MJ - Behind the Virginia senator's moderate reputation is a history of quiet progressive activism.

[TomCADem]

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/07/tim-kaine-vice-president-hillary-clinton-virginia-senate

When Tim Kaine moved to Richmond in 1984 to start his legal career, his first assignment was a pro bono case representing a black woman named Lorraine who'd been turned away from an apartment. The landlord had told her he'd already rented it out when she showed up to take a look at the place. But when she asked a coworker to call back later the same day, the landlord said it was available. It was a clear-cut discriminatory housing case.

Reflecting on the case last fall, Kaine—now a 58-year-old Democratic US senator from Virginia—said it prompted a "'there but for the grace of God go I' moment." For Kaine, the act of moving to a new city to start his adult life, fresh out of Harvard Law School, had been "such a positive­," he said, but "for her [it] was a negative, getting turned away just because of the color of her skin." He won that case and quickly became one of the few attorneys in Virginia focusing on fair housing, which would later constitute, by Kaine's estimation, 75 percent of his legal practice. A few months after he became Richmond's mayor in 1998, he won a $100.5 million jury verdict against Nationwide Insurance for the company's discriminatory lending practices. It was the largest such award in history.

Kaine is a top contender to be Hillary Clinton's running mate. He's on a three-person short list receiving full vetting, according to the Associated Press, alongside Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julián Castro. A former Virginia governor and onetime head of the Democratic National Committee, he has ample executive, legislative, and political experience. He represents a swing state and speaks fluent Spanish—a handy attribute in this year of Trump.

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Last June, Kaine teamed up with Sen. Jeff Flake, an Arizona Republican, to propose a bill that would impose restrictions on the White House in fighting ISIS and require consultation with Congress on strategy. The measure never got a vote, and when Obama requested military authorization without those restrictions, Kaine sounded a skeptical note. "I am concerned about the breadth and vagueness of the US ground troop language and will seek to clarify it," he said.

[tallahasseedem]

1. I think the timing of the announcement was great...

It's giving everyone the weekend to read up on Kaine and realize that he may have just been a good pick after all!