We knew McCain’s masterful chess move of adding Palin to the ticket would cause Obama’s camp to have conniption fits. Between the anti-Palin media bias, the racism disguised as threats against her, the hacked email — they’re afraid. Very afraid.

But afraid enough to dump Biden from the ticket under the guise of poor health as some bloggers thinks the Dems are planning in early October?

It’s quite a stretch to point to the lack of Obama-Biden merchandise as proof the Big O plans to dump Joe. More likely it’s just further proof that Obama doesn’t want to keep reminding his voting base that part of his plan for change and proof he’s ready to lead involve partnering with a long-time Washington insider whose experience dwarfs Obama’s own. And then there’s that whole “sounds like” issue.

Sure, Biden’s health is of concern: the man had two surgeries to remove brain aneurysms… twenty years ago. I suppose it’s possible, as some suggest, that Biden will suddenly take a turn for the worse next month, allowing Hillary to come riding to the rescue as the antidote to Palinmania. And perhaps the assurances that Hillary didn’t really want to be VP, made by Bill Clinton on The View yesterday, were designed to deflect.

But if an early October Biden-Clinton swap does occur, think about what it does to the objections and attacks Dems have been making since Palin landed on the GOP ticket.

Clinton supporters were angry when Obama first passed over Hillary in favor of Biden. How satisfied would they really be knowing that her presence on the ticket was just a hefty helping of sloppy seconds? Sure, they might vote based on getting Hillary into office, but if that’s how Obama gets into the White House he’d have to watch his back. (Clinton didn’t refer to Robert Kennedy’s assassination earlier without reason, after all, and as we all know John Kennedy died in office.)

Most of all, consider what it would mean if Obama’s poll ratings soared in the wake of a Biden-Clinton switch? It means he should have had Clinton on the ticket in the first place, but that he didn’t exercise good judgment. Which would make a Biden-Clinton switch not only a sham for covering up the consequences of his mistake, but pretty much prove exactly what the GOP has been saying about him all along: he lacks the judgment to lead. Being led by polls and the likelihood of losing? Nope, sorry, that doesn’t count.

When McCain nominated Palin to appeal to female voters, Dems — seeing it as a statement that women are interchangeable — angrily demanded: “How dumb do you think we are?”

If there’s a “health problem” that leads Biden-Clinton swap come early October, I think we can all assume it means Obama’s answer is: very.