Rice is Angling to Become Mccain's Running Mate, Says Republican Strategist

Condoleezza Rice has become the subject of renewed speculation that she is a front-runner to become the running mate of John McCain in the November presidential elections, after a Republican strategist claimed that she was actively campaigning for the job.

Dan Senor, a former Pentagon spokesman, said in a television interview that "Condi Rice has been actively, actually in recent weeks, campaigning" for the vice-presidential nomination. As evidence, Senor pointed to the fact that Rice had attended one of the regular weekly meetings of Americans for Tax Reform, a Washington salon of prominent conservative figures that has never enjoyed the company of a secretary of state before.

McCain was deadpan when confronted with the suggestion that Rice was putting herself forward, saying: "I missed those signals". But he did praise her as a "great American ... who served as a role model to so many millions of people in this country and around the world".

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee has shown no urgency in selecting his running mate, as he is likely to want to watch the Democrats complete their nomination process before deciding. His choice is certain to be heavily influenced by whether he will be competing against Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton in November.

Rice would come with strong elements in her favor, as well as several potential handicaps. Her instant name recognition among Republican and independent voters would be a major advantage, as Senor noted, saying that McCain may not want to spend a month or six weeks of the election campaign introducing an unknown vice-presidential candidate to the US public.

On the negative side, Rice inevitably comes with some of the baggage from the Bush presidency, which McCain may be keen to avoid as he seeks to present himself as his own politician. As a member of the administration deeply involved in the early planning of the Iraq war, at which point she was national security adviser in the White House, Rice also bears some of the blame for the initial handling of the post-invasion, which has been sharply criticized by McCain.

While speculation swirls around the senator from Arizona, the road to the Democratic nomination continues to be a long, hard grind. While the focus of campaigning may be Pennsylvania, which holds its primary on April 22, the real political business is being done with the super-delegates who hold the key to the nomination.

Obama has continued to successfully whittle away at Clinton's dominance among the senior party figures and officials who make up the 800 super delegates. On Monday he notched up another super delegate vote - his 69th - when Margaret Campbell, a Democratic member of the state assembly in Montana announced that she was backing the Illinois senator rather than the senator from New York.

Of the 800, only 330 have yet to cast their vote, according to the New York Times. As the energy in the election continues to veer towards Obama, he has managed to cut Clinton's previously commanding lead to just 34 of the super delegates.

Because of the way the Democrats apportion delegates, even if Clinton takes Pennsylvania convincingly and all the other nine contests, which conclude in Montana and South Dakota on June 3, she will be unable to amass sufficient votes to make up her delegate deficit. Obama has a lead of 134 pledged delegates, according to Associated Press.