Biden's the One

During the night, it was confirmed by media outlets that Delaware Sen. Joe Biden is Barack Obama's choice to be his running mate.

It appears to me that the response to Obama's choice is decidedly mixed.

In the New Republic, Jonathan Cohn says the selection of Biden is a "great pick." John Nichols writes, in The Nation, that Biden was the "necessary choice."

Ron Fournier of the Associated Press contends that "Obama sought to shore up his weakness — inexperience in office and on foreign policy — rather than underscore his strength as a new-generation candidate defying political conventions."

Fournier makes another interesting observation: "Hillary Rodham Clinton didn't even make his short list."

That may be the clearest indicator of all that this decision was made with no apparent consideration given to the effect it might have on the electorate in November.

In fact, it almost seems to have been made based on the assumption that Obama will win the general election, no matter who the running mate is.

Although polls are virtually meaningless at this stage of the general election campaign, the most recent survey I've seen of Clinton's supporters suggests that barely more than half of them have embraced Obama's candidacy nearly three months after Clinton's concession.

The rest are supporting John McCain or have decided to sit it out if they can't find an alternative that is acceptable to them.

That tends to reflect my own observations among the Clinton supporters I know. One of my female friends who supported Clinton in the primaries e-mailed me this week — "I try and try to like Obama and I had pretty much decided to vote for him after getting sick watching McCain pander at Saddleback," she wrote. "But, then Obama didn’t impress me, either, and he just never has. I just don’t have a good choice."

I don't know if the selection of Biden has changed her view — or the views of any of the other disgruntled Clinton supporters. I do know that she and many other Clinton supporters wanted to see Clinton on the ticket. If they aren't pleased with this choice, what will they do in November?

After all, if half of Clinton's supporters choose to vote for McCain or Ralph Nader or someone else — or do not participate at all — that's about 9 million Democrats — and that's a pretty substantial bloc of votes to have to make up.

But there certainly are drawbacks with this nominee, as there inevitably are. In Biden's case, it may be his mouth — which has gotten him into trouble before.

Jim Geraghty writes, in National Review, that "[t]he fun thing about an Obama-Biden ticket is that the McCain campaign can point to a new awkward comment by Joe Biden ... that contradicts the stands and qualities of the Democratic nominee for every day from now until Election Day."

As Massimo Calabresi observes for TIME magazine, Biden was guilty of a "classic Biden gaffe" regarding Obama when Biden announced his bid for the presidency in February 2007.

"[Y]ou got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy," Biden said — apparently, as Calabresi mentioned, "oblivious to his implied slur of previous African-American politicians," like Jesse Jackson (who made two runs for the Democratic nomination in the 1980s) and Colin Powell (who, after much speculation, decided not to seek the 1996 Republican nomination).

Not to mention Shirley Chisholm, who was certainly no "guy" but who was the first black to campaign for the nomination in 1972. She didn't receive many votes (about 5% of the delegates), but she does hold that historic distinction.

Biden clearly was not chosen because he can deliver a traditionally Republican state in November — as the selection of Evan Bayh of Indiana or Tim Kaine of Virginia would have been interpreted in many circles. And it never seemed to me that it would be a sure thing that Bayh or Kaine could bring in either state — with those states' long histories of supporting Republican tickets. At best, I felt picking Bayh or Kaine would be a longshot gamble — and one that was transparent at that.

Delaware's population is larger than only five other states. It has only 3 electoral votes, which have gone for the Democrats in the last four presidential elections.

But Delaware never seems to support any candidate by a wide margin, and the last two elections have represented a reversal of form. From 1952 to 1996, Delaware voted for the winning candidate in every presidential election (Dwight Eisenhower in 1952 and 1956, John Kennedy in 1960, Lyndon Johnson in 1964, Richard Nixon in 1968 and 1972, Jimmy Carter in 1976, Ronald Reagan in 1980 and 1984, George H.W. Bush in 1988 and Clinton twice in the 1990s).

And, with the exceptions of 1916, 1932 and 1948, the state was on the winning side in the remaining presidential elections going back to 1900. In short, it was a pretty reliable bellwether state through most of the 20th century.

"Obama picked [Biden] for the simplest of reasons," Calabresi writes. "The six-term Senator from Delaware is strongest in areas where the freshman from Illinois is weakest. Biden's tenure in the Senate, his foreign policy expertise, his religion, and his suburban middle-class background, all fill gaps in Obama's own presidential profile."

Prior to disclosing his choice, Obama said he wanted a running mate who would challenge him in office, not necessarily a "yes man."

I suppose one can bring different interpretations to that requirement. Certainly, Biden never has been the sort who would shrink from a fight. (And that could be a welcome change for some Democrats, who were disappointed in the performances of first Joe Lieberman and then John Edwards in their debates with Dick Cheney in 2000 and 2004. And many were also disappointed in Al Gore's debate performances against Dan Quayle and Jack Kemp, even though the Democrats won both of those elections.)

But this morning I've been looking through the 2008 edition of The Almanac of American Politics, and the Senate voting records for Obama and Biden are identical. Their main point of disagreement appears to be on an issue that came before the Senate while Obama was still in the Illinois state legislature — Biden joined many other Democrats, including some former rivals for the nomination, in authorizing George W. Bush to go to war in Iraq.

The National Journal rates both candidates as liberals on economic, social and foreign issues — Biden's rating is more liberal than Obama's on social issues, Obama's rating is more liberal on economic issues, and the two men have the same rating on foreign issues.

And I still wonder how Biden, with 36 years in the Senate (making him fourth in Senate seniority among Democrats), fits in with Obama's message of "change" — which, as I mentioned before, has been interpreted by many of his supporters as being a break from the political establishment.

How does the selection of a man who was first elected to the Senate in the same year as the Watergate break-in and Nixon's 49-state landslide fit in to that message?

Personally, I've felt that both parties' presumptive presidential nominees needed someone with experience as a governor on their tickets — since both Obama and McCain lack executive experience.

Obama chose a colleague from the Senate. Will McCain do likewise?