Biden: ‘I Wish to Hell I’d Just Kept Saying the Exact Same Thing’ - Polidicks

[QUOTE][IMG]https://static01.nyt.com/images/2017/01/22/magazine/22biden1/22biden1-superJumbo-v3.jpg[/IMG] Joe Biden’s personal compartment on the modified Boeing 757 that serves as Air Force Two had the feel of a motel manager’s office equipped with state-of-the-art communications gear. The room held a little black couch with a pullout bed he had slept on more times than he could count over the last eight years, during which he logged more than a million miles aloft. We were en route back to Wilmington, Del., from Cartagena, Colombia, in early December, and Biden was sitting in a black leather seat with a binder in his lap. It contained the speech he had given at the Democratic National Convention in July. He told me he had been rereading it. He began reciting aloud: “If you live in neighborhoods like the one Jill and I grew up in, if you worry about your job and getting decent pay. ...” His voice accelerated. “If you worry about your children’s education, if you’re taking care of an elderly parent, there’s only one person in this race who. ...” He looked up at me and sighed. “I wish to hell I’d just kept saying the exact same thing.” Biden was afflicted with regret. He was sorry that, on the campaign trail, he had spoken so often about Donald Trump’s unfitness for office and not enough about what Hillary Clinton would do for the middle class. He was sorry he didn’t push harder inside the White House for a middle-class tax cut. [B]And he was still torn over his decision not to run for president, a race that he said would have been “brutal” but that he also believed he could have won.[/B][/QUOTE] [QUOTE]Biden’s biggest worry is that Trump, for all his bluster, could be a global bystander, unwilling to engage a messy world with anything more than chest-thumping. “The question I get everywhere is: ‘Is American leadership going to continue?’ ” he told me on Air Force Two. If Trump “just stays behind the lines — hands off — it could be very ugly. Very, very ugly.” [B]In July, the president of Latvia asked Biden to fly there as soon as possible and give a televised speech assuring the Baltic states that the United States would fulfill its NATO obligations and defend them against a Russian invasion. He did so, emphatically, but his promises offer little comfort post-Election Day.[/B] The prospect of Vladimir Putin fulfilling his dream of re-establishing Russian hegemony over Eastern Europe is not far from Biden’s mind. “Now if we walk away — Hungary, Poland, even the Baltic states, these guys all start to hedge their bets,” he said. Biden’s national security adviser, Colin Kahl, who was with the vice president on the plane, interjected to outline the contradictions in Trump’s emerging foreign policy. [B]If the United States is going to be more cooperative with Russia and Bashar al-Assad’s Syria but more confrontational with Iran, Kahl asked, how will Trump handle them joining together to fight ISIS? [/B]“It’s like a Rubik’s cube trying to figure this guy out,” Biden sighed. “We have no freakin’ idea what he’s gonna do.”[/QUOTE] [QUOTE]The big question now is when, and how, they will re-enter the arena. Obama has already said that, unlike George W. Bush, he won’t refrain from commenting on his successor. Biden may go further. Amid discussion of resistance to Trump, he surprised me with talk of 2020, when he’ll turn 78. “I’ll run,” the vice president deadpanned, “if I can walk.” [B]Three days later, he informed the Washington press corps that he wasn’t joking.[/B][/QUOTE] [QUOTE]Before the election, Biden had begun to map out what his post-vice-presidential plans would look like. Soon he would be back on Amtrak, riding to and from a foreign-policy institute bearing his name at the University of Pennsylvania and a domestic-policy center at the University of Delaware, and continuing the “cancer moonshot” — a Biden-led initiative marshaling resources in government and the private sector to accelerate cancer research. In the meantime, he’ll help play defense against Trump. “Even if the Democratic Party didn’t want me, I’m not walking away,” he said. “I’ve worked on this stuff my whole life.” After Air Force Two touched down on the tarmac in Wilmington, I asked him about a line he liked to use before the election. “So do you still believe what your grandfather said, that God looks out for drunken Irishmen and the United States of America?” Biden said he wasn’t sure about the Irishmen, but he was about the country. [B]“I have to believe that,” he said. “There’s no sense being in this business unless you’re an optimist.”[/B][/QUOTE] [URL="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/17/magazine/joe-biden-i-wish-to-hell-id-just-kept-saying-the-exact-same-thing.html?hp"]https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/17/magazine/joe-biden-i-wish-to-hell-id-just-kept-saying-the-exact-same-thing.html?hp[/URL]

