Reply #12: Yep. Something in his returns may at least be interesting and relevant, unlike

[No Elephants]

Portman, Ryan and T Paw. (The most interesting thing about T-Paw is the nickname--and Colbert gave him that.)

Every time Romney is in hot water, they shills trot out the same tired schtick. "Oh, which, oh which interchangeable WASP male will Romney ever pick? Pawlenty or Portman?"

And then some Republican will throw in some other names, like Christie and Rayan, to spice up the conversation.

However, then some Republican, maybe even the same one who brought up the other names to begin with, will swill say, "Well, anything is possible, but I think the odds are it will be Pawlenty or Portman. Still, there's always a slight chance....."

I, too, think it will be either Portman Pawlenty. There is always the outside chance it will Pawlenty Portman, though. ;-)

(Their last names even start with the same letter, for pity sake. That means the RNC can start monogramming the towels, even before Romney makes the announcement.)


Unless there is something somewhere we don't know yet, neither Pawlenty nor Portman will give anyone a reason to vote for Romney, but, then again, neither of them will give anyone a reason to vote against Romney.

Anyway that was one of the lessons of the Palin candidacy. You don't want a VP who maybe attracts some of the base, but sucks all the oxygen out of your campaign and is too extreme for the indies, which this country has become 100% about. Not only at election time either.

Of course that leaves the 92% unhappy with their elected officials most of the time, but who cares?

Oh, and once something happens once in politics, that means it will happen forevermore. That seems to the conventional wisdom anyway.

In any event, once one fact pattern causes a problem, politician steer clear of it ever after, even if they misdiagnosed. For instance, it entirely possible that McCain lost because of McCain and would have lost even if his running mate were a mash up between Einstein and Ghandi. Nonethess, we will probably never see another Palin, unless the entire country starts acting just like her. Then, maybe they will dare to run someone like her again.

It would be hysterically funny if it weren't so danged unfunny.

Then again, John Stewart and Stephen Colbert seem to be doing okay mocking it all.

Meanwhile, though, we still haven't seen the returns or heard a single good reason why Romney won't produce them. And his European trip was still a pathetic comedy of lame errors, very much unlike Obama's rock concert tour of Europe in 2008. And so on. But we are not unbundling those things anymore, or asking what they may mean about Romney as a candidate and a human being and a head of state.

So shills like Chuck Todd have done their jobs.