Sarah Palin, who recently endorsed Texas senate candidate Ted Cruz in a competitive GOP primary, has started to make robocalls for the Tea Party-backed challenger -- and, reportedly, some of those calls are going out in the wrong state.

According to the Topeka Capital-Journal's Tim Carpenter, Palin's recorded calls have been dispatched in Kansas. While the call begins with a cheerful "Hello, Texas!" greeting from Palin, Carpenter reported Sunday that he had received the message while at his office at the Topeka newspaper, hundreds of miles from the Lone Star State's border.

The call, excerpted in the above video, highlights Cruz's Tea Party affiliation and commitment to conservatism.

Palin endorsed Cruz, the former Texas Solicitor General, earlier this month. HuffPost reported:

"We’re proud to join conservatives in Texas and throughout the nation in supporting your campaign to become the next senator from the Lone Star State," Palin wrote in response to a letter from Cruz, according to his campaign. “Your conservative principles, passionate defense of our Constitution and our free market system come at a time when these cornerstones of our freedom and prosperity are under attack. Our shared goal isn’t just to change the majority in control of the Senate, but to assure principled conservatives like you are there to fight for us.”

Cruz, who also won endorsements from Ron and Rand Paul, said he was honored to have Palin's support, calling her an inspiration to conservatives nationwide.

The former Alaska governor's support of Cruz is the latest in a string of endorsements she has made in tough Republican primaries. Palin made a similar statement of support for Nebraska's Deb Fischer, who won the GOP nomination to the surprise of many last week.

Texas' primary is on Tuesday, May 29. The crowded GOP nomination field includes frontrunner Lt. Governor David Dewhurst and former Dallas mayor Tom Leppert. Cruz and his competitors are vying to succeed Kay Bailey Hutchinson, the Republican senator who announced plans to retire last year.

MIAMI -- Sen. Marco Rubio has close ties to a colleague accused of questionable financial dealings. The freshman senator also once was enmeshed in a controversy over the use of the state party's credit card for his personal expenses. And he has faced increased scrutiny over his personal background since bursting onto the national political scene, including conflicting details of his parents' immigration from Cuba and his recently disclosed ties to the Mormon faith.

Will issues like those in Rubio's personal and political background hold back one of the GOP's fastest-rising stars? That's a question being debated in Republican circles in Washington, Florida and elsewhere as the Cuban-American senator with solid conservative credentials works to raise his profile beyond Florida, if not position himself for a national role within the GOP.

"Marco Rubio is a huge star in the Republican Party in much the same way that Barack Obama was in the Democratic Party between his convention speech in 2004 and his candidacy for the president," said Steve Schmidt, a top adviser to John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign. "There are a lot of plusses when you look at Marco Rubio as a potential vice presidential candidate, but there are also unknowns."

Rubio, who all but certainly has political aspirations that extend beyond the Senate, frequently is mentioned by Republican insiders as an attractive candidate to be Mitt Romney's running mate partly because the party needs to attract Hispanic voters in battleground states like Nevada and Florida in November.

While Rubio denies any interest in the No. 2 slot on the ticket this year, he's working hard to stay in the national spotlight. He recently gave a major foreign policy address in Washington, he's talking about writing a bill to allow some young illegal immigrants to remain and work in the country without citizenship, and next month he'll release a memoir.

The country is only just starting to get to know Rubio and his political vulnerabilities, though Florida residents know both well.

Rubio's relationship with fellow freshman lawmaker Rep. David Rivera, now facing a federal probe into tax evasion, and the credit card controversy surfaced during his 2010 Senate campaign. And they didn't have much effect. But that doesn't mean the country as a whole would overlook those eyebrow-raising issues.

"Floridians may be numb to these hits because of the rough-and-tumble nature of politics in the state, when it's looked at by a national audience it may not be as palatable," said Abe Dyk, a political strategist who managed the 2010 Senate campaign of Rubio's Democratic challenger.

Rubio and Rivera met in 1992, during the campaign of former Republican Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, a fellow South Florida Cuban-American. The two rose through the ranks in the statehouse with Rivera oftentimes playing bad cop to the more congenial Rubio.

During the legislative session, they shared a Tallahassee townhouse, which a bank began foreclosure proceedings on in 2010. Rubio made only partial payments on that mortgage for five months in 2010, even as he held jobs as a consultant, professor and TV commentator. He has said the missed payments were due to a dispute over the terms of the mortgage.

State officials closed a criminal probe into Rivera's personal financial dealings without filing charges but didn't clear him entirely. They cited Florida's brief statute of limitations and its lax campaign finance laws for not charging him with living off of his campaign funds and failing to disclose his income.

