Tim Pawlenty Tipped to Be John McCain's Running Mate During Campaign Swing Through New Hampshire

Other Sources Cite Mitt Romney as the Favorite to Be the 2008 Republican Vice Presidential Nominee

Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty is being tipped as the front-runner for the 2008 Republican Vice Presidential nomination, according to CNN. In an exercise approaching Kremlinology, the practice by which Western governments tried to discern the intentions of the rulers of the Soviet Union by parsing their statements and divining their behavior, Pawlenty became the favorite over former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney because GOP Presidential nominee presumptive John McCain spoke more warmly about Pawlenty than did other potential Veeps in a meeting with Republican delegates in Rochester, New Hampshire.

John McCain had stopped off in coastal New Hampshire after a visit to former President George H.W. Bush's lair in Kennebunkport, Maine. Bush 41, the father of current President George W. Bush, attended a fund raiser with the 2008 Republican nominee presumptive, thumping the tub for the man who would be his son's successor.

The Boston Herald reports that the Presidential buzz has John McCain picking his Vice President as early as this week, and touts Mitt Romney as the favorite. Romney and his family are vacationing in Canada, at Ontario's Lake Huron. Lake Huron seperates the province of Ontario from Romney's home state of Michigan, where he is highly regarded due to his father, former 1968 Republican Presidential candidate George Romney, having been a very popular governor. Romney, thus, offers John McCain help in two states, not just one, though both traditionally are blue states typically in the Democratic column during Presidential Novembers. In the 2004 Presidential election, John Kerry swamped George W. Bush in the Bay State, but he won Michigan by only 165,000 out of nearly 5 million votes cast, giving John McCain and the GOP wet dreams about carrying the state this November.

"Frustrated"