VICE PRESIDENT NOMINEES May 11, 2008
Posted by wmmbb in US Politics.trackback
R Cheney has changed the meaning of what it is to be Vice President. Obama is virtually now the Democratic Presidential nominee, so it will be interesting to see who is selected in the VP role. The same interest will be in McCain’s selection.The role of the VP is to complement, not overshadow, the presidential candidate, yet be somebody who might credibly assume the office of President. This year the interest will be age, gender and “race”, as well as the more conventional need to balance the ticket by recognizing people from different regions, with an eye to the electoral votes they may be able to swing.
So ideally Obama could be looking from someone from Texas or Florida to increase the appeal of his ticket. Texas with 34 Electoral College votes would be a good option since it is both southern and western. While Pennsylvania and Ohio, with 41 electoral votes between them, might be the critical states again, I suspect they are too close to Obama’s home base in Illinois. This is a problem that McCain does not have, and reasonable to expect his VP nominee to come from these parts.
I doubt that Obama will have Clinton as his VP, since she carries some baggage, not least her husband, although it would be a good gender-age match and go some way to re-unite the traditional Democratic Party supporters. The problem that Senator McCain has that he does not have the Reagan charm and cannot get away with outrageous statements about age and experience. He might be tempted to have a Latino running mate, but probably will not.
I hear there are plenty of potential candidates. I suspect that Bill Richardson might be considered by Obama, but Obama has to connect with the white, working class. In these matters it is not just a matter of personalities but also policies.
In the meantime, Clinton still is persisting with her dream, and her supporters are braving the street corners on her behalf. Obama has been busted. He is a politician. Imagine that!
ELSEWHERE:
You know what democracy is the problem, since Robert Novak at Human Events (via Possibly relate posts ) observes:
If all caucuses were eliminated and only primaries used in picking nominees, Obama’s lead of 130 in delegates would become an advantage for Clinton of 45 delegates. The bigger problem is proportional representation replacing the winner-take-all system that enabled Republicans to get their nominee on Feb. 5 Super Tuesday. Without the “reforms” enacted by Democrats during the decade following the party’s 1968 fiasco, Clinton might have clinched the nomination by now.
This argument is a bit like the cricketer who can play well on some pitches not on others. I think the answer should be to increase the opportunity for choice, not constrain it, but any electoral system have different requirements.
So many people are discounting Hillary Clinton as the Vice Presidential nominee to Obama, but what they seem to ignore is that he wont’ win without her, period. Let’s face the facts: First, Obama’s only constituencies that will earn him votes are – Blacks, younger people and some few liberal Whites who will stick with him no matter what. But these groups will not be enough to win him the White House. Where Blacks are the majority when it comes to voting, those states are RED STATES, such as ALABAMA, GEORGIA, SOUTH CAROLINA, MISSISSIPPI, to name a few are. A democrat will never win these states. Only two democrats ever won Georgia: Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter. If there is going to be any change to suit Obama, may be Georgia; but that state is still up in the air.
As for younger voters, yes they are extremely energized, but they should NOT be counted upon too much, otherwise Obama could loose the election. They are never reliable like the older voters. He has to be very careful in counting upon younger people. And White liberals alone must not be counted upon. Who knows, some of them may vote for McCain.
Hillary Clinton’s voters are the MOST important voters Obama really needs not only to win, but to win big, which will give him a clear cut majority to bring the country with him to govern. These groups are: Latinos, Blue Color workers, Women, Older people, Catholics. My goodness, looking at these very powerful and reliable voting blocks, I am wondering why are people blind-sided to read between the lines. This woman is a winner, whom Obama needs to win in all the swing states.
As the search for V.P. is currently underway, Obama MUST not be blind-sided by phony comments such as Hillary has a baggage. Obama himself has huge baggage, taking into account his former pastor, his own bitter comment, his wife, Michelle, his former close associate who has been found guilty by jury in Chicago courts in recent weeks. The list could go on and on. So every body has baggage to worry about; but that must not make Obama to over look Hillary’s powerful and most reliable democratic voting blocks. These are the facts that MUST convince Obama to pick Hillary.
Thanks for commenting Lamine.
I do not wholly disagree with you, except I do not think that Obama would be unwise to have Senator Clinton as her running mate because of the presence of Bill.
Obama seems to me to be a very effective “retail”, or is it “working the meeting”, politician, and hence his success with the caucuses. However, in the Presidential Election he is going to have to win States, and that is where Senator Clinton’s arguments come into play. Her relative success in the Primaries might in part be explained by her having the support of the Democratic Machine, which will in the normal course of events carry large states such as New York. I do not see the Democrats losing in Michigan, but places like Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida and Texas are not as clear.
There, I agree, the voting blocks and social groupings (social class) will be critical. Here, according to me at least, the underlying issue is the voting system that creates the two party system, the winner takes all electoral system that does not fully allow the aggregation and negotiation between different social interests.This is the same voting system that has acted to exclude women and minorities from full representation, so that Senator Clinton becomes an exception rather than being one good female candidate among others.
In the longer frame of events, I am guessing that Senator Clinton’s campaign will very significant. Changing the voting system is a fundamental change, and usually fundamental changes do not occur until there is a crisis or catastrophe. The likelihood of the latter is greater as long as G W Bush remains President.
go oboma
I take you are suggesting Matt that Obama will bomb out. Perhaps. Somebody suggested that the next few post-convention weeks will crucial.
It seems to me that there may well be tensions in the Republican support base created by the influence of the Christian Right. The Palin appointment may add to those pressures. Maybe it will be the Republicans that implode. It is an odd position to take the party has not controlled the White House and Congress for most of the past eight years.
Whereas, I think the Democrats, successfully and unexpectedly in their Convention created a sense of unity after the fractious and prolonged primaries. Clinton’s role in the election, if any, will now be interesting to observe.
When has Obama bombed actually? Maybe you could say in not attracting the working class support in Primaries(I am thinking of Pennsylvania). True in a close election Pa, Ohio, Michigan may make the difference between success and failure. As always there are issues related to turnout, turn off, and the vagaries of the unreliable electoral system.
I think the problem with Palin as a VP is that perhaps she can deliver the Christian Right, but can she deliver, for example, Florida beset by mortgage foreclosures? Of course, it goes without saying that they will keep Palin under wraps away from any independent scrutiny.