We turn now to Senator McCain . . .

UPDATE: As of 9:26 AM MDT it is official, Gov. Palin is the Republican V.P. nominee.

High-level rumors are now flying that Senator McCain may be poised to choose Alaska governor Sarah Palin as his running mate. She would be a smart choice certainly because she is a woman, but also because, in ways similar to Senator Obama, she is young, dynamic and came not quite from nowhere to capture the governorship of her state. She has governed, much like the governor of my state, largely above politics and has shown a great deal of compassion and pragmatism. She has taken some very tough stances on ethics. Prior to be elected governor, she resigned from the the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission citing the lack of ethics of her fellow Republicans.

She is the mother of five children, with one son serving in the U.S. Army. At the expense of sounding a bit shallow, it won't hurt that Governor Palin is quite attractive, just as being handsome does not hurt Sen. Obama. She was second runner-up in the Miss Alaska beauty pageant in 1984. I still say: Stocky bald guys are rock solid, you can count on us!

There was no way Sen. McCain could have chosen Gov. Romney or Sen. Lieberman. Gov. Romney failed to impress when he was running for president because he had to run away from all the positions he took when running for Senate and Governor in Massachusetts, which running away meant changing his positions on a lot of issues, like marriage and abortion. Apart from the issue of him being a prominent member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which loomed large for many voters, especially in the southern states, whose concerns he utterly failed to address in his Faith in America speech, opting instead to give a high school civics lesson, polls showed that people simply did not trust him (see Romney's primary problem is not being LDS). Lieberman would have alienated the Republican base due to the fact that the only Republican issue he is in favor of is the Iraq policy, which the Iraqis themselves recently oveturned by insisting that we pull troops out no later than 2011.

Governor Pawlenty of Minnesota all but said he will not be McCain's choice for VP. Up-front it seems that Governor Palin is an outstanding choice, but only time will tell.