In the last year, Rubio has publicly kept some distance from Rivera and has said that his friend has some issues he must address on the campaign trail. Still, Rubio threw a small Washington fundraiser for Rivera last week. So far, Rubio hasn't faced blowback from his friendship with Rivera.

"It's tough to say how that will play out," says Emilio Gonzalez, a consultant who served in the Bush administration and sees Rubio as a potentially formidable presidential candidate in 2016.

If Rubio were to end up on the GOP presidential ticket or mount his own national campaign in the coming years, he all but certainly would face questions about the scandal over the use of state GOP funds when he was the speaker of the Florida House.

The head of the party, Jim Greer, was forced to resign following revelations he and his second-in-command charged $1.5 million on party credit cards, much of it on luxurious hotels, fancy restaurants, chauffeured sedans and lavish entertaining. Greer's trial is set to start July 30, just ahead of the Republican convention, and many Republican observers anticipate he will detail unethical use of party money by other high-ranking GOP officials.

Rubio himself spent more than $100,000 on the party card between 2006 and 2008, paying off about $16,000 in personal expenses and claiming the rest as official party business. His records from 2005, when he was lobbying to become Florida House speaker, never were released. When asked about using the party card for personal expenses, Rubio has said he sometimes just pulled the wrong card out of his wallet and he has called it a "lesson learned."

He also has had to answer criticism for how he spent money donated to two political committees he formed - including payments to relatives. He has acknowledged the bookkeeping for at least one of the accounts was sloppy.

And then there's the fuzziness around his family's background.

Rubio long claimed his parents fled Fidel Castro's regime. But it was recently disclosed that they arrived several years before Castro took power – although they quickly embraced the Cuban exile community as Castro turned toward communism. Rubio has said the dates he gave were based on his parents' recollections.

There's another part of Rubio's upbringing that long had gone undisclosed, and the revelation is one that could turn off evangelicals who make up the base of the GOP.

Rubio was baptized as Mormon when his family lived for a few years in Las Vegas, thanks to the influence of cousins who belonged to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Rubio returned to the Catholic Church as a young teen, and as an adult he has also frequently attended Baptist services.

When it comes to the vice presidency, Rubio's greatest liability may be one only time can resolve.

"I suspect that the Romney campaign is going to pick someone who is viewed as unquestionably qualified for the office," said Schmidt, who was intimately involved in McCain's selection of Sarah Palin. "To the extent that (Rubio's) in his first term, he's in the first two years of his term and he's 40 years old probably doesn't help him."

___

Farrington reported from Tallahassee, Fla.

Follow Laura Wides-Munoz on Twitter: (at)lwmunoz

The Republican leaders in Congress have mostly defined themselves by what they're against, but now they've announced what they're for -- the most popular parts of the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

I can only imagine the political identity crisis this is causing within the GOP. Their hallmark is opposing anything the President supports, even if it started as a Republican legislative proposal, and now they've plunged themselves into a partisan political abyss of their own making: they are supporting the key provisions of the president's signature legislative achievement, a law the Republicans have derisively and incessantly called "Obamacare" for two years. It turns out that the party realizes that may not have been such a good idea. So they're now pretending to come up with what amounts to their own version of Obamacare.

As Politico reports: "If the law is partially or fully overturned they'll draw up bills to keep the popular, consumer-friendly portions [of Obamacare] in place -- like allowing adult children to remain on parents' health care plans until age 26, and forcing insurance companies to provide coverage for people with pre-existing conditions. Ripping these provisions from law is too politically risky, Republicans say."

These provisions are not just popular and central to the law. They are among the few elements of the ACA that are inextricably tied to and, some say, dependent upon the individual responsibility provision, also known as the individual mandate. Yet the Republicans and their extremist friends in the corporate special interest crowd are challenging that provision and the entire law at the U.S. Supreme Court. You can call this irony or hypocrisy or both.

The simple fact is that Obamacare expands coverage to more than 30 million people and eliminates the worst insurance company abuses for those of us with coverage. It stops insurance companies from denying our care and jacking up our rates whenever they please. Apparently the Republicans have noticed that these things are good and popular with voters.

The GOP's political schizophrenia was evident in the quick backtrack by Speaker John Boehner and Budget Chairman Paul Ryan, who responded to the Politico report by stridently saying they would repeal the entire law, no matter what. Recognizing the political quicksand he was entering, Ryan offered uninsured families a single strand of hope: while the GOP has no intention of crafting actual legislation that could help actual people, which the ACA does every day, the Republicans may deign to share their "vision" with the huddled masses.

