Joseph Epstein: The Comic Stylings of Joe Biden

The vice president is a three-letter word called fun. Or is it four?

By JOSEPH EPSTEIN

With Democrats wondering whether President Obama should keep Joe Biden as his running mate, and some of them even suggesting Hillary Clinton as his replacement, I'm already beginning to miss the vice president. Mr. Biden, after all, supplies comic relief, a thing always in great need and inevitably in short supply in American politics. He is the only politician in recent years whose every utterance isn't predictable. Joe Biden himself must often be astonished at what comes out of his mouth.
The hair-plugs, the shysterish suits, the wiseguy demeanor, the low-grade lawyerly confidence of utterance, it's a grand show the vice president puts on. The first clue we had of Mr. Biden's quality was the long, lost Anita Hill weekend, back in 1991 during the Clarence Thomas Supreme Court confirmation hearings. As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, he displayed his talent for asking all the wrong, which is to say so many of the embarrassing, questions. It was the way he asked them—with that smirky certainty of his own unproved astuteness—that is signature Joe Biden.

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Associated Press

Vice President Joe Biden

Were the president to take Joe Biden off the ticket, he would put lots of late-night talk show writers out of work, which, with the unemployment rate already long over 8%, would not be a good thing for the economy. Letterman, Leno, Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel and Conan O'Brien practically dine out on Biden material. "I got to admit, as a comedian, I'm gonna miss President Bush," Jay Leno once remarked. "Because Barack Obama is not easy to do jokes about. He doesn't give you a lot to go on. See, this is why God gave us Joe Biden."
Does Joe Biden have any sense that he has devolved into a comic character? It seems unlikely. For a man who smiles a lot, he doesn't appear to have much humor. If he did, he wouldn't, he couldn't, be Joe Biden. The want of introspection, of a just self-estimate, the detachment from reality that 35 years in public office is likely to confer on a man, is what makes him the delightful figure he is.
The more egregious Biden gaffes are recorded online. Their number is manifold. Everyone will have his favorites, ranging from the time he asked wheelchair-bound Missouri State Sen. Chuck Graham "to stand up and let 'em see you" to the unconscious racism of his most recent "They're gonna put y'all back in chains" zinger, Southern accent added at no extra charge. My own favorite happens to be his announcing "the number-one job facing the middle class, and it happens to be, as Barack says, a three-letter word: jobs. J-O-B-S, jobs." He's a fun guy, our vice president.
Of course being a fun guy is not the top of everyone's list of qualifications for being vice president of the United States. A touch more gravitas would seem to be required for the job, but one can't ask for everything, comic relief and gravitas, too. Someone with a deeper knowledge of American history than mine might be able to make a convincing list of the nation's great vice presidents, though my guess is that the list would not be a lengthy one.
The office itself was recently mocked in an HBO sitcom called "Veep," with Julia Louis-Dreyfus in the title role. In the show's final segment, Ms. Louis-Dreyfus is worried that the president is going to fob off the campaign against obesity on her, and as the credits begin to roll she is heard bemoaning the job ahead of having to convince every overweight person in the country to drop that cupcake.
Why would Barack Obama want Joe Biden for his vice president? The two men don't seem particularly close. They share few common interests, and have very different temperaments. Mr. Biden is not likely to bring in votes Obama could not win himself, or be a crucial factor in any of the swing states.
What Mr. Biden does provide is contrast for the president. Alongside Mr. Biden, the president becomes what is known as "a contrast gainer." Next to Mr. Biden, in other words, Mr. Obama looks earnest, serious, deep, a statesman. Not just any politician could provide that service, but the Honorable Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. does so magnificently.
Mr. Epstein's latest book, "Essays in Biography," will be published in October by Axios Press.