Reader JT:
I'm from Dayton, although I live in Cincinnati now. I'm watching McCain camp's decision to unveil their veep nominee in my hometown with great curiousity.
Montgomery County, of which Dayton is the seat, is a mostly Democratic area and has gone Democratic in the last two Presidential elections. Having gone through almost a decade of plant closings and a rise in crime and homelessness, Dayton was also recently named one of America's fastest dying cities.
In 2004 I was a volunteer for John Kerry, and worked at his huge campaign rally on October 19th in Dayton. He spoke right downtown at our minor league ballpark, Fifth Third Field, and drew over 10,000 people.
John McCain is choosing to have his event at the much larger Nutter Center, a basketball and concert venue inconveniently located way north of town, on the Wright State University campus. I can tell you that those of us in Dayton and the more conservative Cincinnati are wagging our tongues, thinking there's no way in hell McCain is going to get 10,000 people to turn up at that event, veep or no veep. At any rate, 10,000 people could make the 12,000-capacity Nutter Center look cavernous. Why not choose a smaller venue?
After all, Dayton has been chosen as a Veep Reveal Site before... in fact, just four years ago. John Kerry chose Dayton as the second city to see his new VP nominee, John Edwards, on July 7, 2004. I was there, too.
I'm more than a little confused about McCain's choice of Dayton to repeat Kerry's reveal in 2004. The far more conservative Cincinnati would've made more sense... Dayton is not McCain Country, of that I can assure you.
Reader MB:
I keep seeing or hearing media reports that McCain is considering tapping a pro-choice vice president, and I've seen you post to this effect a number of times. But I can't help but wonder whether this isn't orchestrated for another purpose. There are two possible reasons why the McCain campaign is floating this idea: one, he's seriously considering the idea, or two, he wants us to think he's seriously considering the idea.
I don't believe for a second that it's the former because I think there are some pretty strong political reasons to think it might be the latter, and I just can't see McCain, who has real troubles with his base, angering them leading into the convention. Why would you rile up the nasties right before you're in a room with all of them? You wouldn't. But, what if you were about to choose a pro-life zealot like Eric Cantor, or even a standard-bearer like Romney, and were worried about how it would appear to the middle? Wouldn't you want a little press leading up to the announcement that suggested you were thinking in the middle? McCain faces real opposition from folks at NARAL and other pro-choice organizations, but he is lucky that most of the public thinks he is FAR more moderate than his voting record or even his own statements suggest. Call it "maverick warm-glow." He has done a marvelous job of keeping these fires burning. Likewise, by floating these rumors of a pro-choice candidate, when he comes around and chooses someone in the Republican fold, it's as if he crumpled to their demands, and the base feel like he listens to them. This is not crazy talk!
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