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There's something uncanny about the similarity between Biden's folksy tone in all these anti-busing comments and the way he speaks today.
What comes across in the Biden quotes on busing in the WaPo story is how emphatic they are, how energetic his opposition to racial integration is. This isn't pro forma stuff. He's leaning into it.
Biden's gift for folksiness is his greatest asset as a public speaker—his greatest asset as a candidate. What these quotes show is him putting those gifts to use in the service of a white racist worldview.
Biden's public image benefited hugely from his reinvention as Obama's sidekick—the fact that everything he did was in service to Obama's presidency. His role was vice president as hype man, and he played it beautifully.
But when Batman goes away, it's not obvious that Robin is the person to step into his shoes.
And as my kid said yesterday, that problem is compounded once you start thinking about the role that Robin played in the Anita Hill hearings.
Biden could have ridden the sidekick schtick straight through to the election in 2016, particularly if he'd had a clear field in the primaries. But 2020 is likely to be a very different thing, and I wonder how well he understands that.
Eek. One thing I just noticed about the "my white child" quote—it wasn't just rhetorical. Biden's sons were five and six years old when he said this.
