Kaine defers to Obama on vice-president talk

Media General News Service
Published: August 22, 2008

So is Virginia’s governor the Chosen One?

Sen. Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, said yesterday that he had picked his running mate, but he wouldn’t say who it was.

If Gov. Timothy M. Kaine knew the answer, he wasn’t saying.

“I’m going to let the camam,“ Kaine said yesterday afternoon in Hanover County, a couple of hours after he appeared with Obama at a rally at John Tyler Community College in Chester.

In the morning, Kaine and his staff spent 15 minutes with Obama at the Omni hotel in downtown Richmond, where Obama stayed Wednesday night. Kaine is a national co-chairman of the Obama campaign and a good friend of the candidate.

“They are going to reveal what they want to reveal when they want to reveal it,“ Kaine told reporters at Hanover Wayside Park, where he announced the launch of “Checkpoint Strikeforce,“ an initiative against drunken driving that will target rural roadways.

Kaine’s take differed slightly from his response the evening before in Charles City County, when he said: “I honestly don’t [know].“

Kaine said Obama’s two-day swing through Virginia, his fourth general-election visit to the state, made it clear Obama plans to pay a lot of attention to Virginia and its 13 electoral votes in the run-up to the election.

Kaine said just being considered to join Obama’s ticket has been nice.

“I’ve always thought it sounded . . . a bit unlikely, but I’m not going to tell you it hasn’t been flattering,“ he said.

According to Kaine’s schedule, he will be in Denver, site of the Democratic National Convention, today through Aug. 29.

Kaine said he and his family are leaving town today to head west. Asked whether they planned a stopover in Springfield, Ill., where Obama is set to campaign with his running mate tomorrow, Kaine responded:

“I’m flying out [tonight] is what I’m going to say.“