An Excellent Choice!
If major party presidential nominations went to the most experienced and able candidate, Joe Biden would be the 2008 Democratic nominee. Biden, a senator since 1973 and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, might then pick a rising newcomer from Illinois named Barack Obama to be his running-mate.
But in the real world, presidential nominations go to candidates with an undefinable asset known as charisma: a combination of appearance, intelligence, and rhetorical skills that make people like and trust them. John F Kennedy, Robert F Kennedy and Ronald Reagan had it, Obama has it now, and Joe Biden never had it and never will.
Non-charismatic candidates do get slated for Vice-president: Hubert Humphrey, Walter Mondale, Richard Nixon, George H W Bush and Al Gore are all examples of men who won a presidential nomination after soldiering 4 or 8 eight years as a loyal vice-president. Nixon and senior Bush went on to become President. Harry Truman, Lyndon Johnson and Gerald Ford all inherited the presidency and then were nominated for full terms; I doubt that any of them could have won a presidential nomination any other way.
By choosing the more senior and experienced fellow senator as his running-mate , Obama has followed the example of Senator John F Kennedy, who offered the second spot to Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson of Texas. The ticket carried Texas and narrowly won the presidency. However, when Michael Dukakis picked Senator Lloyd Benson for Veep in 1988 the Texas gambit failed; the Dukakis-Bentsen ticket lost the Lone Star state to Texan-by-choice Vice President George Bush. Apparently Bentsen was no Lyndon B Johnson.
Republicans are already crowing that Biden derided Obama as "not ready to lead" during the Iowa Caucus campaign. Most voters realize that nowadays nearly all contested elections include a certain modicum of negative campaigning (alias "mud-slinging"), so that whenever a defeated primary candidate is slated for VP, the opposite party can find some quote like this. Lyndon Johnson said the same thing about John Kennedy before the 1960 Democratic Convention. And who can forget "voodoo economics?" (1)
If Barack Obama is a political rocket, zooming from Illinois state senator to presidential nominee in a mere four years, Biden is the stabilizer, the gizmo that keeps the projectile on a steady course. Unlike LBJ, Biden does not represent a crucial big state. But to older, working-class voters in the major battle-ground states of Ohio, Michigan and Pennsylvania, Joe Biden is a living reminder that this is still "your father's Democratic Party."
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(1) Bush sr used this phrase to describe Ronald Reagan's proposed tax-cuts. He denied the quote, but videotapes prove he said it.
But in the real world, presidential nominations go to candidates with an undefinable asset known as charisma: a combination of appearance, intelligence, and rhetorical skills that make people like and trust them. John F Kennedy, Robert F Kennedy and Ronald Reagan had it, Obama has it now, and Joe Biden never had it and never will.
Non-charismatic candidates do get slated for Vice-president: Hubert Humphrey, Walter Mondale, Richard Nixon, George H W Bush and Al Gore are all examples of men who won a presidential nomination after soldiering 4 or 8 eight years as a loyal vice-president. Nixon and senior Bush went on to become President. Harry Truman, Lyndon Johnson and Gerald Ford all inherited the presidency and then were nominated for full terms; I doubt that any of them could have won a presidential nomination any other way.
By choosing the more senior and experienced fellow senator as his running-mate , Obama has followed the example of Senator John F Kennedy, who offered the second spot to Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson of Texas. The ticket carried Texas and narrowly won the presidency. However, when Michael Dukakis picked Senator Lloyd Benson for Veep in 1988 the Texas gambit failed; the Dukakis-Bentsen ticket lost the Lone Star state to Texan-by-choice Vice President George Bush. Apparently Bentsen was no Lyndon B Johnson.
Republicans are already crowing that Biden derided Obama as "not ready to lead" during the Iowa Caucus campaign. Most voters realize that nowadays nearly all contested elections include a certain modicum of negative campaigning (alias "mud-slinging"), so that whenever a defeated primary candidate is slated for VP, the opposite party can find some quote like this. Lyndon Johnson said the same thing about John Kennedy before the 1960 Democratic Convention. And who can forget "voodoo economics?" (1)
If Barack Obama is a political rocket, zooming from Illinois state senator to presidential nominee in a mere four years, Biden is the stabilizer, the gizmo that keeps the projectile on a steady course. Unlike LBJ, Biden does not represent a crucial big state. But to older, working-class voters in the major battle-ground states of Ohio, Michigan and Pennsylvania, Joe Biden is a living reminder that this is still "your father's Democratic Party."
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(1) Bush sr used this phrase to describe Ronald Reagan's proposed tax-cuts. He denied the quote, but videotapes prove he said it.
posted by Gerald S Glazer at 11:42 AM
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