August 21, 2008

Before Obama announces his VP pick, just one question…

…and it’s not for Obama, but for those of his supporters who have been hailing Joe Biden as a fabulous choice.

Many (most?) of you say Bill Clinton’s “fairy tale” remark was racist:

“It is wrong that Senator Obama got to go through 15 debates trumpeting his superior judgment and how he had been against the war. There’s no difference in your voting record, and Hillary’s, ever since. Give me a break. This whole thing is the biggest fairy tale I’ve ever seen.”

How criticizing Obama for attempting to differentiate between his war stance and Hillary’s is supposed to be racist is beyond me, but, whatever. The question is this:

If “fairy tale” is somehow racist, then how do the same Obama supporters who condemned (and continue to condemn) Bill Clinton as a racist now justify wholehearted support for Joe Biden as vice president in light of Biden’s observation about Obama in 2007?

“I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy. I mean, that’s a storybook, man.”

Now that, ladies and gents, is, indisputably, a racist remark.

So why am I hearing how great Joe Biden would be as Obama’s veep? Are the Biden fans too young to remember this (or the absolutely horrifying “You cannot go to a 7/11 or a Dunkin’ Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent — I’m not joking” gaffe of 2006)?

As Jonathan Chait wrote in 2007, “In addition to his uncontrollable verbosity, Biden is a gaffe machine.” But foot-in-mouth disease is no excuse. So, I’d like to know:

How does Joe Biden get a free pass for saying that a black man who is “articulate and bright and clean and … nice-looking” is “a storybook,” while Bill Clinton has been sentenced to eternal damnation for saying Obama’s take on his own record is a “fairy tale”?

Somebody explain it to me, because I really don’t get it.

Posted by: Sapphocrat

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