Thread by @frodofied

This has become a thing so let me address this in more detail.

First of all, I am sincerely fond of Joe Biden. He has had an amazing career of public service and he was an exceptional Robin to Obama's Batman.

But...

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https://twitter.com/santanica1/status/1076100708150247424

Joe Biden's political viability provides a near perfect real world contrast to @HillaryClinton.

And it provides a glimpse into the depths of hypocrisy and sexism that permeated the 2016 election from the primary straight through the general.

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Biden's legislative record/personal history are far more centrist than Clinton's, though you'd never guess that if you listen to the types of questions he's asked or the ways he is criticized.

Biden's harshest critics are ofte.n more respectful than Clinton's kindest.

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Note: Apologies for time lapse. I had a personal emergency present itself this morning while writing this thread. I will continue presently.

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In fact, many of lthe legislative votes that Clinton is most criticized or held to be almost singularly responsible for, including the Iraq war, Biden also supported. Most galling of all, however, is the 1994 Crime Bill. Biden was its architect, writer, & Democratic sponsor.

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Clinton, of course, was not even in the Senate at the time the Crime Bill was introduced, and being the First Lady at the time, had limited influence over its content or passage.

Yet, most do not know, or at least do not acknowledge, Biden's central role.

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While the Crime Bill's passage was discussed in a pointed but limited way in 2008, in 2015, Russia's troll army spoon fed the idea to progressive activists that responsibility for the bill rested with Hillary Clinton.

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They also turned one line, from one speech Clinton gave in support of the bill, into evidence that Clinton was a vociferous, opportunistic racist. Of course, the line was isolated away from the context and body of the text and never said what they claimed it had.

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While I am not suggesting that Biden be held responsible for the actions of Clinton's critics, I am suggesting that these facts and incidents open up new wounds and raise other troubling questions that make it impossible for me to support him in 2020.

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For me, one of the most troubling issues it raises goes to the heart of my most serious criticism of Biden, and the one that makes it truly impossible for me to support him.

Joe Biden believed himself to be the heir apparent to Barack Obama.

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He completely ignored the fact that he had a pretty shitty track record for running for President, and refused to acknowledge that Clinton, having not exactly lost to Obama in 2008, was actually the more obvious person to assume that role.

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Biden also greatly underestimated the strength of the bond Obama had forged with Clinton. And it was a unique bond. When good people fight good people for the same prize, they often do not see their opponent as the enemy, but merely a co-competitor.

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This allows them a personal distance, even during the actual battle, to credit their opponent when it's due and to allow for a new and emergent, if grudging, respect to take root. This is what happened between Clinton and Obama in 2008.

Biden should have understood this.

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Because, no one who understands politics or who was paying attention at all to the state of the world in world in 2008, could have possibly thought Obama had given Biden precedence over Clinton by making him VP.

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No, in 2008 the two most important people in DC were always going to be the President and the person they chose to be their Secretary of State.

And for that role he chose Clinton.

Had Biden been paying attention he would've seen the further writing on the wall.

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Because, again, anyone paying attention would have noticed that from 2011 onwards Obama was making it increasingly clear that if 2012 went his way whom he thought should attempt to succeed him.

And that was not Joe Biden.

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Which is why the whisperings of Biden being blindsided by Obama's behind the scenes nod toward Clinton is also galling.

At the very least Obama's preference was publicly obvious as Clinton was preparing to leave Foggy Bottom.

Behind the scenes Joe went full on drama queen.

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And this is where Joe Biden lost me forever. Like Sanders, Biden let his ego get the better of him. After everything that happened in 2015/16 and since, it's hard to remember the many times Biden tried to knee cap Clinton both on her way to the nomination and after.

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But his words and deeds were hard to misinterpret. As the primary for the Democratic nomination began in earnest Biden began to suggest to anyone who'd listen that he was the stronger candidate and better choice.

It was belief he held to strongly and never gave up.

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Joe Biden could have run for President in 2016, but he did not. His decision not to run was made, he said, in response to the death of his beloved son in May 2015, but this seems like an unconvincing excuse given Biden's late decision in October and his actions thereafer.

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It is easy to claim you would have won a contest someone else lost when you chose not to play.

Joe Biden did not run for President because he knew he would have lost the nomination to Hillary Clinton.

Obama knew this too and counseled Biden as much.

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Biden's growing resentment of Clinton was barely contained after Oct 2015. And, behind the scenes, he became "that dude." You know, the one who stands at the sidelines constantly muttering to others ,'privately' that he should've made a different decision.

