(CNN) - Has Bobby Jindal ruled out being John McCain's running mate?
One day after it was revealed the presumptive Republican presidential candidate was slated to hold a closed-door meeting with the 37-year old governor, Jindal told Fox News there is no way he will fill the bottom half of the GOP presidential ticket.
CNN's Political Market: Jindal's stock goes down
"I'm not going to be the vice presidential nominee or vice president," Jindal said. "I'm going to help Senator McCain get elected, as governor of Louisiana."
"Let me be clear: I have said in every private and public conversation, I've got the job that I want," Jindal also said.
It's not uncommon for those being considered for a slot on the presidential ticket to deny interest in the position, but Jindal's blanket statement is notable, especially in light of the fact he is widely considered to be on McCain's shortlist. It also came the day the two men were scheduled to sit down at a private meeting the McCain campaign refused to discuss. On Wednesday afternoon, the meeting was postponed due to weather.
GOP sources also tell CNN Jindal is being considered for the keynote address slot at the Republican Convention.
Earlier: VP buzz rises around Jindal
Widely considered a rising star in his party, VP speculation first swirled around Jindal earlier this summer when he was one of a handful of politicians McCain invited to his Sedona, Arizona ranch. The long weekend was described as purely social, though former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Florida Gov. Charlie Crist - two other Republicans considered to be top vice presidential possibilities - were also in attendance.
Jindal has been lauded by several conservatives wary of John McCain, including talk-radio host Rush Limbaugh. But the decision would undercut one of the Arizona senator's chief arguments against Obama: his relative lack of experience. The Louisiana governor is nearly 10 years younger than the Democratic presidential candidate.
Watch: Jindal talks politics
COLUMBUS, Ohio (CNN) – Neither snow, nor rain, nor gloom of night only works for the post office – not presidential campaign photo ops.
The McCain camp planned a Thursday visit to an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico near the Louisiana coast, an off-shore drilling event designed to help attract attention as Barack Obama delivered his speech in Berlin.
But the threat of bad weather forced the trip to be cancelled. Instead, McCain will be spend the entire day in Columbus, Ohio , where he was already scheduled to take part in an evening town hall meeting on cancer. He’ll appear with Tour de France champion and cancer survivor Lance Armstrong at the Livestrong Summit on the campus of The Ohio State University.
BETHLEHEM, Pennsylvania (CNN) – John McCain defended comments he made in an interview on Tuesday when he incorrectly argued that the surge in Iraq gave way to the so-called “Anbar Awakening” – when Sunni leaders joined forces with U.S. troops to fight Al Qaeda in the fall of 2006.
The Arizona senator told reporters Wednesday afternoon that when he refers to the surge, it encompasses not just the January 2007 increase in troop levels but also the counter-insurgency that started in Iraq’s Al Anbar province months prior.
“A surge is really a counter-insurgency strategy, and it’s made up of a number of components,” McCain said. “This counter-insurgency was initiated to some degree by Colonel McFarland in Anbar province, relatively on his own.”
“General Petraeus said that the surge would not have worked, and the Anbar Awakening would not have taken place, successfully, if they hadn’t had an increase in the number of troops,” McCain added.
BETHLEHEM, Pennsylvania (CNN) – Reluctant at first to wade into the vice presidential selection process, John McCain Wednesday was coaxed into offering more praise for one of the hotter names in the speculation game this week.
Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty drew more attention as a likely short-lister earlier this week after McCain brought him up unsolicited in New Hampshire, telling a private meeting of delegates they were “really going to like him.”
At a media availability inside a Bethlehem, Pennsylvania grocery store Wednesday, McCain was asked about talk Pawlenty was at the top of the list.
At first, McCain demurred, saying “you know that I can’t mention any names. We have a process going on.’
Pressed on whether he had anything positive to say about him, McCain quickly said, “Oh, Tim. I’m sorry. He’s a great, fine person.”
