We live in the era of professed equality - if she steps into the ring like a man then she gets hit in the mouth like a man. Surely you don't think she'd pull her punches - neither should Joe.

The Underground Railroad

I think KBH would be the smart pick, but she's no dummy. She can be governor if she wants, and she'll take the surer bet. I think McCain't is gonna be stuck with Romney.

I grew up in a tough loop of a subdivision in San Diego... no girls my age for 3 blocks, but plenty of tough young boys.  The neighborhood bully took my kid brother's skip rope away and was beating him with it.  I didn't like my brother, but family is family.  So, I trotted up the block and saw the circle of kids egging on the bully.  I punched him hard in the stomach and he went down flat... just as his mother drove by.  She didn't stop, but could clearly see her kid sprawled in the middle of somebody else's driveway... at the hands of a girrrrrrrl.  The bully got up and punched me in the stomach.  I didn't go down, but kept my feet and raised my fist again.  They dispersed.

The bully came over after dinner, apologized, and carried my books for a week.  No more trouble from that family of boys.

Sometimes you can avoid cocksure bullies, and sometimes you have to knock them down a peg or two.  Even if you are only 13 and female and skinny.  A good life lesson.

Somehow, I doubt if Hutchinson and Biden will engage in fisticuffs... but wouldn't expect either of them to mince words, either.

And, yes, Mittens would go home to cry.

If I was McCain's VP and female, I'd be offended if Biden held back because of my gender alone.  The real danger in a female vp candidate is if she played the victim card and if the media bought into it.  Even if she isn't as tough as Ann Richards, somehow I doubt if she'd try to position herself as a weakling.  Texan women don't.... not if they want to succeed politically.  Why belittle yourself?

http://bagnewsnotes.typepad.com/bagnews/2006/09/texas_democrat.html

I include New Yorkers (and metro) in my definition of Mid-Atlantic.  I'm from north/central Jersey, so I'm still getting used to this whole Philly thing.  

no worry here.

If it's Romney I'll be very, very surprised.

McCain's weakness on domestic issues only becomes a weakness if he makes the idiotic mistake of campaigning on domestic issues.  Other than that, the only place it comes up is in the debates and, well, the VP candidate isn't much help in the presidential debates.

McCain's REAL weakness is actually the same as Obama's - he's not a very good campaigner.  He's never really had much in the way of serious opposition before the 2000 presidential campaign and he got spanked hard there.  Even here, he won not on the strength of his campaigning but on the fact that the rest of the field was a joke.

Plus, Biden attacks one of McCain's strengths - the love of the media.  Biden is almost as loved by the media bobbleheads as McCain.

So there's no good reason for McCain to select Romney - the base doesn't like him, undecided moderates don't swoon at the thought of a Romney presidency, the press doesn't like Romney, and Romney isn't that great a campaigner (he's not bad, but he's handicapped by the fact that he's fairly unlikable - he's like a competent Giuliani in that regard).  The one reason to take Romney would be to get donation dollars rolling in from his Wall Street cronies, but McCain is already taking public funding, so that advantage is blunted.

I mean, he could still pick Romney - McCain has shown that if there's a bad choice to be made, he's not afraid to be the one who takes it.  But McCain should probably be looking for a good campaigner that the press actually likes (someone the press likes is automatically going to not scare the moderates, for the most part).

Farther back than FDR.  I'm pretty sure none of his veeps were from the North.  Truman was from Missouri, Wallace from (I think) Iowa, Garner was from (I think) Tejas.

But, when we talk about northern tickets, we really mean the Northeast (New York, Massachusetts, etc).  Obama's from the Midwest and Biden's from the Mid-Atlantic.

Delaware is actually a southern state.

So it's not really a northern ticket.

Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to you country.

This North Dakota/Minnesota/Wisconsin* boy solidly agrees. I'm not entirely thrilled with Biden's politics, but I'm delighted we've got someone in the VP slot whose not afraid to throw a punch or twelve. I think a lot of us culturally Scandinavian Northern types are really ready for that. Up here the build to anger burns long and slow, but once it goes off...wow!

*I seem to slowly be drifting East as I get older.

Kelly McCullough - author of WebMage, Cybermancy, CodeSpell, and MythOS - ACE (Penguin)