Ah, the Old V.P. Trick

politics.salon.com — Carl Cameron of Fox News reported Sunday night that Newt Gingrich’s campaign has been engaged in “preliminary ‘what-if conversations’” with Rick Perry’s camp about teaming up as a ticket in advance of this summer’s Republican convention. That this kind of story attracts any attention is a consequence of the deadlocked convention talk that won’t quite go away. The odds that the GOP presidential nomination won’t be settled well in advance of the late-August convention in Tampa are slim, but they’re not entirely nonexistent. And if Gingrich manages to win in Dixie this week, it will bolster the most plausible deadlock scenario that now exists – meaning we’ll probably hear a lot more about possible strategically preemptive V.P. selections by the candidates in the weeks ahead. At least that’s what’s happened in the few modern campaigns where suspense – or the illusion of suspense – has lingered through the primary season.

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