Editor's note: Over the next few days, First Read will be recapping the year in politics. Our first entry: what we consider the Top 10 political events of 2012.

1. "47 percent": A surreptitiously recorded video of Mitt Romney, released on Sept. 17 by Mother Jones, didn't lose the presidential contest for the Republicans. But it cemented the impression of Romney that the Obama campaign wanted to portray -- as a multi-millionaire whose business history and policies ignored average Americans.

In the video, from a closed-door fundraiser in May, Romney tells wealthy donors that the "47 percent" of the country that doesn't pay income taxes, that is dependent on government, and that believes "they are victims" will vote for President Obama no matter what. He adds in the video: "My job is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives."

Romney first responded that his comments were "not elegantly stated," and he later said they were "completely wrong." But the damage was done. The Obama campaign and its allies pounced on the "47 percent" comments in numerous TV ads (like here and here). In the end, according to the exit polls, 53 percent of voters said that Obama was more in touch with people like them than Romney was, and another 53 percent said Romney's policies would generally favor the rich. The irony: Romney won just 47 percent of the popular vote.

2. The Democratic convention: This year was another reminder that political conventions do matter in presidential contests. After the Democratic convention in Charlotte, N.C. -- which featured well-received speeches by First Lady Michelle Obama, San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro, former President Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama -- the Dem ticket got a noticeable bump in state and national polls. The convention also served as a turning point for Democratic Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren, who delivered a primetime address. (Before the speech, Warren was trailing in most polls; afterward, she jumped into the lead.)

By comparison, Romney received little to no bump in the polls after the GOP convention in Tampa, Fla. Indeed, Romney's own acceptance speech was overshadowed by Clint Eastwood's impromptu -- and bizarre -- remarks to an empty chair (which he pretended to be Obama) on the convention's final night.

3. The Denver debate: After the convention season and after the "47 percent" video surfaced, Romney's presidential candidacy hung by a thread -- polls showed Obama pulling away and news reports uncovered turmoil within the Romney camp. But just about two weeks later, Romney would have his strongest moment of the presidential campaign. At the first presidential debate, in Denver on Oct. 3, Romney shined and Obama fell flat. Afterward, Romney began to gain on Obama in national and some state polls, and his campaign touted that it had the momentum in final weeks, even after Obama was viewed as the victor in the other two debates. But in the end, the Denver debate wasn't enough to erase Romney's rough summer and September.

4. The Supreme Court's health-care decision: Here's a thought exercise: Imagine if the U.S. Supreme Court had struck down Obama's landmark health-care law. Such a ruling would have deprived the president of his signature domestic achievement, and would have allowed Romney to charge that Obama wasted his first year in office on an unconstitutional endeavor. It's impossible to know how the presidential election would have turned out after that hypothetical outcome, but it's safe to say that such a ruling probably wouldn't have helped Obama.

In the end, however, the Supreme Court upheld the health-care law by a narrow 5-4 majority on June 28. And the ruling served as a sort of turning point in the summer: Before, Obama's campaign was struggling (the news from the monthly jobs reports were disappointing, and Republicans pounced on Obama's "the private sector is doing fine" remarks). After, it was the Romney campaign that struggled (the scrutiny over Romney's tax returns and work at Bain Capital, plus the mixed reviews of his overseas trip to Europe and the Middle East).

5. Hurricane Sandy: Here's a second thought exercise: What if Hurricane Sandy had never pummeled the East Coast in late October and hadn't allowed the incumbent Obama to demonstrate presidential leadership or bipartisanship (with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie) after a natural disaster? While the hurricane probably wasn't a decisive event in the election -- Romney's momentum after the first debate was already waning -- it helped Obama. According to the exit polls, 42 percent said the president's response to Sandy was important in their vote, and Obama won those voters by a 68 percent-to-31 percent margin.

Larry Downing / Reuters

President Barack Obama and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie talk with survivors of Hurricane Sandy in a community center while touring damaged areas in Brigantine, N.J, Oct. 31, 2012. Obama and Christie put aside partisan differences to visit storm-swamped parts of New Jersey together and oversee relief efforts after the devastation of the storm Sandy.

6. "Legitimate rape": If the "47 percent" tape cemented the impression of Romney as an out-of-touch multi-millionaire, then Rep. Todd Akin's "legitimate rape" remark put an exclamation mark on the Republican Party's struggles with female voters. In an interview on Aug. 19, Akin -- the GOP nominee in Missouri's Senate contest -- explained his opposition to abortion in cases of rape, saying that pregnancies by rape are rare. "If it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down."

