Picking Joe Lieberman

This past week McCain floated the idea of picking Tom Ridge as his running mate. Ridge is the former governor of Pa and the first director of homeland security. He is also pro choice. In McCain's interview he states that his being pro choice wouldn't necessarily prohibit him from being Vice President. My guess is that they are using Ridge's name as a Trojan horse trial balloon for Joe Lieberman. If they don't get much kickback from the right on Ridge they can feel emboldened to pick Lieberman. If they get a huge uprising from conservatives against Ridge, who is at least a Republican, then they can all but forget about Lieberman.

I had a friend of mine ask me what I thought about Ridge and suggest that I blog about it. To be honest I could care less about Ridge but picking Lieberman piques my interest. Choosing Ridge would be a somewhat risky choice but the reward is not as high as choosing Lieberman. Having Lieberman on the ticket would daringly break down the political barrier by running as a bi partisan ticket.

The risk of course is that he is not fully in line with most Republicans on a number of important issues including abortion. Republicans want someone who will work to prevent abortions and who will stand up for the innocent babies. Lieberman does not meet that criteria but McCain does. Does choosing a partner who disagrees on such a fundamental issue reveal a lack of commitment on McCain's part to the pro life movement? Does it weaken his opportunity to enact pro life laws as President? One could reasonable argue yes on both questions and that poses a problem for him and a bigger problem for those pro life voters who want to vote for him.

The reward for picking Lieberman would be expanding McCain's appeal to independents and Democrats. But more than that it would put Obama's words of change into action. Instead of talking about being bi-partisan and changing the status quo in Washington, selecting a Democrat to run on the Republican ticket would actually do it. I have often thought that McCain's best chance is to highlight how bipartisan he has been in the past and contrast that with Obama's empty rhetoric on the issue. Picking Lieberman would be effectively doubling down on that strategy.

Finally, and maybe most importantly choosing Lieberman would allow McCain to be McCain. McCain enjoys his maverick persona. He is most comfortable swimming up stream and taking on the status quo. He even enjoys taking on members of his own party that he disagrees with. That's what makes McCain so unpopular with his colleagues but very popular with the American people.

My best guess is that there is an internal battle within the McCain camp between picking Romney and Lieberman. His handlers no doubt want to make the safe choice and pick Romney while he is lobbying to pick his friend Lieberman. It will be interesting to see who wins that argument.