The Donald’s campaign continues to rumble onward towards the Republican National Convention in Cleveland later this month. It has effectively become a secular republican (small “r”) coronation, rather than the knockdown, drag-down wrestling match it had once promised to be. Amazingly, every one of the baker’s dozen-plus opponents to Trump (a group of GOP greybeards had initially called a really deep bench of really qualified candidates) have been crushed by him in head-to-head primaries, or had pre-emptively dropped out of the race the moment they saw the Trump-ian sixteen-wheeler bearing down on them on that electoral highway.

But a presidential candidate must have a vice presidential running mate, the putatively second-most-powerful-politician in the land. This is true even if the only regular constitutional duty for that officer is to preside over the Senate – and even if that job is often handed off to others to do on a routine day-to-day basis as the Senate does its deliberations and snit fights. Political wags used to say that the vice president’s real job was to politely enquire every morning, just after breakfast, about the health and well-being of the president – because if the president dies or is declared incompetent to carry on in terms of the Constitution, the vice president must step up and step in.

Back in the days, big (powerful and meaty) men wearing double-breasted suits with ample waistcoats, watch chains, pocket watches and lit cigars clenched in their respective mouths really did meet in those smoke-filled rooms at the national nominating conventions to hammer out quietly the presidential/vice presidential ticket. This was well before there were all those silly primaries or caucuses in every state where the whole thing was played out before an increasingly horrified populace. Then, a vice presidential nominee would be added to the presidential one in order to balance the two-man ticket in terms of geography and political leanings within the party, and to try to find someone who could deliver their home state (usually a big, contested one) to help the overall ticket, come November. Back in those long-gone, halcyon days, the parties tried to generate a ticket that could appeal as broadly as possible to potential voters and encourage undecideds and independents to come over to them.

Accordingly, there were those sometimes awkward mergers like Illinois liberal Adlai Stevenson and the somewhat more conservative Estes Kefauver from the border South state of Kentucky, or John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson (Massachusetts and Texas and supposedly a more liberal candidate paired with a more conservative Southerner). Among Republicans, there would be Ike Eisenhower and Richard Nixon – the one with age, presumed moderation, and the tempering of enormous experience, paired with youth and some real communist-hunting chops – and the added advantage of big states Texas and California as home turf.

Now, more and more, the presidential nominee gets to make the choice, largely unimpeded by that room of party hacks trying to appease the various sectors of the party, since the room has long been replaced by the primaries and a swarm of political strategists, pollsters and data-driven political hacks. Sometimes this new style works out just fine, as with Barack Obama’s selection of Senator Joe Biden (regardless of Biden’s meagre state vote pulling power, coming as he did from tiny Delaware). Biden’s foreign affairs experience, long-time familiarity with the Democratic Senate caucus and his closeness with organised labour were deemed to be just the right thing to bolster the more austere, cerebral Obama – especially since the two men actually had a real and easy rapport. Then again, sometimes, the pick by the presidential nominee doesn’t work out quite so well, as with John McCain’s choice of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. ‘Nuf said, perhaps.

Now, amid Donald Trump’s unique steamroller of a campaign, he, his family and a few friends have been hinting for weeks that the presumptive candidate had already narrowed down the vice presidential possibilities list to just a few names: New Jersey’s Chris Christie; Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions; former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, and Indiana Governor Mike Pence, plus a few ringers like a retired general or two, or even a Trump-ian daughter. Several other names have publicly indicated having wanted their names taken out of consideration – making Trump’s task of picking that one candidate that much easier, or harder, perhaps, given that a logical name like Tennessee Senator Bob Corker had taken himself out of the running.

Over the past several weeks, the three main contestants have been brought along for a kind of ongoing public audition in various events. Key questions in such an audition are: what is the body chemistry with the candidate; how does he do with the kinds of red-meat-craving crowds that have been attracted to rallies by Trump’s promises to kick a few more minorities; and can he smile – or at least grit his teeth calmly – while enduring this kind of public vetting and the more private, more intensive, more thorough version happening backstage? Finally, there is the question of what happens when the two men look into each other’s eyes – do they see kindred spirits, or does the future look cloudier for their marriage?

