The Candidates
I was not aware of concept of the “Evangelical trifecta” myself, but it certainly has a nice ring to it:
Yes, yes. Mike Huckabee. I know many evangelicals love him. But could Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty fit the bill for evangelicals too? Think about it. Minnesota is a purple state, he’s popular articulate, young and handsome and an Evangelical to boot. Stop the presses! That’s called the Evangelical trifecta.
Be sure to read the whole thing here.
June 12th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
McCain’s problems are going to come primarily with economic conservatives and immigration conservatives, not Evangelicals.
As long as McCain picks a socially conservative VP, he shouldn’t have a problem pulling the socons.
June 12th, 2008 at 2:32 pm
Maybe I can’t count but
1 Popular
2 Articulate
3 Young and Handsome
4 Evangelical
June 12th, 2008 at 2:42 pm
Ummm… Yeah… You’ve got a point there Memmnon.
June 12th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
I noticed that as well Memnon… but shouldn’t even “young” and “handsome” count as two? There are certainly *lots* of young people who aren’t handsome, and a fair amount of older people who are.
It looks like (based on the punctuation and conjunctions) Mr. Brody was classifying things this way:
1. Popular articulate (??)
2. Young handsome
3. Evangelical.
June 12th, 2008 at 2:53 pm
Dear David Brody,
If Ronald Reagan can’t win a state, by definition, that state cannot be “purple”.
June 12th, 2008 at 2:53 pm
I didn’t even know Pawlenty was Evangelical. I guess I just assumed he was a Lutheran.
June 12th, 2008 at 2:54 pm
Sampo, Minnesota has gotten more conservative since Reagan. If Minnesota were as liberal as it was in the ’80s, Kerry would have won it by 35 points like he did Massachusetts.
June 12th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
Pawlenty is the right pick. I say that even though he isn’t my favorite candidate, Romney is by far. I also doubt that Pawlenty can deliver Minnesota, but he is the right guy to help elsewhere with Reagan Democrats.
June 12th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
Typically a moderate Democrat like Carter or Clinton does better than a liberal, but there are at least five states where a liberal makes a stronger general election candidate. They are WA, OR, IA, MN, and WI. There are probably a handful more, but those are the ones that come to mind.
June 12th, 2008 at 2:59 pm
Pawlenty will not excite, boring.
Why not pick the one Veep choice the Dems fear the most? And we know who that is.
June 12th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
Who is it Ted?
June 12th, 2008 at 3:23 pm
Two white guys on the Republican ticket = Kiss. Of. Death.
But at this point, with the way that Obama is lengthening his lead over McCain, I’m beginning to think that Republican women like Palin should breath a sigh of relief if they don’t get offered the spot on the ticket.
June 12th, 2008 at 3:27 pm
I suspect I don’t have to answer this, but I will anyway…yes. Tim Pawlenty is the perfect evangelical veep. And the perfect blue-collar veep. And the perfect “don’t lets piss anyone off Veep”.
June 12th, 2008 at 3:27 pm
Sampo #5,
You realize that Reagan lost Minnesota by 3,761 votes out of 2 million, and that Mondale was from Minnesota, right?
June 12th, 2008 at 3:32 pm
Kavon,
And if I recall correctly, I remember an anecdote where Reagan and his team knew they could have won Minnesota, but he didn’t want to embarrass Mondale, so they pulled back a bit. Not sure how true that anecdote is, but regardless it’s fairly clear that Minnesota isn’t nearly so blue as the “we haven’t won it since 72′” statistic suggests. Heck, Mondale was on the ticket 3 times during that period; that’ll tend to help in keeping the state blue.
June 12th, 2008 at 4:17 pm
Matthew, it’s not true. Reagan made an election-eve visit to the Mpls/St. Paul airport.
It’s weird. I’ve heard this anecdote for years and it is not true. Besides, how do you try not to win a state — tell people not to vote for you?
June 12th, 2008 at 4:44 pm
McCain needs someone with business experience - someone who can add some economic credibility to the ticket.
I don’t think Pawlenty does that.
June 12th, 2008 at 5:27 pm
The GOP never wins the econmy vs the dems.
I think it makes better strategic sense to play up nat’l security and foreign policy and try and run up the score with those margins than try and win the economy.
Kerry beat Bush on the economy by 80-20 and he still lost.
When all is said and done Pawlenty and Romney make the safest, most conventional picks for VP. With Huck apparently out of the running, those two have to be the favorites.
Hear me roar makes a good point re Palin and other women VPs. It’s not only dem women and hillary voters who they could help with. they could help boost turnout and interest among gop and gop-leaning independent women.
unfortunately, Palin directly contradicts McCain’s stubborn weakness in saying that 2000 acres of ANWR is a pristine treasure on the level of the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone.
If it’s not Pawlenty or Romney I’d find someone who emphasizes McCain’s natl security and foreign policy and run on victory in Iraq vs defeat. Make the choice one between victory and honor and defeat, humiliation and surrender.
The american people have never ever voted for defeat and I don’t think they will start now
June 12th, 2008 at 10:07 pm
Republicans can’t let their electoral success hinge on how many countries we can get into a fight with - we have to start making up ground on domestic issues, because, once the Iraq war is over, they are going to dominate.
June 13th, 2008 at 12:36 am
convention would say pick romney or t-paw, but in this year with the wave going in the dems direction, mccain has to generate buzz with the vp. he has to stir the shit stor,. t-paw and mitt are safe choices. but america doesnt care about safe choices. most of them want to vote for a radical like barack and they dont care what happens. mccain has to stir it up, give those women a reason to turn against barack, give them reason to attack the media as sexist. pick sarah palin, it stirs up the pot, makes things interesting, turns alot of heads, and may just win this thing for us.
June 13th, 2008 at 1:39 pm
Writing from Mpls, Pawlenty would be a good/safe pick albeit perhaps a bit dull. Obama will still win MN by 5-10 points with
or without Pawlenty as McCain’s VP.
However, if you see McCain in Virginia, MN at all then you know their polling has him being competitive and he’s in Virginia
to sway those Iron Range democrats in the northern part of the state.