With Biden named VP choice, who does McCain choose?

So who is McCain's best bet to counter Obama's choice? Or does he want to counter his choice? Would it be best for him to not worry about his opponent and just do his own thing?

If Sen. McCain chooses to go the route Obama did and pick someone who fills in his weaknesses, who does he choose? Someone strong in the economy?

Or he could take another path and choose someone to help him win a battleground state, like Governor Crist from Florida, or Governor Pawlenty from Minnesota.

All in all, who would best help McCain get into the White House?

I think Pawlenty may be the guy. As far as the best man for the job, I think it would have been Bobby Jindel. He's catholic, a minority and extremly popular. If only...

reply to post by GD


Being Catholic, and a minority would help McCain bring in some extra voters. Jindel is young and doesn't have a whole lot of experience, and I don't think he helps the Senator's economic policy much. I also think that McCain will win Louisiana anyway, so he doesn't necessarily need Jindel to bring in voters of a specific region.

Pawlenty could help win more than just Minnesota which is a battleground state, he could also help bring in another battleground, Wisconsin. Pawlenty is an environmentalist which can also help McCain. He would be a good choice in my opinion.

I've heard Mitt Romney's name mentioned a few times as being someone very possible in this position, especially considering the economy being the major issue at the moment, which would definitely shore up McCain's credentials in this arena, at least in the eyes of the pundits..

reply to post by Inannamute


Romney would be a help as far as the economy goes. But, however, Romeny and McCain did not get along well during the primaries and McCain has already aired an ad bashing Sen. Obama for picking someone that once opposed him. A little hypocritical don't you think?

Picking Romney to win a few states isn't a bad idea either. Romney will help bring in Utah's big Mormon population. He could help to win Michigan, his home state, and could also help in Massachusetts, where he was the governor for four years.

I think who McCain chooses will say quite a bit about the political climate of the Republican Party today. If he happens to choose Lieberman, that would tell me that HE actually made the choice. I think he would like to have Lieberman, to expand his centrist base and because he LIKES the man, but I don't know if the party would allow it.

Lieberman

Aside from his Democratic pedigree, Lieberman is a supporter of abortion rights, gun control and gay rights, meaning his selection would invite a revolt from the Republican right at the Republican National Convention.

Some other options are Colin Powell, Tom Pawlenty and Mitt Romney, all of whom I think have something to bring to the McCain campaign, as well as possible risks.

Colin Powell would add an air of experience and "presidentialness" to the ticket. But he's pro-choice, which could turn away some of McCain's more conservative base.

Tom Pawlenty is young and just a really nice guy, but he's unknown. McCain voters might want him to choose someone with more celebrity, like Powell or Lieberman.

Mitt Romney seems to be in the top position, but who knows? And while he's known and would unify the party's base, this choice would have some serious problems of its own, not the least of which being that McCain and Romney were at each other during the primaries.

I'm curious to see who he chooses.

[edit on 24-8-2008 by Benevolent Heretic]

reply to post by wisefoolishness


John McCain will choose someone who is younger to counter the age issue. He may choose to go the diversity route to try to court the independent voters. The conservative voters will vote for him no matter who he chooses.

I will guess he will choose Mitt Romney, as he is informed on the economy. The problem is both men do not get along with each other as evidenced in the primary race. Watch the debates and look at the faces of both Gov. Romney and Sen. McCain when they are debating.

I also wonder who Bob Barr will pick as a running mate.

Edit spelling

[edit on 8/24/2008 by kidflash2008]

So far we have Mitt Romney and Tim Pawlenty being favorites, two picks that would certainly help McCain.

But no one has mentioned an ATS favorite Ron Paul. What do you guys think about a McCain-Paul ticket? Seems like a long shot to me, but you never know. He doesn't help the age factor (I believe he's 73), or bring in a state that McCain probably won't win without him (Texas). It's just one of those things that would shake it up a bit, and of course everyone loves "what if..." scenarios.

It never entered my mind that McCain might choose Ron Paul. But I don't think Ron Paul would have any interest in being a VP in the current system. Paul is in a different Universe entirely, politically, than either John McCain or Barack Obama. Even if McCain asked (which I seriously doubt he would), I don't think there's ANY way Paul would consider it.

