POLITICO'S Whiteboard got the advance tape of Vice President Joe Biden's harsh appraisal of his predecessor:
Vice President Joe Biden told NBC's "Meet the Press" that his predecessor, Dick Cheney, is trying to "rewrite history" with his criticism of the President Barack Obama's terrorism policies.
"I'm not gonna guess about his motive," Biden told "Meet the Press" moderator David Gregory in an advance excerpt released by the network of the interview taped Saturday night from Vancouver, where the vice president is leading the U.S. delegation to the winter Olympics. "All I know is he's factually, substantively wrong. On the major criticisms he is asserting... He either is misinformed or he is misinforming. But the facts are that his assertions are not accurate."
Biden's harsh appraisal came in an interview designed to counterprogram Cheney's appearance Sunday morning appearance on ABC's "This Week," where he is to be interviewed at 9 a.m. by guest anchor Jonathan Karl.
"Dick Cheney's a fine fellow," Biden said. "He's entitled to his own opinion. He's not entitled to rewrite history. He's not entitled to his own facts... It's one thing to criticize. It's another thing to sort of rewrite history. What is he talking about? . It's one thing to be outspoken. It's another thing to be outspoken in a way that misrepresents the facts. .. [I]t's almost like Dick is trying to rewrite history... I'm not being facetious. Maybe he's not fully informed of what's going on.
Here are some of Cheney's comments today as transcribed by The Oval:
Cheney, by the way, was also asked Biden's 2008 opponent Sarah Palin, and isn't sure she's ready to be president. "I haven't made a decision yet on who I'm going to support for president the next time around," Cheney said. "Whoever it is, is going to have to prove themselves capable of being president of the United States."
Here are some other highlights:
Afghanistan.
Cheney: "I'm a complete supporter of what they are doing in Afghanistan. I think the President made the right decision to send troops into Afghanistan. I thought it took him a while to get there."
The Christmas Day bomb plot.
Cheney says "enhanced interrogation techniques" -- including waterboarding -- should have been available for suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmuttalab: "I think you ought to have all of those capabilities on the table. Now, President Obama has taken them off the table. He announced when he came in last year that they would never use anything other than the U.S. Army Manual which doesn't include those techniques. I think that's a mistake."
Biden on conservative criticism over Abdulmutallab being read his Miranda rights: "Let me choose my words carefully here. Dick Cheney's a fine fellow. He's entitled to his own opinion. He's not entitled to rewrite history. He's not entitled to his own facts. The Christmas Day Bomber was treated the exact way that he suggested that the Shoe Bomber was treated. Absolutely the same way."
Iraq.
Cheney on Biden's comments praising Obama's handling of Iraq: "They opposed the surge that was absolutely crucial to our getting to the point we're at now with respect to Iraq. And for them to try to take credit for what's happened in Iraq strikes me as a little strange ... So if they're going to take credit for it, fair enough, for what they've done while they're there, but it ought to go with a healthy dose of "thank you, George Bush" up front."
There is still confusion over the election results in Iran, some of it coming from the United States.
Officially, the United States is recognizing the election results. Unofficially, Vice President Joe Biden didn't get the memo.
Biden said Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press" that he had doubts about whether Iran's presidential election was free and fair, though the United States must accept Teheran's claim that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won a resounding re-election.
U.S. officials are trying to understand whether the vote accurately reflected Iranians' response to President Barack Obama's effort to open a dialogue after a nearly 30-year diplomatic freeze, Biden said. "That's the question," Biden said, adding: "Is this the result of the Iranian people's wishes? The hope is that the Iranian people all their votes have been counted, they've been counted fairly. But look, we just don't know enough" since Friday's vote.
While Ahmadinejad insisted the results showing his landslide victory were fair and legitimate, Biden simply said, "You know I have doubts."
"It sure looks like the way they're suppressing speech, the way they're suppressing crowds, the way in which people are being treated, that there's some real doubt about that," Biden said.
