Romney blasted McCain's experience on the economy, while McCain literally compared Romney to a pig. McCain accused Romney of a "wholesale deception of voters" while Romney labeled McCain a prominent advocate for "liberal causes."
And there's plenty more trash talk where that came from.
In fact, Romney - reportedly on the top of McCain's short list of potential vice presidential candidates - once ripped on McCain over his economic experience and vowed never to run with him.
"There's another guy running on our side, Sen. McCain - he's a good man, he's a hero - but his views on the economy, well, I think are sort of summed up by his own statement that it's not really something he understands that well. He's said that a couple of times," Romney said in Sanford, Fla., on Jan. 28.
McCain has "indicated that when he chose his vice president, it would have to be somebody who really understood the economy," Romney said. "Well, I do understand the economy, and I'm not going to be being any vice president to John McCain, either. That's not going to happen."
Those words, reported partially in The American Spectator and also recorded on tape, are some of the ammo awaiting a potential "McMitt" ticket, a nickname gaining increasing strength among politicos.
A day before, Romney took to CNN to criticize McCain, saying he is at an "enormous disadvantage" when it comes to changing Washington or fixing the economy.
"There's no way he can pick up the story about changing Washington. He's been there 25 years. He's a creature of Washington," Romney said.
Then, in a potentially helpful comment for the now-Democratic nominee, Romney added: "You have someone like Barack Obama, who last night had a stunning victory, and his message was all about change. And that's not a message that John McCain is able to carry forward."
It was a month earlier in the campaign, before the first caucus and primary, that McCain heard that Romney was saying McCain wants to give amnesty to undocumented immigrants. Asked to respond, McCain balked.
"Never get into a wrestling match with a pig," McCain said. "You both get dirty - and the pig likes it."
Of course, if McCain chooses Romney for his vice presidential nominee, it wouldn't be the first time two former rivals have joined arms for political purposes.
President Kennedy added Lyndon Johnson to the ticket even though the two despised each other at the time; and President Reagan teamed up with George H.W. Bush despite a not-so-friendly relationship.
Candidates have to draw distinctions between themselves during a primary, and many times that distinction is highlighting a policy or personal difference, even unfriendly ones, says Costas Panagopoulos, a professor of political science at Fordham University in New York.
"That story changes quickly if someone gets the call" to be a potential vice president, Panagopoulos says. "Candidates can bury the hatchet; and often time presumptive nominees will deliberately choose people who do differ in terms of personality or policy to add balance to the ticket. They don't necessarily want carbon copies of themselves."
tburr@sltrib.com
Weak Veep
Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, may choose his running mate any day now. But he's already declared that running mate won't have near the authority now given to Vice President Dick Cheney.
A vice president "has only two duties," McCain said during a debate at Drake University in Des Moines. "One is to cast a tiebreaking vote in the case of a tied vote in the Senate. And the other is to inquire daily as to the health of the president."
McCain added: "I would be very careful that everybody understood that there's only one president."
