If the tension really does exist, the blame falls squarely on Clinton. This is Barack Obama's party, in more ways than one.

The Clintons are certainly powerful figures in the Democratic Party, but do they really think that they deserve an entire night to themselves at Obama's convention? They have both been given prominent speaking roles.

While Bill Clinton would have been a nice fit for Tuesday night, putting Hillary on the schedule for Wednesday night would have been a bad idea. First of all, she doesn't have a lot of foreign policy experience of her own. She is addressing the issue which plays most strongly to the democrats who voted for her and haven't come around for Obama yet. More importantly, putting her on the schedule for Wednesday night would have been disastrous. It would have sent a false message of hope to her supporters that she might be the VP nominee (I am referring to real Clinton supporters, not the fringe lunatics who are willing to vote against everything they believe in because they feel it isn't fair that the woman lost).

Obama made the right choice.

Bill Clinton is an incredibly intelligent man. He should have no problem crafting a speech that, while playing to the night's theme, highlights how much better the economy was under him. Our economy and national security are intertwined and Clinton knows it.

Lastly, the Clintons should be trying to distance themselves from Mark Penn if unity is something that they really want. Penn is probably the guy behind all the recent leaks that have further agitated the Hillary faithful. If the Clintons don't do this convention right and it ends up costing Obama, they will have earned the blame they get. The only question left to ask will be whether Mark Penn did his damage on his own, or was he following orders.

The advantages to an early pick are clearly explained by Mr. Schaller, but I think that he is overlooking a few things.

For one, Obama may not have decided until very recently whom he would pick. It is hard to announce a VP when you haven't picked one yet.

Why might Obama not have decided until recently? This is the area that Mr. Schaller could have addressed better. Obama is not your father's nominee. From the hard fought primary and PUMA fallout to his skin color and background and his youth, Obama is fundamentally different from Kerry. (Speaking of Kerry, how did those extra three work out for him?)

I think that this election cycle, it was actually wise of Obama to wait until late in the game to announce his VP choice. There were just too many unanswered questions to announce early. Would the PUMAs come around? Would McCain run the kind of Rovian campaign that he has? Which of the close states might be the gamebreaker if a governor from there was selected? And there are many more. The Georgia situation could not have been predicted a month ago. In light of the tensions there, selecting someone such as my personal favorite, Governor Sebelius, would be being second guessed now.

Perhaps he should have announced just before his vacation, so there was an attack dog out there while he took his last breather before the final sprint. But if he had, it still would have been before the Russin-Georgian conflict began.

Right now, Biden seems like the most likely choice, but I wouldn't be surprised to see Clinton or Richardson named this week. As much as I despise the campaign that Clinton ran, I would be more comfortable now with her selection than I would have been a month ago. Who could have known the Straight Talk Express would hit a bus (both literally and figuatively)? Bayh and Kaine are still possible, given that even by the most dire of electoral maps released this week, Indiana or Virginia would push Obama over the top.

There are a lot of factors in choosing a VP and in the age of internet, things simply change too rapidly for an early announcement.

"Say what you want about how Hillary Clinton ran her campaign, but she did leave behind a nice electoral recipe for Obama to use."

She also left behind an even better recipe for McCain and he has been following it to the letter. She opened up doors of attack that the McCain camp would not have dreamed of opening against the first black candidate of a major party.

Obama was clearly referencing Dick Cheney in those remarks. It is possible that the use of "he" was simply to emphasize the Cheney reference.