Akin went on to lose his race against endangered incumbent Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill. (Republicans also lost another winnable Senate race, in Indiana, after the GOP nominee made another controversial comment on rape.) And in the presidential contest, Obama won female voters by 11 percentage points, 55 percent to 44 percent.

7. The Michigan primary: You might not remember it, but there was a time -- in February -- when it wasn't clear that Mitt Romney would be the GOP's presidential nominee. Back then, according to some polls, Romney was trailing Rick Santorum in the upcoming Feb. 28 Michigan primary. A loss in Romney's native state would have sent Republican leaders into a panic, and might have sparked a movement to draft another Republican into the race. In the end, however, Romney edged Santorum in Michigan by three percentage points, 41 percent to 38 percent, and he later went on to wrap up the GOP nomination.

8. The South Carolina primary: But there also was a time when it appeared that Romney would wrap up the nomination early. He won the Iowa caucuses by the narrowest of margins and then triumphed in New Hampshire's primary. A win in the next contest -- in South Carolina on Jan. 21 -- would have effectively ended the fight for the nomination and would have given Romney more months to prepare for a general-election fight against Obama.

But then came adversity for Romney: Newt Gingrich routed him in South Carolina's primary, and then it was determined that Santorum -- and not Romney -- had won in Iowa. Romney later regrouped in Florida and Michigan. But instead of the general election beginning in earnest in January or February, Romney didn't essentially clinch the GOP nomination until April, when Santorum suspended his campaign. 

9. Benghazi: On Sept. 11, attacks were launched on the U.S. embassy in Cairo, Egypt and a consulate in Benghazi, Libya. Obama administration officials gave the impression that an anti-Muslim video sparked both attacks. (And Romney was criticized for firing off a statement blasting the embassy in Egypt for condemning the "efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims.")

But as it was later determined, the Benghazi attack was a coordinated terrorist act, which resulted in the deaths of four Americans, including the U.S. ambassador to Libya. Under intense GOP criticism for initially linking the Benghazi attack to the anti-Muslim video, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice in December withdrew her name from consideration of being Obama's next secretary of state.

10. The Ryan pick: Not since John F. Kennedy tapped Lyndon Johnson to be his running mate in 1960 has a VP selected greatly impacted a presidential contest, at least in a positive way for the ticket. And that streak held true in 2012 after Romney picked Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan on Aug. 11 to be his VP sidekick -- Romney, after all, ended up losing Wisconsin by seven points, 53 percent to 46 percent. But the selection ended months of speculation about Romney's eventual choice, and it further elevated Ryan into the national spotlight.

Mary Altaffer / AP

Mitt Romney, right, shakes hands with his newly announced vice presidential running mate, Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan, after Ryan addressed the crowd Saturday, Aug. 11, 2012 in Norfolk, Va.

This article is based on reporting by NBC’s Carrie Dann, Garrett Haake, Alex Moe, Jamie Novogrod, and Andrew Rafferty. It was written by Dann.

At 11:11 pm on Friday night, political journalists all over America read the subject line of their latest email, blinked, and asked aloud, "Where's Paul Ryan right now?"

There was exactly one person standing on the Republican congressman’s driveway in Janesville, Wisc.

NBC reporter Alex Moe, who had spent 15 days shadowing the onetime dark horse to be Mitt Romney's vice presidential pick, was preparing to leave Ryan's neighborhood for the night when the email blast thundered into her inbox: "MITT ROMNEY ANNOUNCES VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE IN NORFOLK SATURDAY."

The venue for the announcement, according to the press release: the USS Wisconsin. Ryan's home state.

Until a few days prior, speculation for the VP choice had centered around Ohio's Sen. Rob Portman and former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty. But Portman had just given remarks at the opening ceremony for a charity bicycling tournament,  and NBC reporter Andrew Rafferty had seen him return to his hotel in Columbus less than an hour earlier.

Moments before, Pawlenty had just wrapped up a lengthy fundraiser in Manchester, N.H., and NBC’s Jamie Novogrod was at that moment driving behind the black hatchback whisking the governor and his wife back to the Hilton Garden Inn where they were checked in.

Ryan was the question mark.

So, at 11:15 pm, Moe marched up to the side door of Ryan's Wisconsin home -- where the lights hadn't yet been turned off for the night -- and gave a good hard knock.  And then another one.

No answer.

When Pawlenty got the call he wouldn’t be the pick
Three days earlier, Tim Pawlenty woke up to a beautiful vista, and the memory of some disappointing news from the night before.

In Aspen, Colo., for a closed-door conference of national security luminaries, Pawlenty had spent the better part of a nervous week in the shadow of the Maroon Bells peaks, enduring radio silence from Boston.

