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Humphrey Professor Larry Jacobs and Senior Fellow Vin Weber comment on Governor Tim Pawlenty's political chances of becoming a Republican candidate for president.

Former U.S. Rep. Vin Weber, a national Republican strategist, said Pawlenty is "very smart" to be digging into policy matters. "The policy side is where Republicans have been perceived as having been virtually brain dead for the last couple of years," Weber said. If Pawlenty can polish his reputation as a policy innovator, it will enhance his political prospects.

It also could endear him to an important segment of the party, the "Republican intelligentsia," said Larry Jacobs, director of the University of Minnesota's Center for the Study of Politics and Governance. While Palin appeals to the "populist, anti-intellectual element" of the GOP, Jacobs said, Pawlenty could charm policy wonks at conservative think tanks and the editorial boards of the Wall Street Journal and National Review.

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