Andrew Golis

One of the primaries reasons that has been argued by those who do not think that Kerry should choose John Edwards for his VP is that Edwards is a more talented politician and would outshine his boring boss. Of course, some people have argued that the fact that Edwards compliments Kerry in that he is the yang to his yin. Kerry is experienced and Edwards is a freshman, Kerry is a war hero who is therefore seen as strong on national security while Edwards has a blue-collar background and his therefore seen as strong on domestic issues. Kerry north, Edwards south, etc. etc.

So the question is, would this seemingly complimentary contrast in styles actually lead to Edwards outshining Kerry on the stump? I don’t think so.

Here’s why. Kerry won the primary for one reason, and one reason only: gravitas. Primary voters saw him as crossing the national security “he’ll keep me safe” threshold that is now clearly a huge help for him in this campaign. Edwards didn’t. Edwards was seen as too young and inexperienced, voters feared that he wouldn’t know enough or be mature enough to sit at the head of the table in the situation room (or they feared that others would think this).

Because of this, I think that Kerry’s gravitas would prevail. Edwards would be seen as the golden little brother. He would be articulate and smart and a good campaigner. Kerry could sit behind him and have a kind of amused and appreciative fatherly look to him: “aww, look at him go” you would see him think. Voters would see this the same way they see the relationship between Bush and Cheney. It is the knowledge that a serious man sits with President Bush at the situation room that lets voters sleep at night. Of course, in this case the relationship would be more appropriately situated.

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