Senator Obama lost another potential running mate yesterday when Senator Webb of Virginia took himself out of contention for the vice presidency. Mr. Webb, a freshman lawmaker elected less than two years ago, issued a statement yesterday in which he ruled out a spot on the Obama ticket. “Last week I communicated to Senator Obama and his presidential campaign my firm intention to remain in the United States Senate, where I believe I am best equipped to serve the people of Virginia and this country,” he said in a statement. “Under no circumstances will I be a candidate for vice president.” A Vietnam veteran and a former secretary of the Navy under President Reagan, Mr. Webb, 62, had been touted as a possible running mate because of his military experience — which Mr. Obama lacks — and his potential to deliver Virginia, a state that the presumptive Democratic nominee is targeting aggressively. He could have been a risky choice, however, because of his blunt speaking style and the novels he penned earlier in his career, which included graphic sex scenes. Mr. Webb is at least the third potential Obama running mate, and the second from Virginia, to rule out the vice presidency in recent weeks. Governor Strickland of Ohio last month said he did not want the job, and Governor Warner of Virginia said he was committed to a race for Senate and would not be a candidate for any other office.

MCCAIN RETURNS TO BALANCED BUDGET PLEDGE

Senator McCain is promising to balance the budget by the end of his first term in office, returning to a pledge he made early in his primary campaign before seeming to back away from it this spring. The presumptive Republican nominee made the declaration yesterday in an economic speech in Denver and in a jobs plan released by his campaign. His campaign was short on details about how he would achieve a balanced budget, but a briefing paper pointed to reduced costs once the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were over and spending cuts nearly across the board. A McCain administration, the memo said, would “reserve all savings from victory in the Iraq and Afghanistan operations in the fight against Islamic extremists for reducing the deficit. Since all their costs were financed with deficit spending, all their savings must go to deficit reduction.”

GEORGIA REPUBLICANS DOWNPLAY OBAMA’S CHANCES IN STATE

Georgia’s two Republican senators say they aren’t buying Senator Obama’s optimism about competing in the traditionally red state. In a conference call yesterday, Senators Isakson and Chambliss criticized the Democrat’s plans to raise taxes and his foreign policy, the Atlanta Journal Constitution reported. “They would like nothing better than to crack a Southern state,” Mr. Isakson said, telling reporters he doubted Georgia would be in play, even though some polls have Senator McCain ahead by just a few points.

OBAMA PLANE MAKES PRECAUTIONARY LANDING IN ST. LOUIS

The airplane carrying Senator Obama made a precautionary landing in St. Louis yesterday after the crew had a problem keeping the nose up on takeoff from Chicago. The plane, an MD-80 Midwest Airlines charter, struggled to keep the nose at the necessary angle as it left for Charlotte, N.C., the pilot said. Later, Midwest Airlines said the problem developed because an emergency slide in the tail cone of the plane deployed in flight and never threatened the safety of the flight. The National Transportation Safety Board said it planned to investigate the incident. A Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman, Laura Brown, said the plane did not declare an emergency but “requested a diversion for mechanical issues they called a flight control problem.” After landing, Mr. Obama read the paper in the front cabin but ventured briefly to chat with the press at one point. “I just thought we’d spice things up a little bit today,” he joked. The Illinois senator and a small entourage eventually left the plane to wait out the maintenance at a local hotel; the North Carolina trip was postponed. But he called the Charlotte event to apologize for his absence and to summarize his speech on the nation’s economic woes. He expanded on that economic message later to his traveling press corps in Missouri, a battleground state he hopes to win in the fall.