Freedom Line Blog

Jonah Goldberg on the difference between conservatives and liberals as stewards of the economy:

At least Reagan argued that the economy would prosper if he were allowed to liberate it from the scheming of self-styled experts. Clinton ran out in front of a parade of free-market successes and, like Ferris Bueller, acted as if he was leading the parade.

In his manifest hubris, Obama believed it was just that easy. He, too, could simply will a vibrant economy into being through sheer intellectual force. But, unlike Bill Clinton, he wouldn’t sully himself by playing “small ball.” Obama would be “transformative.”

This reminded me of Mitt Romney’s acceptance speech last week when he said, “President Obama promised to begin to slow the rise of the oceans and heal the planet. My promise… is to help you and your family.”

Free markets and strong families.  Sounds like a good combination to me.

Jonathan Allen of Politico sums up the highly successful line of attack Republicans aimed at President Barack Obama during their nominating convention:

If Republicans landed a punch on Obama, it was the kind of strategic body blow that a skillful pugilist deploys to gain better position for the rest of the fight.

No roundhouse, no jaw-splitter, no knockout. It was the kind of shot aimed at subtly shifting momentum and softening up the opponent in a way that may not be evident to the casual observer.

Allen is right and Obama’s camp knows it.  That’s why they’ve been running a character assassination campaign against Mitt Romney – felon, murderer – instead of talking about any of the President’s accomplishments.

The simple fact is there aren’t any successes directly attributable to Obama worth talking about.  The more the Romney team can make this election a “good man, bad president” referendum on the incumbent, the more likely it is that Obama will be a one-term wonder.

Chalk up another win for advocates of school choice. Opposition to school vouchers is usually steeped in language about the policy being “risky” or “untried” (it’s a uniquely liberal gift to prefer guaranteed failure over possible success). But a new study out of the Brookings Institution (no one’s definition of a conservative haven) shows powerful results for young African-Americans:

In the first study, using a randomized experiment to measure the impact of school vouchers on college enrollment, Matthew Chingos and Paul Peterson, professor of government at Harvard University, examine the college-going behavior through 2011 of students who participated in a voucher experiment as elementary school students in the late 1990s. They find no overall impacts on college enrollment but do find large, statistically significant positive impacts on the college going of African-American students who participated in the study.

 

Their estimates indicate that using a voucher to attend private school increased the overall college enrollment rate among African Americans by 24 percent.

To say that Mitt Romney is struggling with black voters would be an understatement. That’s a real shame. Barack Obama may give them rhetorical affirmation and a sense of common identity; but Mitt Romney, who supports greater educational freedom, could actually bring them hope and change.

A Pew Research poll shows more Americans interested in the Republican Party’s convention platform than in presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s acceptance speech.

But an interview Romney gave to Politico indicates those who watch Mitt’s speech Thursday night might be in for something good:

His language, his approach, his mannerisms convey: I am not asking you to trust me to see into your soul, or to feel your pain, or bring you hope and fuzzy change. I will bring you concrete, measurable, profitable change — the kind you can authentically take stock of, and even measure in your family’s bank account.

Romney, who this week watched Obama’s 2008 convention speech again, said the lofty, theatrical address loaded with promises never kept provides the perfect device for juxtaposing his leadership style with the president’s.

…

Romney’s point: You had love, you had hero worship, you had emotion. How did that work out?

Over at National Review, John O’Sullivan argues that the Romney-Ryan ticket should take a realist tone when it sells its vision of entitlement reform, referencing a familiar example:

Despite all the guff written about him, Reagan was not an optimist. He was a realist who believed in the virtue of hope (which is quite another thing — see below). Realism is a combination of prudence and hope. Realists believe that they can solve problems and win battles, but only by evaluating the dangers accurately and proposing adequate responses to them. Reagan expressed great faith in the future of the American people, but he also warned that their grandchildren might lose that future if the present generation did not defend the U.S. Constitution and traditional liberties. He warned eloquently against the Soviet threat, but instead of looking on the bright side and leaving matters to chance, he drove through — against strong political and media opposition — tough policies on foreign policy and defense.

Hope and prudence are what Ryan has shown with his persistence in speaking the fiscal truth to seniors in his Wisconsin congressional district.  It was hope in the power of fact-based arguments that compelled him to spend hours in town hall meetings detailing the chronic deficits afflicting Medicare and Medicaid.  And it was from a deep well of prudence that he sought to explain how the continued failure to reform their structure will result in either taxes we can’t afford or cuts in coverage some people can’t endure.

