No. 2 sages

How successful have previous Times editorial boards been at handicapping running mates? We'll leave that for you to decided, though there are some notable gems (especially the 1988 observation that Dan Quayle was "bright" and lionizing Dick Cheney in 2000 for his record of maintaining "good relations with leaders of both parties"). Most notable is the absence of stinging opinions on any of the VP contenders, perhaps a testimony to presidential candidates' partiality to running mates mostly unknown to the general public. Below are instant editorial reactions to previous vice presidential announcements.

On George H.W. Bush's pick of Quayle in 1988:

August 17, 1988
On His Own

Ronald Reagan flew off to his Santa Barbara mountaintop Tuesday as patriarch of American Republicans, and George Bush plunged into steamy New Orleans to write the next chapter in the history of the GOP. As if to emphasize that the day is now his, Bush reached into the post-World War II baby boom to choose a running mate who was born a year after Winston Churchill delivered his Iron Curtain address in Fulton, Mo.

In disclosing his choice of 41-year-old Indiana Sen. Dan Quayle, the vice president described Quayle as a dynamic young man of the future. Quayle is one of the bright, hard-working and very conservative Republicans who was swept into office in the Reagan landslide of 1980, and he is one of those who survived the loss of Senate control to the Democrats six years later. The wisdom of Bush's choice will emerge as the campaign unfolds, but Democrats are bound to have something to say about Republicans attempting to reach out to women and minorities in 1988 but fielding a ticket of two white Protestant males who were born to wealth.

The major job ahead, though, lies with Bush. He did not get off to the best possible start on Tuesday. Bush had pledged to keep his running-mate decision a secret until Thursday, or at least tonight, in an effort to maintain suspense and interest in the convention proceedings. But such promises are virtually impossible to keep, and Bush should have known it. Word started to leak as soon as the vice president began informing other potential vice presidential nominees.

And Bush tripped over his tongue at the airport meeting with the President when he introduced President Reagan to his three Mexican-American grandchildren as "the little brown ones." Bush often has boasted of the Mexican ancestry of the children and his son's ability to speak Spanish. The comment obviously was not intended as a slur, but is typical of Bush's occasional difficulty in using the English language with sufficient precision.

Bush's aides expressed pleasure with the endorsement that he received from the President during Reagan's 43-minute-long address to the Republican National Convention in the New Orleans Superdome Monday night. However, the bulk of the address consisted of a recitation of Reagan's own achievements, as he saw them, and a reiteration of his vision of America as a specially blessed place. This followed a movie tribute to Reagan narrated by Reagan. The President never has been very comfortable or generous in praising other politicians.

Bush's dilemma is to reap as much political currency as he can from the Reagan-Bush team's achievements while trying to mold the party to his own concepts and convictions. Fitting the Reagan mantle to himself will not be easy. The warmth that many Americans feel for Reagan is extremely personal and not transferable. As one woman said Monday night while blotting tears from her eyes during the Reagan movie: "It doesn't matter who comes next. It will never be the same."

Reagan's political success is rooted in his unique character, his consistency, his self-confidence and an unshakable belief in the goodness and rightness of his America — an America framed by Reagan's bucolic boyhood along the Rock River in Illinois, an uncomplicated America of long ago.

Now the vice president stands on his own, out from under the long presidential shadow. And Republicans wait to hear of George Bush's vision of America.

On Bill Clinton's pick of Al Gore in 1992:

Friday July 10, 1992
Gore: A Very Credible Choice

When political pros and pundits discuss the qualifications for vice president, they talk about which region of the country the candidate represents, about liberal/conservative labels, about whether the person in the second spot on a ticket will have no effect or a negative effect on the chances of the presidential candidate. But when most Americans think about a vice president, they care most about one thing: Would he or she, if called upon, make a solid, credible President?

Gov. Bill Clinton of Arkansas, the presumptive Democratic candidate for President, has named Sen. Albert Gore Jr. of Tennessee as his vice presidential choice. Gore has a record as a centrist and the respect, if not the endorsement, of many American leaders in and outside his party. Whatever else one might say about the Clinton-Gore ticket, Gore enjoys a high level of confidence among those who have worked with him. In that regard he is clearly closer to the model of what a vice presidential candidate ought to be than others we might think of.

n choosing Gore, Clinton apparently is seeking to make a big statement about generational, baby-boomer change. Clinton is 45, Gore 44. (Clinton said he smoked marijuana in his younger days and didn't inhale, Gore simply said he smoked marijuana during his college days and wisely left it at that.)

The selection of Southerner Gore also goes against the conventional wisdom of putting regional variety on a presidential ticket. We'll be glad when "conventional wisdom" no longer also says that women and minorities on the ticket are risky. Alas, Clinton's final short list of veep candidates contained neither. But of course that particular conventional wisdom won't change until the nation changes.

On George W. Bush's pick of Cheney in 2000:

Wednesday July 26, 2000
Mr. Inside

George W. Bush's campaign generated some genuine political excitement Monday when word circulated that retired Gen. Colin L. Powell was in the picture as a possible vice presidential running mate. Then came the letdown. The rumor was quashed by both Bush and Powell, and the Republican presidential candidate turned instead to the inside favorite, former Defense Secretary Dick Cheney.

