Rep. Paul Ryan will reportedly be Mitt Romney's choice for vice presidential running mate. If true, that decision is nearly insane.

While the decision will help Romney with those in the Tea Parties, libertarians, and other fiscal conservatives, it will hurt him with the 75% or so of the country that doesn't fall into those camps.

It will be child's play for the Obama campaign to portray Ryan - a fan of the fringe figure Ayn Rand - as someone whose ideas differ markedly from those of most Americans. They'll portray Ryan as a Grinch and a Scrooge who would willingly throw starving orphans into the street. And, this will simply reinforce the Obama campaign's current attempts to portray Romney as someone who favors the wealthy, someone who seeks to take from the poor to enrich the rich.

The decision hasn't been announced yet, and rumors of a Ryan pick could be a red herring. If they aren't, start preparing for four more years of Obama right now.

UPDATE: Romney did indeed pick Ryan as his running mate, so I removed the question mark from the title. The plus side of this is that it will get the hopes of those in the Ryan target market up, and then dash them. The downside is that they won't learn from that experience and come back with policies that are more pro-American.