This election will likely turn on whether Ryan’s realistic appraisal of entitlement reform will be interpreted by the public as a blend of hope and prudence or instead an accountant’s excuse to throw granny off a cliff.

William Kristol sums up the grassroots enthusiasm over the Paul Ryan pick:

Until last week, the Romney campaign was a few hundred operatives working hard in Boston trying to win a presidential election. Now Romney-Ryan is a groundswell of citizens spontaneously writing, volunteering, and proselytizing on behalf of a cause. The first was going to be a grueling uphill climb. The second could be more like running downhill with the wind at your back. Even in the second instance, of course, the candidate still has to jump the hurdles and avoid the obstacles. But it’s a lot easier to prevail when you stand for a cause citizens are eager to join than when you’re engaged in a campaign voters may diffidently support.

And it’s not just politically involved citizens who are energized by Ryan’s elevation to be Mitt Romney’s vice presidential running mate.

As Fred Barnes notes, the 87 House Republicans who won office in 2010 have helped heighten Ryan’s profile by supporting his budget reforms.  At least 70 of these are considered likely to be reelected this year, thus solidifying their importance in the caucus.  By putting their party on record as supporting Ryan’s vision, these House GOPers make Romney’s embrace of Ryan a clear legitimization of conservative, market-based reform.

Ryan is the linchpin.  Without him providing the bridge between the reform-minded conservatives in the House and the Romney campaign, it’s very likely that a Romney Administration would be reluctant to move on a policy package the candidate did not run on.  Now, Romney owns it.

Let the proselytizing continue.

I’ve written before that the importance of Paul Ryan’s brand of conservative reform is that it puts federal policy on a fundamentally different trend line than its current course under President Barack Obama.

From Ryan’s perspective, the American future post-reform looks like one where there’s more money in everyone’s pocket, less going to the government, and a fiscally sustainable social safety net.

As for President Obama, all you need to know is contained in his campaign’s “Life of Julia” web ad.

If Ryan is true to form, then during his time as Mitt Romney’s running mate he’ll accentuate the choice facing voters this fall of an American future that is either growing thanks to a resurgent capitalism or declining under the weight of a galloping socialism.  Perhaps he’ll do so along the lines described by Harvard economist Robert Barro in the Wall Street Journal:

Drawing correct policy implications is hard because one naturally focuses on the jobs and production that are directly saved or lost when the government bails out GM or when Chinese imports expand. In contrast, it is impossible to detail where U.S. jobs and production would have been created or destroyed if GM had been allowed to fail or if trade with China were curtailed.

What is feasible is to look at the overall impact of a set of policies. For example, a general increase in socialistic policies tends to lower economic growth. And, more specifically, the Obama administration’s weakening of individual incentives to work and produce by its sharp expansion of transfer payments can be reasonably viewed as retarding the U.S. economic recovery since the end of the recession in 2009.

With the addition of conservative thinker and budget expert Rep. Paul Ryan to the Republican presidential ticket, we can hope that the economic dialogue will become more serious. And perhaps this added substance will extend beyond the important issue of long-term fiscal reform to encompass the enduring but still crucial debate about socialism versus capitalism.

I’ll add my voice of support to the chorus here, and say I think Paul Ryan is an inspired choice to be Mitt Romney’s running mate.  One of the benefits of selecting Ryan, is that Romney gives conservatives a chance to articulate the dramatically different trend lines between the parties when it comes to reforming Medicare.

Under ObamaCare, $700 million is ripped out of an already teetering Medicare system to pay for new entitlements.  By contrast, Ryan’s reform grandfathers current seniors while converting Medicare into a voucher program for younger Americans.  Whereas ObamaCare creates new spending commitments with the same pile of money – thus spiking deficits – Ryan’s reform (and by extension, Romney’s) caps Medicare’s subsidy at a level that makes federal spending more sustainable over the long haul.

The campaign just got serious.  I’m looking forward to the next 12 weeks.

Count me pleasantly surprised by Saturday’s announcement that Mitt Romney has selected Paul Ryan as his running mate. Given the risk-averse nature the Romney campaign had demonstrated up to this point, I was expecting the choice to be bland and uninspiring — my foremost guesses having been Rob Portman or Tim Pawlenty (for what it’s worth, multiple reports seem to indicate that Romney’s final choice came down to those two and Ryan). Ryan, who truly has been the intellectual leader of the Republican Party for the past several years, is a vastly superior choice to either of those two.