It was Monday night when he got the call from Mitt Romney and learned that, for the second time in four years, he'd been passed over for the second-in-command job. When NBC reporter Carrie Dann greeted him on the Aspen Institute campus the following morning, he betrayed no disappointment, but he could no longer afford to be very forthcoming about the details of his schedule during the upcoming week.

Pawlenty's hurried manner on the way into breakfast left the reporter's intuition tingling over his halting answers to questions that had previously been met with teasing and tolerance. "Just... my schedule hasn't changed," he told her.

It hadn't. Which meant that he'd need a poker face to field questions from Dann and other reporters for another grueling four days.

All seemed normal in Norfolk
The story was classic Stu Stevens: too unbelievable to be anything but true.

Top Romney strategist Stuart Stevens was telling reporters in the Norfolk Marriott bar a tale about becoming seriously ill while working in Albania and subsequently having to be airlifted to a hospital in Zurich for treatment. By 11:00 pm Friday night, the press corps had long given up on trying to bait Stevens into giving something away about the vice presidential selection process, and war stories abounded instead. The mood was too casual, it seemed, for anything out of the ordinary to be going on.

After Stevens wrapped up the tale, NBC reporter Garrett Haake decided to call it a night early, ready to rest up for the launch of Romney's bus tour the following day. Teeth brushed, he flipped through his emails one last time before bed.

Then he saw the campaign’s advisory for its vice presidential selection.

An hour later, he would be standing on a pier in the middle of the night, staring in disbelief at the waves below.

Portman wouldn’t be the guy, either
Rob Portman missed the call.

The Ohio senator was giving remarks at Friday night's opening ceremonies for  Pelotonia, a charity bike ride to raise money for cancer research, when the phone rang around 7:30 pm. Mitt Romney was on the line, but Portman couldn't pick up.

Two hours later, Rafferty spotted Portman in the lobby of the Columbus Hyatt, clad in a bright red Ohio State Buckeyes polo.  By then, Portman had spoken with the GOP nominee, and he knew that he would be returning to Capitol Hill instead of the White House after all.

When the 11:00 pm announcement came that Romney would name his running mate the following day, it was clear to Rafferty that Portman couldn't be the guy. Was the charity bike tour an elaborate ruse? Was the senator being whisked to a secret location in an SUV, ushered thru hidden loading docks under the dark of night? 

It couldn't be. But he waited in the lobby until 4:00 am, just to make sure the Ohio pol didn't pull the fast one of a lifetime.

Chasing (and then losing) Pawlenty
Feeling just a few miles per hour short of a car chase, NBC's Jamie Novogrod was following a black Volvo carrying Tim Pawlenty and his wife Mary back to Manchester. The couple had attended two fundraisers on Romney's behalf that Friday evening, and reporters had waited in torrential rain to spot the couple's comings and goings.  The friend driving the former Minnesota governor had a New Englander's lead foot, and the reporter following at a safe distance strained to keep sight of the car.

Pawlenty's star had seemed to be dimming in recent days. So when Jamie got the call from a colleague that the pick was set to be announced the following morning, it seemed obvious that the governor couldn't possibly be “the guy” -- after all, he had a full slate of New Hampshire events the following day, with no hint of an abrupt departure for Norfolk.

At the Manchester exit off the highway, his view of the Volvo obstructed in the wet weather, Novogrod spotted too late the car's tail lights disappearing into the night several hundred yards down the road. 

"I've lost him," Novogrod told Dann, who was awaiting Pawlenty at his hotel. "You're on your own."

Blackberry down
On the air and on the web, NBC's reporting unfolded with few hiccups.

But behind the scenes, there was some sprinting that would have impressed the U.S. Olympic team, and at least one electronic casualty.

In Norfolk, Haake rushed down to the site of the USS Wisconsin, the site of the following morning's event that just so happened to bear the name of Ryan's home state.

Sockless and juggling camera equipment, he  heard the request over his cell phone's speakerphone to set up a liveshot of the event site.

Thud.

He dropped his blackberry, speaker blaring, to the wooden pier where it bounced once, twice, three times, over the edge into the bay.

Splash. It was gone.

By then, though, Haake already had some peace of mind. NBC had confirmed Ryan was the pick.

The pieces fall into place
At 12:01 am Saturday morning, after intense phone collaboration between reporters in the field, top correspondents, and seasoned producers, NBC News reported three Romney sources indicating that Ryan had been selected for the VP slot.

Throughout the network's team, the pieces had fallen into place.