Despite the fact that the vice president said the United States for now recognizes the election results, Major Garrett, reporting for FOX News, reports that an administration official, who did not want to be named, is more cautious:
A senior official, speaking without attribution, said the Obama administration would not describe the announced outcome of the Iranian election as legitimate or illegitimate.
It would also not describe a victory by Mir Hossein Mousavi as necessarily better than a victory - now claimed and endorsed by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei - by reigning Iranian President Mahmoud Ahamdinejad.
"We're not going to characterize what would have been a better or worse scenario," the official said. "We will deal with this as it is, not as we wish it to be. We have very serious foreign policy and national security issues at play here. That was the case yesterday. It is the case today."
The official said the White House and State Department will "follow closely" reports of voting irregularities and called the public statement by Press Secretary Robert Gibbs on irregularities a "straight-forward" signal to the world about US concerns.
"We are continuing to follow and monitor developments, but we are not going to get ahead of the facts."
The senior official said there was legitimate reason to study complaints from Mousavi's camp that the former prime minister even lost in his own political base to Ahmadinejad, that cell phones and text messaging appeared to have been blocked, and that shortages in ballots may have denied millions a chance to vote.
Grand Ayatollah Sanei in Iran has declared Ahmadinejad's presidency illegitimate and cooperating with his government against Islam. There are strong rumors that his house and office are surrounded by the police and his website is filtered. He had previously issued a fatwa, against rigging of the elections in any form or shape, calling it a mortal sin.
On the streets, protests are continuing. Here is recent video of riot cops riding motorcycles directly into a crowd of protesters.
When asked about reports of arrests and the detention of opposition leaders, including that of his challenger Mir Hussein Moussavi, Ahmadinejad gave a cryptic response during a news conference. Here is CNN's translation:
"The situation in the country is in a very good condition. Iran is the most stable country in the world, and there's the rule of law in this country, and all the people are equal before the law. And the presidential election has witnessed people's massive turnout. As I said, even in a soccer match, people may become excited and that may lead to a confrontation between them and the police force. This is something natural. A person coming out of a stadium may violate the traffic regulations. He will be fined by the police no matter who he is, an ordinary person or even a minister.
"So these are not problems for the people of Iran. 40 million people have participated in the election and these 40 million people will safeguard the elections, based on the Iranian culture. There is no partisanship based on the Western concept. In fact, the people are friends with one another, and they're going to cast their votes in favor of any candidate they like, and of course, such a voting process will not lead to any hostility among the people. And you go to the streets you see that people are friends with one another, and in Iran, no one asks the other whom you're going to vote for.
"The situation is very good, and Iran is on the threshold of making considerable progress. And definitely in the next four years, the status of Iran in the world will be further promoted.
Here is video of the CNN's Christian Amanpour pressing Ahamdinejad for answers concerning the challenger's safety:
Sen. Joe Biden has reportedly banned CBS Channel 3 in Philadelphia after its news anchors asked him questions concerning payments made with campaign funds to relatives for consulting fees.
The anchors were asking questions off a recent Washington Times story by Jim McElhatton that reported that Biden has paid more than $2 million in campaign cash to his family members, their businesses and employers over the years, a practice that watchdogs criticize as rife with potential conflicts of interest. McElhatton's report stated:
The money largely flowed from the coffers of Mr. Biden's failed presidential campaign during the past two years to a company that employs his sister and longtime campaign manager, Valerie Biden Owens, according to campaign disclosure filings.
The senator from Delaware also directed campaign legal work to a Washington lobbying and law firm founded by his son R. Hunter Biden, the disclosures show.
Putting family members and their companies on the political payroll is legal if the work is legitimate and charged at market rates, according to the Federal Election Commission. Still, public watchdog groups have long criticized such arrangements.
