"It might help, but I'd be nervous about the names he would name. Remember: He said he would appoint subprime crisis-enabling Democrat Andrew Cuomo to replace staunch conservative Republican Chris Cox at SEC. If he's got more like that up his sleeve, he'd be better off keeping his mouth shut!"

Martha Zoller, syndicated radio host:

"I'm in the Bill O'Reilly school that says that McCain needs to say Rudy will be the attorney general and he will go after every person involved in this meltdown, and those convicted will spend time in jail. And Mitt Romney will be the treasury secretary and he will manage the rescue. McCain needs to be bold, he needs to be McCain."

Nick Rizzuto, founder of Conservative Punk and producer of the Andrew Wilkow Show on Sirius radio:

"Considering that the prevailing (and ignorant) opinion is that this financial crisis is the fault of Republican lack of action and "de-regulation", adding more Republicans to an already faltering ticket doesn't seem to be a great idea. For example putting a Mitt Romney in as treasury secretary might read as putting the fox in charge of the hen house, considering Mitt's corporate background. Announcing Rudy as your Attorney General borders on irrelevant seeing as no one is really concerned with any legal issues on a federal level. The Patriot Act, for example, has turned out to be a non-issue."

Apparently if you ask my friends, McCain has close to a 50/50 chance of getting this one right. Those aren't great odds. It's likely McCain will continue to go after Obama's relationship with William Ayers, Reverend Wright and others. His constiuents, after all, have asked him to. But can he afford another risky campaign move with pre-election cabinet appointments? Or should he bypass this spin of the roulette wheel? I guess it depends on whether he's feeling bullish or bearish. Campaign strategy isn't exact science, of course, but it shouldn't always be a gamble either.