Republicans' political back-flips are staggering and make Mitt Romney, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, look consistent by comparison. While telling their diehards they're repealing Obamacare in full, they're misleading the public and telling them they can keep the provisions that protect them from insurance company abuses. Many of the Obamacare provisions the Republicans say they'd like to keep are ones that are already in effect. If the court were to fulfill the desperate hopes of Republicans in Congress and overturn Obamacare, the Republicans would then try to immediatelly reinstitute much of what the court will have overturned. That's stunning and bizarre.

For two years the Republicans have promised to "replace" Obamacare as part of their non-stop repeal campaign. A fake plan like this is hardly a "replacement."

Just like their promise to protect Medicare, the talk about preserving the good stuff is an election year lie. The Republicans will always put the big corporations before the consumers they represent. They have an extremist agenda, and they're pursuing it at all costs. They've been driving an assault on women's health care, on health care in general, on every program central to the goal of opportunity and shared prosperity for all. Now that the election is getting closer, their right-wing agenda doesn't seem like such a great idea.

Boehner's words show that the GOP has discovered that hating the people they represent is bad politics. But how can the party reconcile that realization with its fundamental desire to do whatever big corporations say? They have to lie to the voters.

The Republicans in Congress and Mitt Romney will never do anything to help the middle class. They want to end Medicare as we know it. They support insurance company discrimination against the sick. They are waging an enthusiastic war on women and students and middle-class taxpayers. They want to give massive tax breaks to the 1 percent and protect outrageous things like big tax subsidies for the oil companies. Anyone inclined to entrust our nation's health care to this duplicitous party that exists to front for people who have grown rich off the status quo should remember that.

How long can the Republicans keep up the pretense that they plan to come up with their alternative health-care-reform plan? I'm going to go with "forever." Robert Pear and Jonathan Weisman report in today's New York Times that the party is really working hard on that alternative plan:

House Republican leaders are quietly hatching a plan of attack as they await a historic Supreme Court ruling on President Barack Obama's health care law.

If the law is upheld, Republicans will take to the floor to tear out its most controversial pieces, such as the individual mandate and requirements that employers provide insurance or face fines.

Steve Kornacki, Salon
At the very least, the Republican Party base's revolt against its own establishment cost the GOP a 50-50 Senate tie in 2010, with primary voters forcing unelectable nominees on the party in three races that it had otherwise been on course to win. A decent case can be made that the uprising actually cost Republicans outright Senate control.And now the same thing may be happening all over again, with Nebraska joining a growing list of unexpected 2012 Senate battlegrounds "“ at least for the moment. 

Eugene Robinson, Washington Post
Republicans say they're eager for the presidential campaign to turn away from "distractions" and focus instead on the economy. Someone should warn them that if they're not careful, they might get their wish.It is true that voters' unhappiness with high unemployment and slow growth poses a challenge for President Obama as he seeks re-election. But for Mitt Romney and the GOP to take advantage of this potential opening, they'll have to do more than chant the word "economy" like a mantra. They have to make the case that their policies will work better than...

Gloria Borger, CNN

Michael Warren, Weekly Standard
The May 8 election could also turn out to be the final fight of 80-year-old incumbent Dick Lugar's long career. A six-term senator and former Indianapolis mayor, Lugar is an institution, but conservative forces within the Republican party have long grumbled that he is too moderate and too ensconced in the Washington bubble, where he's been since entering the Senate nearly 36 years ago. Now, Lugar is in danger of losing the GOP nomination to Mourdock, who is giving Lugar the toughest electoral battle he's ever faced.

Where in the world is Mitt Romney's money?

President Barack Obama's re-election campaign launched a new webpage designed to answer that question and attack the presumptive GOP nominee for putting his wealth in offshore accounts. "Mitt Romney has invested his money around the world, from the Cayman Islands to Ireland to Australia," the website reads. "We don’t know if he’s using these accounts to avoid paying his fair share in taxes, but we do know that in 2010, Romney’s tax rate was a startlingly low 13.9%."

The Associated Press reported in January that Romney has up to $32 million in accounts overseas. The webpage features a large infographic tracking the locations of these accounts and the amounts of money they contain, though as of now, most of the locations on the map display ominous question marks rather than account balances. It also provides social media links urging readers to call on Romney to return his money to the United States.

The infographic is the latest interactive tool the Obama campaign has created to highlight Romney's wealth. In April, the campaign debuted a calculator allowing voters to compare their tax rates to Romney's, swiping at his relatively low 13.9 percent rate.

Michael Tomasky, Daily Beast
It couldn’t be more hilarious, watching these Republicans rend their garments over the Obama administration’s bin Laden video. Imaging the paroxysms we’d have been forced to endure if George W. Bush had iced the dreaded one is all we need to do to understand how hypocritical it all is. But what obviously gets under Republicans’ skin is not the fact of this video’s existence, but the fact that Barack Obama got him and they didn’t, which destroys their assumption of the past decade that they are “the 9/11 party.”...

