On Kerry's selection

I’m keeping an eye on my inbox — Joe Trippi correctly pointed out that if the Kerry campaign hopes to e-mail 1m+ people with word of his announcement, they’ll have to start sending those e-mails in a few minutes if they hope to have them all distributed by early tomorrow morning.

As for who he’ll pick, I mentioned in my last post that my money is on the out-of-the-blue pick (while I named Bill Bradley, it could just as easily be any of a number of other individuals — how about Al Gore?!).

If Kerry manages to make a selection that nobody saw coming, if he manages to make the most public of decisions completely in private — well, that will show discipline that’s been lacking from Democratic campaigns in years past. It will show leadership — that he’s capable of a bold stroke that shows creativity, resolve, self-confidence.

And picking someone that seems a bit of a curve is just good news cycle management. Kerry’s already enjoying a bounce — but I think there’s room for this bubble to grow. An out-of-the-blue running mate becomes its own meta-story: the press will want to report on how they missed it, how Kerry went through the process, and the Kerry campaign will slowly leak details of the dead-of-night meetings, the head-fakes, etc. over the last month — leading to even more coverage. And that doesn’t even take into account coverage of the running mate himself (herself?).

Nicest random piece of intel you don’t hear about on the traditional news nets? Hair Force One is getting repainted in Pittsburgh as we speak.