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.
