When you're hoping to ascend to the presidency seven years after qualifying for Medicare, folks are going to have some concerns about your fitness to serve four, and more to the point, eight, years in office. So for McCain, a solid VP pick isn't merely a political good or a fun parlor game: It's something of a threshold question. If voters can't imagine the VP taking office, then they probably won't let McCain get there, either. Over at RedState, they're discussing who McCain should choose, and the leading candidates seem to be Don Carcieri, governor of Rhode Island, and Rob Portman, former director of the Office of Management and Budget. Interestingly, they hate all the traditional choices -- Tim Pawlenty, Condi Rice, Mitt Romney -- because that would further show that conservatives can't trust John McCain.
