V.P. Etc.

It's been confirmed that for his acceptance speech at the Dem Conven on August 28, Obama will speak to 75,000 in the stadium where the Denver Broncos play. Of course that's not the largest crowd that's heard a speech on that date--upwards of a quarter of a million were on hand--me among them--when Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his "I have a dream" speech for the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, 40 years before Barack's.

On the VP front, Jim Webb opted out. Also, I saw Janet Napolitano on TV and she looks too grim. So I'm down to two favorite possibilities: Kathleen Sibelius and Bill Richardson. Richardson because the southwest and the west are definitely in play, plus the Latino connection, plus the foreign policy experience. His drawbacks remain the same: possible emnity from the Clintons, a tendency to go off message and attract too much attention. I'm personally not wild about Richardson as VP, but unless Obama picks somebody who is on nobody's radar--like Bill Bradley or Gary Hart--there don't seem many good choices. I do think the VP candidate has to come with some stature, because the days of the nobody VP are over. Bradley and Hart do have stature, lots of international experience, known as creative thinkers and good communicators. So not every surprise candidate would be a welcome surprise. And I just don't see Obama pulling a Bush and naming a real old establishment guy, like Sam Nunn.

The political play of last week was the Obamas in Montana celebrating the 4th, and Obama's daughter Malia's birthday, while John McCain was nowhere to be seen.

An interesting if a bit cynical piece on Kathleen Sibelius as Barack's vp, with that second photo--they sure look good together. The third photo is one I came across on the Rolling Stone site--that's Barack and Michelle breakfasting at Pamela's, a place in Pittsburgh where I used to do the Sunday breakfast thing.

Otherwise there were various kerfluffles over Obama's positions on various issues, and a media self-manufactured frenzy over a change on Iraq Obama didn't make. A Bush environmental appointee quits, supports Obama. Another Salon piece on Obama as a literary kind of guy. Obama songs are the calypso rage, and may inspire some votes in Florida. Buzz that Obama may make his acceptance speech at the convention in the nearby stadium (JFK made his at an outdoor stadium in LA in 1960), and he may speak outdoors near the Brandenburg gate in Berlin on his upcoming overseas trip.