There's no questioning Cheney's qualifications. He was a rising star in the House GOP leadership when he resigned his Wyoming congressional seat in 1989 to become George Bush's secretary of Defense, a position he held during the Desert Storm war. Both in Congress and earlier, as White House chief of staff to Gerald Ford, this man of steady, moderate demeanor was able to maintain good relations with leaders of both parties. Still, he has a conservative record that is compatible with Bush's and acceptable to the Republican Party's religious right.

But the selection of Cheney, 59, after months of heading George W.'s search for a running mate, needs inspection. The Texas governor insists the decision was his alone. But was the choice influenced by his father, the former president, in whose Cabinet Cheney served? Does that raise a question of what role the elder Bush might play if his son were elected?

Every president has sought counsel from one or more of his predecessors, and as father and son, the former president and the candidate are certain to be in frequent contact. At what point might one's ideas become the other's policies?

George W. promises he would be an independent president, and we take him at his word. But he should be aware of concerns about the possible influence of his father and take steps to demonstrate his independence.

In choosing a running mate, Bush certainly could have broadened the appeal of his campaign by selecting a woman, such as Elizabeth Dole; a minority member, such as Powell, or a supporter of choice on abortion, such as New York Gov. George Pataki. He might have sought a running mate who promised to bring along a hefty bunch of electoral votes, perhaps Pennsylvania Gov. Thomas J. Ridge.

At the last moment, Arizona Sen. John McCain made himself available but was rejected by Bush forces. During his battles with Bush in the primaries, McCain demonstrated his allure to both Democrats and independents. But the animosity generated then apparently was too much for the two men to overcome.

Cheney may not inject excitement into the campaign or bring more than three Wyoming electoral votes that Bush would win anyway. But he has a breadth of experience that Bush needs — in White House management and in national security and foreign affairs. He is certain to be an effective campaigner unless Bush makes him the ticket's chief attack dog. Cheney's wife, Lynne, the popular former head of the National Endowment for the Humanities, will also be an asset.

Bush had his options. When potential running mates have dubious vote-pulling power, the rule is to pick one who will do no harm to the ticket. The former Defense secretary surely will deliver more of that security for candidate George W. Bush than Dan Quayle did for the senior Bush.

Fast forward to 2004: Cheney morphs from bipartisan to "lumpish." On John Kerry's pick of John Edwards:

July 7, 2004
The Obvious Choice

John Edwards is the best public speaker in national politics. Better than Bill Clinton. Better than the late Ronald Reagan. Lately, Edwards has been declaring his admiration for John Kerry with enough passion and eloquence to persuade listeners that they must have been imagining his recent battle against Kerry for this year's Democratic presidential nomination.

Kerry's choice of Edwards for No. 2 on his ticket is more obvious than it is inspired, reflecting Kerry's caution and, some might say, his lack of vision. But an obvious choice is generally obvious for a reason. Edwards brings more than crude geographical balance. He brings a Southern gift of gab to a Democratic ticket led by a man whose rhetorical gifts are limited by some puzzling combination of New England reticence, muddy thinking and always trying to have it both ways.

Edwards could win a talking contest against his GOP rival with one tongue tied behind his back. Vice President Dick Cheney gives speeches that are so barren of any effort to charm or persuade that the delivery alone seems to reflect contempt for democracy.

So Edwards can talk. But what does he have to say? Republicans are eager to tar him simultaneously as a committed left-winger and ambitious slickster who stands for nothing. A lack of deeply held beliefs can be useful in a political campaign, even for a sitting vice president, whose job traditionally is to support the president's policies and not to reason why. (In the current administration, of course, it works the other way.) Yet a vice president must always be prepared to serve as president. So a lack of core beliefs could be a significant problem.

The more frightening possibility, though, is that Edwards does have core beliefs, and that they are reflected in his demagogic us-versus-them arias to juries during his career as a plaintiff's trial lawyer, and in his opposition to free trade, among other issues. The campaign will be a process of smoking Edwards out on some of this.

Edwards is indeed extraordinarily ambitious -- perhaps even by the standards of the U.S. Senate, where he is only in his first term. But ambition -- even nearly insane ambition -- is not a disqualification for high office, or none of this year's presidential candidates would qualify. A tougher issue about Edwards' mad dash to greatness is whether he has garnered enough experience for the world's biggest job. A short answer to that is: No, but no one has. The job is unique.

The right question to ask about experience is not, "How much?" It's, "What kind?" Republicans will be right to note that neither Kerry nor Edwards has ever run anything bigger than a small law firm or a Senate office staff. In recent elections, voters have shown a clear and probably wise preference for governors over members of Congress.

Republicans can brag that their ticket not only has a former governor and current president on the top but has as No. 2 the former chief executive of a company (Halliburton) that could actually teach the government a thing or two about creative accounting.

One more thing. Edwards is handsome. The consensus on Kerry is that he is Lincoln-esque. The traditional grinning-candidates-at-the-podium shot from the Democratic convention will be a thing of beauty, compared with the Republican version, featuring a lumpish Cheney and President Bush trying hard to suppress his patented smirk. That shouldn't matter. But you know it does.