USTIN - As a drenching rain pounded the Texas hill country yesterday, George W. Bush remained secluded at his ranch, weighing his choice of a running mate.
Aides said no announcement is likely before tomorrow, and all signs continued to point to Richard B. Cheney, the former defense secretary, former congressman and former White House chief of staff.
As of last night, the Texas governor had made no telephone calls informing any of the potential candidates for vice president that they had been cut from his short list.
But Karl Rove, Bush's campaign manager, and Karen Hughes, his communications director, took to the Sunday morning talk shows to knock down any discussion that Arizona Senator John McCain was in the mix. Both of Bush's top aides said the governor took McCain at his word when he said several months ago that he was not interested in the vice presidential nomination.
Although Bush spent several hours last week in Chicago with former Missouri Senator John Danforth, Danforth said yesterday that he expects Cheney, the man in charge of Bush's selection process, to be named as the governor's running mate.
''I think it's Cheney. You know, with the registration change, that's what I believe,'' Danforth told The Associated Press before walking into church in St. Louis.
On Friday, Cheney flew to Wyoming and switched his voter registration to the state he represented in Congress for 12 years, rather than continuing to vote in Texas. Cheney had been living in Dallas and running an oil and engineering firm. But the US Constitution prohibits electoral college members from voting for a presidential and vice presidential candidate from the same state.
Other possible candidates on a list that Bush has said is shrinking include: Governors Frank Keating of Oklahoma, George Pataki of New York, Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania, and Senator Chuck Hagel of Nebraska.
On the talk shows, both Rove and Hughes vigorously defended Cheney as a quality candidate.
Rove, for example, said Cheney's three heart attacks and quadruple bypass surgery would not be a liability in the campaign.
''Those heart attacks occurred in the '70s and '80s and he then served as secretary of defense in President Bush's administration and presided over Desert Storm,'' Rove said on CBS's Face the Nation.''I don't know of a more stressful situation than being secretary of defense during an armed combat, and he seemed to do just fine.''
With gasoline prices high and with Vice President Al Gore blaming the oil industry for huge profits, Rove and Hughes waved off suggestions that Cheney's association with the oil industry would be an issue in the campaign. Bush, too, is a former oil industry executive.
When asked about Bush picking a Washington insider, Rove said that choosing Cheney would not hurt Bush at the polls.
''Governor Bush is running to change the tone of Washington, but that doesn't mean he's anti-Washington,'' Rove said on ABC's This Week. ''There are a number of people who have served in Washington who could help bring about that change.''
As the Republicans dealt with the speculation and the waiting game, aides to Gore pounded Bush for making a spectacle out of an important decision with profound consequences for the nation.
''It's pretty clear that the Bush campaign, who've had no message for weeks, are turning what should be a very serious decision into a political photo op,'' said Chris Lehane, Gore's press secretary.
''Al Gore, in contrast, recognizes this is a very serious decision and the process he's using reflects that. He's protecting the integrity of the process.''
This week, Gore will campaign in Michigan, Ohio and Illinois, and he will emphasize what he considers to be Bush's poor handling of the Texas state budget, which has a $1.4 billion surplus, far less than originally expected because of miscalculations in the Medicaid program and the cost of state prisons.
''His campaign is spending too much time on the vice presidential selection process and not enough time on the budget and it seems like they've got a shortfall in both,'' Lehane said. ''They certainly seem to be having difficulty making up their minds.''
Yvonne Abraham of the Globe Staff contributed to this report from Michigan. Material from the Associated Press was included.
