Looking Sunny for Crist

The Tallahassee Democrat, the newspaper in Florida's capitol city, ran a story today under this headline: "Pundits Say McCain-Crist Duo Possible." Charlie Crist is the Governor of Florida and a Republican. He also endorsed McCain in the run-up to the Florida primary. McCain scored a huge win there. Now the pundits are saying that Crist may be McCain's VP choice.

Some politicos have also mentioned the governors of Minnesota and South Carolina. But Minnesota has 10 electoral votes and South Carolina 8. Florida has 27, a tenth of what it takes to win the White House.

The story quotes Keith Simmonds, a political science professor at Florida A & M University which is in Tallahassee. "With McCain having problems with his Republican base, he cannot afford to lose one of the South's largest states," said Simmonds, who is also assistant dean of the FAMU College of Arts and Sciences. "Our popular governor who has shown that he knows how to attract Democrats and independent voters can be quite helpful to McCain if he is concerned about keeping his base intact by the time November comes around."

On February 14th, in an exchange of comments on an earlier post, I wrote this: "I have a friend, a McCain supporter (I have friends in high and low places), who believes just he will choose based upon regional appeal. I mused that Gov Crist of Florida, in that case, might be a choice - he is very popular - and comes with the most exemplary credential of being an FSU grad."

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