Barack's Short Straw

I've been doing a fill-in shift on WHJJ in Providence over the past couple of weeks, and I just made lighthearted fun when the story was floated in the market that one of their Senators, Jack Reed, was a possible VP pick for Barack.

One intriguing possibility, if Obama doesn't target a single state or try to amplify the change message: Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island. That state's four reliably Democratic electoral votes aren't in doubt and Reed is unknown nationally, but he could help Obama in several ways.

The guy is only 5'7" tall, and I just couldn't imagine the two of them on the stage together - would Reed's hand lift high enough to do the joint hand lift? My argument wasn't enough, alas, to dampen speculation.

He's a Catholic with working-class roots (his father was a school janitor), and could enhance the ticket's appeal to those swing voters. He has expertise on issues at the center of the campaign debate, economics and the housing crisis.

More important, he would offset Obama's lack of national security experience. Reed, 58, has a reputation as a serious thinker and is a respected voice on defense matters. He's a West Point graduate and Army Ranger, with views that are right in line with Obama's. He voted against the 2002 Iraq war resolution and became an early critic of the way the war was fought while working to increase the size of the Army.

All good arguments if the decision comes down to one, doing no damage, and two, strengthening the ticket's current weak point - experience.

He's got an attractive wife and toddler at home, which might produce the sort of family tableau that boosted the Clinton-Gore ticket (Reed met his future wife, a Senate staffer, on an official trip to Afghanistan with McCain).

Like Obama, he's got a Harvard Law degree and spent time teaching at the college level (West Point). The two men are reported to have a good personal relationship.

The only thing that really matters out of the list provided, though, are his military/foreign policy credentials and vote against the war in Iraq - something that Barack has essentially confessed he wouldn't have done had he been in a position to vote on the war.

Reed isn't flashy, and he wouldn't upstage the star. If he joins Obama's upcoming visit to Iraq (it would be Reed's 12th since the war began), his running-mate stock could soar.

I still say that he's too short.