Didn’t think that was possible, did you?

Mitt Romney is an objectively worse and totally unfit VP pick for the future of the country for all the reasons identified in the recent four-part series (here, here, here, and here), and because of all that was noted during the primary season. But the damage caused by picking this other person would be immediate, serious, and likely fatal to McCain’s candidacy.

John McCain has railed against excessive CEO pay and perks — sometimes inadvisedly, because many highly-paid CEOs earn it.

McCain may never have mentioned unmerited golden parachutes and severance packages on the stump, but he doesn’t have to. Anyone criticizing CEO pay goes after these, and should. It’s the money that failed leaders like Ford’s Jack Nasser, Home Depot’s Bob Nardelli, Mattel’s Jill Barad, and others have taken with them as they walk out the door that drives even many ardent supporters of capitalism, including yours truly, to distraction.

Carly Fiorina was one of those recipients of ridiculously excessive and totally undeserved booty 3-1/2 years ago. Those, including Fiorina, who claim that HP turned around under her successor because things she had initiated during her tenure finally came to fruition are indulging in fantasy.

This woman is a poster babe for undeserved, overly generous send-offs. I don’t even like the fact that she’s a McCain campaign spokesperson, but as long as she does only what a spokesperson is supposed to do, her presence is (barely) tolerable.

John McCain’s selection of Fiorina as Veep would be a massive injection of political cyanide.

Note: This post has been carried forward from earlier today.
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This is the final of four posts covering:

• What Mitt Romney did to Massachusetts while he was Bay State governor.
• What he did to the nation while he was governor.
• His risky associations and entanglements. This one has a “surprise.”
• (THIS POST) What he did to the nation, the Republican Party, and John McCain during his GOP primary run.

UPDATE: Though the details below are important, Dick Morris does a nice job this morning (HT Ironman, in the first comment below) describing the essence of Romney’s unsuccessful bid for the GOP presidential nomination –

And John McCain rightly did not like Romney’s tactics during the primaries. Using his gigantic money advantage to dominate television, he seized early leads in virtually all of the primary states, only to lose them later on. And, when they started slipping away, he resorted to unfair, distorted, scorched-earth negative ads, betting that his opponents couldn’t afford to spend enough for the truth to catch up to his charges.

John McCain should not forget this, and should pick someone else.

UPDATE 2: From Gregg Jackson and John Haskins this past Sunday (title abbreviated) — “Romney a Better Fit for Obama Than McCain.”

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MITT ROMNEY’S DISGRACEFUL PRIMARY CAMPAIGN

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Brian Wesbury, whose writings I have quoted often (link is to a BizzyBlog site search on Wesbury’s name), is at it again, puncturing the economic gloom with reality-based analysis. Since his job is to provide useful info for the investor-clients at First Trust, creating unrealized hype is not in his best interest.

Wesbury is predicting a stunning improvement in the economy’s growth rate (PDF; HT Political Calculations) when Uncle Sam’s Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) releases second quarter Gross Domestic Product (GDP) information next week:

Growth Was Solid in Q2

Late next week the government will release initial estimates of real economic activity in the second quarter. Not long ago, in early April, when the quarter was just beginning, the consensus forecast for Q2 2008 real GDP growth was 0.0%, with as many economists predicting contraction as were predicting growth.

Now, three months later, the consensus is up to 2.2%. And no surprise – we are forecasting a 3% growth rate, more bullish than almost any other economist.

Wow. If this result occurs, it’s going to be really tempting for Old Media to exclusively credit the economic stimulus checks for the improvement. But that’s baloney; those were factored into the earlier lower estimates.

I’m not as sold on 3% as Wesbury, despite the detailed walkthrough he’s done, but I believe that the final result (i.e., after the BEA’s August and September revisions) won’t come in any lower than the 2.2% consensus he refers to.

By the way, Wesbury says that the 2.2% consensus forecast came from Bloomberg. If you can find it in any media report, or even at Bloomberg, you’re a better searcher than I. This Bloomberg report from Monday has a consensus prediction from “earlier this month” of 1.5%. Former CNN political commentator Al Hunt, who is now Bloomberg’s executive Washington editor, wouldn’t be holding back on us, would he?

