On Day 3 of the RNC, vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin took center stage -- along with domestic oil drilling.

The drill-here, drill-now message poured out all over the convention to the roars of a pumped-up Republican crowd, who spontaneously took up the chant: "Drill, Baby, Drill!" Astonishing.

The phrase was coined by Maryland Lieutenant Governor Michael Steele, who said during his remarks:

So, do you want to put your country first? Then let's reduce our dependency on foreign sources of oil and promote oil and gas production at home.

In other words, drill baby drill! And drill now!

It stuck.

Today the New York Times published its picks for the presidential primaries (Clinton & McCain) in two lengthy pieces that filled its editorial columns.

In the 1147 words devoted to discussing Hillary's merits and positions on the issues, the words "energy", "global warming" and "climate" did not appear in a single instance.

In the 737 words devoted to discussing McCain's merits and positions on the issues, "global warming" was mentioned twice -- both times in the context of discussing McCain's ability to take a stand in the face of his party's orthodoxy. The word "energy" did not appear in a single instance.

We -- and many others --have noted before how the media has egregiously ignored the issue of global warming in campaign coverage; and how pollsters similarly ignore the issue.

And now the New York Times, the newspaper of record, has committed the same inexcusable error of omission. Here's further evidence, from its commentary on Clinton and Obama:

On the major issues, there is no real gulf separating the two. They promise an end to the war in Iraq, more equitable taxation, more effective government spending, more concern for social issues, a restoration of civil liberties and an end to the politics of division of George W. Bush and Karl Rove.

It's at times like these that the abbreviated exclamations of the blogosphere -- WTF, OMFG, etc. -- are so useful and appropriate.

Kenneth Green of the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) rightly points out the Democrat-GOP divide on the climate change issue in the 2008 election. But he euphemistically calls it a “climate gap” when a giant ocean sits between the two parties' candidates on the issue -- too vast to be bridged, too important to be dismissed as politics-as-usual.

First it was the Sunday morning talk shows, and now the Gallup pollsters. Mum's the word on climate change in the 2008 presidential election, thanks in large part to America's most prominent opinion makers and their total lack of prodding and pulling on the climate issue.

Be sure to tune in tonight as CBS asks the presidential candidates about global warming. Here's the question they are using. Ready?

Is Global Warming Overblown?

Of all the ways a responsible news organization can ask questions about global warming, why did CBS decide to ask the question inside a skeptical and meaningless frame? You can hang that question around anything -- the absence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, or the subprime mortgage lending crisis, or even Hurricane Katrina. You can question anything on TV, where nothing is real.