The Middle East, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Recession, Depression, Stimulus, Democrats, Republicans, Congress — sometimes the big issues in today’s world can make your head spin. There’s so much going on and it’s tough to keep up with all the details, but even though it’s hectic, the big issues can have a big impact on your life, your career, and your future. Lucky for you, I’ve taken the  top headlines and condensed them into easy-to-read tidbits with all the info you need to know. And trust me, this is the stuff you need to know.

Are you a fan or a critic of Obama? Were you counting on a new stimulus package this year? How do you feel about Congress’ decision over whether or not to keep troops in Iraq? What issues matter most to YOU?

The worst part of Thanksgiving is the dogs. Everyone has that one relative with a German shepherd, two Corgis and a Schnoodle/Pug mix. Some of us have more than one of these relatives, and some of us have many, many more than one. Some of these relatives have named their dogs Bill O’Reilly. All of these relatives arrive at every holiday party.

But you can’t just tell someone that you don’t like their dogs. There is no greater insult around the Thanksgiving table; you may as well have stuffed, dressed and roasted nephew Kenny.

Political beliefs work the same way, and in some ways are more annoying, because there’s no practical limit to how many you can stuff into the same party, and they’re usually invisible, unless Uncle Joe’s got some kind of witty hat (“Republicans Screw The Country, Democrats Usually Raise Taxes”).

And so you’ve got Grandma’s staunch Grand Old Politics jumping on your new dress and cousin Laura’s furious socialist anarchism taking up all the space on the couch and Teddy and Ralph are barking and howling about the liberal media and you can’t just shoot them.

So you’ve got to find a non-violent, pleasant solution to the problem. Just how do you deal with divergently political relatives?

The simple Thanksgiving solution is to compliment their cooking. This isn’t always easy, because people will put anything in a pie these days, and it might be compliment enough to even swallow Aunt Maura’s green bean and rhubarb casserole. But a quick white lie can be an effective deterrent to all-out family feuding (“All I’m saying is that they should learn to speak English — ” “Oh, Maura, I just love the way you’ve pickled the rhubarb!”).

Dropping the ‘willful ignorance’ bomb might sting, especially when this is the year for politically passionate young people, but it’s an acceptable Big Red Button when the situation gets too dire. Refuse to know anything about anyone, anywhere: just for today, you don’t talk about foreign politics, which includes anything outside the circumference of the pumpkin pie.

Alternately, you can simply pretend you’ve got wildly inconsistent political beliefs and simply agree with everything. Play it off as a product of your age: all that multi-tasking us young folk do has taught us to radically re-align our world view every five minutes, and maybe Grandpa will be impressed and give you ten dollars or something.

If you think you’ve got the wit, you can try taking both sides at once. Try playing devil’s advocate, but do it with such dripping sarcasm that your allies think you’re hilarious and your enemies just agree with you. After all, if people disagree with your political beliefs, it’s because they’re stupid, right? They’ll never catch on (“O’Reilly? He’s a genius! He’s got the sexiest pout on TV!”)

Finally, you can try to appeal to the elementary spirit of the day: we should cast aside our grievances and unite in the common spirit of thanks.

But who’s going to buy that?

Sometimes it seems like the only thing keeping the family together is the dogs.

Is that really Kate Winslet?

Stay in the know! Track election results all day!

Your jeans are killing the environment!

It’s Heidi Klum’s turn to rock out with Guitar Hero.

Madonna’s fans are dangerous.

The GOP is trying to disqualify Iowa student ballots!

What did Lo and LC wear for Halloween?

More election day snacks and drinks for your party.

Shopping on a budget? Make a list.

Bush is so over the White House.

Who did Sarah Palin vote for? She’s not telling!

Man. I wish. Actually, the second presidential debate was pretty boring, especially compared to the mud-fight we got when Palin and Biden duked it out. So what happened last night? The candidates mostly stuck to the same guns they’ve been waving all election: McCain pounding home his foreign policy experience (and his opponent’s lack thereof) and Obama preferring to stick to what many see as a more “in-touch” attitude on domestic concerns. Lots of stump speech sound bites were recycled, and, as usual, there wasn’t that much actual debate.

McCain started the night in a rougher place than before, as the flailing economy and sliding poll numbers gave the Republican senator plenty of ground to catch up on.

It wasn’t a problem for him overall, though; he managed to fight Obama to a standstill on most issues, (including the economy, and it’s hard going being a Republican on the economy today), and nobody blew themselves out of the water with embarrassing gaffes. Nothing last night is going to change the dynamic of the race, though, and that’s not terribly good news for McCain.

