I picked a good time to go on vacation with my family last week. The battles amongst my three kids in the back of the car while we rumbled down the interstate reminded me a great deal of the state of the race for the White House - a lot of finger pointing, shrieking and name calling, and not a whole lot of substance.
In other words, we are about where we usually are at this point in the race for President, just before the national political conventions.
The choice of Rep. Paul Ryan as Mitt Romney's running mate certainly injected a new amount of steam into this race, as both sides have furiously tried to spin the selection to their advantage.
Democrats were planning to tie Romney to Ryan's budget in Congress, and they've tried to do that repeatedly in recent days, attacking the GOP on Medicare and more.
Republicans were planning to to attack the Obama record for not doing enough to rein in spending or entitlement programs, and they've used Ryan's budget work to do just that repeatedly in recent days.
President Obama will campaign Tuesday and Wednesday in Ohio and Nevada. Vice President Biden will be in Minnesota and Michigan this week. Both men also have fundraisers in New York.
Romney & Ryan will stump for votes together on Monday in New Hampshire; Ryan will then head to Pennsylvania for rallies on Tuesday. Most of those states on the schedule in both parties are on the working list of competitive "swing" states for November, a list that might look like this:
Florida, Ohio, Nevada, Virginia, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Colorado, Wisconsin, Iowa would certainly be on my list - and maybe Michigan and Pennsylvania as well.
If you look at the averages of the poll numbers compiled by Real Clear Politics, Romney leads in only one of those swing states - North Carolina - though he is in the margin of error in Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Ohio and Virginia.
In other words, one week out from the GOP convention, President Obama seems to have the edge in this race, albeit a slight advantage.
Will that change with Paul Ryan? I'm not a big believer that running mates can do that much for you - other than hurt your candidacy - so I'm not sure Ryan was going to be a game-changing-selection anyway.
Instead, now we will see whether the Romney Team can stay disciplined and talk about the issue that has kept them close for much of the year - the economy.
If they can't keep the focus on economic issues, then each day that happens is a bonus for Team Obama.
Election Day is 11 weeks from Tuesday.
