Your link curiously left out Dr. Keyes even though he was a presidential candidate. I know McCain would never choose him, but he is more prominent than several other that were mentioned. He did lose against Obama in Illinois, and did not have a large following in this primary. He however knows Obama’s tactics very well, is an African American, would balance the ticket and is far enough right that nobody in the base would question his conservatism.
McCain will have to appoint someone “truly” conservative to win the base back.
From the article you linked:
“The Top Ten
So how do we sort through this jumble of names and letters? Well, you can’t determine a Veep by mathematical formulae since each brings a nuanced set of advantages and disadvantages. Maybe some of these people have some unknown skeletons in their closets while others would never accept a role as VP. Nevertheless, applying my above observations, some political common sense, and my own set of biases, here are the Top Ten vice presidential candidates for the GOP in 2008.
1. Gov. Tim Pawlenty
2. Gov. Charlie Crist
3. Mayor Rudy Giuliani
4. Gov. Mark Sanford
5. Gov. Haley Barbour
6. Gov. Sarah Palin
7. Rep. Rob Portman
8. Sen. John Thune
9. Gov. Mitt Romney
10. Rep. Chris Cox”
I can’t say that I agree with several of the names here, but overall it’s a fair list. John McCain’s most important job right now is to ensure that conservatives support him during the general-election campaign, so I think that Crist and Giuliani need to be eliminated because they’re pro-abortion and that Romney is similarly a non-starter due to his liberal record as governor of Massachusetts. I think Pawlenty and Sanford are the two best names on this list and, in fact, they’re the top two names I’ve been mentioning as potential McCain runningmates. (The other names I’ve mentioned, Congressmen Mike Pence, Paul Ryan and Steve King, are absent from this top-10 list.)