Just after midnight, when he returned to his hotel, Pawlenty confirmed to Dann and other reporters waiting for him there that he wouldn't be traveling to Norfolk the following day. He wouldn't say who the pick was, but it was clear there was no chance he was the one. "I didn't enter this thinking I was going to be the vice presidential candidate," he said. "So I'm not disappointed."

Portman was safely in his hotel room. Shrugging a phone to each shoulder -- one for a network conference call and one for GOP sources -- NBC's reporters ruled out other also-rans: Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, and others.

Where was Ryan?
None of them was "the guy."  But then ... where WAS "the guy?"

Moe, now accompanied by an NBC satellite truck and crew, was still at the Wisconsin congressman's house. She'd spoken to Ryan earlier that day and accompanied him home from a memorial service for victims of the Sikh temple shooting in his district. Arriving home at around 2:00 pm ET, Ryan had sheepishly admitted that he'd forgotten his keys and trekked into the backyard to dig around for a spare.

That was the last time anyone in the press saw the Wisconsin congressman until he appeared in Norfolk as a vice presidential nominee.

Because after a week of smoke and mirrors to keep secret the most-sought-after answer in American politics, he did just about the simplest thing in the world.

Paul Ryan walked casually into his backyard -- and kept walking. Out of reporters' sight, navigating through a familiar forest, he emerged to a car waiting to take him to the airport.

And then to Norfolk.

Romney picking Ryan shakes up the race, but will it last? … Big crowd turns out for Romney-Ryan in Wisconsin… Three questions we have: 1) Is Romney already distancing himself from Ryan’s budget plan?... 2) Which party is more comfortable debating the Ryan budget -- the GOP or Democrats?... 3) And just how will the Medicare debate play out, especially in Florida?... Romney stumps in the Sunshine State today, while Ryan heads to Iowa… And Obama begins three-day bus tour through the Hawkeye State.

*** Shake it up: By selecting Paul Ryan as his running mate on Saturday, Mitt Romney did something that Walter Mondale, Bob Dole, Al Gore, and John McCain did in previous presidential contests: They used their VP pick to try to shake things up. Trailing in the summer, they chose a running mate -- be it Geraldine Ferraro, Jack Kemp, Joe Lieberman, or Sarah Palin -- to change the fundamentals of the race. These picks all worked in the short run, but only once (with Lieberman) did it serve its purpose for the rest of the campaign. (Gore, after all, was able to battle back to where he actually won the popular vote.) So how will this play out for Romney? By picking Ryan, he made the calculation that he needed to pick someone to help redefine himself, first and foremost. The move also serves to fire up conservatives, give the GOP ticket a jolt of youthful energy, and make the case he now stands for something big. But it also wasn’t the kind of VP selection we saw from George W. Bush in 2000 or Barack Obama in 2008 that essentially said: “I’ve got this thing.” Instead, by picking Ryan, Romney said: “I need some help.”

*** Big crowd turns out for the GOP ticket in Wisconsin: And help is what he got last night. Per NBC’s Garrett Haake and Alex Moe, the largest campaign crowd of the season greeted Romney and his new running mate on Sunday in Waukesha, WI. “The energy generated by Ryan seemed to inspire the man at the top of ticket, who took on a heckler midway through his own remarks, then turned the moment into an indictment of President Obama's campaign, whose tactics have riled Romney in recent weeks.” In the first 48 hours after the Ryan pick, Romney looked like he’s enjoying being a candidate again. But after just two days of campaigning together -- during the final days of the Olympics (including yesterday’s USA vs. Spain basketball gold-medal basketball game) -- Romney and Ryan are now going their separate ways, and they possibly might not campaign together until the GOP convention. Romney today stumps in Florida, while Ryan heads to Iowa, where Obama also begins a three-day bus tour.

*** Romney: “I have my budget plan”: Is Romney already distancing himself from Ryan’s budget plan? It seemed that way in yesterday’s Romney-Ryan interview on “60 Minutes.” When CBS’s Bob Schieffer asked Romney if Democrats were going to be able to turn the presidential contest into a referendum on Ryan’s budget plan, the former Massachusetts governor responded, “I have my budget plan as you know that I've put out. And that's the budget plan that we're going to run on.” So wait a second: Romney selects as the running mate a man best known for his budget plan -- under the rationale that this race needs to be about big ideas. But then Romney says he has his own budget plan? On “TODAY” this morning, NBC’s Savannah Guthrie asked Romney spokesman Kevin Madden if Romney would sign the Ryan budget if it came to his desk. Madden replied -- as Romney has said before -- that he would sign it.

