One Way of Measuring VP Interest

There are doubtless many better predictors of who McCain might pick as VP than who comes up more frequently on a Google News search with McCain [potential VP surname], and of course how prevalent the person is in the news even separate from VP rumors will affect the total. But these numbers are interesting nonetheless:


The short-list:

Romney (good guy): 6,081

Crist (good guy): 2,781

Jindal (very bad guy): 2,494
(Interestingly, fewer hits than McCain Lieberman! Perhaps Americans aren't as swayed by a McCain-Jindal ticket as extremists would have us believe?)


Honorable mentions - good guys:

Rice: 1,809

Pawlenty: 813

Ridge: 533
(Non-quantitatively, I've sensed a recent uptick in Ridge mentions relative to the others)

Fiorina: 433

Richard Burr: 385

Rob Portman: 141


Honorable mentions - bad guys:

Lieberman: 2,600

John Thune: 354

K. B. Hutchinson: 289

Mel Martinez: 287

Mark Sanford: 178

Haley Barbour: 75

Sarah Palin: 50


So, if I'm John McCain, here's my problem: I have to win the center and a few key states (like Florida) if I want to beat Obama, but I can't risk alienating the religion-as-government wackos too much (who don't seem to understand that not voting for McCain is the same as voting for Obama - great thinking guys!)

So, if I were McCain, I would start leaking rumors that I'm going to pick someone who's not even pro-life (like, say, Tom Ridge). The anti-education, anti-medicine special interests start foaming at the mouth.

Then when I pick Charlie Crist, he doesn't seem so bad.