On Paul's age... He wears it extremely well. I wouldn't have a problem voting for him for president. He is aware, intelligent, quick and brilliant.

reply to post by wisefoolishness


Would Ron Paul run with Bob Barr on the Libertarian ticket? That would be interesting to see how well it does.
McCain is looking at these reasons when choosing a running mate:
age (to counter the age argument)
economic policies
someone to appeal to moderates

Excuse me if I remain outside the box, as per usual, but what if he hijacked the Change slogan by not picking a politician?

McCain has a built-in advantage on security and he doesn't need to worry too much about stimulating the base because the Republicans are already leading in projected base participation (due in part to the remaining bitterness over the democratic primary fight).

He's still losing on Domestic issues though- energy and jobs are a big deal.

So why not feel out T. Boone Pickens?

Pickens was a supporter of George W Bush and helped fund Swiftboat Veterans for Truth, but he has recently renounced his Republican affiliation and stopped giving to political campaigns, saying that the candidates are dropping the ball on enegy policy. USNews.com

McCain could gain some good earned media by staging a "road to Damascus" experience for his party on energy policy and bringing a high profile former-Republican back into the fold by embracing a populist issue like enegy independence.

This perfectly lines up against Obama's weaknesses, which Obama seems to think his running mate selection will address. Obama is having a hard time relating to blue collar people still, which is something he hopes that Biden can help him with. But if McCain comes back over the top with a surprise pick like Pickens, he laugh at how cute Obama and Biden look trying to go slumming while he, as the candidate who "gets it" is actually embracing change for the working man. That's not even to mention the money that Pickens can bring in, which will be very important as the campaign goes more negative.

[edit on 24-8-2008 by The Vagabond]

T. Boone Pickens would be an unexpected pick, and would help McCain fix any holes in his energy policy, thus helping his economic policy.

Also going outside the box, I have read about the possibility of General David Petraeus being John McCain's VP pick. Petraeus is a Five Star General and very smart. However, he doesn't bring too much to the table that John McCain doesn't have already.

One of McCain's major advantages which he must beware of in his running mate choice is that he isn't as much of a lightning rod as some others.

So far the most recent favorable/unfavorable ratings I can find from gallup are from March unfortunately, but Here they are.

McCain's unfavorable rating was 6 points lower than Obama's at the time, and a wopping 17 points lower than that of Hillary Clinton (then still in the race).

That makes Obama have to work that much harder to smear John McCain in the eyes of independents, or to paint John McCain as a threat which Democrats must mobilize to stop.
On the other hand, anecdotal evidence suggests that Republicans are seeing Obama as a threat which must be stopped. Some have even characterized him as the Anti-Christ in a literal sense.

McCain needs to be careful about overdoing it with attempts to stimulate his base and accidentally stimulating a backlash from the so-far lackluster Democratic base. In that sense Petraeus would be the perfect storm of bad moves. All he does is add hotly contested military credentials to McCain's virtually unassailable ones, highlight a losing issue, and strengthen Obama's ability to paint McCain as a continuation of the Bush legacy.

McCain needs somebody without too many well defined positions who is strong on economics or energy. Going with a domestic policy guy who has too much affiliation with the religious right could be very dangerous.

reply to post by The Vagabond


The problem with Mr Pickens is he does not support more offshore drilling and does not have experience. Sen. McCain is going out of his way to hammer Obama on the drilling and experience bit. He would lose those arguments if he were to pick Mr Pickens.
Something that is not discussed here is McCain and minority voters. They now make up a big chunk of the voting block. George Bush needed 40% of the Hispanic vote to win, and he received a little more than that. McCain is trailing in both those departments. Even if McCain does well with blue collar workers, he needs more of the blue collar minority vote to win. He needs diversity, and that is why he may pick Condoleeza Rice for VP.

Some great insights so far, I will offer a few opinions in the spirit of the discussion.

Mitt Romney - Great economic credentials and could help with the
Mormon vote but (as pointed out) he and McCain are like oil and water and McCain is known to hold grudges.

Bobby Jindahl - Has a great future with the GOP but needs to rack up some more experience. Look for him in the future. Great speaker.

Ron Paul - He was perceived as a fringe candidate in the GOP and is a little too radical to run as VP to McCain. Too honest for his own good, shame for us. Never had a chance in this system even with some hardcore support.

Tom Pawlenty - Would bring some more conservative credibility to the ticket, has some foreign policy experience. Has some decent economic experience and is a McCain insider already.

In my opinion it will be Mike Huckabee. Reaffirms the religious base. A good contrast to Biden (would be some great debates). Brings economic experience. Puts a Southerner on one of the tickets which has been important in past elections.