*** Which party is more comfortable debating Ryan and his plan? Here’s another question to ponder: By picking Ryan, are Romney and the Republicans playing on their turf? Or on the Democrats’ turf? On the one hand, the Romney-Ryan ticket will double down on the argument that Obama and the Democrats have failed when it comes to the deficit/debt. After all, the deficit was $1.4 trillion in FY ’09; $1.3 trillion in ’10; $1.5 trillion in ’11 (projected); and $1.1 trillion in ’12 (projected). On the other hand, Obama and the Democrats have been DYING to turn the presidential contest into a race against House Republicans. And guess what: Romney just selected a House Republican to be his running mate. As one of us wrote over the weekend, Obama has already delivered three big speeches in the past two years taking aim at House Republicans and the Ryan budget. “It’s a vision that says if our roads crumble and our bridges collapse, we can’t afford to fix them,” Obama said during his April 2011 speech at George Washington University. “If there are bright young Americans who have the drive and the will but not the money to go to college, we can’t afford to send them… It’s a vision that says America can’t afford to keep the promise we’ve made to care for our seniors.” Obama’s other two speeches were in Kansas (in Dec. 2011) and at the AP luncheon (in April 2012).

Shannon Stapleton / Reuters

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney claps as vice president select Congressman Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., gives the thumbs up to supporters during a campaign event in Waukesha, Wisconsin August 12, 2012.

*** The battle over Medicare: And here’s a third question we have: Just how is the Medicare debate going to play out? One of Romney’s demographic strengths is with seniors, and three of the oldest populations in the country happen to be in these battleground states: Florida, Iowa, and Pennsylvania. But Romney -- already at a disadvantage with other demographic groups like women and Latinos -- can’t have seniors turn into a jump ball in November. So far, Romney and Republicans will counter that Obama’s health-care law is the bigger threat to seniors and Medicare. "There's only one president that I know of in history that robbed Medicare, $716 billion to pay for a new risky program of his own that we call Obamacare," Romney told “60 Minutes” yesterday. "What Paul Ryan and I have talked about is saving Medicare, is providing people greater choice in Medicare, making sure it's there for current seniors. But here is the challenge for the Republicans: Romney and Ryan are talking about FUNDAMENTALLY changing Medicare whereby future seniors will receive vouchers/premium support for LESS than they currently get under Medicare. What Obama did under the health care law was reduce the rate of growth in non-essential services (like Medicare Advantage), as well as increase premiums for higher-income recipients. That doesn't affect the Medicare benefits that current/future seniors receive.

Watch: How Ryan formed his economic plan 

*** The battle over Florida: In fact, Romney today campaigns in Florida. And he’s being greeted by headlines like this one from the Miami Herald: “Ryan could be a drag on Romney in Florida.” It is possible for Romney to get to 270 electoral votes without Florida -- but it’s extremely unlikely. If Obama were to win Florida, Romney would need to win CO, IA, NV, NH, NC VA, and WI. In other words, he’d have to run the table. By the way, we can report that according to a Romney-Ryan campaign source, Ryan will make his first visit to Florida next weekend.

*** Today’s back-and-forth: The Romney camp is up with its second TV ad hitting Obama welfare. “Barack Obama has a long history of opposing work for welfare,” the ad goes. “On July 12th, Obama quietly ended work requirements for welfare. You wouldn’t have to work and wouldn’t have to train for a job.” However, as First Read and others have pointed out, it’s a BIG stretch to say that the HHS’s waiver to states ends work requirements for welfare; work requirements are clearly stated in the HHS announcement… Meanwhile, the Obama camp has a web video of Floridians commenting on the Ryan budget plan and its cuts to Medicare. 

*** On the trail: President Obama begins a three-day swing through Iowa. Today, he hits Council Bluffs at 10:15 am ET and Boone at 6:15 pm ET… Romney stumps in Florida, visiting St Augustine at 8:20 am and Miami at 5:25 pm… Paul Ryan stops by the Iowa State Fair at 2:00 pm ET, while Joe Biden campaigns in North Carolina… And First Lady Michelle Obama appears on the “Tonight Show.”

Countdown to GOP convention: 14 days
Countdown to Dem convention: 21 days
Countdown to 1^st presidential debate: 51 days
Countdown to VP debate: 59 days
Countdown to 2^nd presidential debate: 64 days
Countdown to 3^rd presidential debate: 70 days
Countdown to Election Day: 85 days

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Mitt Romney released two years of his own tax returns to the public but that didn't appear to be enough when he vetted running mate Paul Ryan and other vice presidential candidates.

The campaign team for Romney, the Republican presidential candidate, reviewed several years of tax returns from Ryan and others, according to Beth Myers, the head of Romney's vice presidential search process.

But Romney - a former private equity executive with an estimated net worth of up to $250 million - has refused to publicly release more than two years of tax returns.