I have no idea how the politics of this play out. It seems to me that the fears that liberal demagoguery of the Ryan budget could cost Romney Florida are well-founded, given the state’s huge population of seniors. Minus the Sunshine State, it’s hard to envision a scenario where Romney becomes the 45th President of the United States in January. I also remain skeptical that, even with Ryan on the ticket, Wisconsin will elude Obama’s grasp this time (I hope I’m wrong about this, but it seems to me that the conservative commentariat has been excessively enthusiastic about prospects for flipping the Badger State ever since the Scott Walker recall).

These are not causes for despair necessarily, but cautionary notes as we begin the campaign in earnest after Labor Day. The Romney campaign — not known heretofore for its exceptional messaging skills — has just given itself perhaps the most daunting communications task in the history of modern American presidential elections. This election will no longer be a backwards-looking discussion about Barack Obama’s stewardship of the American economy over the past four years; instead it will be a 90-day symposium about what the “social contract” (a phrase I loathe, but one that will carry the day) will look like in 21st Century America.

The advantage that Romney and Ryan have is that their vision — reining in spending, empowering individuals, reducing the debt, and reasserting individual responsibility — is the only one that is viable in the long-term. The advantage that Obama and Biden have is that their vision — an unsustainable status quo that cossets Americans from responsibility and hides the calamitous costs of the welfare state — is much less psychologically disruptive, a trait that (sadly) goes a long way in winning over a substantial portion of the electorate.

The stakes of this election have just become enormous. This is no longer about whether Mitt Romney will become president or not. It’s now about whether the conservative vision for arresting America’s decline will receive popular ratification. And there are only 12 weeks to make the case. With the smartest, most articulate defender of the conservative alternative now on the ticket, we’re about to run out of excuses. If we can’t win this time, the resultant chaos will make the aftermath of the 2008 election look like a garden party.

Governor Mitt Romney this morning announced his choice of Representative Paul Ryan (R-WI) as his Vice Presidential running mate.  It is a great pick.

There is no other public official on the planet who can better articulate conservative economic principles to the electorate – and aggressively advocate those principles to address our nation’s fiscal crisis head on – than Paul Ryan.   He is a man of strong character and deep intellect.  He is unapologetic in his defense of individual liberty and free enterprise.  And he knows that America is an exceptional nation.

Most important, Romney’s choice of Paul Ryan shows that his priority is leading and governing the nation.

Game on!

Besides her Sarah Palin-esque rise to prominence as South Carolina’s Governor – and the fear that she’s too green to be Romney’s vice president – there’s another, more salient reason Nikki Haley isn’t being talked about as Mitt’s running mate: she’s using Barack Obama’s stimulus formula and getting worse results.

According to The Daily Caller, since becoming governor in 2011, Haley has tried to dole out more than $70 million in tax incentives and grants to businesses as a way to create jobs in South Carolina.  Still, the state’s unemployment rate sits at 9.1 percent, much higher than the 8.3 percent national average.

Some Palmetto State conservatives have had enough, including Harry Kibler, a Tea Party member and founder of RINO [Republican In Name Only] Hunt:

“She basically is running all over the state trying to make sweetheart deals with corporations to entice them to move to South Carolina and start business here,” said Harry Kibler, a tea party activist and founder of the conservative group RINO Hunt.

“I have a heartfelt philosophy that if we get government intrusion out of the business culture in South Carolina, that business will move here on its own,” Kibler told The Daily Caller News Foundation.

…

“The governor seems to think that the only people in South Carolina that create jobs is the state legislature and the government,” RINO Hunt’s Kibler countered. “Make South Carolina the freest state or the cheapest state to do business — for all business — and business will naturally be attracted to South Carolina.”

Don’t expect Mitt Romney to invite that kind of criticism from the Right by picking Nikki Haley as his vice president.

The Washington Times quotes some GOP operatives as saying the culturally conservative Virginia governor could provide the link to the conservative base Romney needs while not upstaging the presidential candidate on the stump (an apparent consideration given the rhetorical abilities of other possibilities Chris Christie and Marco Rubio).

I don’t know much about McDonnell’s tenure as governor or his political chops, and the Times article may just be a puff piece doing McDonnell a favor by keeping his name in the mix and on Drudge Report where I first saw the article.

But since Quin has weighed in on McDonnell as a possible vice presidential candidate – sort of – I wonder what he thinks about the potential for a Romney-McDonnell ticket.

Quin, thoughts?

