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Wednesday, September 10 BRATTLEBORO -- It's 4:30 on a Friday afternoon in late August, and Mike Thornton is motoring to a gig at Ole Miss.
But his mind isn't on the road. The news that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has been tapped to be John McCain's running mate is just a couple of hours old, and Thornton's mind is whirring. What rhymes with Palin? ... What's funny about Alaska?
It's an unusual way to pass the time, but that's how life is at the intersection of Broadway and the 24-hour news cycle, the junction of comedy and current events.
Thornton is a member of the Capitol Steps, the well-known political musical satire group that has been skewering politicians on both sides of the aisle for 27 years. The challenge is to keep the material fresh. Dan Quayle jokes don't cut it anymore ... mostly.
"We try to keep it brand new," said Thornton via cellphone, somewhere south of the Mason-Dixon line. "Probably once a week, we're changing stuff."
Sharpened wits at the ready, it doesn't take long for the Capitol Steps to turn news into laughs. Seconds into the phone conversation, Thornton was explaining proudly that he'd already plugged into Palin's name into the Steps' trademark "Lirty Dies" routine, where the first letters of names or phrases are switched around -- he used "Hike...