Who will be Romney’s VP pick?
It is a given that Romney will be the GOP’s nominee this year, so who will be willing to “take one for the team” and go down in flames?
Romney/Santorum: No. Rick will be looking to 2016 and I doubt that creating “party unity” is going to be on his agenda. 0%
Romney/Huntsman: Too sane. Also, an all LDS ticket? Not so likely. 0%
Romney/Bachmann: A crazy conservative woman to make Romney seem sane while winning back women who hate women? 1%
Romney/Gingrich: The most hated man in America? We could only wish for that pick. 1%
Romney/Cain: Cain who? Oh yeah, that pizza guy who cheats on his wife 1%
Romney/Paul (Ron): The Paulites finally get a crumb from the GOP power brokers ? Too crazy. I don’t see it happening. 2%
Romney/Perry: This would warm the hearts of the GOP base, and Dem strategists alike. GWBush IV, dare we dream? 3%
Romney/Jeb Bush: Covers the Texas/Florida crowd and gets Jeb’s name out there for 2016, but also allows team Obama to run against GWBush again 4%
Romney/Christie: The GOP loves Christie, but I think he is too smart to hitch his wagon to the Romney debacle. 4%
Romney/Corbett: Brings PA into the fold. 5%
Romney/Kasich: Brings Ohio in to the fold. 5%
Romney/Rubio: Another guy looking toward 2016, but probably more in need of the exposure than Christie. 6%
Romney Paul (Rand): Has a back room deal already been struck? According to team Santrorum, Paul is in the bag for Romney because this is a done deal. 7%
Romney/Martinez: Governor Susana Martinez of NM? Or some other yet to be vetted unknown. 35%
Palin/Romney: Sky dad does not love me this much.
I think that he will select a social conservative such as Perry or Santorum, to capture the dwindling Republican Base. I would put Paul Rand as a distant third choice in this respect.
Bush and Christie and Corbett and Huntsman make too much sense for today’s Republican Party. The last thing that Republicans want is a rational Pres/VP ticket.
Let’s face it, Ron Paul can run on only one ticket, the Paul/Paul ticket (and that comes from a fellow named Paul). Who else in the world would be willing to share a ticket with Ron Paul?
I think that the party may have learned enough in 2008 to avoid Palin & Bachmann.
A woman, a black guy, or a black woman. Condoleezza Rice?
Either way it must be killing wingnuts that they believe the next President will not be a Christian. I’ve seen the polls where they are asked if they believe Obama is a Christian or not… hopefully soon there will be poll like that about Romney.
I think he would be clever to pick someone like Nikki Haley. She has the conservative creds, she’s not loopy like Palin and Bachmann. She’s a minority, and would attract minority voters, especially the coveted hispanic vote.
Sure she’s pissed off a few in the GOP, but the idea is to win, right?
Anyone want to make a $10,000 bet that it’s Susana Martinez?
If they are serious about trying to win this election (which is debatable) they need to do better with women and Hispanics. Putting a Hispanic woman on the ticket is much easier for Republicans than ending the war on women or ceasing their call for the deportation of anyone who might be bilingual.
If Martinez is smart enough to be the VP, she is probably smart enough to see the transparent ruse that she would be representing on the ticket.
There is no accounting for personal ambition though, so who knows.
I’m at a loss. I add and reject potential VP choices at a rate that’s shocking! 😉 Mainly because Romney has so many holes to fill. I’m just not seeing a VP candidate that can help Romney on all the areas he needs help.
One couldn’t pick anyone worse than Biden so anyone Romney picks will be viewed as an improvemment.
That’s so… deep.
Yes Rockland, Palin, Gingrich, or Santorum would be an improvement. They would do much to IMPROVE Obama’s chances for reelection.
If I was looking for a person to provide a sharp contrast with Biden, I’d go with Joe Lieberman. A humorless, shrimpy, self-important a-hole.
But didn’t the GOP mock him and call him “Loserman”. How many times did we see “Bore and Loserman”?
He can’t go with Lieberman for the same reason McCain couldn’t. Romney is going to need the crazy.
I know it could never happen, but other than an Inuit with Aspberger’s Syndrome, that would be the highest contrast match-up against Biden.
Martinez? Another half-term governor chosen to appeal to women? Haven’t we been there?
how many years of Republican progress on women’s issues was erased by McCain’s selection of Palin as his running mate?
Now half-term female governors are off-limits because of his selection of an incredibly incapable running mate.
I don’t see it working out, but I don’t put it past the GOP to give it a shot anyway.
What about Allen West?
West is certainly crazy enough to fill the bill, and picking him would be in keeping with the Republican habit of trying to poach Dem votes based on the flimsiest of surface similarities. I’d put him in the running.
Romney has said the most important quality he will look for in a vp is that if something were to happen to him( the president,) the vp could do the job. Hence,
Romney/Christy
Dream on. Christy has been a good soldier for Rmoney, but I doubt he’ll have the inclination to lay down his political life for the cause. Furthermore, two north easterners? It is a big old wingnut country out there.
Christie* has said himself that he’s not ready to be President. It’s probably the only thing I agree with him on.
Christy couldn’t survive the aerobics involved in a national race. Think he’ll go with Rubio because GOP support from Hispanics is probably in.single digits by now.
Rubio is the guy who said Social Security and Medicare make us weaker. On video. I’d hope to see a lot more of that if Rubio is on the ticket.
Romney himself wants to raise the Social Security age, and voucherize Medicare, with the telltale phrase “Current retirees won’t be affected.”
He could manage it if he could get a NJ State Police helicopter to set him down within 100 feet of each speaking engagement.
You’ll notice that the less time a candidate has spent on a big-time stage, the better Republicans like them: Christie less than a full term as governor, Rubio just two years as senator, Haley two years, Jindal less than a full term; on and on it goes.
Two takeaways: One, they are low-information voters because THAT’S WHAT THEY PREFER! And two, nobody, not even their favorites, can pass their litmus tests: Haley is now hated by the TPs for backing Romney and selling out the port of Charleston (in her state) to Savannah (not in her state); Rubio’s creation myth has been shown threadbare (his family left Cuba a few years before Castro took over, not after); Jindal flopped on national TV; and on it goes.
Rubio, by the way, wouldn’t appeal at all to most Latinos. Cuban ex-pats are not generally popular with either Puerto Ricans or Mexicans, because they think they’re better than other Hispanics and because they’re right-wing reactionaries. Hating Castro does not automatically mean liking the rapacious vultures who ran the country before him.
Unknown to conservatives, Hispanics are not a monolithic culture or voting block, which is rather funny considering their only real reason for liking Rubio is that they think it will help them with Hispanics. (Yes, he glommed onto the Tea Party early on, but he was an ambitious office-holder well before the movement was born).
I worked at General Motors one summer and there were a bunch of different Hispanic groups. The only thing they had in common was contempt for the Cubans. One guy told me, “They think they are European.”
I think Haley Barbour might be in the running. I look for RMoney to ask him to head the search committee and it determines that try-as-he-might, he just couldn’t find a better running mate than himself.
CHRISTINE…remember the endorsement. And she could raise millions.
the best pick by far is lyndsay graham
Not a bad choice. Graham would make Romney seem less creepy by comparison.
Will Graham come out of his closet for a chance to be VP? I doubt it.