ELI SAYEGH
Staff Writer
While Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama continue to spar for the Democratic nomination, Republican presidential candidate John McCain has begun to consider who he will choose as his running mate.
The list of mentioned names is extensive: Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman, Jr., South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, former Secretary of State Colin Powell, former Massachusetts Gov. and presidential hopeful Mitt Romney.
If McCain wants his best shot at winning the White House, he should select Mitt Romney.
What about the bad blood that developed between the two over the past few months? Quite simply, bad blood becomes irrelevant throughout the course of the election process. Just look back to the John F. Kennedy-Lyndon B. Johnson and Ronald Reagan-George Bush tickets, both of which began with bitter primary conflicts but culminated in coalitions that successfully won the White House.
Better yet, McCain and Romney seem to have already buried the hatchet. Immediately following Super Tuesday, Romney suspended his campaign and offered a glowing endorsement of McCain to heal any wounds and stimulate unity within the party. Since then, McCain and Romney have campaigned together and seem to have planted the beginnings of a constructive friendship.
Many Republicans within the party are in favor of a McCain-Romney ticket. According to veteran Washington columnist Robert Novak, Karl Rove and other top brass within the GOP are pushing for Romney.
Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, recently told Utah’s Deseret Morning News that “the smartest thing [McCain] could do would be to pick Mitt Romney” as a running mate.
“You take that ticket to the country and say, ‘Here’s the guy spending his whole career learning about foreign affairs and national security. Here’s the guy who’s built his career as a sound manager and administrator and dealing with economic issues,’” Bennett said. “This is your balanced ticket.”
Balance is the key word. Romney would supplement McCain in virtually every area where he might otherwise face trouble in the general election.
For instance, choosing Romney would bring in the conservative base of the party and provide an ideologically balanced ticket to voters. There is a large chunk of Republican voters that are hardly motivated to support McCain; this can be resolved if he chooses the right person as his vice president.
Perhaps the biggest advantage of choosing Romney is that he would provide immediate competence to McCain’s most vulnerable area: the economy. In an election that is gearing up to be all about national security and the economy, McCain can emphasize his national security expertise and Romney can show his economic savvy.
For voters worried about the direction the economy is headed in, there isn’t a more qualified person to oversee economic affairs than Romney. The Harvard Business School grad has years of experience as a CEO and successfully revived multiple business operations, the 2002 Winter Olympics and the economy of Massachusetts. From the standpoint of finding an economic advisor, it’s a no-brainer for McCain.
And in the general election in which the war is often won in the battleground states, Romney provides a definitive edge.
He would boost McCain in Michigan (which John Kerry won in 2004), his hometown state and the state where his father was once an immensely popular governor.
Ditto in Colorado and Minnesota; Romney won both state primaries by convincing margins, and both are crucial states that could go either way in 2008.
And perhaps most startlingly, Romney could even tilt the balance in the overwhelmingly Democratic state of Massachusetts. A March SurveyUSA poll shows McCain and Obama tied at 47 percent. Romney was governor of the state from 2003 to 2007 and is relatively well-liked there.
John McCain’s vice presidential choice could be the single most important decision of his candidacy. He should choose someone who will not only increase his base of support but bolster him with regard to the most important issues of the election. A McCain-Romney ticket would be a dream team for the Republican Party and a formidable duo in the general election.
04-03-2008