Lately, the president has been sucking up a lot of oxygen in the room with his unrelenting attacks on Bain, outsourcing, and now Swiss bank accounts.

A quick way to reverse the situation  would be for Romney to name his running mate a few weeks earlier than usual.

Reuters:

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney acknowledged on Tuesday he is considering naming his choice to serve as vice presidential running mate earlier than usual to better compete with President Barack Obama.

As they work from a short list of leading Republicans, Romney and his advisers say they are weighing whether he should announce his choice some weeks earlier than the traditional time of around the Republican National Convention, which is to be held in Tampa in late August.

The reasoning, advisers say, is that two candidates would be able to raise more money and engage Obama and Vice President Joe Biden in battle with polls showing Americans closely divided on whether to pick the Republican challenger or Democratic incumbent in the November 6 election.

Picking the choice early could also serve to guarantee some positive news coverage at a time when Romney is under fire from Obama over whether he should release more financial information about his wealth.

The subject of when to announce the pick was brought up by a voter at a lively town hall meeting Romney held in a high school gymnasium in Grand Junction, the largest city in western Colorado. The man asked whether Romney would announce his vice presidential choice before the convention.

"I can't give you the timeline for that. That's a decision we'll make down the road. Nor can I give you the individual," said Romney.

Romney is to attend the opening ceremonies of the Summer Olympics in London in two weeks in a trip that will also take him to Jerusalem. Should he choose to name his choice early, then he would have next week as an option for a proper rollout, or he could wait until he returns from abroad and announce his pick in early August.

Some recent polls have shown that the president's attacks are beginning to hurt Romney, so the idea that he might announce his pick next week isn't all that farfetched.

Still, I think he's going to want more than a week of touring with his running mate and his attendance at the Olympics would preclude that. More likely, the announcement will come the first week in August, which isn't very early.