Wesbury then rips into the climate of economic negativism — which has been, of course, largely created by Old Media:

Many say it feels like a recession and predict negative growth. Then the data arrive, and show growth. The pessimists then say it doesn’t matter because it’s “old” news. After all, the quarter is already over and the evidence of recession will be clear by next quarter, they say.

Eventually, those forecasting recession are going to run out of time. The clock is already ticking and the economy remains resilient. Construction and auto related layoffs account for more than all the job losses in the past year. Initial unemployment claims remain below 400,000 and the financial sector appears to be bottoming.

If second quarter GDP growth comes in mediocre (it’s important to remember that while 2.2% isn’t recessionary, it’s nothing special) or even decent, you would think that the presidential candidate I refer to as “Mr. BOOHOO-OUCH” (Barack O-bomba Overseas Hussein “Obambi” Obama – Objectively Unfit Coddler of Haters) might be embarrassed about, and apologize for, his claim less than two weeks ago (covered at NewsBusters; at BizzyBlog) that there is “little doubt we’ve moved into recession.” After all, politicians who place country before party wouldn’t go negative about the economy without basis, would they?

(Aside: Hard to imagine that the Obamessiah’s predictive powers are less than perfect, isn’t it?)

Don’t hold your breath. As a member of the POR (Pelosi-Obama-Reid) Economy triumvirate that is proactively attempting to inflict a recession on us by keeping oil and gas prices artificially high and creating expectations of huge tax increases starting next year, Wesbury’s assessment means that Obama will just have to try harder to talk — and take — the economy down.

Cross-posted with slight revisions at NewsBusters.org.

From Calhoun County, Alabama:

July 19, 2008

Call it luck, fate, fortune or providence. A Calhoun County deputy lived to see another day after the quick reactions of a local investigator and a lawyer saved his life Thursday.

Calhoun County Sheriff Larry Amerson said the deputy, Robert McGinnis, was working at his post behind the security desk at the entryway of the Calhoun County Courthouse around 4:30 p.m. when he passed out.

“He had an issue with his potassium level,” said Amerson. “Apparently if it falls enough it can make your heart quit beating.”

The courthouse was all but deserted, said Alex Ference, an investigator with the Calhoun-Cleburne County District Attorney’s Office, who was working late.

Ference said a handful of people, including a few lawyers, were slowly trickling out of the building.

“Normally I would have been gone by that point,” Ference said. “I was working a little bit late. Just as I hit the inner doors, I heard a female attorney scream.”

When Ference turned toward the security desk, he recognized that McGinnis was having a serious medical problem, he said.

He quickly grabbed McGinnis’ radio and called the Sheriff’s Office for help. Ference and Anniston attorney Carey Kirby pulled McGinnis out from behind the security counter.

“He was looking really bad and we couldn’t get a pulse, so I told a deputy to get the defibrillator,” Ference said.

According to Ference, the courthouse has only one of the units, which send an electric shock through the body to stabilize or reinitiate a heart attack victim’s heartbeat.

When the courthouse purchased the unit several years ago, Eric Patterson, who is in charge of security at the courthouse, asked Ference if he wanted to sit in on the training. Ference agreed, and the two went to the class together and joked about having to use the razor — which is included in the defibrillator pack — to shave the chest of a hairy person, he said.

“We never thought we’d have to use one of these machines at all,” Ference said.

But Ference, who has worked in the DA’s office since 2000 and who was a deputy for five years before that, suddenly was working on “Bobby,” someone he has known for several years.

“It was really scary. His eyes were getting glazed over,” Ference said.

Kirby also has known McGinnis for some time. He said Kirby had always been good to him and very friendly.

“I was just praying that there would be something we could do to help,” Kirby said.

Ference said the diagrams illustrating how to use the device are self-explanatory.

“This was my first time to use one,” he said.

“The machine pretty much handles everything. At first I wasn’t sure if he was having a stroke or a seizure or something else. But he wasn’t responding,” he said.

Ference attached the patches that conduct electricity into the body to McGinnis’ chest and let the machine evaluate whether the deputy needed to be shocked.

After a few moments the machine warned the men to stand clear and sent electricity through McGinnis’ body.

Shortly after the shock they saw that McGinnis had a pulse and was breathing, Kirby said.

“That was the first time I’ve ever seen anything like that,” Kirby said. “I mean, we checked for a pulse. He was dead.”

By that point other deputies and more help had arrived, Ference said. …..

Go here for the rest of the story.