The American Spectator

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Will Joe Biden Stay on the Ticket?

By David Weigel on 1.8.09 @ 9:00AM

I'm not as convinced as Doug at the disposibility of Joe Biden. First, it's not right to say Biden was "chosen at the one moment when [Obama's] candidacy seemed in danger." Obama picked Biden right before the Democratic convention, when he was leading McCain. The only moment of true danger was that two week period between Sarah Palin's convention speech and the economic meltdown. Indeed, that's when we first started reading silly "Hillary will replace Biden on the ticket" stories.

Second, we always see these sorts of takes in the weeks before a party takes power—remember Tim Noah's much-linked and quite boneheaded "time to dump Pelosi?" article, right after John Murtha lost his majority leader bid (for which all non-redneck Democrats must still be grateful)? When it comes from the Weekly Standard, the magazine that did the most to push McCain to pick the Alaska Albatross as his VP, I shrug. Terzian's arguments are mostly cant—did Colin Powell or Condi Rice "solicit advice" on foreign policy from Dick Cheney? Well, then. Dick Cheney must have been a weak VP!

As to whether Obama will dump Biden in 2012... eh, I read too many "time for Bush to dump Cheney" stories from 2001 to 2004 in order to take that seriously.

I'd give Biden a year or so in the role before I read an assessment like this. For now, I suspect a lot of those Politico-driven "Biden to give up powers" and "Biden won't lobby Senate" stories were false flags. It's just impossible to believe that the fourth most senior senator will twiddle his thumbs and dream of retirement when his party's led in the Senate by a bumbler like Reid.