As far as I understand it, conventional wisdom on the right and the left are that the following vice presidential choices were nixed by the McCain campaign because they were pro-choice:

• Tom Ridge, the popular former governor of Pennsylvania.

• Joe Lieberman, the heretical Democrat.

• Kay Bailey Hutchison, otherwise a down-the-line conservative senator.

• Jodi Rell, arguably the most popular governor in the country.

And so instead we got Sarah Palin. Sometimes I don’t think it’s fully appreciated how constrained the GOP is by its pro-life orthodoxy.

Ezra Klein is a former Prospect writer and current editor-in-chief at Vox. His work has appeared in the LA Times, The Guardian, The Washington Monthly, The New Republic, Slate, and The Columbia Journalism Review. He’s been a commentator on MSNBC, CNN, NPR, and more.