Victor Davis Hanson makes a modest proposal:

So how much do we wish to detour from the issues to know about the background of either candidate Romney or incumbent Obama? Some sort of compromise seems in order. If transparency is really what the public demands, and if these issues distract attention from a necessary debate over the economy, then in bipartisan fashion let us now demand full disclosure from both candidates: ten years of income tax returns from each, full and complete access for journalists to all known medical records of each, and complete release of all undergraduate and graduate grades, test scores, and other records.

Romney may not wish to release a decade’s worth of careful tax planning and investment that might reveal him to be more concerned about making money and keeping most of it than about outsourcing or foreign bank accounts. Obama may likewise be embarrassed over a prior undisclosed ailment, or a relatively unimpressive Occidental or Columbia record that would belie his media reputation as the “smartest” man ever to serve as president in the nation’s history. Perhaps for much of August we might hear that Romney had a gargantuan Swiss bank account, or more bankers in the Caribbean than we had surmised. Maybe Obama smoked more marijuana than he has admitted to or received lots of Cs and even some Ds in International Relations — grades that would make it almost impossible for most students to get into Harvard Law School.

I predict that if they do release their records, each man reinforces the central objection to his candidacy: Mitt gets hit for his money; Obama for his record.

The newest item available in the gift shop at Mitt Romney’s campaign website:

As my colleague Mollie Hemingway notes at Ricochet, indignation at the president’s remarks seems to be taking root with a swath of the American people much broader than the conservative base. One can only hope that trend will lead to this t-shirt someday being featured in the wing of the Obama Presidential Library describing what went wrong in 2012.

In a typically insightful column, Byron York says there are at least five reasons why Mitt Romney’s campaign seems to be flailing.  Two jumped out at me:

Romney’s business history and taxes are two issues left unresolved from the primary campaign.  During the primaries, Republicans didn’t want to hear fellow Republicans criticizing Romney’s record at Bain Capital.  Some characterized attacks on Romney’s Bain history as attacks on capitalism itself.  Democrats and many independents don’t feel the same way, and Obama and his SuperPAC allies are relentlessly slamming Romney’s business history both nationally and in key states around the country.

…

Newt Gingrich complained loudly — some called it whining — when Romney first hit him with a negative ad barrage in Iowa.  Then, when Romney attacked on a far bigger scale in Florida, Gingrich reacted badly again.  Privately, the Romney campaign, which at times seemed to delight at kicking the hell out of a Republican opponent, had no respect for Gingrich’s tendency to complain when attacked.  Just take it and hit back harder — that was the way they saw it.  Now, however, Romney is complaining about Obama’s attacks.  Romney is far more self-controlled than Gingrich, but the effect is the same; he’s whining about the other guy treating him badly.  It’s the same thing that happened in the primary campaign, only with Romney on the hurting end.

The good news for Romney is that these are correctable problems.

There is an excellent defense to the “vulture capitalism” charge the Obama Administration is recycling from the GOP primaries – Troy wrote it back in January.

As for hitting back, one of the factors York mentioned but I didn’t excerpt was that GOP SuperPACs aren’t landing as many punches on Obama as Democratic SuperPACs are landing on Romney.  The latter is drowning in negative ads in swing states.

Of course, legally, SuperPACs can’t coordinate with presidential campaigns.  But York’s reporting implies that those running GOP SuperPACs aren’t sure how hard to hit Obama and on what issues.  My guess is that Romney doesn’t know himself, and is communicating that with his defensive rhetoric.

Of course, that’s not how the Obama campaign operates.  Like Romney in the primaries, they’re in the general to win.

Unsurprisingly, the Democratic SuperPACs aren’t suffering from the confusion plaguing Romney and his SuperPACs; probably because they know President Obama will “just take (whatever Romney throws)” and want his supporters them to “hit back harder.”

Like I said above, these are correctable problems, if Romney is willing to make the changes necessary to sharpen his rhetoric and toughen up his persona.

So far, that’s a BIG if…

One thought on Quin and Ashton‘s back and forth on possible VP choices for the Romney campaign (a conversation I join with football pads):

I remain a firm backer of Jon Kyl (a position that seems to have attracted only Quin and Ben Domenech — it may not even carry a majority in the Kyl household), for the simple reason that I think he would make the best Vice President (see here and here for why).

That being said, Ashton is probably right that Christie is the best candidate. As you’ve probably heard ad nauseam by now (because there’s no pundit in America who has any original analysis on the mechanics of picking a number two), it often falls to the running mate to be the attack dog on the stump. And, frankly, there’s no one else in the GOP whose bite packs as many pounds per square inch as Christie’s.

