By far the most active political betting market at the moment is on who will be the Democratic nomination for VP – a job, given Biden’s age, could be a huge stepping stone to becoming President.

This was all triggered by this report from CBS News

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) “has been asked by Joe Biden to undergo a formal vetting to be considered as his vice presidential running mate, one of several potential contenders now being scrutinized by his aides ahead of a final decision,” If a potential contender consents, she should be poised to undergo a rigorous multi-week review of her public and private life and work by a hand-picked group of Biden confidantes, who will review tax returns, public speeches, voting records, past personal relationships and potentially scandalous details from her past.”

Quite clearly a nominee for the presidency does not want to risk his/her effort being compromised by scandals about the chosen running make to come into the open once the nomination has been made. That has happened in the past after Walter Mondale chose Geraldine Ferraro to be his running mate in 1984.

My view is that the reaction on the betting markets is over-done. A bigger story would be if Klobuchar, who sits for Minnesota in the US Senate and was one of the main runners for the WH2020 nomination, was not being vetted.

I’d expect other figures who are high up in the betting to also be asked because this is all part of the normal process.

So I don’t think that this report should be seen as that significant and I do not think Klobuchar is value at the current odds.

Mike Smithson