Some particularly good (or bad) moments for each candidate:

THUMBS UP:

- Obama connecting with the people. During the audience questions, Obama fielded one on the bailout from “Oliver” pretty handily: “Well, Oliver, first, let me tell you what’s in the rescue package for you. Right now, the credit markets are frozen up and what that means … is that small businesses and some large businesses just can’t get loans. If they can’t get a loan, that means that they can’t make payroll. If they can’t make payroll, then they may end up having to shut their doors and lay people off. And if you imagine just one company trying to deal with that, now imagine a million companies all across the country.” Simple — perhaps too simple — but an effective way to turn an abstract issue into a real chummy sort of thing, and a nice response to silence critiques that Obama is too “professorial”.

- McCain’s snappy response on whether he’d wait for the approval of the UN Security Council before aiding Israel in the event of a military crisis. This debate featured lots of qualifiers to stances and lots of question-dodging. Like it or not, McCain’s definitive answer — “let me say that we obviously would not wait for the United Nations Security Council” — was a welcome moment of clarity, especially when contrasted to Obama’s milquetoast response involving “using all the tools at our disposal.” The “Straight Talk Express” shtick carried McCain through the primary, and more moments like this would have helped his performance.

- McCain’s cute jokes. Obama’s got the style game all sewn up, but McCain does have a certain gravelly charisma when he loosens up a bit. “Hey, I’ll answer the question,” he quipped after a particularly long-winded Obama response, and while it’s pretty obvious that nobody really answers questions straight-on in a presidential debate anyway, McCain managed to sound a lot more appealing when his smiles came easily.

-Obama sets his priorities. Stealing a little bit of the Straight Talk thunder, Obama was up-front about his priorities: environment first, health care second, education third. McCain dodged the same question, responding, as if in a fairy tale, that “we can do them all at once”.

THUMBS DOWN

-Obama makes faces. Obama spent a lot of time fuming after particularly pointed McCain barbs — the issue of tax reform in particular had him clearly riled up. Righteous rage is appealing sometimes, but it often looked as if McCain had a better handle on his own body language between questions.

-McCain’s less-cute jokes. “Did we hear the size of the fine?” interjected McCain, after Obama discussed his tax plan. We get it, Obama never stated it explicitly, but shoving a joke in at the end of the opposing side’s rebuttal just felt petty. Similarly, the crack about how nice it was to finally see Obama in a town-hall setting felt petulant and bitter.

THUMBS EH?

-Obama defers to Michelle. “What don’t you know and how will you learn it?” went the last question. Obama’s response? “My wife, Michelle, is there and she could give you a much longer list than I do. And most of the time, I learn it by asking her.” Am I the only person that thought Obama was referring to his prowess in the sack? I am? Okay. Fine.

-McCain has many heroes. Invoking the GOP greats is a fine strategy, but both President Reagan and Teddy Roosevelt were “my hero” at different points in the night, according to McCain. I’m surprised he didn’t go further: remember, Abraham Lincoln was a Republican. Or how about pioneer of laissez-faire economics Adam Smith? Or why not me? I’m great. Sheesh.

As I continue to try and wrap my head around Sarah Palin, the GOP’s newest Vice Presidential pick (“a woman making strides toward the white house, good!”, “a woman who thinks the government has the right to tell her what her reproductive rights are, bad!”), a few wayward comments flying around the internet and media have gotten me really confused.  According to sources, Palin is on record stating that global warming is not man made, and that polar bears aren’t endangered

…What?

“A changing environment will affect Alaska more than any other state, because of our location.” Palin stated as early as a few weeks ago to a conservative magazine for it’s September issue. “I’m not one though who would attribute it to being man-made.”

As a moderate liberal, I can often support Republicans and Independents, as long as I believe their brain is in the right place. The thing is…denying humans have anything to do with global warming, and working to keep polar bears off the endangered list goes beyond politics and veers into …well…complete and utter wrongness.

“The state of Alaska will sue to challenge the recent listing of polar bears as a threatened species, Gov. Sarah Palin announced. She and other Alaska elected officials fear a listing will cripple oil and gas development in prime polar bear habitat off the state’s northern and northwestern coasts.”

“Palin argued that there is not enough evidence to support a listing. Polar bears are well-managed and their population has dramatically increased over 30 years as a result of conservation, she said.”

Alaskan oil is more important than protecting wildlife?  Wildlife that has met the unfortunate conclusion time and time  and time again of drastic decrease or even full extinction in the next 50 years?

How is McCain and crew (not to mention Palin herself) going to twist her statements into sounding even remotely with the times?  You know who else thinks global warming is propaganda, and could give a rat’s ass about the polar bears?  My next door neighbor.  Who’s 85.  And who thinks the birds on the telephone wires are communicating directly with NASA.

Even though I’m proud of the fact that old white dudes are finally taking women seriously, I’ve been wary of Plain from the beginning, and this new information has done nothing to assuage my fears. Palin may be a powerful woman, but she ain’t no Hillary, and she certainly ain’t no environmentalist.