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TMCNet: Obama vice president announcement expected soon

[August 19, 2008]

Obama vice president announcement expected soon

(Associated Press WorldStream Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) WASHINGTON_Barack Obama will publicly disclose his vice presidential choice in the coming days, though the Democrat is keeping most aides who are preparing for the announcement in the dark and giving away nothing to voters as he campaigns.

The Illinois senator has staffers in place to aid the No. 2 and his or her spouse, including more than a dozen seasoned operatives who have set up shop in a section of the campaign's Chicago headquarters.

Obama was believed to have narrowed his list to Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine, Delaware Sen. Joe Biden, Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh and Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius. While it seemed increasingly unlikely that he would choose his vanquished rival, New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, some Democrats speculated Monday that he could pull a surprise and pick her.

Obama planned to campaign in Florida on Tuesday, and on Wednesday ride a bus through North Carolina and Virginia, where he was appearing with former Gov. Mark Warner, who is campaigning for the Senate. After that, Obama's schedule is wide open, leaving the end of the week as a more likely time to make the announcement before the Democratic National Convention begins next Monday in Denver.

Campaign manager David Plouffe e-mailed supporters last week telling them they would receive first word of Obama's decision through a mass text message, but otherwise the team has revealed little about what to expect.

For his part, Republican rival John McCain is seriously considering naming his running mate between the end of the Democratic convention Aug. 28 and the Sept. 1 start of the Republican convention in hopes of stunting any uptick in polls for Obama. McCain has at least three large rallies planned in top battlegrounds _ Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan _ before the Republican gathering in St. Paul, Minnesota.

His top contenders are said to include Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney.

Less traditional choices include former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge, who could help in the battleground industrial state, and Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman, the Democratic vice presidential pick in 2000 who now is an independent. But both would face heavy opposition from the Republican base because of their support for abortion rights.

The drama of Obama's impending announcement drew dozens of new reporters to travel with his campaign Monday in New Mexico. But Obama stuck to his word that he would not say anything about the decision until his announcement.

On the campaign trail Monday, the argument over the unpopular 5 1/2-year-old war _ one of the key issues separating the candidates _ flared again after McCain spoke in Orlando, Florida, to the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention, a friendly audience given his heroic service as a Navy fighter pilot and prisoner of war in North Vietnam.

The Iraq war, the odds-on top election issue before the presidential contest began, has given way to voter concerns over a stumbling American economy that shows no signs of rebounding.

McCain, a four-term Arizona senator, said the victory in Iraq he envisioned still could be "squandered by hasty withdrawal and arbitrary timelines. And this is one of many problems in the shifting positions of my opponent, Senator Obama."

Obama issued a sharp retort, questioning McCain's sincerity in support of Iraqi sovereignty _ one of the Bush administration's goals in the war that McCain heavily promoted in the months after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

"It is hard to understand how Sen. McCain can at once proclaim his support for the sovereign government of Iraq, and then stubbornly defy their expressed support for a timeline to remove our combat brigades from their country," said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton.

"John McCain is intent on spending $10 billion a month on an open-ended war, while Barack Obama thinks we should bring this war to a responsible end and invest in our pressing needs here at home."

McCain insists U.S. troop withdrawals be dependent on conditions on the ground in Iraq. Obama, with agreement of the Baghdad government, says American forces should be gone in 2010.

After his Florida appearances, McCain flew to Atlanta where he raised more than $1.75 million for Republicans at a fundraiser clouded by confusion over the role of Ralph Reed, the former Christian Coalition executive director linked to a lobbying scandal. McCain led an investigation into lobbyist Jack Abramoff's dealings with Indian tribes when he was chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee.

Abramoff ultimately went to prison for conspiracy, mail fraud and tax evasion; Reed's association with the former lobbyist contributed to his failure in 2006 to become the Republican candidate for lieutenant governor of Georgia.

Obama, meanwhile, has sought to defang McCain's attempt to make the 2008 presidential contest a referendum on Obama's character, experience and readiness for the presidency, while trying to duck his associations with the unpopular President George W. Bush.

Even as they were kept out of the loop on the decision, Obama's staff debated who would make the right choice for running mate. Many said if the candidate asked them, they would suggest Biden because of his foreign policy experience and strong debate skills; Sebelius because she is a respected Washington outsider who has won a Republican state; or Bayh, a middle-of-the-road senator who supported Clinton in the primary campaign, because he can appeal to Democrats uneasy about Obama and could help him win Republican-leaning Indiana.

Each candidate could pose problems, too. An Obama-Sebelius ticket would be especially light on international experience. Bayh supported the Iraq war; Obama did not and has said that is a leading indicator of judgment.

Republicans are already envisioning their response to a Biden pick _ Obama is so inexperienced that he had to pick someone with a 26-year record in Senate. Biden has spent a longer time on Capitol Hill than McCain, they point out, which does not exactly represent the kind of change Obama says is needed in Washington.

Biden, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was far from the speculation Monday; he traveled over the weekend to Georgia to meet with President Mikhail Saakashvili and discuss the country's military clash with Russia.

Sebelius was traveling to Michigan on Tuesday to help boost Obama's support among women there.

Kaine leads a Republican-leaning state that Obama hopes to put in his column in the Nov. 4 election, but he is open to attack from Republicans because of his lack of foreign policy and national security experience.

___

Associated Press writers Nedra Pickler in Chicago, Beth Fouhy in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Philip Elliott in Atlanta, contributed to this report.

___

On the Net:

Obama: http://www.barackobama.com

McCain: http://www.johnmccain.com

Copyright ? 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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