Obama VP Choice - II

Reader aaron comments:

So you're counting out Sebelius? She seems like a fairly safe pick, too.

It seems interesting to me, though, that we're talking about a campaign that might not have a Southerner for once. Sebelius and Bayh are both Midwesterners, even if they both come from some pretty conservative states. You don't count the appeal of having an additional white, Southern man on the ticket? I suppose that Obama's strengths in certain segments of the South kind of preclude that kind of appeal to the non-Obama supporting segment of the population.

To address the first point, I would really be shocked to see any woman on the ticket other than Clinton (who I believe is unlikely). I like Sebelius, and am glad to see her getting some national attention, I just don't see Obama trying to break through the gender and color gap at the same time.

The second point is quite interesting. I think, on some levels, there's simply no one to pick. The Democratic party brand was so bad over the last 15 years in the south that there really aren't any Dems with a lot of national prominence in that region. Claire McCaskill's about the best choice I can think of, and a popular senator in a swing state to boot, but again, I'm just not seeing her as having a strong chance.

I also believe that conventional wisdom about Dems needing a southerner on the ticket (or white, male, southerner) to succeed is prefaced on too few data points to be anything approaching an axiom. This is because any discussion of the "Democratic Party" prior to the party realignment that occurred during the Civil Rights movement is in many ways talking about a different party and especially a political climate that doesn't exist anymore. So for me, using in the '60 election shouldn't really count. This point is predicated upon only two people, Carter and Clinton -- not nearly enough examples to make any sort of inference. Let's also not forget Gore's 2000 run, where I think he'd really lost the "southern" label to the point that he lost his home state of Tennessee, had a VP candidate from Connecticut, and still got 500,000 more votes than Bush 43. If Gore becomes president in 2000, I think to a large extent the Democrats-need-a-southerner argument wouldn't be nearly as prominent.