We need you uncle Joe. Please come back

[QUOTE=ZakkShock;51685629]We need you uncle Joe. Please come back[/QUOTE] Depends whether he'd buck the establishment Dems or be a pretty liberal like Obama

[QUOTE=Joe Biden]“So do you still believe what your grandfather said, that God looks out for drunken Irishmen and the United States of America?” Biden said he wasn’t sure about the Irishmen, but he was about the country.[/QUOTE] As an oft drunk Irishman, I can confirm the big man upstairs is a friend.:pudge:

It saddens me to think there's a possible timeline where this guy's the president instead of the living embodiment of Cheetos and Bullshit that we're getting on Friday.

If there is any good to come out of this election I hope it's an internal re-evaluation and reflection on the DNC and the left in the US and how they can better themselves in the eyes of the american people. The Democrats definitely have some work to do if they want to take seats in 2 years and perhaps even the presidency in 2020. Hopefully Biden's remarks spur more introspection from other major party members.

I'd vote for Joe Biden without even hearing what he planned to do while in office.

[QUOTE=Kylel999;51685677]I'd vote for Joe Biden without even hearing what he planned to do while in office.[/QUOTE] Sounds familiar...

As much as I like Joe's character, this election was establishment vs anti-establishment. He would've lost.

[QUOTE=Llamaguy;51685769]As much as I like Joe's character, this election was establishment vs anti-establishment. He would've lost.[/QUOTE] Ehhh Clinton lost very narrowly. I would not be so certain.

[QUOTE=Llamaguy;51685769]As much as I like Joe's character, this election was establishment vs anti-establishment. He would've lost.[/QUOTE] Hillary almost won despite a horribly mismanaged campaign and a mountain of dirt.

[QUOTE=Goberfish;51685643]Depends whether he'd buck the establishment Dems or be a pretty liberal like Obama[/QUOTE] people shit on the DNC for good reason, but imo establishment/anti-establishment isn't nearly as important as [I]whether the Democrats actually control more than one office at a time.[/I] i reckon any progressive, likable, energetic Democrat can win in 2020 regardless of where they come from - it's just a question of if the rest of the government will cooperate once they do. [editline]17th January[/editline] the point is, establishment Dems let the working class down by focusing exclusively on the presidency, not by lying outright - abusing their trust by making promises a lone president could never keep. they can win that trust back with a solid 50-state approach, expanding operations into every level of government, and a likable candidate pushing for the basic first-world amenities the working class are asking for. i don't think establishment/anti-establishment comes into that.

Definitely would have preferred him as the dem. Candidate than Hillary, for sure.

[QUOTE=Llamaguy;51685769]As much as I like Joe's character, this election was establishment vs anti-establishment. He would've lost.[/QUOTE] he didn't have half the shit hillary had on her and he definitely wasn't as hated by as many conservatives and liberals as hillary was. many democrats simply refused to vote for hillary and that cost her the election it's been months since the election and people still don't understand why she lost for some reason [url]http://www.forbes.com/sites/omribenshahar/2016/11/17/the-non-voters-who-decided-the-election-trump-won-because-of-lower-democratic-turnout/#ae7eef540a11[/url] hillary's campaign was AWFUL and she still won the popular vote. biden would have won [editline]17th January 2017[/editline] the only problem for him would have been trying to make it past the nominations because all the dems were told to step down to make way for the queen

I think the sheer fact Biden isn't a woman would probably be a plus in his favor.

Biden isn't THAT woman

[QUOTE=Lambeth;51686464]I think the sheer fact Biden isn't a woman would probably be a plus in his favor.[/QUOTE] In the long list of things that Hilary had going against her being a woman is relatively low.

