If today’s polls are any are any judge – and if they could just be consistent – Barack Obama is on his way to being the 44th president of these United States. One of the best possible results of that outcome will be the Delaware senator Joe Biden will be lifted out of relative obscurity and placed in full view of pretty much everybody – not just those of us who watch C-SPAN.
This is not just a jobs program for late night comics desperate to determine how to make fawning over a president look funny – something they have proven incapable of during the election process. It will be a boon to the rest of us in dark times:
“Mark my words,” the Democratic vice presidential nominee warned at the second of his two Seattle fundraisers Sunday. “It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy. The world is looking. We’re about to elect a brilliant 47-year-old senator president of the United States of America. Remember I said it standing here if you don’t remember anything else I said. Watch, we’re gonna have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy…
“And he’s gonna need help. And the kind of help he’s gonna need is, he’s gonna need you – not financially to help him – we’re gonna need you to use your influence, your influence within the community, to stand with him. Because it’s not gonna be apparent initially, it’s not gonna be apparent that we’re right.”
Translation: Everyone bleeding to pass the global test in our international relations may be in for a rude surprise. Because it’s one thing to carp from the sidelines about mistakes made by men in the arena. But it’s an entirely different thing to actually govern. And you prolly ain’t gonna like it.
“There are gonna be a lot of you who want to go, ‘Whoa, wait a minute, yo, whoa, whoa, I don’t know about that decision’,” Biden continued. “Because if you think the decision is sound when they’re (sic) made, which I believe you will when they’re made, they’re not likely to be as popular as they are sound (uh, what?). Because if they’re popular, they’re probably not sound.”
Although he’s waterboarding the English lanugage here, the best meaning I can suss out is that he’s not telling people that Obama will make mistakes – he’s telling them that Obama will deliberately make the kinds of choices they have explicitly selected him to undo. Unca Joe is practically promising his peeps that a vote for Obama means 1) a perceived opportunity for bad actors scared witless over the last eight years by Texans unafraid of breaking the crockery, and in response, he’s going to promise, 2) four more years of George W. Bush.
And by the way, when he’s not making W. look like a model of linguistic clarity, he’s also reminding everybody how much higher his IQ is by throwing in classical references to “cleaning the Augean stables.” “Literally.”
This guy is going to be gold.
Two more weeks.
I think Joe had better learn all he can about being president.
I think we should wonder who the next VP will be if Biden’s health doesn’t cut it. Everyone keeps talking about “What if McCain dies in office?”
Really?
What if Biden does? Does it matter? It could… thinking along the lines of Bill C’s comment…
[...] Neptunus Lex He’s not telling people that Obama will make mistakes – he’s telling them that Obama will deliberately make the kinds of choices they have elected him to undo. Unca Joe is practically promising his peeps that a vote for Obama means 1) a perceived opportunity for bad actors scared witless over the last eight years by Texans unafraid of breaking the crockery, and in response, he’s going to promise, 2) four more years of George W. Bush. [...]
Forget the stables reference…how many vp candidates tell you to “gird your loins” in a campaign speech? He’s defintely got a way with words.
Four years of looking at his pathetic implants? Oh, the humanity…It’s enough to make one serve with ACORN.
Lex and friends … I don’t have to remind you that if Obama is mysteriously offed in some way, and Biden becomes President and can’t stay the course, for one reason or another, next in line for the President’s Chair at the White House is the egregious and unbearable Nancy Pelosi [she who thinks natural gas is not a fossil fuel, and other fascinating misconceptions]. Contemplate that awful situation for awhile.
Marianne
The nausea inducing possibilities above make one inclined to start a four year alcoholism experiment early.
I am firmly convineced that Biden was selected for the Veep slot ONLY because he was someone who would make Obama look qualified.
The mere thought of Biden as President, under ANY circumstances is the worst kind of Halloween scare imaginable.
At this dismal point, even the thought of Hillary as President sounds almost tolerable.
Then someone mentions Pelosi as number three in line.
Must. Find. Glass. No, forget glass…straight from bottle!
What I find to be a complete hoot is that after this global crisis occurs we are expected to “stand with him” even if we “…want to go, ‘Whoa, wait a minute, yo, whoa, whoa, I don’t know about that decision’,”. You have to agree with Obama’s decisions in this crisis “Because if they’re popular, they’re probably not sound.”
Amazing. I guess the rule is you can only disagree with Republican presidents.
George V.
his command of the language makes the Gordian knot look like a bow tie.
Well then, it is settled. We’ll just vote McCain in and save ourselves from this international generated crisis.
Geez, this politickin is easy.
I agree with Sonarsenior – why elect an administration that the bad guys want to gut-check. Elect one that will smash them where they live. It’s called deterrence.
“If you would have peace, prepare for war.” Wars are precipitated by the weak and cowardly. The when the happen “It’s Tommy to the Front….”
Kipling nailed this lot many years ago. The Neo-con Chickenhawks are just as bad, alas.