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Sen. James Webb, D-Va., left, stands with Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., during a campaign event at the Nissan Pavilion in Bristow, Va. Thursday, June 5, 2008

Scratch Senator James Webb as Barack Obama’s Vice President.

Why you ask?

Webb is a confederate REBEL at heart or so he writes.

Webb is no mere student of the Civil War era. He’s an author, too, and he’s left a trail of writings and statements about one of the rawest and most sensitive topics in American history.

He has suggested many times that while the Confederacy is a symbol to many of the racist legacy of slavery and segregation, for others it simply reflects Southern pride. In a June 1990 speech in front of the Confederate Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery, posted on his personal website, he lauded the rebels’ “gallantry,” which he said “is still misunderstood by most Americans.”

Webb, a descendant of Confederate officers, also voiced sympathy for the notion of state sovereignty as it was understood in the early 1860s, and seemed to suggest that states were justified in trying to secede.

“Most Southern soldiers viewed the driving issue to be sovereignty rather than slavery,” he said. “Love of the Union was palpably stronger in the South than in the North before the war — just as overt patriotism is today — but it was tempered by a strong belief that state sovereignty existed prior to the Constitution and that it had never been surrendered.”

Webb expanded on his sentiments in his well-received 2004 book, “Born Fighting: How the Scots-Irish Shaped America,” which portrays the Southern cause as at least understandable, if not wholly laudable.

“The venerable Robert E. Lee has taken some vicious hits, as dishonest or misinformed advocates among political interest groups and in academia attempt to twist yesterday’s America into a fantasy that might better service the political issues of today,” he wrote. “The greatest disservice on this count has been the attempt by these revisionist politicians and academics to defame the entire Confederate Army in a move that can only be termed the Nazification of the Confederacy.” As in the Confederate Memorial speech, Webb suggests in his book that relatively few Southerners were slaveholders and that the war was fought over state sovereignty, which in the eyes of many at the time included the right to secede from the national government.

“The states that had joined the Union after the Revolution considered themselves independent political entities, much like the countries of Europe do today,” Webb wrote. “The 10th Amendment to the Constitution reserved to the states all rights not specially granted to the federal government, and in their view the states had thus retained their right to dissolve the federal relationship.”

Don’t think the Black Congressional Caucus nor the Civil Rights coalition of the Democrat Party will give a positive vetting of Webb.

Another potential “moderate” Vice President candidate bites the dust.

Photo Courtesy of Skeptical Brotha

Is Team Obama “FIGHTING OFF” the Clintons for payment of their campaign debt by channeling Senator James Webb for Vice President?

Another way to stop the Hillary-for-Veep speculation: Fire up some other speculation.

And so Obama announced this morning that he’d be campaigning in Virginia with Senator Jim Webb and former Governor Mark Warner.

Senator Webb has been touted as the Vice Presidential candidate who best augments the lack of military experience of Obama, comes from a possible pick-up state in the Electoral College, Virginia, and is a former Reagan Republican.

Flap thinks Webb is in the running and look at what Intrade says this morning:

As of this morning, Webb’s stock is up and Hillary’s is down. Obama has to balance the loss of white working class women who are pissed at him for beating Hillary with bolstering his foreign policy and military credentials.

An Evan Bayh from Indiana would be a “SAFE” choice.

Webb Is Vague About Gun Incident

U.S. Sen. James Webb expressed support yesterday for a top aide caught with a handgun in a Senate office building but shed little light on his role in what he described as an “unfortunate” situation.

Webb (D-Va.) declined to confirm what the aide, Phillip Thompson, told authorities after he was taken into custody on Monday: that the gun belongs to the senator and that he was “safekeeping” it for him. Webb said that a mix-up was to blame for the episode but that he could not provide details because Thompson faces criminal charges.

“I think this is one of those very unfortunate situations where, completely inadvertently, he took the weapon into the Senate yesterday,” Webb said. Beyond that, Webb provided little information, never saying whether the gun is his.

“I have never carried a gun in the Capitol complex, and I did not give the weapon to Phillip Thompson, and that’s all that I think I’ll say,” Webb said during a news conference at the U.S. Capitol.

So, Senator, you have no knowledge that your aide carries a gun?

There is more to this story.

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The Michael Ramirez Files

Democrat James Webb holds an election victory rally in Arlington, Virginia, next to his wife Hong Le Webb, moments after his opponent, incumbent Republican U.S. Sen. George Allen, concedes defeat in his bid for re-election to the U.S. Senate, November 9, 2006. Webb’s victory insures the Democrats will control the U.S. Senate.

George Will: Webb Offends Bush & the English Language

That was certainly swift. Washington has a way of quickly acculturating people, especially those who are most susceptible to derangement by the derivative dignity of office. But Jim Webb, Democratic senator-elect from Virginia, has become a pompous poseur and an abuser of the English language before actually becoming a senator.

Wednesday’s Washington Post reported that at a White House reception for newly elected members of Congress, Webb “tried to avoid President Bush,” refusing to pass through the reception line or have his picture taken with the president. When Bush asked Webb, whose son is a Marine in Iraq, “How’s your boy?” Webb replied, “I’d like to get them (sic) out of Iraq.” When the president again asked, “How’s your boy?” Webb replied, “That’s between me and my boy.” Webb told the Post:

“I’m not particularly interested in having a picture of me and George W. Bush on my wall. No offense to the institution of the presidency, and I’m certainly looking forward to working with him and his administration. (But) leaders do some symbolic things to try to convey who they are and what the message is.”

Webb certainly has conveyed what he is: a boor. Never mind the patent disrespect for the presidency. Webb’s more gross offense was calculated rudeness toward another human being — one who, disregarding many hard things Webb had said about him during the campaign, asked a civil and caring question, as one parent to another. When — if ever — Webb grows weary of admiring his new grandeur as a “leader” who carefully calibrates the “symbolic things” he does to convey messages, he might consider this: In a republic, people decline to be led by leaders who are insufferably full of themselves.

Not an auspicious start for the Senator-elect, James Webb.

Boorish behavior?

You bet – like you get over at the NUTROOTS home, Daily Kos.

Based on Webb’s behavior before being sworn in, one shudders to think what he will be like after that. He already has become what Washington did not need another of, a subtraction from the city’s civility and clear speaking.

Indeed

It WILL be a long six years with this character.