Revealing some of its messaging strategies for the election, the AFL-CIO released a video Monday painting GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney as "Mr. 1 Percent," contrasting the former Massachusetts governor with President Barack Obama, "the champion of the 99 percent," according to the ad.

Portraying Romney as the embodiment of Wall Street values, the video opens with a mashup of Romney's economy-related gaffes on the campaign trail, including his infamous statements that he likes being able to fire people and isn't concerned about "the very poor." The video also highlights some of Romney's anti-labor statements during the past few months, such as his accusation that Obama is "kowtowing" to "union bosses" and his pledge of support for Ohio's Issue 2 anti-union law.

In a statement, AFL-CIO spokeswoman Alison Omens said the video is meant to "educate folks about what Romney truly believes."

"Mitt Romney's attack on workers coming together in unions is a predictable refrain in a career of getting rich looting companies and destroying good jobs," Omens said. "If Romney spent time listening to working people instead of focus-group testing his beliefs, he'd realize that working Americans want a true opportunity to get ahead and don't celebrate the freedom to 'fire people' or outsource good jobs."

Somewhat incongruously for a pro-Obama ad, the video also alludes to the AFL-CIO's ongoing efforts to build an "independent movement" less tied to the Democratic establishment and better equipped to hold lawmakers of both parties accountable to the labor community.

"If we want our country to value what we value ... then our job is to build a movement, an independent movement ... not beholden to any party or any candidate," Richard Trumka, the labor federation's president, says in the ad.

HuffPost reported last week that the AFL-CIO's super PAC, Workers' Voice, was handing control of its $4.1 million war chest over to union and non-union members, rolling out a new incentive system to promote political activism.

Watch the "Mr. 1 Percent" video here:

Robert Reich, Salon
What are the three demographic groups whose electoral impact is growing fastest? Hispanics, women and young people. Who are Republicans pissing off the most? Latinos, women, and young people.It's almost as if the GOP can't help itself.

Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) shot back at House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi on Thursday, claiming that Pelosi's move to connect a GOP student loan plan to the so-called Republican war on women was "pathetic."

"She wants to continue this fiction that every Democrat messenger is trying to put forward, which is there's a war on women,” Bachmann told Fox Business Network’s Neil Cavuto. “There is no war on women. There's never been a war on women."

On Thursday, Pelosi lambasted the recently announced Republican bill, which would keep student loan rates at their current levels by pulling money from a public health fund included in President Barack Obama's health care law. Democrats had originally proposed covering the estimated $6 billion cost by closing a tax loophole that lets certain wealthy people avoid paying Medicare taxes, but Republicans countered by targeting what House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) called an Obamacare "slush fund."

"He's calling it a slush fund," Pelosi said of Boehner's proposal during a press conference. "Well, it may be a slush fund to him, but it's survival to women. It's survival to women. That just goes to show you what a luxury he thinks it is to have good health. We do not agree."

Bachmann went on to attack Pelosi's strategy in her interview, accidentally referring to her as the "Speaker of the House" and accusing Democrats of perpetuating a "political fiction" in order to cater to women voters.

The House passed the GOP's student loan proposal on Friday by a vote of 215 to 195. The White House has threatened to veto the bill.

David Zurawik, Baltimore Sun
Tuesday night, there was a two-hour report by "Frontline" that explained better than anything I have ever seen on TV how the middle-class got shredded by Wall Street and sold-out by our elected leaders in Washintgon -- and that includes Democrats in the White House.There were also presidential primaries that made Mitt Romney all but official as the GOP candidate.But all anyone will be talking about this morning is President Barack Obama slow jamming the news with latenight host Jimmy Fallon at the University of North Carolina.

ST. PAUL, Minn. -- Minnesota's debt-plagued Republican Party faces an eviction hearing next week after failing to pay rent for its headquarters since August.

The party's landlord filed the notice in county housing court last week and a hearing is set for next week. Minnesota Republican Party Chairman Pat Shortridge told party members in a memo that officials are trying to renegotiate its lease.

The GOP has 21 months remaining on a lease with Hub Properties Trust for space a block from the state Capitol. Shortridge revealed the rent hadn't been paid in eight months.

The most recent federal campaign reports show the Minnesota GOP owes nearly $1 million to vendors. That includes $107,000 to Hub Properties.

The eviction notice was first reported by Politics in Minnesota.

As he continued to deny any interest in becoming Mitt Romney's running mate, Sen. Marco Rubio instead turned the veepstakes spotlight on fellow Florida Republican Jeb Bush, who he said would make a "fantastic vice president."

