Soon after last week's Condi trail balloon drifted away, another , more credible one has magically appeared. The NYT has a generally favorable piece on former Minn. gov. Tim Pawlenty, last seen absorbing a vicious beating from fellow Minnesotan Michele Bachmann in one of the early debate. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/16/us/politics/pawlenty-looked-at-as-romney-running-mate.html?_r=2 Pawlenty's appeal seem to boil down to two factors. One, Romney seems to like him. Two, he is not rich. He's not Mormon either, so there's that. In fairness, he is an accomplished politician who understands the issues and can duel with hostile leftwing journos effectively. Like most of the other possibles, he is kind of boring, but in a good, reassuring way. The kind of guy you ask to keep an eye on your house when you go on vacation. The downside is that it is doubtful if he can even carry his home state. If polling shows he would bring Minnesota and maybe Wisconsin over to Romney, then his odds go way up. Probably though he loses out to Ohio Sen. Bob Portman in that regard. Portman might have more sway with home state voters, and Ohio is crucially important to Romney. He can lose Minnesota and Wisconsin and still win. He cannot lose Ohio and win. Unless. Unless Romney can carry NJ and maybe Pennsylvania. Now if only there was a brash NJ politician, a governor maybe, who has tons of charisma, connects with ordinary voters, is respected by independents and loves to duke it out with the liberal media.
There is one,but he can be more poisonous to Romney then the left sometimes <object width="420" height="245" id="msnbc5ac8a3" classid="clsid27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=10,0,0,0"><param name="movie" value="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32545640" /><param name="FlashVars" value="launch=48143377&width=420&height=245" /><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="wmode" value="transparent" /><embed name="msnbc5ac8a3" src="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32545640" width="420" height="245" FlashVars="launch=48143377&width=420&height=245" allowscriptaccess="always" allowFullScreen="true" wmode="transparent" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.adobe.com/shockwave/download/download.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash"></embed></object><p style="font-size:11px; font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #999; margin-top: 5px; background: transparent; text-align: center; width: 420px;">Visit NBCNews.com for <a style="text-decoration:none !important; border-bottom: 1px dotted #999 !important; font-weight:normal !important; height: 13px; color:#5799DB !important;" href="http://www.nbcnews.com">breaking news</a>, <a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032507" style="text-decoration:none !important; border-bottom: 1px dotted #999 !important; font-weight:normal !important; height: 13px; color:#5799DB !important;">world news</a>, and <a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032072" style="text-decoration:none !important; border-bottom: 1px dotted #999 !important; font-weight:normal !important; height: 13px; color:#5799DB !important;">news about the economy</a></p> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/iT9H5jpSz7U" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> Very presidential <iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/7vPoccqAbPU" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Pawlenty is what Romney wants and needs imo.Appeals to conservatives ,doesn't turn off independents,doesn't outshine Romney,no controversy,no ties to Bush etc