Gephardt carries more weight in midwest than Edwards does in the south

[digno dave]

I just saw this brought up on Nightline and it seemed like a good point.
There seem to be more battleground states in the Midwest and around the Great Lakes than in the South. Don't we have a better chance at winning Ohio and Missouri than we do winning Georgia and North Carolina? So...maybe Gephardt is the way to go. I personally was really pissed at him for helping to lose so many seats in 2002 but he campaigned very well as a presidential candidate, i thought.

Like they said, it is going to come down to 7 or 8 states in the end.

[David Dunham]

1. Edwards as VP will give better speeches than Gore did under Clinton

[jus_the_facts]

2. all the SOUTH hasn't gotten to vote YET......

....so this is pure conjecture! :(

[Gloria]

3. The CNN talkers remarked that Gephardt gave Kerry tons of

support in a number of states, inc. Ohio. It wasn't talked about much, but apparently it really was important....

[digno dave]

4. yep

I think Edwards message has faded a bit. But then again, did Gephardt ever even have a message?

[PVnRT]

5. Missouri, maybe

Elsewhere, though, no, and this is from someone who actually lives in the midwest, not an ABC correspondent who lives in New York City.

[Cuban_Liberal]

7. I agree, and I'm a Midwesterner, too.

Gephardt would be ZERO help to the ticket in the Midwest.

[PVnRT]

9. He's well known on DU

but not amongst the general public - that's just how it is.

Edwards would help more than Gephardt, as would Harkin, Clark, or Graham.

[Cuban_Liberal]

11. Or Durbin.

There are LOTS of candidates who would help us in the Midwest more than Gephardt.

[Bombtrack]

8. Exactly. Alot of the models posing as journalists with independant thought

processes are the people who spread this idiotic wisdom. Things like "ohio is the florida of 2004" or the spread of the absurd notion that primary appeal and success is parallel to general election electability and focused appeal.

Cambpell Brown at NBC epitomizes this

[tameszu]

12. Campbell Brown is great just for model value alone

Actually, I find her to be much more useful than a lot of the other useless reporters: she looks good, some of the stuff she says is at least half-right, and because she doesn't blab all of the time, it seriously cuts down the amount of dumb stuff that comes out of her mouth.

I.E.: Any Faux anchor, Mort Kondracke, Bill Schneider, Tweety (some of the stuff he says is actually half intelligent, but you have to dig it out from so much stupidity), etc.

[Bombtrack]

6. Their both bad choices, but Gephardt is worse

Gephardt is not the favorite son of the midwest, he's not even the favorite son of Missouri. He's only been elected to an urban district.

And Iowa showed that big and or/Organized labor has no favorite son, and that Gephardt certainly doesn't have the grasp of it or any of these groups that his proponents say he does.

He's a hackish career politician with zero charisma.

Bob Graham, however is the most popular politician in the biggest swingstate, that also happens to be the bluest red state in 2000 and the only southern state that is a tossup for Kerry.

[tameszu]

13. I like Bob Graham much more than Gep

Gep is soooo boring. He has hypnotic un-eyebrows.

Graham might not exactly light up a room, but he's likable (to me, at least).

[Zynx]

10. I don't think so. I don't think he does much for you in Missouri.

He is from one St. Louis district that is not representative of the state. He is not popular in the rest of it and would not bring you it.

[littlejoe]

14. Having lived in Missouri for decades, I can tell you that

Gephardt's influence really doesn't reach much past St. Louis. Kansas Citians don't care for him. He had absolutely no pull in Iowa. In short, he would make a poor strategic choice for Kerry's running mate.