(CNN) - White House Press Secretary Dana Perino has confirmed that President Bush will address the Republican National Convention on its first night.
Perino told reporters today at the White House briefing that President Bush will deliver a speech on September 1, Labor Day. She said incumbent presidents traditionally address the RNC on the first night of the convention.
The White House has not yet said whether Bush might appear with presumptive nominee John McCain at the convention. The two men have made few joint public appearances since McCain effectively claimed his party’s nomination this spring, as the president’s approval ratings continue to hover near historic lows.
Republicans will hold their convention September 1-4, 2008 in Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota. Democrats are slated to hold their convention the week before in Denver, Colorado.
(CNN)– Sen. Barack Obama's campaign manager David Plouffe briefed House Democrats Wednesday on the campaign's strategy to win the White House and bolster the Congressional Democrats’ majority in November.
According to several Democrats who attended the closed door meeting, Plouffe explained the campaign’s plan to enlarge the electoral map by committing resources to states that have traditionally voted Republican.
Rep Jan Schakowsky, D-Il, a national co-chair Obama's campaign, said Plouffe explained "various ways to get to 270 electoral votes." He gave a power point presentation with an analysis of the 18 states the campaign sees as the key battlegrounds.
(CNN) - If John McCain captures the White House in November, the Arizona senator might not be the only happy party: in a new People magazine interview, Barack Obama tells the magazine that he suspects his own daughters might be relieved if his presidential bid falls short.
"They have a wonderful life in Chicago," he said, in an interview released Friday. "So I'm sure there's a part of them that won't be heartbroken if things don't work out."
That life includes a jam-packed schedule of dance, gymnastics and piano lessons, plus soccer and tennis - but it isn’t all fun and games. The Obamas may spend “hundreds” on slumber parties – but they don’t give their daughters Christmas or birthday presents, in order to "teach some limits."
"Malia says, 'I know there is a Santa because there's no way you'd buy me all that stuff,'" says Michelle Obama.
McCain said Obama ingored the facts in Iraq
(CNN) - John McCain said Wednesday that a troop withdrawal from Iraq under an Obama administration wouldn’t be a lasting one.
The presumptive Republican nominee told the crowd at a Pennsylvania campaign event that Barack Obama advocated an “unconditional withdrawal” - a description of the Illinois senator’s policy that they debuted as he headed overseas several days ago - though he said “we are winning and we are succeeding” in Iraq, not a recent contention that the United States had already succeeded.
“Senator Obama says, ‘Well, if we don’t succeed we may have to go back in.’ Well, you might,” said McCain. “When I’m President of the United States we will come home. We will come home with victory and honor but we will never have to go back because we will have won this conflict.”
The Arizona senator also repeated his Tuesday charge that his opponent, for political reasons, is hoping for an American failure in Iraq: “Apparently Senator Obama would rather lose a war in order to win a campaign.”
(CNN) - Financial experts have spent months tracing the roots of the housing market implosion that sent the global economy into chaos. President Bush has his own explanation: Wall Street got drunk.
"There's no question about it. Wall Street got drunk," Bush told supporters at a Republican fundraiser in Houston Friday. "It got drunk and now it's got a hangover. The question is, how long will it sober up and not try to do all these fancy financial instruments?"
His comments at the private event were recorded on a cell phone, and posted to the Web Tuesday.
White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said the president was just relating his views in a slightly more colorful manner. "He has said before that Wall Street was dealing with very complex financial instruments and that the markets didn't fully understand the risks that those instruments posed to the system," she said Wednesday.
(CNN) - In case you're wondering why our economy is in the toilet, President Bush had the explanation at a closed Republican fund-raiser in Houston last week:
”Wall Street got drunk – it’s one of the reasons I asked you to turn off your TV cameras. It got drunk and now it’s got a hangover. The question is: how long will it sober up.”
The depth of the intellect at the very top of our nation's government is staggering, isn't it?
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