Politics: Does the VP pick matter?

From the Washington Post:

"but can provide an image boost, as Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.) did for Al Gore four years ago."

Does anyone else here remember the "huge image boost" from Lieberman? Were all your friends and families "abuzz" with excitement over the droll, patrician, holier-than-thou Lieberman? How 'bout that huge swell of support that carried Gore to a landslide victory? Joe-mentum my ass.

Crap like this is what makes all this "analysis" as speculative and worthless as it actually is. The only thing I think we should count on is a fairly negligible effect by the VP choice, with anything more as a nice bonus. The difference between, say, Gephardt and Edwards, is that Gep will have a negligible negative impact, and Edwards stands to (hopefully) make a negligible positive / excitement impact. It would be fun to suppose that Edwards would lead us to victory, and conversely, Gephardt would drag us to defeat, but it probably won't have that big an effect on the average voter.

But, of course, I'm just guessing, like everyone else. At least in this case, I can feel like as big an expert as any columnist, since they don't know what the hell they're talking about either...