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There much to do about Democrats winning 60 seats in the US Senate this past election (it’s looking like they will have 59 seats once Al Franken is declared the winner in Minnesota). However, 60…



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Evan Bayh is organizing a Blue Dog caucus in the Senate.

Matthew Yglesias explains further…
With Republicans out of power, the GOP can’t really block progressive change in exchange for large sums…



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Barack Obama is supposed to announce his VP candidate this evening or tomorrow morning by text message to supporters. There will be an event in Springfield, Illinois tomorrow afternoon with Obama and the Vice President candidate.

I am predicting that the choice will be Joe Biden. Biden is known to talk a lot and, except for a comment midweek that he’s not the guy, he has been pretty quiet the past couple weeks. Biden is coming off a trip to Georgia where he talked to leaders in the region about the conflict with Russia. Biden best quality in my opinion is that he isn’t afraid to throw elbows and go on the attack.

Bayh and Kaine’s names have been put out there before Obama made campaign stops in their respective states and the buzz wasn’t always positive. I think that was basically a test run and the campaign has decided against those two. Another reason that going against Kaine is that Obama just spent two days campaigning in Virginia, a key battleground state, so it wouldn’t make sense to announce your naming the Governor of Virginia VP at an event in another state.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Hillary Clinton gets the nod. This diary at Open Left makes the case that Obama will name Hillary Clinton that makes a lot of sense.

If, in June, Clinton told you she should be your VP and you were seriously considering it, what would you do? You would probably tell her that the only way it could happen is if you wholeheartedly endorse me, make it clear you have gotten over the joint ticket idea, have those under your influence (such as the “Vote Both” folks) drop all of their efforts on HRC’s behalf. You’d say, I can’t look weak by picking you, like I was forced by circumstance. It must look like a choice I made that I didn’t have to make but I did because I’m such a big person and I care about the country and I care about victory.

There are three candidates that I would most like to see be named vice president. I would love for Obama to name Kathleen Sebelius, who was campaigning in Iowa yesterday, is still a choice, but there hasn’t been much buzz about her lately. And Tom Harkin is pushing for Chris Dodd, which I think would be a great choice. Finally, I have been a little surprised that Bill Richardson hasn’t been mentioned as much. I think he would bring a lot to the table.

Then it could be a complete dark horse candidate like Tom Daschle, John Kerry, Mark Warner, or Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer (one of the battleground states Obama is visiting after the announcement is Montana).

Now it’s just time to sit back with my cell phone in hand and wait for the announcement.

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Barack Obama was in Indiana overnight and has a speech on energy policy today.

Officially, Barack Obama will deliver an energy-policy speech Wednesday to citizens in Elkhart, Ind. But the focus of the political chattering class will be on the man sitting shotgun at the event: Evan Bayh, the Indiana senator thought to be on the likely Democratic presidential nominee’s short list of vice-presidential candidates

Rumors over the weekend are that Obama will be naming Bayh his vice president on this trip. Adding fuel to the fire, ObamaBayh08.com directs you to the DNC website.

Bayh, of course, is denying all the VP talk.

Of all the candidates that have been mentioned as possible vice president candidates, Bayh is probably the least appealing. He voted for the war and was a past president of the DLC. I admit that Bayh would be a safe pick. He probably puts Indiana in play and brings some foreign policy experience.

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Barack Obama is excepted to announce his choice for vice president next week (which he will be announcing via text message).

From MyDD…

John Kerry announced his choice of John Edwards for VP on July 6, 2004, exactly 20 days prior to the first day of the 04 Democratic convention. If Barack Obama follows the same schedule, he will announce his choice on Tuesday, August 5. Certainly one suspects the announcement will come prior to the commencement of the Olympics on Friday, which means the likelihood is that the announcement will come some time in the next 5 days.

In the rest of the post they run down the complete short list (would that be the long short list?). The names that I am hearing pop up the most are Sen. Evan Bayh, Sen. Joe Biden, Gov. Tim Kaine, and Gov. Kathleen Sebelius. Out of those 4, Biden and Sebellius would be by far my top choices. However, I still prefer Bill Richardson and Wesley Clark.

Over the next couple days, I will be posting more about the possible candidates.

In the meantime, DesMoinesDem chimes in with her thoughts over at Bleeding Heartland.

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Sen. Evan Bayh (D-IN) has endorsed Hillary Clinton. Bayh is a former chair of the centrists DLC, just like another Cinton backer, Tom Vilsack. The spin is that the Bayh endorsement shows Hillary can compete in red states.

Bayh is a moderate Democrat whose blessing could help Clinton pick up votes in Republican states.

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Political Insider says vice presidential candidates rarely are named from people who have been running for president.With many presidential candidates being touted as possible vice presidential nominees should they lose their party’s primary, such as S…

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After the Edwards campaign released its list of “senior Iowa staff” the other day, I thought it might be prudent to discuss how each campaign’s staff is shaping up. Their differing approaches are interesting, at least, and they could make a difference by the time the caucuses come around next January.
First up, the Obama […]

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I know, I live in Iowa, so a defense of the caucuses that comes from me is just going to seem like I’m greedy.  I should say that before I moved to Iowa for college four years ago, I shared the opinion that the importance of the caucuses is unjustifiable, and that a national primary […]

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There has been some speculation about the connection between Tom Vilsack and Hillary Clinton.  Perhaps some of the ’sack staff will move to the Clinton camp, and that would be a huge boost to Clinton if it happened.  But while the staff might go to Clinton, it is way too early to assume that Vilsack’s […]

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