There are “conflicting” (wink, wink) stories out that John McCain has made the final decision on his vice presidential running mate. Many sources and new agencies began reporting this a few days ago. According to Mike Allen and Jonathan Martin of Politico, “John McCain has chosen his running mate and the person will be notified on Thursday, a senior campaign official said.”

Early this morning, McCain himself put out a strong denial that he had made his decision. He said he will announce his pick later this week. Well, given that it’s already Thursday, and McCain and “special guest VIP” have campaign events scheduled for Dayton, OH tomorrow, it’s highly unlikely that A) McCain is still mulling over the choice, and B) that the person has not yet been notified.

The fact that McCain has spent most of this week resting in his Sedona ranch answering only a few calls from reporters should pretty much cement the fact that the decision has already been made, and that most likely, the pick is already in the know. Politico’s Allen and Martin added, “A friend said McCain had pretty much settled on his selection early this week, and it crystallized in the past few days.”

Unless McCain goes for a total wild card or dark horse as a way to shake the race up, the most likely candidates are Mitt Romney, Tom Ridge, Meg Whitman (former CEO of eBay), Representative Eric Cantor, Tim Pawlenty and, believe it or not, Joe Lieberman.

Some close to the McCain camp have said that McCain is really high on Lieberman and has pushed to make him the VP pick. I think we can all safely and assuredly assume that it will not be Lieberman. Putting a “Democrat” on the ticket that is pro-choice and generally, socially liberal would undo all the hard work McCain has put in courting the conservative base in his party. However, Lieberman was, and still is, so high on the list of finalists that Karl Rove felt the need to call Lieberman and ask him to remove himself from McCain’s consideration.