Still no Obama veep?

I took my family to a baseball game (the home team lost 6-1) and came home expecting that Obama would have announced his veep. Instead, nothing but rumors.

Everybody's hearing Biden. John McCormack at the Weekly Standard hears it's Biden. NBC says it's Biden.

Meanwhile, Hot Air found a story out of Kansas City that Obama-Bayh '08 bumper stickers were already being printed. But that fizzled and Team Obama says the announcement will come Saturday morning. Then CNN noticed a "flurry of activity" at the Biden residence. I think Allah nailed the general reaction:

Is that really happening? After a week of excruciating suspense, the big revelation is Joe Hairplugs?

Exactly. I mean, after all the wild speculation (hey, what happened to the Chet Edwards bubble?) now it comes down to a guy who made his first White House bid in 1988? Anti-climatic in the extreme. The oddly delayed announcement drew this reaction from Ed Morrisey:

In fact, one has to wonder whether Obama really had made up his mind, or whether his first or even second choice didn’t turn him down. That would explain the delays in the announcement, and the apparent disorganization of Team Obama in handling an event that should have underscored the seriousness of their candidate. After all, they set the expectation that the running mate announcement would come this week, and they missed their own target.

Is it still too late for Obama-Eagleton?

UPDATE 11:35 p.m.: Clinched?

The United States Secret Service has dispatched a protective detail to assume the immediate protection of Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., a source tells ABC News, indicating in all likelihood that Biden has been officially notified that Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, has selected him to be his running mate.
Sources also tell ABC News that two others said to be finalists for the position of Obama's running mate -- Sen. Evan Bayh, D-Ind., and Virginia Gov Tim Kaine -- have been told they have not been selected for the vice presidential slot.

So says Jake Tapper, whose original claim to fame was having once dated Monica Lewinsky.

UPDATE 11:45 p.m.: Seems kind of obvious by now, but Hillary has been informed she's not the running mate. Meanwhile, given Biden's reputation for "clean and articulate"-type quotes, Dan Riehl says:

Secret Service enroute to protect Joe Biden? Better hurry before he shoots himself in the foot before the official announcement. That is, if his foot isn't already in his mouth, of course!

This promises 10 weeks of non-stop gaffes, clarifications, damage control and apologies.

UPDATE 12:20 a.m. Saturday: Politico:

As it now stands, his announcement will land on a weekend and bleed right into the nominating convention -- a time when a nominee can already expect to be nominating national attention.
What’s more, by keeping expectations hanging for so long, Obama makes it harder to deliver on all the anticipation. A weeks-long strip tease, ending with a naked Joe Biden or Evan Bayh -- or some other safe but unsexy choice -- might prove deflating.

The thing is, Joe is old news. Very old news. And he's got no executive experience. To jerk around the national press for a full week, only to deliver Joe Biden -- this is a disappointment. Imagine the reactions of those poor saps getting their text messages: "WTF? Dude. Joe Biden?"