Barack Obama came out of his convention with a nice bounce and then John McCain got his, thanks in large part to his high-stakes gamble on Sarah Palin.

The race at the moment seems even-up, with one tracking poll actually giving McCain his first slim lead in months. But it is not yet time to obsess and hyperventilate over the polls. Wait for at least another week, maybe even two, for all the statistical noise to clear. What has gone up may come down and what has gone down could get worse, but it’s still pure speculation.

Conventions traditionally generate wild swings: Michael Dukakis was once up 16 points in 1988, and for much of 1992 Bill Clinton was running third to Ross Perot and George H. W.Bush.

What we do know is that Palin passed her first test with flying colors and began to make McCain’s impulsive selection look like a stroke of genius. But she still has more tests to pass, including an ethics investigation by her state senate and a battery of questions from the press—whenever she is permitted to meet them.

Then comes full exposure of her record, her flip-flops and mis-statements. This “hockey mom” already has spread a lot of bull hockey. Or do they call it moose hockey up there?

The long odds still slightly favor Obama for several reasons, most important of which is that the economy remains miserable with joblessness rising. The incumbent party historically loses in such situations. Also, in the long run—unless they bring a concrete piece of electoral turf such as Lyndon John brought John F. Kennedy—people don’t elect a president based on his vice president.

The biggest game at the GOP convention was Where’s W?

McCain did a remarkable dance pretending he is not a Republican, let alone a Bush Republican. His every sentence said change while his every program spelled more of the same: tax cuts for the rich, privatization of social security, salvation through offshore drilling, no government health plan, overturn Roe v. Wade and on and on.

This is called cognitive dissonance—like corned beef with mayo, it jars the senses.

On foreign affairs he promises to be even worse than Bush—he still doesn’t want a timetable to get out of Iraq. He’s morphed into a total neo-con, ready to start the next conflagration ASAP.

Small wonder the chief villains lambasted by the convention speakers were the media and community organizers. The media have been GOP targets since the Goldwater era—a sure sign of a losing campaign. Worse yet, community organizers usually organize against incumbent mayors and governors—of which Rudy Guiliani was one and Palin was both.

The only concrete change McCain promised was vetoing congressional “earmarks.” Not exactly a bellringer on the public agenda as far as I can tell.

As to that decadent culture of wicked Washington, McCain has been part of it for three decades, most of the time with presidents of his own party. Did I mention they were Republicans?

It will be difficult indeed for McCain-Palin to continue to deny their party identities for the next two months. More likely they will be rebranded Bush III soon enough. W can run from the convention, but he can’t hide.

The public remains on the Democratic side of virtually every issue and there are eight weeks in which to reinforce the case, despite the double dazzle of McCain’s personal story and Palin’s invigoration of the far-right base.

More than ever this will be a state-by-state race, regardless of the national numbers, which are likely to remain close. Here, thus far, by everyone’s reckoning, Obama continues to hold a clear advantage. I’ll write more on this later.

But despite the specter of Palin haunting America, it is still Obama’s race to lose. He continues to have more money and better organization.

On the other hand, hockey happens.