Democratic convention, is the Big Tent. A two-story, 8,000-square-foot temporary structure, the Big Tent offers facilities for bloggers to work out of. And unlike the Pepsi Center, which has no wireless for security reasons, the Big Tent is completely plugged in. Our Observer Joe Sudbay is all praise for the alternate blog-spot hotspot at the convention. Read more...

The roster of celebs, both political and cultural, checking in at the Democratic convention just keeps getting thicker by the day. A day after her encounter with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, FRANCE Observer Anne Bottaro, one of the youngest volunteers at the convention, brushes up with Oscar-winning actor, Richard Dreyfuss, star of Hollywood epics such as "Jaws" and "Close Encounters of the Third Kind". Read more...

Our Observer Julissa Reynoso calls herself a "ferocious Hillary supporter". So it was only fitting that on Hillary Clinton's big night at the Democratic convention, when the former First Lady took to the floor to support Barack Obama's White House bid, Reynoso got a leg-up in the Pepsi Center seating order. In short, Reynoso was given a seat in an exclusive, private booth earmarked for close friends and supporters of Clinton - including her school friends and high school sweetheart. Read more...

Another political celeb hook-up on the sidelines of the Democratic National Convention. This time, it's Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the US House of Representatives. Our Observer Anne Bottaro was at an event for Italian Americans at a Denver restaurant, when the first female House Speaker showed up. For 17-year-old Bottaro, who is volunteering at her first-ever political convention, it was a meeting of a lifetime. Read more...

During the long, bitter Democratic primary season, Latinos overwhelmingly supported Hillary Clinton. Despite the senator from New York's strong endorsement of Candidate Obama, there is still a small, die-hard group of Clinton supporters. In the lead-up to the convention, they were derisively dubbed "PUMAs" - (short for Party Unity, My Ass). And they could be spotted in the crowd with their Hillary T-shirts and "Nobama" buttons. But in Denver these days, Democratic delegates - including the die-hard Hillary supporting Hispanic delegates - seem to be coming around to display some much-needed party unity. Read more...