Posted on 10/24/2008 9:23:58 PM PDT by Red Steel
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Joe Biden is no Barack Obama.
He channels many of the same well-tested phrases and platforms. But he doesn't just talk about families struggling to pay bills. He chokes up. And he doesn't just denounce Republicans for carving up America into "real" and "fake" parts. He's a finger-pointing, cheek-bulging ball of fury.
With three dozen years of Senate service behind him, Biden is chanting Obama's mantra of change, and taking potshots.
"John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin -- when they get on stage, I love to watch 'em. They get on and they say, they start, 'Yeah, I'm a maverick.' 'No you're a maverick.' 'We're mavericks.' "
The mocking tone drew laughs at an outdoor rally in downtown Charleston, capital of a state President Bush won easily, twice.
"You can't call yourself a maverick when all you've been the last eight years is a sidekick!" Biden thundered, delivering a punch line borrowed -- with attribution, lest he open himself to allegations of plagiarism -- from a Senate colleague.
Biden is playing the loyal running mate, stumping Friday in West Virginia and in rural Virginia, where Democrats hope to chip away at the GOP enough to break a 44-year losing streak.
Biden rallies are just as big as Obama rallies -- if you just count the folks who stand behind Obama and ignore the thousands of others. The gestures are bigger than Obama's -- more hand-chopping, more emoting.
And more gaffes, though none
popped up Friday -- unless you count the lament about West Virginia's "ecolomic loss."
"I know Halloween is coming, but John McCain as a candidate of change? Whoa. C'mon. John McCain and change -- he needs a costume for that," Biden said.
And don't get him started on Palin's comment about enjoying time in the "pro-America" parts of the country. "We gotta stop this malarkey about who is more American, who is more patriotic!"
"When a thought comes to his mind, it comes out his mouth," said one voter in the crowd, Tom Rippeto, 65.
He may not have Obama's sizzle, Rippeto said, but he's prepared to step in in a crisis. "It's kind of like the Kennedy-Johnson thing."
"He's fantastic," agreed Jacob Newbert, 26, a Charleston resident who recently got his civil engineering degree. He had wavered between Obama and McCain, until they picked running mates.
"There's no comparison," Newbert said. "I expect my politicians to be hypocrites, but Palin is the only one I've heard contradict herself in the same sentence."
Before heading to Virginia, Biden stopped into Ellen's Homemade Ice Cream, which has been selling "Baracky Road" and "Biden Thyme" (pear with thyme). No Palins-n-cream in sight.
Biden had some of his namesake sorbet, then asked for a cone of chocolate chip.
"Don't tell my wife," he said, a treat in each hand.
As cameras rolled, Biden happily answered a softball question about the campaign's chances in West Virginia.
"They feel good," he said. "We've got a great ground game."
Then a reporter asked if he stands by last weekend's prediction that adversaries would test Obama soon after inauguration. The McCain campaign built a TV ad around the comment, which Obama dismissed as a "rhetorical flourish" of the sort to which Biden is prone.
This time, the Delaware senator walked away. He kept his mouth shut, except for the ice cream.
Rimshot Joe really doesn’t have the credibility to mock anyone. The boy is “borderline senile.”
Could this be the reason he didn’t release any brain scans?
Borderline AND senile.
So Obama has taken the tape off Plugs’ mouth?
That’s good for us.
I wonder what his next gaffe will be ...
Stand up Chuck!
Can’t scan something that ain’t there.
LMAO! Grrrrrrrr, getum plugs.
lol
He blinked like crazy. I’ve heard someone speaking about body language before that said when people are lying they blink a lot.
I think he was truly flummoxed as no one has dare ask hard questions of “the One” and “the none”
He needs to. Needs to go out and convert all those rednecks. But not to worry, Murtha says that even though there area lot of "old" rednecks out there, it's getting better all the time. Has gotten better this month, this week even!
Those rednecks must be dying like flys...
Hang in there people. And if you are old and live in West PA, by all means go vote early!
The DNC would be well advised to hide this numbskull Biden in an undisclosed location before he does anymore damage to the Obama campaign. Between Biden and Murtha I think McCain/Palin will do fine on election day.
F-O-O-L is a three-letter word.
“Doh”!
Wouldn’t it be great if the very next interview Biden does poses the same questions Barbara West put to him?
He would think he’d died and went to Hell, where the tables are turned and Democrats are ridiculed and scrutinized by the news media!
He’d be so flummoxed that his chicklet teeth would fall fumbling, and his forehead would de-botox and crinkle up like corrugated cardboard.
“The boy is ‘borderline senile.’”
Oh I think he has crossed that border farther than an illegal in Minnesota.
Spell it out for us Joe!
Why is Biden in West Virginia anyways? Didn’t he piss them all off with that coal mining gaff?
This time, the Delaware senator walked away. He kept his mouth shut, except for the ice cream.
Is it true the Secret Service code name for Biden is Chia Pet?
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