Posted on 03/12/2008 11:58:23 AM PDT by Kuksool
Now that he has embarrassed the “experts” and naysayers by clinching the Republican nomination and securing President Bush’s endorsement, Sen. John McCain can focus on picking his running mate. Three potential vice presidents merit the Arizona Republican’s immediate consideration.
Former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, 63, would add considerable executive experience to a ticket headed by a legislator. His experience in managing a $40.2 billion government with some 216,000 employees would prove an invaluable complement to the political skills of a president who mainly has written legislation, debated, and voted on Capitol Hill since 1983. Giuliani’s counterterrorism credentials are sterling, and would burnish McCain’s reputation as a foreign-policy hawk who would fortify America’s national security. Giuliani is popular with fiscal conservatives, given his mayoral tax-cutting record, as well as his maintenance of city spending at 1 percent below inflation — an achievement that seems almost pious compared to the free-spending bacchanal that Republicans hosted between 2001 and 2007.
Giuliani also could help make New York and its 31 electoral votes competitive for Republicans, along with adjacent Connecticut and New Jersey.
Giuliani’s shortcomings are twofold: After his high-flying campaign plunged to Earth — as did Icarus after he soared too close to the sun, which melted his wax wings — Rudy no longer resembles the invincible political force he seemed just last November. Badly beaten in the primaries, Giuliani would have to work hard to overcome worries that he could be beaten again next November.
Also, some stalwart conservatives — already near mutiny over McCain’s victory — might find it hard also to accept Giuliani, given their suspicions about his views on abortion, gay rights, and gun control.
Meanwhile, South Carolina governor Mark Sanford, 47, blends a socially conservative voting record as a three-term House member with a low-key approach on such issues that should comfort social moderates. He is an energetic school-choice advocate and one of America’s premier fiscal conservatives, combining an average 85 rating from the National Taxpayers Union with such legendary behavior as sleeping in his congressional office to economize tax dollars. The American Conservative Union gave him a lifetime rating of 86.
Sanford is bright, youthful, and cheerful. He also won reelection as governor with 55 percent of the vote in November 2006, a year when Republicans got bludgeoned from coast to coast. As an executive, he runs a $7.1 billion government with some 62,000 employees. Still popular, Sanford is from a state already likely to support McCain. But Sanford could help hold southern states that might waver, such as Virginia and Florida, where he was born in 1960.
Also appealing is Securities and Exchange Commission chairman Chris Cox, 55. While he has not been the creative deregulator his admirers had hoped, Cox likely is restrained by the Bush administration’s terminal sheepishness. He was a far more courageous free-marketeer while a nine-term House member. Cox scored a 75 average NTU rating and 98 from the ACU. (McCain enjoys a 77 average NTU rating and 82 from the ACU.)
The Californian Cox is a native of St. Paul, Minnesota — site of the Republican Convention — and was a member of President Reagan’s White House Counsel’s Office. Fluent in Russian, he founded Context Corporation, which translated the Communist Pravda newspaper into English, delighting Kremlinologists in 26 countries. He was considered among the House’s most cerebral members, though he is telegenic and buoyant, not eggheaded.
“I have known Chris Cox a long time,” says Martin Anderson, a Hoover Institution senior fellow, veteran Reagan aide, and co-author, with Annelise Anderson, of a forthcoming Crown/Random House book about the Reagan presidency. “Cox is a great Republican, and I think that he would make a really terrific vice president who could help McCain a lot.”
With McCain, 71, from contiguous Arizona, and Cox from Newport Beach, a McCain-Cox ticket could place California in a pincer. Cox championed legislation to keep the Internet tax-free, making him a quasi-deity in vote- and cash-rich Silicon Valley. Energizing conservatives in southern California’s Orange, Riverside, and San Diego Counties could capture the Golden State’s 55 electoral votes for the GOP.
“I just want to compete in California,” McCain told CBS News on Tuesday. “I think as a western senator, I understand their issues. . . . I’m a free trader. California is vitally involved in the issue of free trade.”
Even if California remains in the Democratic column, Democrats will have to spend time, money, and muscle defending reliable territory. This will consume resources they otherwise would array against McCain elsewhere.
Rudy Giuliani, Mark Sanford, and Chris Cox are John McCain’s most promising options to help him win the White House and, if necessary, to fill his shoes.
Are we sure that today is such a good day to use “Going for seconds...” in a headline?
You've got to be kidding me.
Well, McCain certainly is an embarrassment.
For much of last year, Murdock was shilling for Rudy. He was claiming that Rudy’s liberal stands on guns and abortion actually helped the conservative cause.
Regardless of who McCain’s VEEP is; if he carried California or New York against Osama then we are looking at a Reagan like landslide. No Veep candidate can deliver either of those states. Just ask Duncan Hunter.
I agree with thinking out of the box for a VEEP. Hopefully McCain will not pick anyone who ran for the nomination this year. Because they were really bad candidates. How do I know? Look who got nominated.
Every time anyone says anything critical of Obama, McCain instantly apologizes. Who would anyone want to be a VP with McCain. As soon as the MSM attacked McCain’s VP, McCain would agree with the MSM and also attack him.
mccain - clinton for the win.
I don’t think I’m going too far out on a limb in predicting none of those mentioned will be the VP candidate.
| McCain-Feingold '08 Yeah, you're stuck with us. Suck it up. |
Don’t know about those other guys, but GIuliani??
GIULIANI???????????????????
Get lost.
Two losers for the price of one.
No woman choices for VP, and no minority choices for VP? Either Herman Cain (despite his lack of political experience), Janice Rogers Brown (despite her lack of political experience and her age), or Sarah Palin (despite her present pregnancy and her only recently being elected Governor of Alaska) would also make decent VP choice possibilities for McCain, IMHO. My favorite white male for VP for McCain is Rep. Mike Pence, but my instinct is that McCain will eventually pick another RINO, such as either Mitt Romney or Charlie Crist, to be his final choice for VP, which will also upset the majority of conservative voters all over the U.S. for awhile.
Pretty funny actually.....great creativity!
I like it.
A good alternative might be:
“McCain-Feingold ‘08 - Just shut up already!”
Just not sloppy.
Oh wait, I know...," he shout as he whips out a pen, and starts to write...
Giuliani’s shortcomings are twofold: After his high-flying campaign plunged to Earth — as did Icarus after he soared too close to the sun, which melted his wax wings — Rudy no longer resembles the invincible political force he seemed just last November.
:-/
This guy is obviously not what is called a “social conservative.” Even mentioning Guiliani is sheer lunacy. It would confirm everything that fully 1/3 of the party thinks of McCain already - he is not truly a social conservative and will not nominate those types of judges to the bench.
As for Sanford, I like him quite a bit, but this guy goes out of his way to say he “down played” his social conservatism as if that were a good thing. Again, this guy has his own agenda.
Since everyone else is telling McCain what to do (it has worked so well in the past), I will too. My top 3 picks for him are as follows: Sanford, John Kasich and Huckabee.
I think Murdock was a Giuliani shill. I assume that’s why his 3rd choice is a guy (Cox) who has no chance whatsoever. I’m just surprised he mentioned Sanford.
He mentioned Sanford in the same way RINOs toss out the names of conservatives, i.e., it’s all for show.
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