During an appearance on CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday, the freshman senator said he believed the former governor should accept the place on the ticket if offered it by likely GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney.

"I hope he'll say yes if future President Romney asks him," Rubio said. "I think he'd be a fantastic vice president."

Rubio continued: "But let me just say this about the vice presidential process. Up to now it's all been theoretical; we have a nominee now, and our nominee, Mitt Romney, the leader of the Republican Party, has a vice presidential process in place. And I think from this point moving forward, I think it'd be wise for all Republicans to kind of respect that process, myself included, and say moving forward, we're going to let his process play itself out."

His comments came just days after Bush, a popular figure in the Republican Party who many had hoped would seek the presidential nomination, said that Rubio should be Romney's running mate.

"Well I can’t speak for Gov. Romney, and I can’t speak for Sen. Rubio, but if I was on both sides of that conversation I would ask -- and I would hope that Marco would accept,” Bush said in an interview with Newsmax.

"There’s a lot of things in between that may not make that happen," Bush said. "But I am a great admirer of Mitt Romney’s and I’m a huge fan of Marco Rubio’s, and I think the combination would be extraordinary.”"

While both Bush and Rubio have endorsed Romney, they have also both insisted that they are not interested in seeking the vice presidency.

Sunday is Earth Day, and some Republicans who aren't convinced of climate change may not be celebrating. Mitt Romney's views on the matter have evolved to "we don't know what's causing climate change," while Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK), the ranking member on the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, has used the Bible to deny global warming.

Here is what the GOP presidential candidates and others have to say about climate change.

Last night I joined Rachel Maddow to talk about Mitt Romney's evolving views on Afghanistan.  At various times, Romney has said we needed to get out of the Afghanistan mess, agreeing for the most part at the time of early GOP debates with House Representative and then presidential candidate Michele Bachmann until shifting to a harder-line posture on staying in Afghanistan.

Romney, who has endorsed the general time frame of closing down most of the US mission in Afghanistan at the end of 2014 has been critical of Obama's decision to drawdown the committed surge forces and bringing levels to 68,000.  Obama -- acting like a Commander-in-Chief should listened to the advice of 'the generals' and then made a decision based on larger strategic factors and ordered that the surge troops be drawn out.  Romney has implied that Obama should not only 'listen to the generals' but should do what they tell him. 

Romney might want to go back and read testimony given by former ISAF Commander General David Petraeus about Afghanistan before Congress in which Petraeus said that the recommendations he was making were based on factors inside and related to Afghanistan alone -- but were not taking into account the larger "strategic situation."  Petraeus shied away from giving a strategic assessment of the value of Afghanistan in relation to other matters like America's posture with Iran, with the broader Middle East, with stability dynamics in South Asia -- particularly with Pakistan and India. 

Obama and his national security team lead by Tom Donilon and Denis McDonough have committed to a strategic rebalancing of US forces and long-term commitments. They are working to downsize America's vulnerability to the instability and challenges in the Middle East and South Asia which are sapping American resources and power and deploy to where global economic growth is shifting:  Asia. 

If Mitt Romney re-reads his Citadel speech and checks out the Asia sections, he agrees that Asia needs more attention.

The clip of my discussion with Rachel Maddow follows below:

Rachel Maddow talks to Atlantic editor-at-large Steve Clemons about whether John McCain is pushing Mitt Romney into more hawkish, never leave Afghanistan position

While I have largely dismissed the foreign policy competence and coherence of Mitt Romney's strategic vision in the past, I'm seeing Romney up his game in a few hires he has made. 

First of all, the Romney team has brought on board former Department of State Under Secretary for Global Affairs Paula Dobriansky to play a lead role on shaping his national security and foreign policy agenda and positions.  Dobriansky, who until recently was a senior executive with ThomsonReuters and once was Vice President and Director of the Washington operations for the Council on Foreign Relations, is a formidable and creative public intellectual.  I'm not sure she wrote the piece, but one could sense a different hand -- probably Paula Dobriansky's by my guess -- behind the interesting Mitt Romney Foreign Policy magazine oped, "Bowing to the Kremlin", in which he challenged Obama's caught-on-mic comments to Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on ballistic missile defense.

The essay was tough-minded, internally consistent and coherent, and a real contrast to other Romney foreign policy commentary.

The next big hire that I mentioned to Rachel Maddow last evening was that Ric Grenell, a long time communications expert who served as spokesman for four US Ambassadors to the United Nations, is now Romney's national security spokesman.  Grenell worked for former Senator Jack Danforth at the UN; then John Negroponte; then the affable John Bolton; and finally Zalmay Khalilzad.  During the long battle over John Bolton's Senate confirmation vote which he never received, Grenell was a tireless, tenacious, tough advocate for Bolton with the media.  I was one of those skeptical of John Bolton's UN confirmation, but I give Grenell credit for being fair-minded and serious with me. 

