 |
|
Nov. 23, 2009
JWisdom.com: Actually, it really is all about you with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff
Nov. 20, 2009
Nov. 19, 2009
Jonathan Tobin: ADL Crosses the Line with Report Bashing Obama Critics
Nov. 18, 2009
JWisdom.com: The (Jewish) Dating Game
with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (8 minutes)
Nov. 17, 2009
Steven Emerson: How Does the 4th Amendment Impact Terror Finance Investigations?
JWisdom.com: If Frank Sinatra married Edith Piaf
with Rabbi Y.Y. Rubinstein (2 minutes) Life lessons from what would be regarded as the most inappropriate lyrics ever sung
Nov. 16, 2009
JWisdom.com: Deconstructing faith
with Rabbi Warren Goldstein (9 minutes)
Nov. 13, 2009
JWisdom.com Sarah's subjective reality
with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 6 minutes)
Nov. 12, 2009
JWisdom.com Does God get tired?
with Rabbi Harvey Belovski ( 5 minutes)
Nov. 11, 2009
JWisdom.com Marriages are not made in Heaven
with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (VERY fast 15 minutes)
Nov. 10, 2009
Michael Doyle: Author of book exposing CAIR ordered to remove supporting documents from Web
JWisdom.com If the creation so loudly shouts the existence of the Creator, why aren't more people believers? with Rabbi Naftali Brawer (9 minutes)
Nov. 9, 2009
Mark Steyn: Shooter exposes hole
in U.S. terror strategy
JWisdom.com It's never too late to
have a happy childhood with Sarah Chana Radcliffe (5 minutes)
Nov. 6, 2009
JWisdom.com Zero to 1/60th: How
to Empower An Hour with Gavriel Aryeh Sande (7 minutes)
Nov. 5, 2009
JWisdom.com Hidden Hints: Unlocking
Faith & Prayer with Rabbi Jay Yaacov Schwartz (10 minutes)
Nov. 4, 2009
JWisdom.com When God played peacemaker
With Rabbi Sroy Levitansky (5 minutes)
Nov. 3, 2009
JWisdom.com Are you are closet idolater?
With Sara Yoheved Rigler (10 minutes)
Nov. 2, 2009
JWisdom.com Abraham's Strange Change
With Rabbi Yitzchok Fingerer (5 minutes)
|
| |
Jewish World Review
August 25, 2008
24 Menachem-Av 5768
New ‘Cheney’ is safe pick as Obama chooses Biden's experience
By
Michael Goodwin
| 
|
|
|
|
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Meet the new Dick Cheney. By picking Joe Biden as his running mate, Barack Obama has taken a page out of George Bush's successful 2000 campaign and named a partner who knows a thing or two about the adult world.
For many Democrats and independents, it will be a reassuring choice, if not an exciting one.
Of course, what with the Darth Vader comparisons, Bush's choice of theonce-respected Dick Cheney has been a disaster. And Biden brings his own baggage, so he's certainly not risk-free.
But polls show Obama is facing serious voter doubts about his youth and inexperience, and he picked the VP candidate on his short list whose experience and gravitas could best address those doubts. All the others, from Hillary Clinton to Evan Bayh of Indiana, would have been overtly designed to deliver a state, a voting bloc or a special interest.
Biden, although he is a Catholic and has a working-class background, offers nogain in clear, measurable ways. Instead, he is schooled in the ways Obama is not - in Washington and in foreign policy. He can also make the "values" case, as he did repeatedly Saturday, that might be more believable to voters who have proved immune to Obama's charm.
Most important, Biden can step into the Oval Office in an emergency.
Still, this is not a marriage made in heaven. As the designated hit man on John McCain, Biden's tendency to be bombastic could surface. He falls in love with his own voice and sometimes doesn't stop until he's made a gaffe.
And despite repeated invocations of "change," Biden's very career undercuts the Obama theme. He has been in the Senate for 35years - since Obama was 11 years old. Not exactly a new face. And Biden voted for the war in Iraq - and was wrong to suggest partitioning that country during the worst of the civil strife there.
Yet viewed through the prism of Obama's strengths and weaknesses, Biden brings old-fashioned balance in every sense to the ticket. At 65, he's an older white male, meaning there is no doubling-down on inexperience, or on a rainbow ticket that Clinton or New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a Hispanic, would have signified.
Biden also shows Obama is worried about the right things, such as the nasty new world order the next President faces. Hopefully, Obama realizes his own Kumbaya instincts are not serving him well.
Russia's invasion and dismembering of Georgia is a prime example. Obama's first statement on the invasion was so even-handed that Sen. Joe Lieberman, a John McCain supporter, correctly called it "morally neutral."
And Biden, as a rival candidate, criticized Obama for saying he would meet without preconditions with Iran and North Korea. It was a foolish pledge that revealed Obama's inexperience.
In the end, a President is the Decider, as Bush so memorably put it. But having a seasoned adviser and a solid backup is a baseline test for a nominee, and Obama passed that test with Biden.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in Washington and the media consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
Michael Goodwin is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for the New York Daily News. Comment by clicking here.
Archives
© 2007 NY Daily News
|
