Give The Other Ryan A Rose

Paul Ryan, that is, and of course I'm talking about his selection as Mitt Romney's running mate. Some random thoughts:

Not Pawlenty, not Portman.  I jumped on the bandwagon, along with many others, who were sure Romney would go with a so-called boring white guy. Received wisdom seemed to be that Ryan was too polarizing, too hard right, too "bold" for the famously risk-averse Romney. I feel some "always a bridesmaid" sympathy for Tim Pawlenty, or T-Paw, who was a finalist last time around too, before John McCain selected Sarah Palin.

A sharp right turn. Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus writes that when the Wall Street Journal, the Weekly Standard and the National Review are all telling you to do something, you should run the other way. All three of those conservative publications insisted this week that Romney should select Paul Ryan, and lo and behold, he did. Did Mittens cave? The Romney campaign has provided a meticulous tick tock timeline, making sure everyone knows he decided last week, before getting instructions from Bill Kristol and his friends. By the way, Kristol was Sarah Palin's biggest cheerleader four years ago, repeatedly insisting that she was McCain's best bet. And John McCain is still saying that he's "proud" of Palin. Ick.

Paul Ryan is young. At 42 he's younger than Sarah Palin was when she was selected and he's a lot younger than Mitt Romney. I was thinking yesterday that there's a slight father-son dynamic between the two of them and it turns out, Ryan is the same age as Romney's eldest son.

Ready on day one? Paul Ryan has more government experience than Palin had, with seven terms in the House of Representatives, but he has no executive or private-sector experience, which up until now Romney has been touting as a crucial qualification, and no experience running for office at the statewide level, much less the national level. The "big fish in a little pond" nature of running in a House district isn't the strongest preparation and seasoning for a national level campaign, which is one reason why Congressmen don't usually go directly from the House to the vice presidency (or the presidency.) Gerald Ford was the last Congressman to make the leap, back in 1974 and he wasn't elected. He was appointed by Richard Nixon after Vice President Spiro Agnew resigned. Before that you have to go back to 1932.

Apparently Vice President Joe Biden called Ryan to congratulate him and welcome him to the race. Nice. Political junkies are salivating at the thought of the Vice Presidential debate, which should be a doozy.

Finally, how many years worth of tax returns did the Romney campaign require Mr. Ryan to provide?