Eric Cantor for VP - Bear Bait For The Democratic Party?

Came back form vacation last night and spent some time catching up (oy, what a week it was to miss blogging!  Still, well worth it...) and was listening to Eric Cantor speak of his blowup with Barack Obama via Legal Insurrection.  Professor Jacobson entitled the post "Is it too early to talk about Eric Cantor for VP"? 

To be honest, I hadn't thought about it too much.  Of course, after just a few seconds of mental review, I realized what a perfect choice he would be.  Jacobson points out "Eric Cantor has been fighting the good fight for years".  That's the first reason.  But he's not a Bob Dole legacy-type; he's been in Congress only a decade.  It's the fact that he is a fiscal and foreign policy hawk, who lays out his positions with clarity and intelligence that makes him, by standard reckoning, a strong VP candidate. His background - as a a former small businessman in a family legal firm - will help him make the case about the destructive force of high taxes more personal and effective as well.  Not to mention that his strong pro-Israel stance (as well as pro-life) will help invigorate the Republicans evangelical base.

But there are two other intangibles that would have a tremendous effect on the campaign dynamic as well:

-He gets under Obama's skin.  For Obama the political is personal, and he will be thrown off his game. Note Obama's one-sided feud with Benjamin Netanyahu.  His insatiable lust to force a humiliating defeat upon a man who will not concede to his unquestioned brilliance has been one of the most shocking, and disturbing, ongoing story lines of his presidency.  How will he react to Eric Cantor attacking him on the stump on a daily basis? Expect a sputtering Obama to put forth  bizarre accusations combined with blatently false statements, all delivered with a puerile, adolescent rage that will diminish the president and elevate the cooler Cantor.

-Cantor is a Jew.

I'm not suggesting the "affirmative action" angle, after all, Joe Lieberman was there first.  But it would create two added complications for the Obama campaign: One, the possibility that even more Jews could be peeled off to vote for one of their own, which would force Obama to further defend his Israeli policy, which could be accurately defined as serial attempts to humiliate Netanayhu and bend the Jewish nation to his will while putting the support of the United States behind the moral decrepitude of the Palestinians.

Secondly, and more importantly, it would smoke out the anti-Semitic element of the Democratic party.  For it is the party of anti-Semitism, sometimes hiding behind "anti-Zionism", other times feeling comfortable enough to just come out and Jew-bait.  Expect the Democrats to go after Eric Cantor the way they went after Sarah Palin, with hatred and bloodlust after they dimly realize that he, like she, could take away some of the voters they deem core (or perhaps chattel).  And as they will have little of practical use to go on to prove he will be bad for the Jews - the way it was almost impossible to say Sarah Palin would be bad for women - the assault will dive into anti-Semistim within a few quick news cycles.

And the American people will be horrified. They will not be roused by the anger of the Jews - Obama could nuke Tel Aviv and still  get 50% of the Jewish vote - but by the 3rd-world demagoguery of the Democratic party.  The people of this nation will realize that while they may be seeing strictly one man being smeared due to his faith - and hearing it defended as simply "politics" - it could be any of them tomorrow, depending on whom the president and the Democrats deem as that day's enemies of their state.

Their will be denials and "clarifications" after toxic statements, of course, and plenty of obscurations and smokescreens by the media, but there will be little backing down from the Left.  Even the president, who will act above it all, will not disown the practice, and might possibly slip up himself, with his obvious personal animosity towards Cantor.  The viciousness of the attacks on Cantor, based on his religion, will be a death knell for the Democrats.  Not just for 2012, but possibly for a generation.

Eric Cantor is not only a well-qualified man for Vice President.  He's also bear bait for the hatred of the Democratic party.  Put him out there, and it will come, as sure as the sun rises...

Now put Rick Perry on the top of the ticket.  A successful Texas governor with the admiration of the Hispanic population, running with a wonky Jew.  Imagine the bloodbath.  Yes, rhetorically, from the Democrats, the anti-Semites, and their supporters in the mainstream media.  But I'm talking about in the electoral college...