The secrecy has led Democrats to say he has something to hide about his vast wealth, which included bank accounts in Switzerland, and in the Cayman Islands and Bermuda, known offshore tax havens.

"Why does an American businessman need a Swiss bank account, or investments in known tax havens, if not to be hiding something?" Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz said on "Fox News Sunday."

"Mitt Romney needs to show American voters at least the same number of tax returns that he asked Paul Ryan to show him when he was vetting him for vice president."

Polls show U.S. President Barack Obama has benefited from putting Romney on the defensive over his taxes and wealth, painting him as someone out of touch with middle-class Americans.

Romney campaign officials declined to comment about the vetting process and how many years of tax returns were required, saying it was meant to be "private and confidential."

During an interview with Romney on CBS's "60 Minutes" on Sunday, Ryan said he would follow Romney's lead and release two years of his tax returns.

Tim Pawlenty, a former Minnesota governor who was a potential Romney running mate, said he also had to submit several years of tax returns during the search for a Republican vice presidential candidate.

"So more than two?" asked George Stephanopoulos, the host of ABC's "This Week."

"Well, we don't get into the details of the vetting process, but I gave him a bunch of tax returns," Pawlenty replied. "I don't remember the exact number of years." 

RNC Chairman Reince Priebus, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and White House adviser David Axelrod discuss Mitt Romney's selection of Paul Ryan as his running mate.

A Meet the Press roundtable discusses the effect that Mitt Romney's pick of Paul Ryan will have on the 2012 presidential campaign.

ON A CAMPAIGN BUS IN VIRGINIA -- When Mitt Romney introduced Wisconsin congressman Paul Ryan as his running mate today, it was the culmination of a still-mysterious process that reached its climactic final stages on Aug 1, when Romney told Beth Myers, his former chief of staff, that he had made a decision: he wanted the House budget chairman on the ticket.

That decision date, supplied by campaign advisers, means that Romney selected Ryan before the congressman's boomlet in conservative media, and on the very day of his return from a week-long trip abroad.

Jessica Rinaldi / Reuters

Republican presidential candidate and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney pushes a shopping cart into Hunters Shop and Save in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire Aug. 6, 2012.

Five days passed before the two men could meet, but this past Sunday, Aug. 5, Ryan came to Romney for a meeting, likely at the presumptive nominee's home in Wolfeboro, N.H., and accepted the offer.

That afternoon, senior staffers huddled at Romney's secluded estate on Lake Winnepesaukee for hours. Strategist Stuart Stevens was there, as were senior advisers Eric Fehrnstrom and Bob White, along with Myers, the head of Romney's VP search. Over the course of an hour in early afternoon, cars began to peel away from the cul-de-sac, but there was no sign of Ryan, who managed to arrive and depart undetected, despite reporters gathered in town for the start of Romney's protective pool the next day.

At the time, one senior adviser told NBC News the meeting was a "strategy session," that had nothing to do with selecting a vice president, a remark that was likely intended to preserve the secrecy of the selection process.

In Wisconsin, there was no sign of Ryan at his home or around town that Sunday, which was also the day of the Oak Creek shooting at a Sikh temple, in the congressman's district.

NBC's Alex Moe contributed to this report.

Mitt Romney's selection of House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan as his running mate stirred prompt conservative enthusiasm on Saturday while Democrats vowed to link Romney to less popular elements of the Wisconsin congressman's budget plans.

Romney introduced Ryan to voters at a rally this morning in Norfolk, Va., where he highlighted the ambitious budget proposals that have made Ryan a hero to Republicans -- and a lightning rod for liberals.

"With energy and vision, Paul Ryan has become an intellectual leader of the Republican Party," Romney said upon introducing his new No. 2. "He understands the fiscal challenges facing America: our exploding deficits and crushing debt – and the fiscal catastrophe that awaits us if we don’t change course."

Darren Hauck / Reuters

House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan (L) (R-WI) introduces U.S. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney (R) as he addresses supporters at Lawrence University during a campaign stop in Appleton, Wisconsin, in this March 30, 2012 file photo. Romney appeared poised to name Congressman Paul Ryan as his vice presidential running mate on August 11, 2012 in a move that will frame the November 6 election in large part over how to reduce government spending and debt. REUTERS/Darren Hauck/Files (UNITED STATES - Tags: POLITICS ELECTIONS)

In picking Ryan, Romney satisfied the clamor in his party's base for a "bold" pick, which, for many in conservative circles, meant naming Ryan himself. It was a direct effort at energizing the GOP base, with whom Romney has sometimes had a fractured relationship.

