Last night on CNBC’s “Kudlow Report,” I argued that, while perhaps not likely, replacing Joe Biden with Hillary Clinton on the presidential ticket is not an absurd notion.
Adding Hillary, I argued, would make this election (like the 2008 one) historic. What I did not argue — what I do not believe — is that Biden should be ousted as the running mate because he is gaffe prone.
In fact, I tend to believe that (whether by design or by coincidence) this ironically helps Obama. As William McGurn notes at the Wall Street Journal, “[C]asting Mr. Biden as the fool who is weighing the ticket down helps the president escape accountability for his own agenda.”
Sometimes playing dumb can be brilliant.
And if McGurn’s headline — “The Dumbing Down of Joe Biden” — is any indication, it might be part of the master plan for Biden to increasingly occupy the role of Obama’s absent-minded grandfather.
We’ve seen this show before, of course. In fact, it’s become a standard sitcom trope. Some characters get more loveable as they become increasingly dumber. This is all a way of saying that Joe Biden has essentially become Homer Simpson.