He also has an unusual asset for a gadfly — he’ll change some minds. There’s a certain kind of American voter — blue-collar, broad-shouldered, bearing a five o’clock shadow and calloused hands — who has a visceral hatred for the effete liberalism of Obama but won’t be much more smitten with a corporate titan like Romney. Christie will resonate with those folks. They know Chris Christie. They go to work with Chris Christies. They sit next to Chris Christies at little league games. And the Chris Christies of the world are the people they’d call to watch the kids if there was an emergency.

As for his actual usefulness in the office of the vice presidency? I don’t see it. Christie is far too strong a personality for the number two job, is doing too much useful work in New Jersey to be employed as an understudy, and — if in fact he has presidential ambitions — is probably better served by remaining a free agent than tying himself to the Romney brand.

My actual prediction? Rob Portman. And if not him, someone else who will probably make us all shrug and go on with our lives as if nothing much has happened. The Romney campaign doesn’t do excitement.

Thanks, Quin, for the “clarification” on your vice presidential pick(s).  So far, I count four possible outcomes allowing you to claim Nostradamus status at the next company picnic.

Putting your competing theories and rationalizations aside for a moment, however, let me ask this: Who do you want right now?

My head tells me Romney should pick Paul Ryan because the two seem very comfortable with each other (one report says Ryan can finish Romney’s sentences and make him laugh) and because Ryan gives Mitt the disciplined, wonkish Washington veteran Romney seems to like (see Rob Portman) as well as the likeable guy-next-door demeanor Mitt needs (see Tim Pawlenty).

I also think Ryan would be a great number two to Romney without being such a second fiddle as to obscure his future presidential ambitions.  Paul Ryan: dutiful and dynamic.

But that’s my head.  My heart wants Chris Christie.  Why?  Because I want someone to articulate the anger I have for the wasted time, money, and opportunities squandered by the Obama Administration over the last three years.  America has more debt, less prestige, and bleaker prospects for the future than at any other time in the last forty years.

That’s more than a “kick in the gut”; it’s an affront to our patriotism.

I want someone who not only articulates the problems with Obamaism, I want a person who can point to the way out.  But right now, I also want someone who does this with an edge.  Not necessarily going off on a heckler while eating an ice cream cone edge, but with something more than charts, statistics, and phrases about getting hit.

I’d like someone in the Romney camp who knows how to hit back.

Strategically, my head is telling me Romney should pick Ryan, but tactically, I want Christie out there getting daily news coverage rhetorically perp-walking Obama’s bad policies out of Washington.

How about you, Quin?  Who do you want as Romney’s VP right now.  You can keep your other prognostications for future reference.  All I’m asking is for an undisputed, single name occupying your Veep choice today.

Philip Klein of the Washington Examiner posted an interesting chart showing the timing of vice presidential picks from 1980 to 2008.  Notice a trend?

Except for John Kerry’s selection of John Edwards nearly three weeks before the 2004 Democratic Convention, all the others picks occurred within a week of or at the respective party’s convention.

As Klein notes, as of today we’re 7 weeks / 49 days away from the Republican Convention in Tampa, so it’s probably waaaaaay too early to expect Quin (Bobby Jindal) or Troy (Jon Kyl) to collect the CFIF office pool money.

For what it’s worth, I’d like a Romney-Christie ticket just to see Chris Christie go after Joe Biden during their debate, play the attack dog on the campaign trail, and land the rhetorical blows on the Obama Administration that Mitt Romney can’t seem to muster.

Of course, those reasons – coupled with Christie’s propensity to be baited into a confrontation – are probably the same reasons Romney won’t pick him.

But if history is any guide, there’s still time for Mitt to get warm to the idea.

I was intrigued by Quin’s post late last week about the potential for a tie between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney in the Electoral College — because I had recently run the numbers and come up with the exact same outcome.

Our analyses are very similar, though not exactly the same. Here’s the way I broke it down:

Safe Obama States — California, Oregon, Washington, Hawaii, Minnesota, Illinois, Maryland, Delaware, Washington D.C. (which, don’t forget, has 3 electoral votes), New Jersey, New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont, Maine (all votes — Maine is proportional). Grand total of 196 electoral votes

Safe Romney States — Alaska, Arizona, Utah, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska (all votes — Nebraska is proportional as well), Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, West Virginia. Grand total of 170 Electoral votes.

Toss-Ups I Give to Obama: Colorado, New Mexico, Wisconsin, Michigan, Virginia, Pennsylvania. Grand total of 73 electoral votes

Toss-Ups I Give to Romney: Nevada, Iowa, Missouri, Indiana, Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, New Hampshire. Total of 99 electoral votes.