"This really energizes the ticket enormously," Bay Buchanan, an outside adviser to the Romney campaign, told NBC News.

Elected Republicans -- from Ryan's home-state governor, Scott Walker, to the other candidates Romney had considered as running mates -- likewise hailed the decision.

"Paul Ryan is a courageous reformer who understands our nation’s challenges, has proposed bold policy solutions to solve them, and has shown the courage to stand up to President Obama and other Washington politicians trying to tear him down," said Florida Sen. Marco Rubio in a statement.  Rubio was another favorite of conservatives to round out the ticket.

But Democrats moved quickly to tie Romney to the controversial proposals that Ryan has offered in his two years as chairman of the House Budget Committee.

"In naming Congressman Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney has chosen a leader of the House Republicans who shares his commitment to the flawed theory that new budget-busting tax cuts for the wealthy, while placing greater burdens on the middle class and seniors, will somehow deliver a stronger economy," said Jim Messina, the campaign manager for President Barack Obama.

Messina charged Ryan with seeking to "end Medicare as we know it by turning it into a voucher system, shifting thousands of dollars in health care costs to seniors" -- a line of attack sure to populate Democratic talking points.

Democrats had found success in attacking Ryan's first budget for its Medicare proposals, helping them to win a special election in upstate New York that was transformed into a referendum on the Ryan plan.

Obama campaign releases have been peppered with references to the "Romney-Ryan" plan now for months, and Democrats expressed renewed optimism that Ryan's selection as Romney's running mate would have a similarly positive effect on their downballot fortunes.

"I think politically speaking, this choice is welcome news to the right wing of the Republican Party. It's essentially telling independent voters to take a hike," Maryland Rep. Chris Van Hollen, the ranking Democrat on the budget committee, told NBC News. "In that sense, I think it will help the president and other Democratic candidates win the middle."

Van Hollen and Ryan have struck up a rapport during their time together on the committee, and the Maryland Democrat noted that he likes his colleague very much personally. "It's not been a food fight," Van Hollen said of the committee's work.

Ryan's selection is almost certain to inject his budget plan into the center of the election, but Romney may take strides toward de-emphasizing thornier elements of those budgets.

Buchanan argued that Ryan's selection didn't represent a full embrace of the controversial budgets authored by the Wisconsin Republican the last two years.

"There's no question that while Mitt Romney certainly praised Paul Ryan for his budget, but the two of them do disagree in some areas as to how it should be done," she said Saturday morning. "It's not an embrace, line by line, of the Ryan plan. Mitt Romney has his own plan."

Of Democrats' near-certain onslaught against the new ticket based on Ryan's budget plan, Buchanan added: "What the Democrats do is their business, and we'll see if they're successful. We can't control what the Democrats do. They've accused Romney of murdering a man's wife, so they'll go to any extreme they want."

Updated at 10:45 am ET Presumptive GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney introduced his choice as running mate, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, 42, Saturday morning at a campaign event in Norfolk, Va.

Romney portrayed the Wisconsin congressman as “an intellectual leader of the Republican Party” and a man who “understands the fiscal catastrophe that awaits us if we don’t change course.”

He called him a legislator who had shown the ability to work with members of both parties, saying, “In a city that’s far too often characterized by pettiness and personal attacks, Paul Ryan is a shining exception. He doesn't demonize his opponents.” 

He added that “a lot of people in the other party ... might disagree with Paul Ryan; I don't know anyone that doesn't respect his character and judgment.”

Romney told the crowd, “At a time when the president’s campaign is taking American politics to new lows, we're going to do something differently. We’re going to talk about aspirations and American ideals and about bringing people together to solve the urgent problems facing our nation.”

Ryan then dashed onto the platform from the battleship U.S.S. Wisconsin docked at Norfolk.

Ryan referred to Romney, the former head of Bain Capital, as “someone who knows from experience that if you have a small business you did build that” – a reference to President Obama’s recent statement on the campaign trail that “if you've got a business, you didn't build that. Somebody else made that happen.” Obama argued that businesses benefit from government infrastructure and public sector investments.

Alluding to the entitlements and debt problems that loom over the next few decades, Ryan said Obama and Democrats in Washington “have refused to make difficult decisions because they are more worried about their next election than they are about the next generation.”

Referring to the nation’s sluggish economy and its growing burden of debt, Ryan said, “We can turn this thing around, … but it will take leadership and the courage to tell you the truth.”

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Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan appear at a campaign event in Norfolk, Va., on Saturday.

Ryan also trumpeted Republicans’ faith in private sector entrepreneurs, saying, “We look at one another's success with pride, not resentment, because we know, as more Americans work hard, take risks, succeed, more people will prosper, our communities will benefit, and individual lives will be uplifted and improved.”