Sen. Joe Biden scored well in overnight polling after his vice-presidential debate with Gov. Sarah Palin, providing more bad news for the Republican ticket that has been faltering in the past two weeks.
An unscientific poll on AOL shows Biden winning 48 percent to 45 percent. MSNBC's unscientific poll had Biden winning 78.6 percent to 18.9 percent, which is not surprising given the liberal demographics of the network's viewers. But what was more eye-catching is that FOX News' unscientific poll has Biden up 61-39.
Other polls included the CNN/Opinion Research poll, which has Biden up 51-36, and CBS, who has Biden winning 46-21.
In the CBS poll, of the uncommitted voters, 18 percent now say they will vote Obama/Biden, while 10 percent now say McCain/Palin.
The CNN poll concluded that the results of the debate cannot be welcome news for the McCain-Palin campaign.
Sen. Joe Biden and Gov. Sarah Palin stood at the podiums last night to show America how both can distort the facts. Factcheck.org ran through their claims and came up with these notes:
Palin mistakenly claimed that troop levels in Iraq had returned to “pre-surge” levels. Levels are gradually coming down but current plans would have levels higher than pre-surge numbers through early next year, at least. Biden incorrectly said “John McCain voted the exact same way” as Obama on a controversial troop funding bill. The two were actually on opposite sides.
Palin repeated a false claim that Obama once voted in favor of higher taxes on “families” making as little as $42,000 a year. He did not. The budget bill in question called for an increase only on singles making that amount, but a family of four would not have been affected unless they made at least $90,000 a year. Biden wrongly claimed that McCain “voted the exact same way” as Obama on the budget bill that contained an increase on singles making as little as $42,000 a year. McCain voted against it. Biden was referring to an amendment that didn't address taxes at that income level.
Palin claimed McCain’s health care plan would be “budget neutral,” costing the government nothing. Independent budget experts estimate McCain's plan would cost tens of billions each year, though details are too fuzzy to allow for exact estimates.
Biden wrongly claimed that McCain had said "he wouldn't even sit down" with the president of Spain. Actually, McCain didn't reject a meeting, but simply refused to commit himself one way or the other during an interview.
Palin wrongly claimed that “millions of small businesses” would see tax increases under Obama’s tax proposals. At most, several hundred thousand business owners would see increases.
I can't put as much attention to the debate as I'd like to because I am still in my office. I have put some links on my main page to more active bloggers tonight.
But from what I have seen Gov. Sarah Palin is struggling with some answers. She just had a difficult time talking about energy independence and global warming.
Sen. Joe Biden has looked smoothed and confident in the early going.
Palin called out Wall Street’s "greed" for giving out loans for "$300,000" homes when the homeowner "can only afford $100,000." Comparing the practice to predatory lending. At one point Palin says paying taxes in not patriotic. Patriotism is getting government out of the way.
Biden tosses in a reference to "a bridge to nowhere," calling all the disagreements over taxes -- who raised them and who didn’t -- bogus.
Later, Palin brought up the point that Biden had once said he would run on a ticket with McCain and that Obama is not ready to be president. She snapped at Biden when he mentioned Obama’s vote to cut off funding for the troops — “That’s another story,” she says.
Biden pointed out that McCain has also voted against funding for the troops.
Palin, trying to distance herself from George Bush, said, "There have been huge blunders throughout this administration."
Ifill reminds both candidates that they would be a heartbeat from the presidency. Both respond by saying, God forbid, it would be a horrible event. I'm not quite sure what Ifill wanted out of that question, other than to make a point that McCain is older than Obama?
Both candidates try to be more of a supporter of Israel than the other.
I'm not sure how many people just won their office pool as Palin used the line "Say it isn't so, Joe?"
Thank you for sticking with me during the night, I had a surprisingly high number of people joining me. Time to go over to MSNBC to see how Biden won, or to FOX to see how Palin won, your choice.
