We've known for two years that the GOP was going to lose the race for the White House this year. George Bush has been increasingly unpopular due to his foreign policy, and his numerous gaffes - the latest, telling the Pope he gave an awesome speech - just keep on coming.

But McCain isn't that far from being acceptable to Democrats. He almost switched parties in 2000, and in 2004, he was offered the opportunity to run as Vice President on the Democratic ticket. If he shakes things up a bit, he might just win.

Hillary Clinton can't win the Democratic nomination, and even if she did, her negatives are too high. The population generally liked Bill, but hated all the Clintonian ways, and Hillary keeps reminding us of the scandals and the lies ("it all depends on what the meaning of is is") that her husband burdened us with.

But the idea of having a woman run for president is appealing, and given McCain's age, a female vice-president is almost as good.

Given the importance of the economy, naming a woman who has private sector leadership experience would be wise. Both Carly Fiorina and Meg Whitman are already on board the McCain campaign, and choosing of them would be a smart idea.

Carly seems to be the better executive. She led Hewlitt Packard to buy Compaq Computer, and put together the company so it made sense. She's bigger on "the vision thing" than day-to-day operations, so it took a while for the new company to coalesce. The board of directors got impatient and replaced her with Mark Hurd, a guy with less vision and more operational experience, and he didn't change Carly's vision at all, simply made the pieces all work together, and Hewlitt-Packard quickly became the industry leader it is today.

Meg Whitman ran Ebay from fairly early on until just recently. While there are fewer Meg-hater than Carly-haters, we're not sure she'd be a very good president. The big problem with Ebay is that it's become a den of scammers - but instead of adopting the policies that make it safe to buy from independent vendors on the Amazon site, Ebay has instead tried to maximize their short-term profits by catering to scammers.

Neither of these women have much in the way of political baggage, which is generally perceived as a good thing. McCain wouldn't have to explain differences between his positions and theirs. However, there's another choice, which does have political experience, and executive experience at that.

The nation's most-popular governor, with approval ratings of 93%, is Sarah Palin. She's the governor of Alaska, and we've seen multiple sites describe her as a "GILF", although with 5 kids, she's definitely a mother as well as a governor.

In fact, she just had her 5th baby this week. From announcements made prior to his birth, Trig Paxson Van Palin apparently has Down Syndrome. Her oldest son, Track, 18, entered the military last September. The girls are Bristol, 17, Willow 13, and Piper, 7.

Alaskans joke that the names indicate place of conception. Todd's family is from Bristol Bay, Willow is near their home, and the family plane is a Piper. Presumably Track could have been conceived in a high school stadium. It's not clear that Sarah has recently taken any math classes, however.

I don't think Mr. Obama is a poor choice for president. His style is to collaborate with the opposition party, rather than to be combative. For instance, he sold fellow Democrats on the idea that some citizens were coerced into confessing to crimes; because of this, they were willing to support a new Illinois law requiring that police interrogation, not just confessions, be videotapes. He sold fellow Republicans on the idea of the videotapings, since it meant that confessions would be less likely to be thrown out by a doubtful judge.

Despite opposition from police departments all over Illinois, Obama got the bill enacted into law. Similarly, his plans for expanding health care are not nearly as extensive as Hillary's universal health scheme - but Hillary has been battling without success since the early 1990s to make them law. Obama's health care plan has a much greater chance of being enacted.

As a conservative independent, I've voted for Republican candidates most of the time for President, for US Senate, US Representative, and statewide offices - but it all depends on the candidate. If Senator McCain offers an unsatisfactory running mate - such as slick Mitt Romney - I'll support Senator Obama this fall. If he offers a highly appealing running mate, someone that promises to be a good President should the all-too-likely occur, McCain may get my vote.

I'm not thrilled with either Senator McCain or with Senator Obama, but there have been many elections with a choice of Tweedledee and Tweedledum, candidates who had very similar platforms, neither of which appeared to be competent to babysit a 4-year-old, much less lead the nation. We're in luck this time. There are significant differences between Republican and Democratic platforms, and both parties are fielding men who seem to be somewhat competent.