Now, on Thursday evening, word has been leaking out to every newspaper and broadcaster, on electronic media and through the light-speed social media, that the Donald’s ardour has embraced Indiana Governor Mike Pence. It is not a done deal yet, whisper political insiders, but the word is now out, via this curious political striptease, that it is to be Pence and that the campaign will unveil Pence as “the one” on Friday in New York.

Pence is a former radio talk show host, a former congressman and now governor of Indiana. Cynics say that this would be Pence’s great political gamble since he is up for re-election in Indiana this year and he was expected to have a tough race, made tougher perhaps by the presence of Trump’s name on the top of the ballot. Meanwhile, just to keep things under control until Friday, Paul Manafort, the veteran political consultant now chairing the Trump campaign, told the media by a conference call, “We have not been reaching out to Washington to tell them to prepare for any particular candidate.” But he explained that Trump would announce his selection in Manhattan on Friday.

Pence’s big selling points, apparently, are that he is unlikely to embarrass Trump politically (the candidate can do that for himself, thank you very much), and, crucially, perhaps, Pence is a firm link to those social conservative voters that remain wary of Trump (those multiple marriages, various affairs, not afraid of big, big spending, wobbly on things like “right to life”, et al), but who are, nevertheless, a key element of any winning strategy for him in November. There is risk there, Pence’s expressed public opinions about his values on some of those issues might possibly alienate some voters whose concerns run much more towards economic issues than the social conservative ones he has made his own.

For example, as the New York Times noted on Thursday, “Mr Pence has endorsed free trade agreements, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership, an Asian trade deal that Mr Trump has described as a ‘rape’ of the American economy. He voted for the Iraq war, which Trump has condemned, and last winter he denounced Mr Trump’s call to ban all Muslim immigration into the United States. If those views place Mr Pence at odds with Mr Trump, they are in line with the outlook of Republican leaders in the House and Senate, who praised him on Wednesday. ‘It’s no secret I’m a big fan of Mike Pence’s,’ said Paul Ryan, the speaker of the House from Wisconsin. ‘We’re very good friends. I have very high regard for him. I hope that he picks a good movement conservative. Clearly Mike is one of those.’ ”

But, in going towards Pence, rather than a Christie or Gingrich with whom Trump has spent rather more time in the recent past, Trump and Pence have had only the most glancing of personal moments with each other. As the Times went on to say, “Mr Pence’s public audition for the No. 2 spot, when he appeared with Mr Trump on Tuesday at a rally in Westfield, Ind., went well. Standing ramrod straight, Mr Pence offered five-and-a-half minutes of high-energy remarks, frequently turning his fire to Hillary Clinton – in an apparent attempt to demonstrate that he could be an attack dog against her.”

Governor Pence’s official biography notes his close ties to his home state of Indiana, including his law school studies there as well as his significant congressional career on behalf of the state. He and his wife, Karen Pence, would appear to be a rock of stability in comparison to The Donald, as the Pences have been married for 31 years and have three children. Karen Pence is an art teacher and the owner of a small business that makes little charms to go on bath towels to indicate whose towel is whose to keep the squabbling down in big families with crowded bathrooms. (You couldn’t make up things like that.)

The official bio makes much of Pence’s role in creating a state-sanctioned alternative to Obamacare, support for technical education and infrastructure development, and cutting state taxes – especially corporate taxes. Pence has also taken much credit for the drop in unemployment in his state to around the national average. (Will that cheerleading conflict with the Donald’s message that the economy is hurtling towards the landfill and that the real unemployment rate is huge?) Oh, and by the way, he has also been a staunch opponent of resettling any Syrian refugees in Hoosier territory, and, historically, he has been a similarly strong opponent of any leanings towards LGBTI rights and he has, in the past, offered the kind of incendiary rhetoric that usually goes with such views.

Of course none of this will help make the case that a Trump-Pence ticket is hard-wired to deal with the challenges of national defence, foreign diplomatic crises, or international economic conundrums. For that they will have to fall back upon the Donald’s constant drumbeat that whatever has happened in the past decade has been dreadful – and that his plans, the best plans, the biggest plans, will make America great again. DM

Photo: Republican Representative Mike Pence of Indiana (C) speaks during a news briefing on Capitol Hill in Washington DC, USA, 22 October 2009. EPA/MICHAEL REYNOLDS