Sen. John McCain said this afternoon that he sees no problem with PBS' Gwen Ifill moderating tomorrow night's vice presidential debate between Gov. Sarah Palin and Sen. Joe Biden despite a possible conflict of interest in that she stands to make a lot of money with a Democrat victory in the fall elections because she has written a pro-Obama book.
FOX’s Carl Cameron, interviewing the Arizona senator this afternoon, asked McCain whether Ifill should excuse herself as the debate moderator. McCain said there is a potential conflict of interest but expressed confidence in the longtime journalist.
“I think that Gwen Ifill is a professional and I think that she will do a totally objective job because she is a highly respected professional,” McCain said during an interview at the Harry S. Truman Library and Museum. “Does this help…if she has written a book that’s favorable to Senator Obama? Probably not. But I have confidence that Gwen Ifill will do a professional job and I have that confidence.”
Campaign officials said they did not know about the book until today even though Ifill’s upcoming publication was mentioned in a Sept. 4 Washington Post profile.
See this article posted earlier today that examines Ifill's possible conflict of interest.
In what is becoming a familiar scene on the campaign trail, politicians started to backtrack on statements they made that seem either ludicrous or were down-right insulting.
Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.) made a hasty retreat from his statement last week in which he told a group of Jewish and African-American Democrats in Florida that they should be wary of Republican vice presidential nominee Gov. Sarah Palin because "anybody toting guns and stripping moose don't care too much about what they do with Jews and blacks." He also said, "If Sarah Palin isn't enough of a reason for you to get over whatever your problem is with Barack Obama, then you damn well had better pay attention."
Hastings released a statement yesterday apologizing for the remark. "I regret the comments I made last Tuesday that were not smart and certainly not relevant to hunters or sportsmen," Hastings said. "The point I made, and will continue to make, is that the policies and priorities of a McCain-Palin administration would be anathema to most African-Americans and Jews. I regret that I was not clearer and apologize to Governor Palin, my host where I was speaking, and those who my comments may have offended."
Over in Sen. Joe Biden's corner, there has been some chatter on the internet today concerning his claim that he was shot at once in Iraq, and the circumstances concerning his helicopter being forced down in Afghanistan.
“Let’s start telling the truth,” he said. “Number one, you take all the troops out — you better have helicopters ready to take those 3,000 civilians inside the Green Zone, where I have been seven times and shot at. You better make sure you have protection for them, or let them die, number one.”
When asked for a detailed account of the experience, Biden described three incidents on two separate Iraq trips in which he felt that he was shot at or might have been shot at. Only one of them took place inside the Green Zone, he said, and involved a “shot” landing outside the building where he and other senators were staying. He added that the vehicle he was traveling in the day before might also have been hit.
Biden said the incident happened in the morning while he and at least one other senator were shaving. Although he said it shook the building, he wasn’t rattled enough to duck and cover.
“No one got up and ran from the room — it wasn’t that kind of thing,” he said. “It’s not like I had someone holding a gun to my head.”
Thinking about it now, he said, a more accurate comment would have been: “I was near where a shot landed.”
FOX News says it has been pressing campaign officials for specifics on the Iraqi incident, but had not heard back from Biden spokesman David Wade.
At the same time, Biden has caused another stir about an incident that supposedly happen on a fact-finding mission in Afghanistan. Biden has said he will grill Palin during Thursday's debate about "the superhighway of terror between Pakistan and Afghanistan where my helicopter was forced down."
"If you want to know where Al Qaeda lives, you want to know where Bin Laden is, come back to Afghanistan with me," Biden told the National Guard Association. "Come back to the area where my helicopter was forced down, with a three-star general and three senators at 10,500 feet in the middle of those mountains. I can tell you where they are."
The problem is that apparently it was bad weather, not terrorists, that forced the chopper to land in an open field last February. Fighter jets kept watch overhead while a convoy of security vehicles was dispatched to retrieve Biden and Sens. Chuck Hagel and John Kerry.