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From the Office of the Vice Prssident flowed a steady stream of unnamed source quotes that spoke to the Vice President's "worries" that Clinton was not upto the challenge or that she would be overrun by her "many scandals."

This was an intentional effort to weaken Clinton.

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It got worse.

In the late fall of 2015 Biden helped to bolster Bernie Sanders by playing into the fiction that Sanders had a good chance to beat Clinton.

That was never true. And Biden knew it.

I repeat, there was never a point in the primary where Sanders had a chance.

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Biden went so far in his efforts to bring Clinton to heel that he actually backed away from his Oct 21st announcement that he would not run for President.

His criticisms of Clinton and her campaign became Increasingly pointed and public.

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But they paled in comparison to what he was saying privately. It was Clinton who had, in fact, felt blindsided, and rightly, because she was.

She had believed that Biden was her friend. But she had also fully expected to run against him for the Democratic nomination.

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She was prepared for a tough fight, she could have handled that fight. But Biden's passive / aggressiveness felt like a betrayal.

And it was.

Publicly Clinton tried her best not to let her annoyance shine through, but Biden was making things more and more difficult.

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Every single thing Biden did played into the notion that Clinton was a weak candidate, and in doing so, he helped to actually weaken her.

By Christmas Biden was playing the selfless martyr role to it's fullest effect. It was exhausting to watch.

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Though, he said, he had made the "tough decision" not to run for President for his family's sake, he was not willing to sit back and watch his beloved party be destroyed by Sanders and Clinton.

Hillary Clinton was not cutting it and Joe Biden was willing to save the day.

28/

But Biden was just further exposing the darker side of Joe.

In Nov 2015 it had been revealed that it was Biden himself who was the source for Maureen Dowd's melodramatic piece for the New York Times that claimed that before his death Bo Biden had "begged" his dad to run.

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Bo, the almost certainly, fictional account claimed, had begged Joe not to let the Clinton's back in the White House. His son, Biden told Dowd,
had made him promise to save the country from Hillary.

I repeat, it was Joe himself who went to Dowd with the story.

30/

The story was planted at the beginning of August, actually August 1st if I recall. The timing was intentional and reveals Joe Biden to be a far more conniving political operative than he is ever credited with.

It's purpose and effect were chilling.

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It coincided, again, not coincidentally, with Sanders campaigns emerging narrative that Clinton was a corrupt force who must be stopped at all costs. Biden was giving Sanders the thumbs up.

"Go get her," he was telling him.

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I don't believe that this conversation ever took place. Despite his reputation as being an "honest Joe" Biden had more than once been caught in lies or exaggerations and then there were the infamous plagerism incidents.

In August Joe Biden was planning to run for President.

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He believed this story would help to hammer the final nail in what he believed was Clinton's emerging political coffin.

Like every man who to takes on Hillary Clinton, however, Joe Biden greatly underestimated both the woman and the strength of her support base.

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It wasn't until January, when it would have been too late to get on the ballot in many primary states, that Biden was forced to admit he would not run citing an inability to compete with fundraising.

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Unlike the Obama's, after Clinton secured the nomination Joe and Jill Biden never became Clinton cheerleaders. In fact, their efforts were only marginally more effective and sincere than Sanders' efforts, and they were hardly on trail that often.

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For their part the Clinton campaign utilized Biden where they thought he would serve them best. He was sent into the Rust Belt and Midwest to help shore up support among the white working class.

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An irony given that after the election Biden joined Sanders in his false critique that Clinton had somehow forgotten the white working class and poor.

To date I can recall no moment where Biden has said anything positive about Clinton's 2016 campaign.

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Joe Biden could have been a real asset to the Clinton campaign at several key points in 2015/16. He could have helped swing the narrative and he knew it, but he chose instead to work against Clinton, and in the most cowardly way imaginable: behind her back .

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He could have stepped up and cried foul where Clinton couldn't. He could have asked why people were blaming Hillary Clinton for a Crime Bill he had written, Sanders had voted for, and her husband has signed.

Think about it...

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He could've started a real conversation about the double standards Clinton faced as a woman.

He might've said, "Hey guys, Clinton was not the only person who voted yes on the pivotal Iraq war vote."

This would've helped substantially. It would have defanged the attacks.

41/

So why will I not support Biden?

Anita Hill
Plagiarism
Gaffe Central
Age

What he did to Hillary Clinton in 2016.

I think that is enough.

/ end