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My personal musings about anything that gets on my radar screen--heavily dominated by politics.

2008-08-23

First Impressions: Joe Biden 

You want to have some fun? Let's get to a town hall somewhere between Chicago and Denver, and turn off the teleprompters. Let's see Obama and Biden muddle through an event without the help of a script.

It could last about six weeks. . . . with about four and a half of those weeks being "um . . uh . . .I . . uh . . er, that is . . .we . . . um . . . "

I would love to be original and get out some clever questions already, but my brother beat me to them:

why is he putting somebody who's been in government LONGER than McCain on his ticket? If experience is a good thing to have in a running mate. . .why isn't it a great thing to have at the top of the ticket?

And what about Iraq? Here's a man (Obama) who has said that his judgement on going to war in Iraq was so good that we should just trust him on all affairs despite his razor-thin record. . .and he chooses as his #2 a man who voted for the AUMF?

In the end, Obama did what he had to do: find a way to try to reassure scared middle-class white voters while picking someone who wasn't going to overshadow him. There's absolutely no geographic advantage to this pick, as Delaware was going to vote for Obama anyway; I wonder if this means he's writing off the West? At any rate, it might get him some of those blue-collar types in the rust belt. We'll see if the gambit works.

This does, however, leave the playing field wide open for John McCain to pick. I would love it if he would go way outside the box--pick a qualified (!) woman who has a little economic background, someone like Carly Fiorino or Meg Whitman. You want to highlight the importance of the economy, make a money person your #2.

Just a thought. Not sure they have any other qualifications to be President. But it would be a "moon shot" kind of move. Bold, interesting, and unexpected.

And, in fact, he should announce his pick the morning after Hillary speaks at the DNC. Heh.
Posted by: Michael / 8/23/2008 12:08:00 AM

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