I certainly won’t claim to be the most well-connected blogger on this side of the ‘sphere, but over the last couple of weeks, I’ve chatted with a few DC politicos, all of whom mentioned they’ve been hearing a lot of “VP buzz” about Joe Biden, most notably if Barack Obama is the Democratic nominee.<\/p>\n
This afternoon, I’ve seen the same point being bandied about in several circles. Marc Ambinder got the ball rolling<\/a>, putting Biden among the frontrunners for Obama’s VP slot (along with Daschle, Napolitano, Dodd, Webb, and Hagel). “[Biden’s] hidden asset is his connection with white, working class voters,” Ambinder said. “His obvious asset is his foreign policy experience.”<\/p>\n Yglesias<\/a> seems lukewarm on the idea.<\/p>\n Biden’s a sometimes maddening figure, but he’s been impressive lately and there’s a lot to be said on his behalf. But putting someone who voted for the war, even someone who did so half-heartedly and after making a quasi-promising effort to restrain Bush, seems to muddy way too much of the argument Obama is making.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Kevin<\/a> said Biden seems like a “decent choice,” and disagrees with Yglesias’ Iraq-related objection.<\/p>\n Once [Obama] leaves the cozy confines of a primary where the anti-war base is enough to win, Obama is going to enter the chillier territory of a general election where he’ll need to draw a bunch of votes from the ranks of people who once supported the war. He needs a good way to signal these folks that he doesn’t consider them tainted forever by their erstwhile support, and what better way than by choosing a moderately hawkish senator who once favored the war but has since changed his mind? The opposite tack — insisting that he’ll associate only with the pure of heart who opposed the war from the beginning — would be something of a disaster. People won’t vote for a candidate who tacitly seems to be calling them idiots.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n I tend to think Kevin’s right about this, in part because Obama already has credibility on the issue by virtue of having gotten the big question right. He wouldn’t necessarily need a running mate who agreed with him on Iraq from the start, and would disqualify many qualified people if he did.<\/p>\n That said, I have a few concerns, and at least one big reason I don’t think Biden will be the choice. Nevertheless, I can certainly appreciate Biden’s positives. He’s very smart and one of the most knowledgeable and articulate Democratic voices on foreign affairs in the party. He’s also proven that he knows how to smack Republican candidates around when he has to. (Two of my very favorite moments from ’07 were Biden hitting Giuliani here<\/a> and here<\/a>. Months later, I still love them, and wouldn’t mind seeing similar remarks directed at McCain’s ticket in the fall.)<\/p>\n But the negatives are numerous. First and foremost, Biden led the way on that ridiculous bankruptcy bill, and I’ll probably never forgive him for it. Second, he eschews message discipline, and is well known for sticking his foot in his mouth with embarrassing gaffes. Third, I can’t think of a single state or constituency that Biden would help Obama win in a general election that Obama couldn’t win just as easily with someone else.<\/p>\n
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\nThis is petty and borderline-silly, but the very first thought that popped into my mind was that awful ranking system from the National Journal. If Biden were Obama’s running mate, the RNC and its cohorts will boast that the Democratic ticket featured the #1 and #3 most liberal senators. It’d be ridiculous, but I guarantee it’d be at the top of the talking points.<\/p>\n