"We were going to send Biden out to fight the Taliban with snowballs, but we didn't have to," joked Kerry to The Associated Press. "Other than getting a little cold, it was fine."
For the record, Biden never explicitly claimed his chopper had been forced down by terrorists.
The calls for Gov. Sarah Palin to step down from the GOP ticket has moved from the blogs to the mainstream media as journalists across the nation have been in a state of shock that she performed poorly during the interview with CBS' Katie Couric.
In a four-paragraph editorial, Zakaria's thesis is that because Palin stumbled on answering Couric's questions she is no way qualified for the office of vice president.
The problem with that thesis is that answering media questions is not what qualifies anybody for high office. If it were, we'd be in trouble with all the candidates.
Case in point: Here's Sen. Joe Biden, well known as a gaffe machine, speaking to, ironically, Couric on how a president can respond to an economic crisis:
Now, we all know that President Roosevelt was not president when the stock market crashed in 1929 (it's what made Herbert Hoover famous). We also know that few televisions existed in the Roaring '20s. So is Biden out of touch for making such a ridiculous argument? Where is the media outrage that he can't put forth a reasonable answer to a reasonable question, and therefore should step down from the campaign?
Biden isn't the only one to misspeak during the campaign. Sen. John McCain has had his share of fumbles in front of a microphone. For instance, he proudly proclaimed at the start of the current financial crisis that if he were president, he would fire Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Christopher Cox for his “betrayal of trust” leading up to this past week’s financial market crisis."
Now, in this case, the problem is that the SEC, which regulates the trading of stocks and bonds, is an independent agency outside the jurisdiction of the White House. While the president nominates and the Senate approves the SEC chairman, there is some doubt on whether a president can actually fire the SEC chair. After a few days of back-and-forth between the McCain campaign and the media about the gaffe, the GOP candidate changed his language to say he would asked for Cox's resignation, not fire him. The media was appropriately tough on McCain, but there were no calls for him to step aside from the campaign for the good of the party.
Or how about this one?
The Spanish press was pounding the McCain campaign for at least one news cycle after the Arizona senator failed to correctly identify Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero of Spain. The reporter that spoke with McCain said that she had the feeling that McCain didn't know what he was talking about. Some said McCain was confused in the interview, apparently thinking Zapatero was someone from Latin America who is an enemy of the United States. This interview started a minor international controversy; but there were no calls from the media that McCain step down from the campaign because he had misspoken to the press on a foreign affairs matter, which is one of his strong points.
And probably the most famous gaffe of McCain's campaign was when Politico asked the senator how many homes he owned. "I think — I'll have my staff get to you," McCain said. "It's condominiums where — I'll have them get to you."
He's still taking heat for that one. But are there any calls for him to step aside? Not really.
Misspeaking in front of cameras is a bipartisan sport. Some of Sen. Barack Obama's have been outrageous as well. For instance:
How could someone who thinks there are 58 states actually serve as president? How many electoral votes do those extra eight states give the Democrats? This is obviously a slip of the tongue, not a sign of a basic lack of knowledge about geography. But what would the media be saying if Palin made that same mistake. Tina Fey would have a field day on "Saturday Night Live."
There were more serious missteps by Obama. Remember his statement earlier in the campaign that "Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided."
That's a policy statement, and it was one that gave Obama some considerable heat. He had to spend days backtracking on the statement.
Once again, CBS' Couric was in the middle of the fray we she asked the senator: "You said not too long ago that Jerusalem should remain undivided. And then you backtracked on that statement. Does that play into the argument that some believe that someone more experienced would not have made that kind of mistake?"
Obama: "Well, if you look at what happened, there was no shift in policy or backtracking in policy. We just had phrased it poorly in the speech. That has happened and will happen to every politician. You're not always gonna hit your mark in terms of how you phrase your policies. But my policy hasn't changed, and it's been very consistent. It's the same policy that Bill Clinton has put forward, and that says that Jerusalem will be the capital of Israel, that we shouldn't divide it by barbed wire, but that, ultimately that is a final status issue that has to be resolved between the Palestinians and the Israelis."
