VP Round-up (both sides)

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

Considering the CW top tier:

Bayh: A weak choice. Aside from maybe helping in Indiana and being vanilla safe would be sort of a non-pick. Non controversy. Looks like the VP in a movie. Very few VPs can deliver a state on their own, let alone a state that hasn't gone Dem in ages.

Biden: So obviously the right pick it's hardly worth belaboring. Masterful attack dog who is the only person whose name has even been floated who can address McCain as an inferior without raising defensive hackles in the MSM.

Kaine: If picked would prove that Obama sold his soul to the devil at the crossroads, cannot possibly lose and is just having fun fucking with everybody. Kaine (who I have voted for, BTW) looks like nothing, sounds like nothing and adds nothing to anything. Picking Kaine would be a show of insecurity since his chief asset is that he couldn't upstage Obama if he was carried by a dozen naked Rockettes. BTW, Kaine would not deliver VA on his own. VA will do what it does. The only Democratic politician in VA with real star power is Warner (D). Also, if Kaine resigns he will be replaced as Gov. by a RW nut, so the pick would have bad, bad karma.

_________________________

McCain is in a funny spot. If he makes a pick that appeals to his base he cannot win. So he has to pick someone with Indy/moderate appeal and hope the nut-right can be scared into turning out anyway to keep the muslim antichrist out of the White House.

Lieberman: Might help a little in Florida, but if Florida is in play the game is up anyway. Would lose his home state by 20 points and alienate fundies like crazy. I'd need a lot of polling to have an opinion of how Joementum plays with Reagan Dems. I see him as a losing choice.

Ridge: The best option. He's one of those pugs it is hard to hate. Very well regarded in PA. Couldn't carry the state on his back, but if PA went red its curtains for Obama, so Ridge has a Hail-Mary pass quality. A war hero, looks like a retired NFL QB. His scandals as director of Homeland Security would only have traction with people who are voting for Obama anyway. Being pro-choice, he would alienate the religious-right, but any McCain pick that doesn't is suicide anyway. McCain's only path to victory is in the suburbs. This is a down-year for pugs in general so even if he picked Huckabee there won't be a rural turn-out miracle like 2004.

Romney: The Jeff to McCain's Mutt. Polished and amoral and capable of at least pretending to take the economy seriously. HOWEVER every objection to Ridge and Lieberman as hurting with the religious right applies equally to Mormon Romney. Helps in Michigan, though probably less than Bayh helps in Indiana. (In home-state terms helps more than Kaine, less than Ridge.) What makes Mittens attractive is that Michigan is this years Fl & OH... the winner of Michigan will win the presidency.

Pawlenty: McCain is the under-dog and cannot fuck around with cute picks. Pawlenty is a very bright guy but unlikely to carry his state and not so exciting. The pug equivalent of Kaine... a pick made only to try to carry a state that will not be decisive. (Obama might carry VA, but VA cannot put him over the top. If he wins VA he'll be winning every close state. And if McCain carries Minn. then it means he's winning all the close states.)

[trewsx11]

1. Obama's VP = will be a complete surprise.

So it's a waste of time speculating on Bayh, Kaine, Sebelius, Clark, etc...

McCain's VP = who cares?

[Sulawesi]

2. Clark?

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

4. I love Wes, but he's a bad politician.

I didn't include him because he's not in the MSM CW shortlist, though he's on DU's shortlist.

[ruggerson]

3. Pawlenty brings a lot more to McCain than Kaine does to Obama

Pawlenty has plenty of fundamentalist cred and would shore up the base. He's also low profile, so the independents would not immediately blanch.

I agree about Kaine. One of the worst possible picks. Biden would be great, if this election drifts more and more towards a referendum on national security rather than the economy, Biden is the serious choice. If the recession weighs heavily in the polls, it frees Obama to make a bolder pick, like Schweitzer.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

5. Agreed, he may do well in the behind-the-scenes church politiking

I probably sell Pawlenty short because I think McCain needs a bigger splash. I've been thinking about Ridge as McCain's best shot at winning, as opposed to keeping it close. The best the religious base can do this year is make it close; Bush-Kerry with McCain as Kerry.

McCain could lose 30 states with Ridge, but with a slim chance of actually winning. I see keeping suburban women close as the key. (Obama will win suburban women; the question is the margin.)

McCain has put all his chips on National Security, and Ridge is a great compliment to what is preordained to be the entirety of McCain's campaign. A two-Vietnam veteran ticket. Rah, rah, rah.

And since McCain looks near death, his VP could matter a little more than average... more a potential CIC pick than a mere favorite son.

[OmahaBlueDog]

6. I think Palin is McCain's best option

.. for the reasons I posted in your other thread.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=6640887&mesg_id=6643228

As for Obama, I like your analysis of Bayh, and I think that's the precise reason he'll be picked; it's the bland, do-no-harm approach. Get someone who won't piss anyone off, and who won't screw up a debate like Dan Quayle or James Stockdale.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

7. I read your Palin comments. Interesting. Would be daring.

[StevieM]

8. I agree that McCain may very well pick Sarah Palin. I thought Obama was going to pick

Tim Kaine, but now I am not so sure. It looks like he is moving toward Evan Bayh, but Biden could definitely still be in the mix.

Steve

[OmahaBlueDog]

12. Me too on Kaine

..and I agree that if this Georgia thing stays in the headlines, Biden's foreign policy knowledge (and his attack dog qualities) make him attractive.

[ruggerson]

9. Palin's kids are named

Track, Willow, Bristol, Piper and Trig.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

10. I hope Bristol is a boy and/or never moves to the UK

(Bristol being Cockney rhyming slang for breast. Bristol City = Titty)

[Unsane]

11. My last call--Joe Biden

Attack dog with gravitas.


Unfortunately it will probably be Bayh.

Your analysis of Ridge has me worried.

I tend to like our chances in Michigan this year regardless of GOP VP. Two Dem senators, a Dem governor, and a terrible economy, it should be an Obama state.

[Mass]

13. I have to agree on both sides. Biden seems the obvious choice in the CW's shortlist,

Ridge is probably a lot more dangerous than some here would like to believe. But, once again, people here tend to underestimate Republicans in general and end surprised when we do not win (How could they lose to this idiot?).

[salonghorn70]

14. Bayh Is The Obvious Choice Not Biden

Bayh will carry Indiana. Biden's Delaware is already solid Democratic and there is no other specific state where Biden can make a difference. Bayh will help in rural areas in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Ohio and will help with Reagan Democrats. I don't think Biden would be much help there. Bayh will be perceived as a great choice and as someone who could assume the office, if needed. Biden would fit that too. I think all the choices being mentioned would be great although the more that I think about Kaine I wonder if his experience would cause a problem. As I said they are all great choices, I just think Bayh would be the best.

[Czolgosz]

15. Biden is perhaps the worst pick I've heard mentioned thus far. His record of favoring corporate

interests over middle class economic security combined with his coziness with lobbyists and mixed with his change-over-my-dead-body 35 years in DC are a killer.