Obama has shown he has better judgement than Al Gore or John Kerry

[Hokie]

Don't get me wrong. I am a great fan of both Al Gore and John Kerry. However, they both made terrible choices for running mates. Both of them used a pick targeted at certain states and portions of the electorate. That is the conventional wisdom of the "balancing the ticket" approach. Lieberman was supposed to bring the moderates and Florida Jewish vote. He was also picked to enforce separation from Bill Clinton. I know we could argue that it really worked however, regardless of the fact that Florida was stolen, it happened only because the election was close enough that it could be stolen. Lieberman's performance against Cheney in the VP debate was the most pathetic debate performance since Admiral Stockdale. That is why I pray that McCain picks Joe Lieberman. Edwards was a better choice than Lieberman but still brought little to help the ticket. He didn't help in any of the border states. He was not good in the debate against a pro like Cheney.

Biden doesn't bring any particular portion of the electorate. However, he will be a formidable campaigner and debater. He is a pro at handling the press. He can be the bulldog that will bite John McCain's behind and not let go while Obama stays above the fray. I thought the 3 best choices not in any particular order were Clark, Biden, and Richardson. Anyone who thought it should be Hillary is naive. Hillary had disaster written all over and she would never have taken it for many reasons. Yes, she is already running for 2012 in case Obama loses but she knows this is not likely. If she in any way is seen as causing Obama to lose she is toast. That is why this was such a crushing defeat for her. I hope she runs against Reid as Majority Leader next year. She would be great.

[book_worm]

1. I agree this was his first big decision and it was a solid and intelligent one.

Lieberman got his sacrimonious self on the ticket in 2000 just because he criticized Bill Clinton. Edwards wound up #2 because it was felt he had a better connection with "plain folks" than Kerry. Biden is somebody who can connect with people and is still a powerful presence in his own right with a wealth of experience. I can't fault Obama's choice.

[sharesunited]

2. Does she have a strong enough love of the law to accept a Supreme Court appointment?

I'd really love to see THAT!

[Cosmocat]

3. Won't happen ...

No president could withstand the public backlash that would come with nominating Hillary.

The fundies are batshiite crazy about the presidency, there is only ont thing they are more crazed about, and that is the supreme court. There would literally be acts of anarchy by the fundies if the antichrist, and to them either Clinton is the embodiement of the antichrist, were nominated for the court.

There is not an R senator ALIVE who would be able to vote to confirm her, it would be the most acrimonious SC process in history, and again, she would NOT get the votes in the senate to confirm, and the president, BO presumably, would be vilified for the failure.

[Frances]

4. I know the fundie leaders are against the Clintons

but I'd love to see statistics on how the fundies voted in 92 and 96. I don't see how Clinton carried any Southern states (which he did) if he didn't get a reasonable number of fundie votes.

[Thrill]

7. The Republicans would burn it down. Before they let either Clinton go on the Bench

[Frances]

5. I watched the Lieberman-Cheney debate

and was devastated when Lieberman said something to the effect that he admired all the millions Cheney had made in the private sector. Cheney replied to the effect that not a dime had come from the taxpayer. Lieberman didn't respond to that claim, which IMO was a lie because I think Halliburton was getting a lot of money from government contracts.

[Hokie]

6. God, yes

I can remember that like it was yesterday. I almost threw my shoe at the television when Joe let that line go without challenging it. I turned off the debate a that point.

[Frances]

10. So glad that someone else "shares my pain" over that debate

[ProSense]

8. It wasn't their judgment.

The Democratic Party from 2000 to 2004 made decision for the sake of unity and trying to win that they had no business making. It's the same kind of attempted extortion that surrounded the push with Hillary.

[highplainsdem]

9. Clinton had made it clear she'd accept, and the polls all showed a majority of Democrats wanted her

on the ticket. So for that reason, I don't think this was the best choice. We'll see how it plays out, how many Clinton supporters this costs Obama.

Otherwise, I think Biden's fine. I just think our chances of winning are much less without a unity ticket. And I believe that because of the polls we've seen so far.

I hope, for our party's sake, that I'm wrong and this hasn't greatly hurt our chances of winning in November.

And of course I'll vote for the ticket, as I always do. I just don't understand Obama not choosing Clinton. I don't believe she'd have hesitated at all to ask him to be her running mate -- especially if polls showed a majority of Democrats wanted a unity ticket.

[blm]

11. I'm not a big Edwards fan but he did EARN serious consideration in 2004 and had McAuliffe bothered

to secure the election process in the four years he had to do so by strengthening party infrastructure state by state like Dean has the throughout his stewardship of the DNC, then Kerry-Edwards would be running for re-election right now. (And I highly doubt Edwards would have sought comfort elsewhere under that circumstance.)