Foreign policy pundits and analysts are now going to have to reconsider Romney on foreign policy and national security and consider his positions more seriously. 

Presidents aren't just people -- they are franchises.  And with Dobriansky and Grenell, Romney has upped the stock value of his foreign policy operation.

-- Steve Clemons is Washington Editor at Large at The Atlantic, where this post first appeared. Clemons can be followed on Twitter at @SCClemons

Noam Scheiber, TNR
Though it was obvious to almost no one at the time, Thursday, April 5, may have certified a momentous change in contemporary politics. It was that day when Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairman Reince Priebus was quoted saying that the Republican "war on women," a favorite liberal talking point, was a creation of Democrats and the media"”no more reality-based than a Republican "war on caterpillars." It probably wasn't the most outlandish comment a GOP operative uttered that hour. 

WASHINGTON -- If Haley Barbour advised Mitt Romney about whom to pick for his running mate, the former Mississippi governor might repeat something he said in a book about his home state's politics: "Never make a political decision until you have to, for things could always change."

Romney's search for a running mate will be guided by a few factors, and the individual qualities and resumes of each potential pick will play an important role. But there will be another significant element: the situational dynamics of the presidential election four months from now, when the GOP convention in Tampa begins on Aug. 27.

Will Romney be trailing President Obama in the polls so much that he needs a jolt, a game changer, a boost of energy? Or will the race be neck and neck, in a dead heat? If so, he will likely be seeking a less risky choice, someone who will not affect the race significantly in either a positive or negative way.

"How that dynamic shakes out will have a lot to do with how a vice presidential pick is made," said Taylor Griffin, a Washington-based consultant who worked in the White House for President George W. Bush and on Republican Sen. John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign.

Interviews with GOP insiders and those involved with the Romney campaign underscore the conventional wisdom: Most people expect the presidential race to remain tight, as a new New York Times/CBS News poll showed it to be on Thursday morning. If that trend continues this summer, it would increase the likelihood of a do-no-harm pick by Romney and reduce the chances that this already cautious candidate with a risk-averse campaign would go out on a limb.

"You gotta be able to win, but the second question is, how are you going to govern together?" said Henry Barbour, a Republican operative in Mississippi and nephew of the former governor. "That's why George W. Bush picked Dick Cheney because they got along; they were compatible. It certainly was not a political pick. Dick Cheney was not a guy who loved going out and campaigning, but he loved governing."

Romney, 65, is known to value loyalty and compatibility.

"Compatibility is a big factor," Barbour said. "It should be obvious ... But if you just pick somebody because you think they're going to help you win some big state or draw big crowds, I think that's a mistake."

There is certainly some skepticism at Romney's Boston headquarters about the potential impact of a vice presidential pick -- at least on the positive side. The focus, according to campaign sources and Republicans who deal with Boston, appears to be on averting the potential of pick causing Romney any damage.

The safer picks are all white men: Ohio Sen. Rob Portman, Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell and former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty.

The riskier picks are almost all women or minorities who are rising stars in the Republican Party but with less experience in national politics than a Portman or Daniels: This set includes Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez and South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley.

Two white men are on the riskier list: New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, whose weakness is that he might be so charismatic that he would outshine Romney, and Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan, whose budget plan is lauded by many conservatives but tough to defend in political sound-bite combat.

The one danger to Romney's taking the safe route is that the monochrome pairing of two older white men could itself pose a risk, since Romney will be trying to unseat the nation's first black president, who also happens to be, at age 50, from a younger generation.

Perhaps the only minority candidate with a substantial enough record to avoid the charge of not be prepared, should he be thrust into the Oval Office, is Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal.

"Daniels and Jindal would be so steady but they wouldn't overshadow him, and they wouldn't have any interest in overshadowing Romney," Barbour said. "It's not their style."

Two other outliers are former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum.

Here are the pros and cons for each choice:

ROB PORTMAN
Pros: He is a 56-year-old former White House budget director (from 2006 to 2007) and successful member of Congress who remained popular with constituents during seven terms from 1993 to 2005. He also served as a U.S. trade representative to boot. Portman has a strong political network in Ohio, which again will be one of the most crucial battleground states in the election. And he is well-known for his keen mind and firm grasp of a broad range of policy issues. He served in George H.W. Bush's White House as well, so he knows how both the executive and legislative branches work.