Biden could've made for the best president to take over after Obama, really wishing I lived in the timeline where Joe is our president elect right now

[QUOTE=Llamaguy;51685769]As much as I like Joe's character, this election was establishment vs anti-establishment. He would've lost.[/QUOTE] Hillary was essentially a conniving corporate secretive politician. She was just a downright bad candidate who happened to have good qualifications. What dirt do people have on Biden? He's establishment, sure, but the only real thing that's going against him is that he was part of the Obama administration. He's a lot more charismatic and passionate than Hillary, and he doesn't put up with bullshit. The man has a great personality and he basically comes across as that one cool uncle that would always buy you beer. He's lovable. Compare that to Hillary who's more like a passive-aggressive soccer mom who spends her weekends reading People magazine. She didn't really have a lot of personality, and I won't even get into the campaign she was running. It still would have been close, I don't doubt that, but Biden stood a much better chance of winning. His biggest quality is that he's likable. And that's a quality that Hillary just doesn't have.

if only biden was about 10 years younger, then he'd have no reason [I]not[/I] to run

[QUOTE] And he was still torn over his decision not to run for president, a race that he said would have been “brutal” but that he also believed he could have won.[/QUOTE] Oh that would've been killer. Considering for a second that HRC didn't have the power to rig the primaries against him, Biden would've been a clear win. Trump got the rust belt and hard-working middle-class-America vote on false promises, but Hillary made people worried and indecisive enough that they went for third parties or just didn't fucking show up for the shitshow. Plenty of Obama supporters had their doubts about Hillary, and true or not, her closed-doors no-comment attitude kept those doubts afloat. Uncle Biden's a familiar face [I]and[/I] a clean slate for your millennials, and an old white guy for your reps and indecisive swing states. He would've won. [IMG]http://farm9.static.flickr.com/8223/8407419409_b376faf9aa.jpg[/IMG]

[QUOTE=Cone;51685808]people shit on the DNC for good reason, but imo establishment/anti-establishment isn't nearly as important as [I]whether the Democrats actually control more than one office at a time.[/I] i reckon any progressive, likable, energetic Democrat can win in 2020 regardless of where they come from - it's just a question of if the rest of the government will cooperate once they do.[/QUOTE] I'm really conflicted about this. I'm instinctively hopeful for the next election, because any candidate would be better than what we had; on the other hand, that requires the DNC to be willing to learn from their mistakes. And after how malicious they've been seeming lately, I'm not sure I can be thrilled about the prospect of them being in charge anymore either. They're not Trump, but they're still the DNC [QUOTE=Kylel999;51685677]I'd vote for Joe Biden without even hearing what he planned to do while in office.[/QUOTE] Don't do this.

[QUOTE=Llamaguy;51685769]As much as I like Joe's character, this election was establishment vs anti-establishment. He would've lost.[/QUOTE] Nah, unlike Hillary people actually like Biden.

I think he'd win but all he'd do is push a Trump further ahead into the future. Policy-wise he's still some more neoliberal bullshit that will allow anxiety to further fester in the people.

[QUOTE=thelurker1234;51688814]I think he'd win but all he'd do is push a Trump further ahead into the future. Policy-wise he's still some more neoliberal bullshit that will allow anxiety to further fester in the people.[/QUOTE] i don't about that though, i mean it's not like people really want much more than better pay, healthcare that won't bankrupt them, more accessible education, stuff like that. they just want to be able to get on with their lives. i don't think that's really outside Biden's grasp provided the rest of the government actually lets him get on with it.

[QUOTE=Llamaguy;51685769]As much as I like Joe's character, this election was establishment vs anti-establishment. He would've lost.[/QUOTE] Anyone but Clinton would have beaten Trump. Anyone who wasn't involved in a scandal throughout the campaign would have had nothing to use to distract the American people from realizing that Trump is very much a proponent of the establishment

[QUOTE=Cone;51688890]i don't about that though, i mean it's not like people really want much more than better pay, healthcare that won't bankrupt them, more accessible education, stuff like that. they just want to be able to get on with their lives. i don't think that's really outside Biden's grasp provided the rest of the government actually lets him get on with it.[/QUOTE] Well that's what I mean, Biden would most likely be another Obama where we get very mild progress in the face of great problems. Most sources IIRC generally place Biden as being slightly more conservative than Obama on economic issues even lol, and he's still most certainly in the pockets of the banking sector and has been for a long time. And in this timeline the DNC also likely stays corrupt as fuck stopping a social democrat from coming in and taking the nomination. So people will turn to the right

Obama should resign 5 minutes before inauguration so joe is the next president and trump the one after to ruin all the numbered trump merchandise