That theme is similar to ones Ryan has sounded in the past. He has been outspoken in saying that America must be “an upward mobility society.”

He told CNBC’s Larry Kudlow last February, “We don't want a safety net that turns into a hammock that lulls people into dependency in this country. We want people to get up on their feet and grab that higher rung of the economic ladder.”

He said, “We don't believe in class division. We believe in growth and prosperity, helping people when they are down on their luck get back on their feet, and pro-growth economic policies that put America in the lead, that make us competitive, that stop tearing people down in this zero-sum thinking.”

A senior adviser told NBC News that Romney informed Beth Myers, who headed his search for a running mate, of his decision to select Ryan on Aug. 1.

Live vote: Is Ryan a good choice?

As the author of an ambitious plan to redesign the Medicare program for older and disabled Americans, Ryan has long been the target of Democratic attacks.

Obama campaign manager Jim Messina issued a statement Saturday saying Ryan's Medicare proposal "would end Medicare as we know it by turning it into a voucher system, shifting thousands of dollars in health care costs to seniors." 

If enacted, Ryan’s proposal would be the most far-reaching change in Medicare since the program was created in 1965.

In 2011, one Democratic group ran an ad showing a man – presumably Ryan – pushing a terrified elderly woman in a wheelchair off a cliff.

Ryan’s plan would gradually increase the Medicare eligibility age to 67. This phased-in increase in the eligibility age would start in 2023.

Ryan’s proposal would do away with Medicare’s open-ended payments for those born in 1958 and later, (that is, people who turn 65 in 2023 or later).

Instead, beginning in 2023, people in Medicare would be given a choice of private plans competing alongside the traditional fee-for-service option.

Medicare would provide a payment to pay for or offset the premium of the plan chosen by the senior. The payments would be higher for low-income people and lower for high-income people. The payments would grow over time but would not necessarily keep pace with the increase in the cost of medical care.

The Congressional Budget Office, in an assessment last year, said Ryan’s plan would result in “much lower deficits and debt in the long run.” But the CBO also found that under Ryan’s redesigned Medicare, “most elderly people would pay more for their health care than they would pay under the current Medicare system.”

One prominent Democrat, Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon joined with Ryan last year on a proposal to redesign Medicare.

Wyden said in an opinion piece in the Huffington Post that the Wyden-Ryan proposal was not a finished piece of legislation but “simply a policy paper intended to start a conversation about how Democrats and Republicans might work together to uphold the Medicare Guarantee.”

Live vote: Is Ryan a good choice?

The Oregon Democrat also added, “Wyden-Ryan doesn't eliminate the traditional Medicare plan, instead it guarantees that seniors who want to enroll in Medicare's traditional fee for service plan will always have that option.”

He added that, “Wyden-Ryan doesn't privatize Medicare because Medicare beneficiaries already have the option of enrolling in private health insurance plans. Wyden-Ryan makes those private plans more robust and accountable by forcing them to -- for the first time -- compete directly with traditional Medicare.”

But Wyden also said, “Some Republicans will undoubtedly declare their support for Wyden-Ryan without knowing what that means or believing in its principles. Mitt Romney, for example, claims to have helped write Wyden-Ryan even though I have never spoken to him about Medicare reform.”

As part of its fiscal year 2013 budget resolution, which it approved in March, the House supported Ryan’s Medicare reform plan. The vote was 228 to 191, with no Democrats voting for the proposal and 10 Republicans voting against it.

Ryan has offered some of his ideas on tax reform in interviews with David Gregory on NBC's Meet the Press. Last May, Ryan said, "What we're saying about taxes is take the tax shelters and the loopholes away from the well-connected and the well-off so we can lower tax rates for everybody so we can allow small businesses to grow and compete."

He also said on Meet the Press in 2011: "Instead of job-killing tax increases, why don't we just stop subsidizing wealthy people? I mean, let's go after the crony capitalism, the corporate welfare in the tax code, in spending. And why don't we income-adjust our spending programs so that we don't subsidize wealthy people as much? I think that's a better idea to get more savings in the budget, get our debt down without doing economic damage."

Ryan, first elected to the House in 1998, worked in college as a staffer for Sen. Bob Kasten of Wisconsin, and later as a speechwriter for Jack Kemp and William Bennett and as an aide to Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas.

Ryan voted for the bailout of the financial sector in 2008, as well as the auto industry bailout. He also voted for the 2003 bill to add a prescription drug benefit to Medicare and has voted this year to repeal President Obama’s health care overhaul.

NBC's Garrett Haake contributed to this report.