Daniels is the polar opposite of President Obama substantively and stylistically. Obama had no experience; Daniels has a great deal of business and executive experience. Obama promised the world and more; Daniels is tempered in what government can provide.
Throughout the 2008 campaign, Obama was weirdly self-referential. “Has there ever been a presidential nominee with a wider gap between his estimation of himself and the sum total of his lifetime achievements?” Charles Krauthammer then asked. Mitch Daniels, on the other hand, is quiet, humble, and self-deprecating. He’s sincere and speaks his mind honestly, almost to a political fault. “The very lack of (Daniels’) charisma becomes charismatic,” Ferguson observes. By 2012, after four years of Obamamania celebritydom, Americans might welcome a return to a “Silent Cal” Coolidge type of president. They might desire someone who doesn’t think much of gracing magazine covers. (And for those liberals obsessed with identity politics: Daniels is half-Syrian.)
As for the VP slot in ’12, I may be getting ahead of myself here. But can anyone name a single politician in America who has publicly challenged President Obama’s policies more forcefully and coherently than Wisconsin Representative Paul Ryan? Ryan is young, just 40-years-old. But he’s as smart as a whip. A few minutes of watching him discuss monetary policy or the wonders of the free market on YouTube will show that. He’s conservative but, like Daniels, not a firebrand. Like Daniels, there’s not a threatening thing about Ryan’s personality. And like Daniels, he’s a doer — and a man of ideas.
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