This was a case where he used code words that upset many Palestinians in part of the world where people die because high-ranking officials use incorrect language. But nobody in the media started to write editorials saying that he should drop out of the race because that he was not qualified for high office because he misspoke to the media.
Here's another case. On his trip to the Middle East, Obama proudly proclaimed that "Now, in terms of knowing my commitments, you don't have to just look at my words, you can look at my deeds. Just this past week, we passed out of the U.S. Senate Banking Committee, which is my committee, a bill to call for divestment from Iran, as a way of ratcheting up the pressure to ensure that they don't obtain a nuclear weapon."
Of course, there was some press concerning this, mostly for one news cycle. Obama is not a member of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee. Obama took credit for the committee's works as one of his deeds. And while there was some press criticism about it, there were no calls for him to step aside because of a lack of ability to speak into a microphone.
Here's the deal. Palin had a bad interview with Couric. Her answers were not on target. But that does not disqualify her as part of the GOP ticket. An ability to speak to the press has never stopped anyone from succeeding in high office. Every politician on the planet misspeaks and stumbles on their words, usually on a daily basis.
Members of the media have the same amount of power in the presidential elections as other citizens. Each reporter, editor and commentator has one vote, just like you. Journalists do like to think they control the national dialogue. The whole Palin phenomena has been a thorn in the news media's side. Journalists did not see her coming as a candidate, they never approved of the vetting process (because they didn't have a chance to vet her), and she represents a segment of the populace that journalists in New York and Washington have a tough time understanding. In their collective mind, they cannot fathom a person coming out of nowhere, who holds opposite values as they do, potentially jumping in and becoming a very powerful person. In a nutshell, they never approved her. Therefore, in most journalists' mindset, she isn't qualified.
But, it's not the news media's call.
You, and everyone else who goes to the polls in November, are the only ones who gets to decide if she, or any one else is qualified. Don't make your decision based on a candidate's performance with the media. Judge office-seekers by their policies, their past performance in government service and their vision for the future. Those are the only qualifications you need to look at.
In the end, she's not qualified only if the voters, not the media, say so.
Democrat vice presidential candidate Sen. Joe Biden and his wife reported giving a fraction of 1 percent of their income to charity during the past decade, below the national average, Bloomberg reports. A Biden spokesman said the couple has given more to charity than they claimed on their taxes.
Biden and his wife, Jill, earned $319,853 in adjusted gross income and paid $72,787 in federal taxes last year, including $2,721 in alternative minimum taxes. They claimed $995 in deductions for charitable giving, about triple what they deducted in any of the nine previous years. Over the past decade they reported giving an average of $369 to charity.
Their deductions for charitable giving -- about two-tenths of 1 percent of their income -- is lower than the national average of about 3.1 percent, according to JustGive.org, a nonprofit organization that connects donors with charities.
"That lack of charitable giving at that level of income would definitely be outside the range of what we say is normal," said Russell James, a professor at the University of Georgia who researches charitable giving.
While all the focus is on the convention in Denver, the Gallup Poll's daily national tracking number came out today, and it's John McCain, not Barack Obama, who has a two percentage-point lead.
This poll was taken during the first three days after the selection of Joe Biden as the Democratic vice presidential candidate. It's a national poll, so it's value is limited at best. But it is the first time Gallup has McCain on top.
An analysis of historical election poll trends by Gallup Poll Managing Editor Jeff Jones shows that recent presidential campaigns have enjoyed a small (though short-lived) bounce from the running mate announcement. This includes a four percentage point bounce for John Kerry in 2004 after selecting John Edwards, a 5-point bounce for Al Gore in 2000 with his announcement of Joe Lieberman, and a 3-point bounce for George W. Bush in 2000 upon choosing Dick Cheney. Bob Dole received an extraordinary 9-point bounce in 1996 after bringing Jack Kemp onto his ticket.