Cons: Portman's stint as budget director under George W. Bush would open a door for Democrats to use one of their favorite attacks: Bush inherited a budget surplus from Democratic President Bill Clinton and handed a more than $400 billion budget deficit to Obama. On a more superficial level, while Portman is friendly with many in the press, he does not bring any extra charisma or excitement to the ticket. In many conservative's eyes, Portman's current position as a legislator instead of an executive (such as governor) is also a minor strike against him.

MARCO RUBIO
Pros: Rubio, 41, is a rock star. He's young, good-looking, well-spoken and a Latino. He's from the must-win state of Florida. What's not to like?

Cons: He's young and only in his second year as a senator. He would also be certain to attract a high level of scrutiny to his past, especially about whether he tweaked his family's story of leaving Cuba to make it more dramatic and if he used a credit card issued by the Republican Party to buy personal items while a state legislator. Rubio has been the most Shermanesque of all the potential VP picks in his promises to refuse any request to consider the job.

CHRIS CHRISTIE
Pros: Christie, 49, is as outsized a personality as there is in modern American politics. He loves the spotlight. He talks straighter than blunt. Some might call his a smash mouth. And voters love him. After three years as chief executive, his approval rating in New Jersey, a Democratic stronghold, is at an all-time high. He has balanced budgets in the face of huge projected deficits without raising taxes and has achieved significant reforms in the state's pension system for government workers.

Cons: He might love the spotlight a little too much for Mitt Romney's liking. He and Romney are worlds apart in terms of personal style. It would be a lot to expect him to hang back and play second fiddle. In addition, having two candidates from the Northeast limits the ticket's geographical appeal and its ability to win over rural voters. His weight is also a factor.

MITCH DANIELS
Pros: Like Portman, Daniels, 63, is also a former White House budget director. He served in that post from 2001 to 2003 and then went on to become governor, now in his second term. Like Christie, he has imposed conservative reforms as governor in budget spending, taxation and state worker salaries and benefits as well as health care. He is one of the most articulate Republicans in discussing the national debt. Also like Christie, Daniels had been wooed intensely by Republican insiders and voters to run in the primary against Romney but refused.

Cons: While Daniels served as George W. Bush's budget director, a surplus turned to a deficit under his watch, thanks in large part to a major recession caused by the September 11 attacks and major tax cuts that Bush pushed through. Daniels did not run for president because his wife and daughters (or at least some of them) didn't want him to. It's not clear whether he'll even agree to being vetted for VP by the Romney campaign for the same reasons. He also lacks the electrifying presence of a Christie or Rubio. His personality is low-key and droll. His tenure as an executive at drugmaker Eli Lilly and Co. in the 1990s would be closely examined.

BOBBY JINDAL
Pros: Jindal is another governor who has accomplished a lot that will appeal to conservatives -- cutting taxes and spending -- and taking on teachers' and state employee unions. And at 40 years old, the former Rhodes scholar is younger than other potential picks. He was re-elected in a landslide last fall and just succeeded in engineering the passage of a sweeping education reform plan by the GOP-controlled legislature. He is now taking on the challenge of trying to curb state worker pensions, though that is proving to be a tougher slog. Jindal is a former congressman (from 2005 to 2008) who in the 1990s ran Louisiana's health and hospitals system and then its university system. He is the son of immigrant parents who came to the States from Punjab, India, six months before he was born.

Cons: He is known nationally mostly for his widely panned 2009 speech giving the official Republican response to President Barack Obama's first State of the Union address. He is not seen as a particularly inspiring figure. His state, Louisiana, is already considered sure win for Romney. And there are two minor hurdles for him to surmount: First, Jindal endorsed Texas Gov. Rick Perry in the primary. After Perry dropped out, Jindal declined to endorse anyone else. And second, Jindal's Washington-based consultant, Curt Anderson, is not on the best terms with Stuart Stevens, the top strategist on Romney's campaign.

PAUL RYAN
Pros: The 42-year-old House budget chairman is a numbers-and-policy ace. He runs through the intricacies of Medicare, Social Security and budgets with the efficiency of a machine. And despite initial resistance a few years ago from many in the GOP, his detailed plan to overhaul federal spending and entitlement programs -- the biggest drivers of the nation's long-term debt –- has become essentially the party's platform. On a few occasions, he has taken on President Obama directly and more than held his own in policy debates. Being tall and good-looking doesn't hurt him. And Wisconsin is a swing state.

Cons: Ryan's "Road Map" may be accepted by the GOP as its best attempt to fix some of the nation's most vexing problems: the budget deficit and national debt. But that doesn't mean Romney and many Republicans want to make that a central issue in the race this fall. They want the economy -- and Obama's handling of it -- to be the focus. A concern is that putting Ryan on the ticket could make a plan that hasn't yet been enacted into law the central focus -- instead of what Republicans view as mistakes made by the incumbent president. This is the reason Ryan is a highly unlikely pick.