The end result: 269-269. The same logjam that Quin reported, with each candidate a single vote shy of victory.

A few thoughts on the toss-ups: I give Colorado and New Mexico to Obama because the growing Hispanic demographic in both of those states is bolstering Democrats and diluting those states’ former allegiance to Mountain West libertarianism (Democrats have also done a bang-up job of organizing Colorado). Wisconsin will be close and I can see it flipping, but — unlike a lot of the conservative commentariat — I don’t necessarily believe that the Walker recall election presages a Romney win; Badger State voters may be compartmentalizing more than the pundits give them credit for (something the exit polling seemed to suggest).

I think Obama takes Michigan because Romney’s rather thin biographical attachment to the state won’t be able to trump Obama’s relentless touting of all he did for Detroit with the auto bailout. Virginia stays close, but goes to Obama because the army of government employees now calling D.C.’s Northern Virginia suburbs home gives him the margin of victory. Pennsylvania is always overrated as a swing state. It’s been reliable for Democrats in presidential elections for decades and the fact that it elected a Republican governor and senator in 2010 has no more bearing on the electoral vote than does the election of statewide Democrats in Montana or West Virginia, two states that will still reliably go for Romney.

I think Romney will generally perform well in the Midwest. The combination of the Obama Administration’s poor economic record and its limousine liberalism (neither of which have anything to offer to the sorts of blue-collar voters who are key in the region) may have a catalytic effect on swing voters, giving Romney Indiana (which, unlike 2008, I don’t anticipate being close), Iowa, and Missouri. Ohio promises to be very close, but I think those same factors may give him a slight edge there. The biggest factor Romney needs to guard against in this part of the country is the Obama campaign’s relentless attempts to use his work at Bain to characterize him as an enemy of lunchbucket workers.

Unlike Virginia (where the D.C. suburbs are, in cultural terms, essentially another state), North Carolina still has all the cultural markings of a Southern electorate. Obama squeaked by there last time under the best of circumstances. I doubt he’ll be able to repeat that feat with his record in tow. Nevada shares demographic factors with New Mexico and Colorado (it also boasts a large union presence because of the abundance of service employees in Las Vegas). But there’s a big Mormon contingent in the state that will be characteristically well-organized and may be able to push Romney over the edge.

Finally, Florida and New Hampshire. These two are the toughest. Florida comes down to a gut check on my part. It is, in many respects, the ultimate swing state. Here, the fact that a Republican governor and senator were elected in 2010 is relevant. This one could be incredibly tight, but I’m inclined to give ties to Romney given the unhappiness with Obama’s performance. As for New Hampshire, its libertarian political culture couldn’t be more different from the rest of New England. That, combined with the fact that Romney was the governor of a neighboring state (part of southern New Hampshire is in the Boston media market) and has a home in Wolfeboro are salient. Republicans have been rolling in New Hampshire of late and I can see Romney picking this one up on election day.

As Troy Senik and I both have expressed strong support for the idea that Arizona’s Jon Kyl should be on Mitt Romney’s short list for vice president, it is worth watching this interview Kyl did on Fox News Channel the other night. The key thing isn’t the particular substance of the discussion, but whether or not Kyl comes across well: Does he communicate his point well, clearly, and understandably? Does he come across as reasonable, competent, knowledgeable, and likeable, all at the same time? The answers to those questions are all “yes.”

There are all sorts of ways a presidential campaign can use a running mate. One of the best is to let the top of the ticket hammer home one strong message, again and again, as the main theme of the campaign, while assigning the VP candidate the role of raising and carrying several secondary issues to continually put the opponent on the defensive and to distract the opposing campaign from its message of the day.

With Arizona being ground zero for the immigration-policy battle, and with Kyl occupying a moderate or middle ground as being critical enough of Obama’s lack of enforcement to satisfy hard-liners but open enough to fair-minded appreciation of some immigrants’ interests that he won’t scare off Hispanic voters, he could well carry the immigration message well as Secondary Issue Number One. As an expert on military and foreign affairs, he could make up for Romney’s lack of experience there and blast the heck out of Obama on those issues, making defense/fo-po Secondary Issue Number Two. With his experience on the Judiciary Committee, he could make judges and Justice Department corruption and politicization (Fast and Furious, Black Panthers, etcetera) Secondary Issue Number Three. Few potential running mates are as well equipped to carry multiple issues against Obama as Kyl is.