All of these bounces occurred before the respective party's convention began, and in most cases the candidates received an additional boost in the polls upon completion of the convention. Thus, any increase in Obama's support in the coming days would seem to be more the result of the star-studded and well publicized Democratic national convention than the apparently lackluster Biden selection.
I know it's Saturday, and there is not much else going on in the world (except for a little pesky storm in Florida). But the three major cable networks are wall-to-wall on the Biden story. That's fine, although I was not impressed with O.J Simpson-esque motorcade media chase as Biden rode to the Wilmington airport.
The media has been camped out at a number of potential picks' homes for days. In that time, the smart money has moved from Kaine, then Bayh, to an unknown Edwards. The media freeding frenzy has been so intense that Joe Biden had to hand out bagels to reporters at his doorstep a couple days ago:
Even for a "news-politics geek" like me, the coverage has been a bit overkill. Stories based on sources, speculation and paid pundits usually end up biting you in the you-know-where. Just ask Matt Drudge, who was pretty confident that he had the Bayh story nailed down not 24 hours ago. We should keep some prespective in these events. One thing to keep in mind, Biden is, after all, just the No. 2 guy. Nobody in their right mind chooses who they are going to vote for based on the No. 2 guy.
It will be interesting to see if McCain gets the same blanket coverage next week. Will CNN camp out at Mike Huckabee's home? Is MSNBC going to chase Mitt Romney's motorcade? Will Tim Pawlenty have to hand out lunch to reporters from FOX?
The presidential candidates haven't received even play from the large news organizations this year. For example, The Washington Post and Time magazine have admitted running many more prominent stories about Obama than McCain. It is a disturbing trend. As we enter the election prime time, when most Americans will start to pay attention, will we start to see more balanced play?
The picks say something profound about Obama: For all his self-confidence, the 47-year-old Illinois senator worried that he couldn't beat Republican John McCain without help from a seasoned politician willing to attack. The Biden selection is the next logistical step in an Obama campaign that has become more negative - a strategic decision that may be necessary but threatens to run counter to his image.
Judgment? Biden voted for the Iraq war. But beyond that, even if we stipulate that he has foreign policy chops, how does that make him a good veep choice? It strikes me that any pick designed to cover up a "flaw" in Obama (i.e. "lack of foreign policy credentials") only accentuates those flaws. Make him secretary of state.
Sure, compared to Bayh and Kaine, Biden looks almost passable, but that's a low hurdle to pass. I'd rather not have to choose my poison. I'd rather have candy.
Sen. Hillary Clinton's statement (he's purposeful):
"In naming my colleague and friend Senator Joe Biden to be the vice presidential nominee, Senator Obama has continued in the best traditions for the vice presidency by selecting an exceptionally strong, experienced leader and devoted public servant. Senator Biden will be a purposeful and dynamic vice president who will help Senator Obama both win the presidency and govern this great country."
Only about half of former Clinton voters say they’ll back the Illinois senator — and it’s not clear if the Biden choice will attract or alienate those who have yet to embrace Obama. Former Clinton communications director Howard Wolfson predicted her troops would eventually fall in line but suggested that Biden needed to project toughness — as Clinton did — to win over voters.
But it's going to be a tough sell:
Hillary supporter Rep. Loretta Sanchez (D-Calif.) predicted the move would further anger many of the New York senator’s most hardcore supporters.
"I never thought he would pick Hillary," she said. "I know politics. Things just don't happen that way. Hillary knew that. Anyone who thought he would put her on the ticket is just clueless."
Sanchez said that she had a friend, a staunch Democrat, who is voting for John McCain because "he is so unhappy about what's happened," adding that Clinton supporters have encountered a "disconnect" with the Obama campaign.