Didn't include Colin Powell or Tom Ridge as I think that they are being floated for reaction but are not really being considered.

I think that would make Pickens a good compromise for McCain, Kidflash. It allows McCain to wash his hands of any criticism about trying to "drill his way out of a hole". Polls already show 60% of the country thinks the candidates are flip-flopping, so what has McCain got to lose if he decides that two sollutions are better than one?

reply to post by Benevolent Heretic

I think who McCain chooses will say quite a bit about the political climate of the Republican Party today. If he happens to choose Lieberman, that would tell me that HE actually made the choice. I think he would like to have Lieberman, to expand his centrist base and because he LIKES the man, but I don't know if the party would allow it.

Very true. In regard to picking Lieberman, choosing him would be a personal choice instead of a strategic one. It would not gain very many Democrats - he is now considered an outsider although he votes along their party lines. If anything, McCain needs to add a more conservative and religious VP to unify the Republican base. Lieberman would not add any stray liberals or Jewish voters to the ticket, those segments have already taken the sides they wish to choose. The Republican Party needs a loyalist rather than a crossover to help support McCain.

well I am a middle aged female who has not been sold to either side yet. I didn't care to much for Hillary either, but It was mentioned tonight on the DNC that Obama needs to try to win that huge group of people who were going to follow Hillary who happen to be this large middle age female voter group.

My choice that I would love to see, however I think she has voiced that she is not Interested in running for an elected office is Condoleezza rice.

I love this woman! she is strong, Independent, smart, shes a diplomat, she has come from a very poor and rough background and whats really interesting is that she and her family were originally democrats but changed parties because the dem's would not allow her father to register to vote back in the day in Alabama, but the republicans would allow him to register, so he became a republican. with this being said, McCain is a pretty liberal republican, and he can swing his opinions around pretty freely, i think she would be a great VP for him, because she does have a lot of compassion and care for others.

I think she would be able to work with the democrats on issues and help avoid stalemates, since she makes a living at diplomacy. she also has a background in business, she helped get stanford university get out of its $20 million dollar deficit in the 90's, so she definetly has a business sense.

"I'm very proud we're fiscally sound now," Rice said. "Even after we had already been through $40 million-plus of budget rejection under [former Provost] Jim Rosse, who had started this process . . . we still had $20 million to go and there wasn't much low-hanging fruit left," she recalled. But she moved the university to "revenue-constrained" budgeting ­ meaning you've got to live within your means ­ and went through with additional cuts. Such action "does mean that people get laid off, and that's not easy," she says.

source link


As a woman voter I would vote the McCain/Rice ticket in a heartbeat, even though i don't plan on voting for McCain at the moment.

below is a link to condi's wikipedia page, its very interesting.

condoleezza rice's wikipedia page

reply to post by sheila947


I have read where she is interested in private. If McCain picks a moderate or pro choice Veep, will the conservative base come out in droves for him like they did Pres. Bush? I think they will vote for him, but he may lose a couple of percentage points to Bob Barr. He has to look at what will win him the election, and he needs to attract minority voters. Most of Hillary's voters will vote for Sen. Obama. The "rift" is being over played by the media (as always). Sen. Obama is going to court the Reagan Democrats, and McCain has to make inroads in the black and Hispanic vote, as they are growing fast.
That is why he needs to have a diverse ticket.

I really wouldn't be surprised to see Joe Lieberman.

The majority of voting Americans do not get their news from the 24 hour cable news networks these days, they get them from the nightly news off one of the "big three networks" (NBC, CBS and ABC). So with that said, it could be argued that the majority of Americans won't even know about, or simply have forgot about the spat he was in with the Democratic party back in 2006 that made him go independent.

I would be willing to bet that the average voting American will remember Joe Lieberman most as Al Gore's VP running mate back in 2000. Lieberman travels with McCain constantly, and considering that there is a good population of Clinton supporters who will not vote for Obama in November, what better way to convince that group of voters to vote for McCain, than by having Al Gore's former running mate run with McCain in November?

In the eyes of an average American voter, or a Clinton supporter who will not vote for Obama, what better way to "reach across the isle" and show that you will not play partisan politics (which is one of Obama's major selling points), than to choose Al Gore's former running mate from the election that most Democrats feel they should of won to begin with? I think it would be very wise to choose Lieberman as his running mate, although I personally wouldn't want to see it.

I still have a gut feeling on Mitt Romney, though.