Whatâ??s next for Daniels?

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Mitch Daniels has plenty of reason to feel good about himself these days.

Last week, he won reelection in a landslide after cutting a wake through a change-averse state, and without going negative
on his opponent, Jill Long Thompson.

Daniels also needs a raft to keep from drowning in accolades.

Today, Governing magazine named him Public Official of the Year for wiping out a deficit he inherited, leasing the Indiana
Toll Road and raising cigarette taxes to fund a health insurance program.

Also this week, venerable Washington Post columnist David Broder devoted a big chunk of a column about rising Republican governors
to Daniels, citing his pragmatic style of problem solving as an example of how to reinvigorate the decimated GOP. Broder quoted
Daniels as attributing his success to relying on market principles, fiscal restraint, listening to people, and a live-and-let-live
approach to social issues.

Bill Kristol, who edits the conservative Weekly Standard magazine, lumped Daniels in with Sarah Palin and Louisiana Gov. Bobby
Jindal as potential presidential candidates in 2012.

Daniels has said he wonâ??t run for office again. Remember, though, that he was recruited to run for governor by party wigs
worried about what they saw as a state going down the tubes.

So, if he were urged to run for something else, how would he respond?

If you were Daniels, what would be your next move?

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