Fred Barnes: Romney for VP?

McCain's problem is that at 72 his vice president matters mightily. In 1988 George Bush could survive the Dan Quayle fiasco because no one seriously expected Quayle to spend any time in the Oval Office. The same cannot be said of McCain.

Fred Barnes analyzes the choices today in the Weekly Standard, checking them off one by one. Lieberman, he notes, has a certain attraction, and the possibility to hardening support at the center. But that would likely come at the price of further turning off the Right, since Lieberman for all of his charm and foreign policy hawkishness is a full-blooded liberal domestically.

There are several governors who are on the list, but each one of them is very young, untested and has not been vetted in the fire of a national campaign.

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Finally, Barnes turns to Romney, who he believes brings a number of advantages. He has stature and experience, and has been through the fire of a national campaign, so he won't bring any surprises. Barnes continues,

Romney has allies in the Bush wing of the Republican party. President Bush favors him as McCain's veep. Jeb Bush, the former Florida governor, preferred Romney over McCain in the primaries, but never endorsed him publicly. Karl Rove, the president's political strategist, has hinted that he considers Romney to be McCain's best running mate.

Is there a downside to Romney? Possibly. It's not his Mormonism. He lost the nomination to McCain, but religion wasn't the reason. As a corporate turnaround artist, he rescued companies, sometimes by laying off workers. When he ran for the Senate from Massachusetts in 1994, the incumbent, Teddy Kennedy, raised the layoff issue with punishing effect. No doubt Democrats would use it again, and it might have resonance if a recession hits and unemployment is increasing.

I find this last point very odd. It's a tribute to the inanity of the average American that you could take a corporate turnaround master and turn that into a liability in an economic crisis. Anyone with any sense knows that fixing something often involves breaking something. You don't turn around a company or an industry or a national economy without forcing adjustments, i.e., causing pain and eliminating some jobs in order to create others. If Romney's skill in this regard is actually seen as a liability by the Democrats, that alone is reason not to trust them with the economy. But don't expect the nitwits at the ballot box to realize this. And if it works, they'll use it.

Barnes concludes by noting that McCain doesn't like Romney, and that in itself might be a huge hurdle. I think it will be. It's not just a question of liking: it's a question of being overshadowed. McCain obviously resented Romney's money, looks or smarts. And that kind of resentment is not likely to lead to comfort in sharing a ticket.

The conundrum, as Barnes points out, is that the list of battle-tested, Oval-office ready VP picks is mighty thin. And we'll learn a lot about McCain when he plays his hand.


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