Same Old Democrat Politics-as-Usual

By Alan Caruba

The selection of Joe Biden as Barack Obama’s vice presidential running mate ensures that the 2008 election will be the same old politics-as-usual that have gotten us to this point.

Biden, a longtime Senator from Delaware, is a comfortable Democrat choice, having run for the party’s nomination several times and as an established figure in the Senate. Not a whole lot of change here.

Presumably, Biden fills in the gaping hole in Obama’s resume when it comes to foreign affairs. It’s also a sure bet that he has spent more than Obama’s 140-plus days in the Senate chambers when it’s been in session.

In the new Obama era of hope and change, Biden is no bright new face filled with new ideas. Having been on record saying Obama was not experienced enough to be President, he will have to wiggle out of that, grab his cheerleader’s pompoms, and get out on the campaign trail.

Friends who surf the Democrat/liberal websites tell me that they are already seeing signs of “buyer’s remorse” when it comes to the Obama candidacy and, though it may seem early to most people, there is increasing chatter that the 2008 election will be “stolen” by the Republicans ala the charge that followed the Gore campaign and others.

Democrats have a very hard time figuring out that a large chunk of the population just doesn’t care much for their ideas. Therefore the elections have to have been “stolen”, not lost.

One thing’s for sure, with Biden on the Democrat ticket, the issue of John McCain’s age no longer has much traction. These are two old, white-haired, white guys. When we look for wisdom and/or experience, we tend to look for age as some kind of indicator.

What we most certainly can look forward to is a splendidly vicious political campaign filled with nasty television commercials. This is what I call the “fun part” of politics but it clearly is not about policies, proposals for the future, or high-minded calls for brotherhood and national unity.

Frankly, I have grown to enjoy McCain’s plodding style. He is not going to run into any burning buildings. He does not go off half-cocked. He knows himself. He knows what he believes. He is unafraid of the media and appears to have a lot of confidence in the voters.

And Joe Biden once said he’d be happy to share a campaign ticket…with McCain!

In his speech on the steps where the Republican President, Abraham Lincoln, once spoke, Joe Biden sounded the theme of the next nine weeks. The Democrats will run against George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, but neither is running in this race. They will have to run away from the last two years of a Democrat controlled Congress that has accomplished nothing.

Watching the Democrats commit political suicide is one of my favorite pastimes.