Chris Matthews: Thune For VP

Chris Matthews calls the McCain VP race for John Thune:

Chris Matthews has made his call -- John Thune, a freshman senator from South Dakota, will be John McCain's running mate on the Republican presidential ticket.

Matthews informed the world -- as well as Thune himself -- of his prediction while the MSNBC commentator interviewed the senator a few minutes before President Bush delivered his latest comments on the war in Iraq.

Thune firmly established himself as a comer within the GOP when he knocked off then-Senate minority leader Tom Daschle in 2004. Telegenic and relatively youthful (he was born in 1961, just like Barack Obama, another member of the Senate's '04 class), Thune almost assuredly is on the working list that McCain recently revealed he's put together of vice presidential possibilities.

In other Thune news, the Senator is working to increase funding for law enforcement on the reservations:

In U.S. Senate action, an amendment to the 2009 federal budget by Sen. John Thune seeks an additional $200 million over the next five years to be spent on improving public safety on America’s reservations.

Those dollars include $25 million per year for tribal law enforcement, tribal court systems and tribal detention centers, plus $15 million a year for extra U.S. Attorneys to prosecute crimes on reservations.