{"id":1250,"date":"2004-02-13T12:49:05","date_gmt":"2004-02-13T17:49:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/1250.html"},"modified":"2004-02-13T12:49:05","modified_gmt":"2004-02-13T17:49:05","slug":"wsj-reports-that-kerry-is-looking-at-running-mates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wsj-reports-that-kerry-is-looking-at-running-mates\/","title":{"rendered":"WSJ reports that Kerry is looking at running mates"},"content":{"rendered":"

Just yesterday I speculated<\/a> about Kerry’s choices for a running mate, and apparently, the campaign is doing the same thing.<\/p>\n

The Wall Street Journal reported<\/a> today that the campaign is “mulling” its options.<\/p>\n

Edwards’ campaign skills make him an early favorite, but the odds against his carrying home-state North Carolina hurt his prospects. Missouri’s 11 electoral votes give native son Gephardt appeal; he also might help in Ohio. Other candidates: Florida Sen. Graham, Govs. Vilsack of Iowa and Richardson of New Mexico.<\/p>\n

Some strategists outside the Kerry campaign expect he will pick soon, for help in campaigning and fund-raising, rather than wait until convention time. “The arguments for doing it early are very compelling,” says Bill Carrick, a Gephardt adviser.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I agree about the benefits of picking before the convention begins — two national candidates out there campaigning are better than one — but I remain a little skeptical about Edwards and Gephardt on the ticket.<\/p>\n

Kerry, despite having been a lieutenant governor, has been in the U.S. Senate for 20 years and is perceived as an inside-the-Beltway politician. There’s nothing wrong with that, of course, but in choosing a running mate, he may want to balance his image with someone whose principle experience is outside DC.<\/p>\n

A Kerry-Gephardt ticket has advantages, but in my mind, is easily labeled a “Washington” ticket. Edwards’ career as a lawyer helps, but the fact remains his only political\/governmental experience has taken place in the Senate.<\/p>\n

As a historical matter, it’s exceedingly rare for a sitting member of Congress to even win a party nomination. But for a party ticket to feature two<\/i> sitting members of Congress? That’s only happened once.<\/p>\n

But, as luck would have it, that ticket was a successful one featuring Kerry’s hero — JFK and Johnson were both sitting senators in 1960.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Just yesterday I speculated about Kerry’s choices for a running mate, and apparently, the campaign is doing the same thing. The Wall Street Journal reported today that the campaign is “mulling” its options. Edwards’ campaign skills make him an early favorite, but the odds against his carrying home-state North Carolina hurt his prospects. Missouri’s 11 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1250","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1250"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1250\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}