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Trump praises Mamdani after White House meeting: "I want him to do a great
job" - CBS News
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1. Trump praises Mamdani after White House meeting: "I want him to do a
great job" CBS News
2. Mamdani’s meeting with Trump comes with a powe...
59 minutes ago
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CHANGE FOR THE BETTER; Through two presidential campaigns and, more importantly, decades in the Senate, Biden accumulated brains around him, many of whom are advising him now. Chief among them is Ron Klain, his former VP chief of staff, and the man who almost -- but not quite -- saved Florida for Al Gore in 1980.
Klain and others have been drilling Biden, who is somewhat resistant to drilling but who loves a good fight that matters.
The chief evidence of that is admittedly old -- his 1987 fight against Robert Bork. Biden was chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee at the time. The key to victory was a brief prepared for him by his staff, which came to be called the "Biden Report." It portrayed the jurist in encyclopedic detail as an ideological extremist whose views rested dangerously outside the mainstream.
It worked.
Democrats would argue that no such heavy lifting is required in Kentucky; just a simple list, clearly stated, of what Romney has said that is untrue and what the president's case really is.
If Biden can't begin making the case, the burden on Obama for the second presidential debate next week in New York will be that much greater.
And if Biden lets loose with one of his famous -- sometimes infamous -- gaffes, that, too will increase the burden on the president and support the GOP talking point that the Romney-Ryan ticket has a better sense of what will and will not work in the future.
Until now, being vice president has, for Biden, been mostly enjoyable, gratifying without requiring much exertion.
He is a key player, but mostly behind the scenes, acting as Obama's go-between with Congress, especially with old Senate buddies. He is respected for his real-world wisdom in a White House staffed with Ivy-blind Rhodes Scholars. At his annual press picnic, he gleefully hunts reporters with a water rifle as they vie for the honor of getting soaked. And in other venues, those same reporters hang on his every word (almost), hoping for a "Joe Moment" -- a gaffe that makes for weird and generally harmless headlines, and that sometimes (as with gay marriage) presages what the president is about to do.
But now, like a leathery ol' cowboy in "The Unforgiven," Biden on Thursday must stride into the sunlight to face a comparative kid.
Biden has to focus on Romney and Ryan. But he has to remember Robert Bork.
For Howard Fineman's full 2012 Countdown, click here.
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