Don't forget that PA has a tradition of supporting moderate Republicans like Specter and Ridge, and McCain fits that mold in most people's minds. Also many of the affluent suburbs in PA are actually quite conservative. Those suburbs combined forces with the rural areas to send people like Melissa Hart and Rick Santorum to DC....

In general, I don't think VP choices make a whole heck of a lot of difference.  And I don't think the wider electorate can be judged by the hot house standards of the blogosphere.  Furthermore, if you want to argue about the effect of a Clinton pick / non-pick on the electorate, you can as easily make the argument that Clinton would alienate both independents with whom she still has baggage and lefties who would see a Clinton pick as the last straw in Obama's move to the center.

If you forecast that McCain will improve his standing among men in Florida it's at least as reasonable that Obama will improve his among women to more closely look like his national polling.

Either candidate could win. It's clearly pandering on his part, but McCain has blasted CEO pay, blasted corn subsidies and said we should relax restrictions on sugar ethonol, and this campaign at least, he's been pretty good with women, having more women in high-profile positions in his campaign, even deferring to some as experts in their fields. And yesterday he said Al Gore's renewable energy goals were achievable.

If Obama tries to pick up Rep and Ind and chooses a Kaine type he'll drive a wedge even deeper in the party. At this point I think he needs a true Democrat on the ticket. (No blue dogs allowed)!

I think it comes down to this:  They don't want the VP candidate to upstage the candidate.  

I am delighted that Virginia has gone purple after so many years of being stubbornly red, particularly in presidential politics. For any of you interested in how Virginia went so red, Garrett Epps' Shad Treatment, one of the best American political roman à clef ever written, explains it all with humor.

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Shad-Treatment/Garrett-Epps/e/9780813917764/?itm=5

The two key Democratic strongholds in the state are the Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington and the Tidewater region around Hampton Roads. The City of Richmond is a blue island surrounded by a red sea.

The fact that two prominent Republican members of the House of Representatives, Tom Davis and Frank Wolf, represent Northern Virginia should be a tip-off that even the most reliably blue part of the state isn't all that reliably blue.

Tidewater is dominated by the Navy, the Armed Forces and the defense industry. It will be a tall order to persuade Tidewater independents to ditch John McCain.

Mark Warner might have overcome some of these obstacles as Obama's running mate, and would fit the "new politics" theme very well. Tim Kaine is perfectly respectable, but he does not light up an audience (big or small) the way Mark Warner does.

I think it's pretty wilfully stubborn of the Obama campaign to be so intensely focused on a state where he has inherent weaknesses (the western half of the state is Appalachia) and where the Republicans nominated the one guy (McCain) who could cut the Democratic majorities in Northern Virginia and Tidewater. By contrast, as a Senator from Illinois he should find much easier going in Ohio than would a nominee from the East Coast or the South. The elections of Strickland and Brown suggest just as compelling a blue trend in Ohio as the election of Kaine and Webb in Virginia (particularly since Strickland and Brown are much more mainstream Democrats than Kaine or Webb).