The Chicago Tribune reports that Sen. Carl Levin of the swing state of Michigan is on board:
"This is a terrific choice. Joe Biden understands the challenges facing our country at home and abroad, and his long history of bipartisanship in the Senate will be a welcome asset. He will be a tireless and enthusiastic partner for Senator Obama in the campaign and in the White House."
WASHINGTON - Sen. Joseph Biden, a senior Democrat, on Sunday urged Republican Sen. John McCain to run for vice president with the Democratic hopeful, Sen. John Kerry, in order to heal the “vicious rift” dividing America.
McCain, of Arizona, “categorically” ruled out standing with Kerry, but Biden, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said he had no second choice.
“I’m sticking with McCain,” Biden said.
“I think John McCain would be a great candidate for vice president,” Biden, from Delaware, said on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” where the two senators appeared together to take questions on Iraq and other subjects.
“Do I think it’s going to happen? No,” he said. “But I think it is a reflection of the desire of this country and the desire of people in both parties to want to see this God-awful, vicious rift that exists in the nation healed, and John and John could go a long way to heal in that rift.”
UPDATE: The text message went out early Saturday morning. It read "Barack has chosen Senator Joe Biden to be our VP nominee."
Cable news folks are reporting that the most anticipated text message in the history of, well, test messaging, will go out sometime between 10 a.m. and noon tomorrow morning. I'm betting Biden.
The cable networks are juicing up the anticipation that Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware will be Obama's running mate. Let's look at some of the plus and minues of such a pick.
Traditionally, a vice president doesn't have much power. His official job description is as president of the Senate, he is there primarily to break tie votes, which should not happen that often in the next two years as the Democrats should have a substantial majority. The vice president is often assigned special duties by the president, but has not executive powers whatsoever.
We all know that Biden offers the foreign policy experience. But is that what you need from a vice president? Isn't that what you need from the president?
Then there's his speaking ability. One thing about Biden, he does speak his mind. And because of that, there is plenty of ammo for McCain. Care for a doughnut?
One of the main positives about Biden would be his ability to go on the offensive. Here he is at a primary debate, hitting almost every opponent with a touch of humor in a matter of minutes. Can you imagine him in a national debate?
He has a little dance to do on his war votes. Here he is defending funding the troops in a vote where he was on the opposite side of the fence from Obama.
And there is always the famous "clean" remark:
Ironically, in a year where "change" and being a "maverick" have been a keystone of campaigns from both parties, we may have the choice of looking at names for four U.S. senators on the November ballot for president. Not much in the change department there, especially considering that the approval ratings on Capitol Hill are actually lower than those of the current president.
MSNBC is pretty sure, at least on Keith Olbermann's show, that it's not Bayh and Kaine. So at least at this hour the most liberal network on television is leaning toward Biden.
Olbermann and Richard Wolffe are both confidant that there will be no text message tonight.
UPDATE4: Most every news organization by 11 p.m. Eastern has discredited the reports on Bayh, saying high-level sources in the Obama campaign have information that the senator from Indiana has been told that he is not the vice presidential selection.
KMBC's Micheal Mahoney reports a company in Kansas City, which specializes in political literature, has been printing Obama-Bayh material... MORE... Gill Studios, would not confirm information about the material. They would not deny it either. At least three sources close to the plant's operations reported the Obama-Bayh material was being produced.
KMBC's site is here. Sen. Evan Bayh's Senate page is here.
UPDATE2: Here is Bayh's Oct. 8, 2002 speech on the Senate floor strongly supporting the war resolution. Ironically, Sen. John McCain questions him during the debate:
UPDATE: Bob Shrum, Pat Buchanan and Andrea Mitchell, while all three appeared on Chris Matthews' Hardball just minutes ago, all said the smart money is on Sen. Joe Biden. Biden's offical site is here. Here is a rundown of Biden's stances on the issues.
