CINCINNATI -- Mary Dietz and her 21-year-old daughter Emily took a detour from their vacation to stand in a long snaking line Monday to see Hillary Clinton in the flesh with Elizabeth Warren.

Mary came for the candidate.

Emily came for the senator.

Mom was more jazzed about the prospect of helping send the Clintons back to the White House to replicate the economic prosperity she felt in the 90s.

Having only been a toddler during that time, the Bernie Sanders -supporting daughter was more interested in gauging if Warren's christening would help Clinton capture the hearts of progressives like her.

These dueling perspectives -- from different generations -- neatly encapsulate the 2016 White House campaign inside the Democratic Party.

But the Dietz ladies, who recently moved to Florida, are in accord on one facet that collected new momentum this week: Clinton picking Warren as her running mate. Both think it would be dangerous.

"I think it would be nice but I think it would make it more difficult for her in a way, with two women," says Mary. "Men are prejudiced."

"I would be happy but I don't know how much the country would see that favorably," says Emily.

"Some people aren't going to look too kindly on two women, ya know?"

The fact that mother and daughter, both politically active female Democrats, harbor such doubts about a Clinton-Warren ticket underline the steep hurdles to such a 2016 marriage.

The Clinton campaign wants it widely known that Warren is high on their Veep list. It serves their immediate political purpose to dangle her before liberals that have been slow to embrace the former secretary of state's candidacy.

The undoubtable electricity Warren delivered on stage in her first joint campaign appearance with the presumptive Democratic nominee only made the prospect feel all the more realistic.

The chemistry appeared genuine; the picture looked inspiring; the reaction was euphoric.

The only problem is: Democrats still think it's just a dream: A beautiful, marvelous, exhilarating dream, but one that dissipates as soon as you wake up to reality.

"It's unlikely that she would be picked," says former Sen. Kent Conrad, who lent advice to candidate Barack Obama during his 2008 vice presidential search. "It's historic to have a woman lead the ticket. Having two women on the ticket would probably just not be where they'd wanna go."

But at the same time, Conrad doesn't doubt that Warren is being given "serious consideration."

"She's high profile, got a very loyal following and proven to be a very good surrogate," adds Conrad. "I'd just think it's unlikely."

The Guessing Game

Trying to estimate exactly how seriously Team Clinton is considering Warren is the ultimate guessing game. With the primaries having concluded and the dawn of summer ushering in a somewhat dead political space before the party's national convention in three weeks, the vice presidential parlor game offers the juiciest storyline.

The problem is that the circle of people who actually know the true candidates in contention is infinitely small, and ultimately shrinks down to the nominee herself. Outside of campaign chairman John Podesta, informal adviser and friend Cheryl Mills, and former President Bill Clinton, it's unlikely any other person -- including senior staffers -- have inside knowledge of the candidate's true favorites. That doesn't mean they don't have access to the list, hold some smart inklings and aren't talking to reporters -- that's all part of the process too.

"She did not tell me before the rally," quipped one Clinton aide, referring to his candidate when prodded about Warren's standing.

Even Warren allies are largely in the dark, weighing amongst themselves whether this is all a mirage to assuage concerns among the party base.

Some Hillary Clinton supporters worry about her chances of winning the presidency if she picks another woman―Elizabeth Warren―as her running mate. (John Sommers II/Getty Images)

They know she's going through the traditional vetting process, having already met secretly with James Hamilton, the attorney leading Clinton's vice presidential search, according to The New York Times.

And Warren appears to relish playing the role of Trump antagonist, likely having gone through in her head all of the upsides and drawbacks to being a No. 2 to a Clinton.

But she has about as good a hunch of whether she'll be picked as you do.

Former Rep. Dick Gephardt knows. He went through the shadowy process in 2004 when then-Sen. John Kerry was the Democratic nominee in need of a sidekick.

"You really don't [know], you're really in a dark place, not a knowledgable place. All you can get is what's presented and what's asked," he says. "It's a little hard to figure all that out."

A Moment Of Maximum Influence

When the history of the 2016 presidential is written, there are two moments in which Warren will have exerted maximum influence. One is an instance that doesn't have a precise date, but became a running question in 2015: When she didn't run herself.

The other is now, the moment the party needs her to bring aboard sullen Sanders supporters and validate Clinton's progressive streak ahead of the national convention.

While standing with her for 45 minutes Monday, Clinton adopted some of Warren's combative rhetoric, fervently advocating for tax hikes on the wealthy and debt relief for college students.

"This is not a time for half-measures. To build an economy that works for everyone, not just those at the top, we have got to go big and we have got to go bold," she said.

But one of the reasons Warren seems like such a long-shot choice is because Clinton isn't known for big, bold moves, especially politically.

A Monmouth University poll taken earlier this month found that aside from Sanders, who is not under consideration, adding Warren to the Democratic ticket would have the most positive net gain (24 to 21 percent) compared to four other choices, including the perceived front-runner for the slot, Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia (9 to 13 percent).

The Clinton campaign is likely in the process of reviewing sets of very specific focus group data to test Warren's appeal among swing state voters. But just as Clinton's perceived weakness with liberal voters has been overblown, so has Warren's problems with middle of the road, moderates.

What Warren exudes -- an independent streak, a folksy authenticity, a fighting anti-corporatist spirit -- might be just what voters are looking for in this anti-establishment cycle, even if they're not ideologically in sync with her.

But because she's sitting on healthy national and marginal battleground state polling leads over Trump, Clinton may conclude she doesn't need that risk -- and that she'll settle for Warren being a superstar surrogate, not a second-in-command.

Gender Politics

In 2000, Vice President Al Gore's vice presidential list included then Gov. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire.

Her name was always the last to appear, and today Democrats acknowledge that while Shaheen was never actually being considered, the Gore campaign thought it was necessary they float a woman.

These strategic leaks of names occur almost every cycle to check a demographic or geographic box, satisfy a media hunger or do a favor for a friend.

"There's often a political imperative that people be listed being considered who aren't being considered," says Conrad. "I've seen in the past where people have asked to have their name be in play because it will help them back home."

It's completely possible that Warren is this year's Shaheen -- whispered by top aides to be included on every list, but in reality on the outside looking in. There is a significant portion of Washington's political media complex that thinks the mere suggestion of Warren is a complete head fake. Stories of why Warren won't be Clinton's pick easily fill a Google page.

They cite Warren's strident anti-Wall Street rhetoric hurting Clinton's fundraising. They note the two haven't fostered the camaraderie that's required of such a partnership. They argue that Warren is simply too contentious a figure and therefore too big a strategic risk.

But what's more surprising is the number of women who bring up gender as their primary concern.

"I hate to say it, but I'm not sure about two women on a ticket," says Elizabeth West, a health care worker in Cincinnati who attended the Clinton-Warren rally. "I work with a lot of diehard misogynists. I think there a lot of people that would hesitate with two women on the ticket. I wish I didn't think that, but I worry about it."

Amy Schardein, another area resident, standing a few feet behind West in line, says skeptics in the sisterhood are just thinking about the ticket all the wrong way.