Friday, October 05, 2012

Biden Has Obama's Back

Did Sundance ever bail out on Butch Cassidy? Not on your tintype, the President’s loyal sidekick is ready to draw down on Romney and Paul Ryan to undo some of this week’s debate damage.

On the campaign trail, the VP aims the kind of zingers Obama eschewed in confronting the ever-changeable Romney: “Last night we found out he doesn’t have a $5 trillion tax cut. I guess he outsourced that to China or something.”

Insisting Obama was “presidential” Wednesday night, Biden gets vice-presidential: “We’re going to ask—-yes--we’re going to ask the wealthy to pay more. My heart breaks.

“You know the phrase they always use? Obama and Biden want to raise taxes by $1 trillion. Guess what? Yes we do...We want to let that trillion-dollar tax cut expire, so the middle class doesn’t have to bear the burden of all that money going to the super-wealthy. That’s not a tax raise, that’s called fairness where I come from.”

Biden’s plain talk when he confronts Ryan next week should re-energize Democrats, despite stereotypical fears that the VP can be a loose cannon in a verbal gunfight.

After this week, that Biden may be just what the Obama campaign needs, the one who showed up in a town hall four years ago to mock an on-line questioner cradling a semi-automatic weapon, explaining, “This is my baby.”

“If that’s his baby,” Biden rolled his eyes, “he needs help. I don’t know if he’s mentally qualified to own a gun.”

For the next month, the VP’s comments on what Romney and Ryan are qualified to do will be just as much to the point.

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