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First Best Second Choice
It was hot yesterday in Palo Alto. Well, mid-to-upper 80s with little in the way of a breeze, which may sound laughable depending on where you’re reading this. But it felt downright Dante-esque here in Northern California given that most of our May seemed overcast and unseasonably cool. I won’t take the coward’s way out and blame the heat for this evergreen story — vice-presidential speculation. What got me thinking about it was this story on Jeb Bush’s presidential staffing hires — specifically, the surprise choice of Danny Diaz as campaign manager.
About Diaz: he was a senior advisor on Mitt Romney’s 2012 campaign and, four years before, a deputy communications director on John McCain’s campaign. But here’s what got my attention: Diaz has also worked for New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez (here is he tweeting about her back in 2014). And if you want to play the veepstakes guessing game, Martinez is worth a wager for at least three reasons:
1) Outreach. Jeb Bush is bilingual; he won’t back down on immigration reform. His kick-off speech next Monday will be at the Kendall campus of Miami Dade College, thus highlighting a theme of minority aspiration (last fall, 71% of credit-seeking students at Miami Dade were Hispanic and 17% were black). Should Bush receive his party’s nomination, Martinez and her compelling biography (nation’s first female Latina governor, former prosecutor, daughter of a Texas deputy sheriff) would seem a natural fit.
2) Gender. Let’s call it the “The Carly Fiorina Theory” — the idea being that the best way to attack a female presidential nominee . . . is by having a woman swing the hatchet (you’ll note that Iowa Senator Joni Ernst also could serve this role).
3) Geography. For all the talk of the GOP winning back Florida, Ohio, and Virginia in 2016, those states alone won’t swing the electoral balance — all the states being the same as in 2012, the Democrats would still have enjoy a 272-266 advantage. Where else to shop for electoral votes? Iowa, yes (6 electoral votes). But also Martinez’s backyard of “New West” (also known as the “Southwest”) and two states in particular: Colorado and Nevada (a combined 15 electoral votes). Win those two and the election goes from 272-266 Democratic to 281-257 Republican. Think of Colorado as the other Republican linchpin, in addition to Ohio: the last successful GOP presidential nominee who failed to carry the Centennial State was William Howard Taft, back in 1908.
There’ll be plenty of hot days ahead that will allow for more idle Republican veep speculation. Off the top of my head, here are a few possibilities:
1) Scott Walker . . . Marco Rubio?
2) Marco Rubio . . . John Kasich?
3) Donald Trump . . . think there’ll be human cloning by the summer of 2016?
Published in Politics
Good analysis on the main part of the post. I can’t see a Walker-Rubio ticket though. It’s just too young. If Walker gets the nod, I think he’ll need an older statesman, possibly Bush himself.
If Bush gets the nod, Martinez is a likely pick, but it could be Fiorina or Walker.
Rubio-Kasich makes a lot of sense, but they do look like twins separated by age. No? Not that that matters.
Please no Donald Trump. Please, on my hands and knees, no Trump.
Bush’s problem is that the dogs won’t eat the dog food no matter what ad agency you hire. Why the pundits still treat him as a first tier guy is a mystery.
Walker continues to give the Dems wheelbarrows full of material… last week he was quoted as promising to reopen the SSM debate as one of his first acts in office. Not who we need at this time.
As of today my choice would be Kasich/Rubio – second choice Rubio/Kasich with a potential/shadow cabinet named including Fiorina at Treasury or Commerce.
G-d, we are doomed. 300 million people and the same politicians, year in, year out with the same folks behind the scenes. I am not sure if I am pulling for SMOD2016 or Cthulhu, but I know it has to be one or the other.
Susanna Martinez would make an excellent VP, as would Carly Fiorina. Because they’re women? No! Because they are both articulate, accomplished people who would be great additions to any ticket.
The question is completely bass-ackwards, (although Frozen Chosen comes closest to recognizing the 800-lbs gorilla in the room). To suggest Susana Martinez as VP material is to ignore the fact that she is as accomplished and capable as Scott Walker, and has proven she can win an election more recently than eight years ago. A good ticket would be Martinez-Bush. Even better would be Martinez-Fiorina.
I think Martinez is a highly likely pick for either Bush or Walker. Or for one of the long-shot candidates.
I’d be surprised if anyone (except maybe Rubio) picked Walker as VP. In another year that might make sense for Jeb Bush, but I think he would avoid an all-white-male ticket at any cost.
What about Nikki Haley? I haven’t heard much on SC lately… but that’s another two-term governor.
Precisely.
Quoted as what? I thought all he’d said is that he supported the idea of a constitutional amendment to let states decide the issue.
As for Bush, he’s still treated as first tier because he’s still polling that way.
Quoted as what? I thought all he’d said is that he supported the idea of a constitutional amendment to let states decide the issue.
No matter how innocuous his comment was he should have learned by now that that’s not how it will be reported. The last thing we need is a guy the MSM can paint as Todd Akin redux, a creationist that wants to put gays in concentration camps while their partners are in the hospital and they can’t visit them.
You may be shocked to find differently. It pays to have a wide circle of contacts and news sources.
Haven’t people who frequent the internet realized that content of news is largely dictated by what they constantly click on? This makes one believe that the few sources they go to is the gospel for everyone.
But what did he actually say? That’s what I’m trying to figure out. The only quote I saw was basically GOP orthodoxy.
The last Scott Walker shocking quote was more or less invented out of thin air, so I’m a little skeptical until I see the words. Walker’s usually pretty disciplined and on-message. (Except that he really needs to not discuss campaign strategy on-air, but that’s a separate issue.)
Don’t bother. They’re going to paint them all like that. Yes, even Bush.
Rand Paul gave the best example of how to handle hypothetical “gotchas” when he threw it back to the interviewer on why Hillary is never asked similar questions. Walker seems to have a tin ear and is not learning to avoid avoidable problems. I would love to see him elected President but don’t think he’s ready for the big show.
Do you happen to have a link to the quote you’re complaining about? Or at least remember what he actually said? Your description doesn’t match the only interview I saw — which ABC already managed to misquote. Which is making me very particular about verifying quotes.
You and I are saying the same thing – I got my information from a blurb on a news show while in a waiting room getting new tires. I don’t even know the network, all I know is that what they [the MSM] ran with was that Walker isn’t willing to wait for the Supreme Court before he reignites the Culture Wars. I would wager it was a deliberate misquote but he should have been smart enough to say let’s wait for the Court or something like that, not give them an unnecessary hook for their agenda.
Then it was probably the same ABC interview I saw, in which case we’ll have to agree to disagree. He was calm and reasonable and said nothing outside the mainstream. If they are going to lie, they are going to lie whether you say anything or not.