A Provocative Addition
Late last week, The Weekly Standard ran an editorial advising Mitt Romney to "go bold" with his choice of running mate, with special emphasis placed on the attractiveness of Paul Ryan and Marco Rubio as potential number twos. Now comes this interesting addition:
As of Friday, when we wrote the editorial, we’d been led to believe [Chris] Christie wasn't in serious consideration. We now have reason to think he may be. So to be clear: We'd certainly include him with Ryan and Rubio as potential gold medal finalists. As to choosing among the three of them? A photo finish. But choosing a VP candidate who will help Romney run a big, forward looking campaign—that is not a close call.
OK, Ricochetti: as the beating heart of the conservative moment, it only seems right that you be the tie-breakers. If your choices for the final three are Christie, Ryan, and Rubio, who would you prefer?
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Comments:
Apr '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
ConservativeWanderer
If they ran a halfway decent campaign, a GOP ticket of Elmer Fudd and Daffy Duck could beat Obumbler. · 15 minutes ago
"Bill Clinton will lose to any Republican who doesn't drool on stage." -- The Wall Street Journal, in a 1995 editorial.
Although in this case I think you are more right than they were.
For my money it would be Ryan.
Jan '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
Susana Martinez ;)
Mar '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
Ryan, Rubio, Christie.
Jun '12
Re: A Provocative Addition
BrentB67 · 52 minutes ago
Ditto
Jul '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
Mar '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
Only one guy on that list even deserves Veep consideration, and that's Ryan. Christie is entertaining but wrong on a whole slew of social issues, and Rubio is too wet behind the ears.
Apr '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
BrentB67 · 24 minutes ago
I agree. I'd characterize my list as "in increasing order of disappointment".
Ryan doesn't need to be VP to be front and center and does more good in the House. Selfishly, Rubio gives me nightmares. He would lead to excessive discussion of inexperienced identity politics picks, which would lead to endless painful conversations about Palin, and his LDS past would lead to even more gritting my teeth through horrible conversations with terrible people.
Christie is great on unions, and is pretty close to Mitt. I want him to be more prominent in the campaign (particularly in the Mid-West), but I'm not so hot for a Christie Presidency and he'd make it awfully hard to seal the deal with conservatives.
May '10
Re: A Provocative Addition
Ryan.
I love Rubio, very promising future, but agree with others that we need to give him more time in the Senate, and maybe even wait for him to be governor of FL. Then he'll be really ready -- to run for the top slot.
Interestingly, I just came over from NRO where they have a veep poll. (I voted for Ryan.) It's currently Rubio 42%, Ryan 29%, Christie 7%, Jindal 12%.
Nov '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
Ryan. Romney needs to leave us with a conservative heir apparent. Reagan's worst legacy was George H. W. Bush.
Mar '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
ConservativeWanderer
If they ran a halfway decent campaign, a GOP ticket of Elmer Fudd and Daffy Duck could beat Obumbler. · 56 minutes ago
I keep reading stuff like this at Ricochet, and I simply don't think it's true. The advantage is still clearly in Obama's court. It's all about the swing votes, and all Obama has to do is be non-offensive to squeak by into a second term. Obama still comes off as likable, and Romney still comes off as cardboard-ish at times. Everyone is talking about how Obama is under 50 percent in swing states, but Romney is still lower than Obama in those same states. If it comes down to a case of "the devil you know", Obama will win handily. Romney just can't seem to get those voters to flip for him, at least not yet. There's still time, but let's not fool ourselves here. It's still advantage: Obama.
Apr '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
All three need to keep the jobs they have.
May '10
Re: A Provocative Addition
If the VP could also head up the Office of Management and Budget - Ryan hands down.
May '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
The Vice Presidency is not worth a bucket of warm spit. We should not remove any figure actually accomplishing anything useful. The job is for the amiable but ineffective, or someone who is at the end of their career in politics.
Keep Ryan in the House, keep Rubio in the Senate.
May '10
Re: A Provocative Addition
I think Ryan could do much more for the cause of fiscal rectitude as President of the Senate than as House Budget Committee Chairman. And that's the only issue in this campaign.
Apr '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
If you mean in the debates, Portman's more spontaneity tested than any other candidate. The last three GOP candidates all picked him as their mock debate partner because he's magnificent at it (although for Dole it was a senate race debate, with Fred Thompson training him for the real thing); no one else viable has any experience at that level.
If you mean outside the debates, I'm not sure that caution is a bad thing. Spur of the moment quips that make a big difference, rather than pre-written great lines, in a non-debate context, are rarely positive. They might make people smile, but random encounters on the campaign trail are terrible places for creativity. If you doubt Portman's ability to avoid saying anything off message, you're clearly unfamiliar with him. If you think that he should be saying things that are off message, we're not on the same page.
Jun '12
Re: A Provocative Addition
Agree. As a close observer of Christie (he's only a few miles away and my wife, as a NJ teacher is predisposed to think he's a horrible person) I must emphasize to my friends around the country that he is a creature very much of Jersey (where I was born and raised.) His success comes in state where being a bit obnoxious is seen as funny. The fact that he's telling the truth is a bonus. I don't see this translating across the country. Rubio is still too young- as I like to tell my lib friends- look what happened the last time we trusted a young, articulate, good looking first term senator. I know thats unfair, I love Rubio, but lets not get caught in that argument. Ryan truly understands the issues. But I worry about pulling him from the senate and quarterbacking the necessary legislation.
Apr '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
Mont McNeil
I think Ryan could do much more for the cause of fiscal rectitude as President of the Senate than as House Budget Committee Chairman. And that's the only issue in this campaign. · 9 minutes ago
I couldn't disagree more. As Budget chairman, all federal spending must pass under his green eyeshades. He can slow down or fast track any spending program, and there is nothing that gets done without his cooperation.
As President of the Senate he gets a good seat for the State of the Union Address.
And he gets to break tie votes.
Aug '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
NPR: One Clue To Romney's Veep Pick: Whose Wiki Page Is Getting The Most Edits?
Aug '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
Continued from above.
Edited on August 7, 2012 at 11:21pmNov '11
Re: A Provocative Addition
Ryan. Rubio would be fine with me. Christie would not be fine.
(Jindal is in a near-tie with Ryan on my preference list.)
It sounds like we have a clear majority opinion. Let the campaign know that Ricochet has spoken!
But what happened to Pawlenty and Portman? I'm guessing that in reality one of them has moved to the top of the list, just because we're not talking about them.