TIM PAWLENTY
Pros: Pawlenty, 51, suffered a political bruising during his time as a candidate in the primary but has emerged as a trusted adviser to Romney after he endorsed him. The personal connection between the two men should not be underestimated. Pawlenty also has an ability to connect with blue-collar voters that Romney does not. And there would be few doubts about Pawlenty's trustworthiness or loyalty.

Cons: He offers little heft to the equation in terms of geographic advantage, in that he is from Minnesota (which is not a swing state) and showed no distinct ability to excite any passion or confidence among voters during his primary run.

BOB MCDONNELL
Pros: McDonnell, 57, is governor of a key battleground state and he looks the part of vice president. He's eloquent and smart enough. He gets along with people well and seems like a natural fit for Romney. After Portman, there seems to be no other potential VP pick who is a better match for Romney when it comes to pure compatibility.

Cons: McDonnell doesn't stand out. He has not distinguished himself with any particular accomplishment or stylistic trademark. His handling of a bill requiring an ultrasound before a woman obtains an abortion was widely perceived as shaky. He first supported a transvaginal procedure before backing away from this stance and saying only an abdominal, noninvasive ultrasound should be mandated.

SUSANA MARTINEZ
Pros: The 52-year-old Texas native and granddaughter of Mexican immigrants has an inspiring, up-from-the-bootstraps personal story. The former district attorney is the first Latina to become governor in the history of the United States. She is also the head of state in a Democratic-leaning state that is nonetheless considered by some to be a swing state. Her two years in office so far have gone reasonably well.

Cons: Not much is known about Martinez. She has vowed she would turn down an offer to be considered for the vice presidential spot. And she is likely not seasoned enough to step into the vice presidential role.

RICK SANTORUM
Pros: Santorum, 53, became a hero to many conservative Republicans with his insurgent campaign for the GOP nomination, which went further than anybody ever expected. Santorum showed a talent for grassroots campaigning (that Pennsylvania campaign watchers already knew about) and a knack for articulating a conservative message that connects with voters in a way Romney never has had. He's also from a swing state, though Pennsylvania has not voted for a Republican presidential candidate since it went for George H. W. Bush in 1988.

Cons: Santorum waged a fierce and sometimes bitter battle with Romney in the primary. It's not yet clear how much the fences between the two have been mended. Santorum is holding off on endorsing Romney, waiting until he can meet with the presumptive nominee and press him to hold fast to conservative principles on key issues. How that meeting goes will likely dictate whether Santorum is even in the running for the VP spot. But Santorum's lack of message discipline and penchant for veering into social issues are likely to be turnoffs for the Romney campaign.

NIKKI HALEY
Pros: The 40-year-old governor of South Carolina is a talented, dynamic and charismatic political figure. She's the youngest governor in the country. Haley is another player among the bumper crop of young, minority stars rising in the Republican Party. She is the daughter of Sikh immigrants from India.

Cons: Haley is struggling as governor. Her approval rating is in the 30s range. Her endorsement of Romney before the Palmetto State's January primary failed to help him beat back Newt Gingrich, who won convincingly. And she is probably too inexperienced.

MIKE HUCKABEE
Pros: The former governor turned Fox News personality won Iowa during his 2008 presidential bid and attracted the same evangelical voting bloc that went for Santorum this year. The 56-year-old remains a hero to many conservatives. His name recognition is substantial, since he has been on national television regularly during prime time most weekends for the last three and a half years. He has an ability to present conservative positions in ways that are more winsome than is true for many other Republicans.

Cons: Huckabee is taken more seriously as a cultural force than as a political figure. And like Santorum, he would bring rightward drift to the ticket at a time when the Romney campaign is counting on the Republican base remaining steadfast (because of the party's intense opposition to Obama) and is focused instead on winning over independents and moderates.

Steve Kornacki, Salon
It's been a week since Rick Santorum's exit cemented him as the presumptive Republican nominee, and Mitt Romney's general election ...

WASHINGTON -- A Southern Republican is raising questions about whether President Barack Obama is capably leading the government.

Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama tells reporters the president should take responsibility for the Secret Service, GSA and energy company Solyndra scandals and insist on a government culture in which taxpayer dollars are not wasted. He said, "I don't sense that this president has shown that kind of managerial leadership."

Sessions is a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is expected to receive a briefing Friday from the Secret Service and hold a hearing next week. The service has ousted three of 11 agents and officers alleged to have cavorted with prostitutes in Colombia in advance of Obama's visit there.

The president has pushed for a thorough investigation into the incident.