Uncommon Commentary #24

The agonizing wait has ended: Obama has finished bidin' his time, and selected his running-mate. It’s being said that the Delaware senator was chosen because of his “foreign-policy experience,” which both seems odd and speaks of the distinction being experience and expertise. One month after the suicide missions against the Pentagon and the World Trade Center, Biden, as reported by the New Republic, demonstrated his sagacity in this field by proposing to placate the Arab world with a $200,000,000 gift to Iran (which is not an Arab country). Anyway, Biden is campaigning not for the office of president but for that of vice-president, which confers no authority over foreign affairs.

Whatever the reason for the choice, it came as a surprise to me. I expected the Future-Answer-to-a-Trivia-Question's pick to be someone like the "Mini-Me" in those Austin Powers films: a small replica of himself, who would distract no attention from him and thus not threaten his evidently colossal ego.