#28 Vice Presidential Musings on Richardson, Strickland, Webb, Kaine, Ritter, Salazar, Brown and Bayh

You may remember that I was a strong supporter of Bill Richardson to be the presidential nominee. I am not a strong supporter of him to be the Vice Presidential nominee, even though his presence on the ticket might help relieve some of the Hispanic opposition to an African-American at the top of the ticket. Two reasons I oppose him as the VP candidate: (1) he would bring only five electoral votes from New Mexico; (2) the Clintons view him as having "betrayed" them by coming out for Obama; and yesterday he indicated that Hillary and Bill had lost the current campaign because of the "sense of entitlement" that they projected while she ran.

With his domestic experience currently as governor and previously as part of Bill's cabinet, and his international experience as UN ambassador and negotiatior, Richardson would make a strong Secretary of State possibility. I think Hillary would make a strong Secretary of Health and Human Servies, but would she be willing to sit in the same room much less work in the same cabinet with Richardson?

Obama has a slightly different problem from McCain. Obama projects vigor, yes, but he also projects youth and inexperience. McCain projects oldness and tiredness; he'd like to project the wisdom that allegedly comes with age, but I haven't seen that yet. His handlers have some work to do. Would Obama do well to choose as his VP candidate someone fifteen to twenty years older than he? If so, Ohio's governor Ted Strickland would work well (though he was an early supporter of Hillary Clinton): he will be 67 by election time. Virginia's senator Jim Webb is 62, and can counter McCain's Vietnam experience: Webb is an Annapolis graduate and served in the Marines in Vietnam.

Or, if Obama wants someone only a decade or so older, he has more choices. Virginia's governor Tim Kaine is 50 years old, and was an early Obama supporter; Colorado's governor Bill Ritter will be 56 by the election; Colorado's senator Ken Salazar is 53 already (and might help bring some of the Hispanic vote to the Democratic ticket); Ohio's senator Sherrod Brown will be 56 a few days after the election; and Indiana's senator (and former governor) Evan Bayh is 52. Bayh, incidentally, was a national co-chair of Hillary's campaign.

However, Strickland, Brown, and Bayh are all midwesterners, and the presence of any one of them on the ticket would not provide the 'geographical balance' that either party generally prefers. Of course, as I've pointed out previously, Clinton/Gore had no geographical balance either. An additional problem with Bayh is that the Indiana governor is a Republican: were Bayh to be elected Vice President, the governor would appoint a Republican to fill his position, and the Democrats would lose a senate seat, a loss they would have to make up by replacing a Republican in some other state's election.

If Obama is looking for a VP candidate not from the midwest, then Kaine or Webb from Virginia, or Ritter or Salazar from Colorado (either could be a favorite-son candidate at the convention this year in Denver) could serve, and would provide greater geographical balance.

[For more in-depth discussion of all of these good people, see my posts # 7-9.]

Advantages to Strickland or Bayh: as strong early supporters of Hillary Clinton, either could be an additional means of healing the rift between Obama and Clinton, and might enable Hillary to campaign more strongly and convince her supporters to vote more readily for Obama. Disadvantage: both are from the midwest.

Advantage to the elite eight discussed above: they'd all be excellent candidates and would add, in different ways, to the ticket.

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