Dole: Candidates should consider non-politician as VP

Former Sen. Bob Dole (R-Kan.) offered some free advice to the presidential candidates of both parties Friday, which is that “It’s far too early to pick a running mate.”

And when they reach that point, he added, they should take a serious look at somebody who is not a politician.

{mosads}“I think it would be good to take somebody outside of politics, somebody in a profession, who understands government,” Dole told a National Press Club luncheon audience. “… That would really appeal to the American people.”

At the same time, Dole predicted that the key to the 2008 election could be which candidate — “whoever he is,” he said, implying that he expects Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois to be the Democratic nominee — carries Ohio, Michigan and Florida.

Referring to the presumptive Republican nominee, Sen. John McCain of Arizona, Dole said, “If I’m John McCain, I’m looking at Ohio. You don’t get to be president without Ohio, and Florida and Michigan.”

The former Senate majority leader, who was on the losing end of two presidential elections, as President Ford’s running mate in 1976 and the GOP nominee in 1996, also said that McCain’s medical records, which were released earlier Friday, “are very important” although he described them as “very positive.”

As for the issue of McCain’s age – he will be 72 in August and would be the oldest person ever elected president – the 84-year-old Dole said, “If age is an issue, I’ll stay with him.”

Dole’s comments about the presidential campaign came during a question and answer session following a speech in which he made an impassioned appeal for the care of wounded veterans of the U.S. military.

Dole, who was seriously wounded during World War II, called the recent disclosures of lack of proper care for some 4,000 seriously wounded veterans of the Iraq war at Veterans Administration facilities in Washington and elsewhere a national scandal, and said he hopes whoever is elected president will push for disability compensation and more funding for seriously disabled veterans.

Displaying little of his celebrated wit, a somber and at time emotional Dole recognized several wounded veterans in the audience, including Jose Ramos, a Navy corpsman in Iraq and a member of the President’s Commission on Care for America’s Returning Wounded Warriors.

“We don’t want to forget people like Jose, but we don’t want to forget veterans from other wars,” Dole said as he called on all Americans to pause for a moment of reflection on Memorial Day. “We’re losing about 1,200 World War II veterans every day,” and there are a total of 26 million veterans altogether.

Dole praised President Bush for his support of veterans, noting that he spent several hours with the President’s Commission on Wounded Warriors, and “didn’t ask how much it will cost” to adequately care for wounded vets. “He said three words – ‘Whatever it takes,’” Dole declared.

Dole concluded by reading an excerpt from a poem by John Stuart Mill that included the words, “War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things: the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks nothing worth a war, is worse.”

Afterwards, Charles Rubio of Washington, a Navy veteran of the Korean War, said he was so moved that he cried.