Yes. Seriously.

Up until now, ol’ Joe has been an ugly caterpillar, repulsive and dismaying to all who beheld him. But now he’s gone into his cocoon and will soon emerge as a beautiful butterfly, as Daniel Halper at the Weekly Standard reports:

With just about a month until Election Day, Vice President Joe Biden is in the middle of taking nearly a week off the campaign trail. He will return to doing campaign events on Thursday, when he will debate Rep. Paul Ryan in the vice presidential debate…

For this weekend, the White House provided the following guidance: “The Vice President will be in Wilmington, Delaware. There are no public events scheduled.”

As for the next three days, Biden will remain in Delaware. “On Monday through Wednesday, the Vice President will be in Wilmington, Delaware. There are no public events scheduled.”

Well, that’s no fun. Public events are where Joe says stuff like, “The middle class has been buried the last four years,” and, “Yeah, you bet we’re gonna raise taxes!” Y’know, campaigning. For Romney.

But Joe needs that time to prepare, because the Democrats are really counting on him after Obama’s debate performance… Stop that. This isn’t funny. Stop it!

The NYT on the Obama team’s effort to get “back on track,” which assumes they were ever on it:

Perhaps most important as the president’s team struggles to put his campaign back on track is a renewed effort to win the three remaining debates, starting with Thursday’s face-off between Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Representative Paul D. Ryan. Mr. Biden began traveling to a Delaware hotel on Sunday for three days of debate camp.

Under the tutelage of David Axelrod, the president’s chief strategist who is personally overseeing the preparations, Mr. Biden will be counseled on how to avoid Mr. Obama’s mistakes and even correct them with a more aggressive prosecution of the Republican ticket. Mr. Axelrod’s involvement highlights the stakes the Obama campaign places on the debate, and Mr. Biden has been reading “Young Guns,” the book co-written by Mr. Ryan, and practicing attack lines that Mr. Obama avoided.

Yay, Joe’s gonna say “47%”! Joe’s gonna say “47%”! Take heart, David Gregory. Stay strong, Andrea Mitchell. Joe’s gonna say “47%.” This one’s in the bag.

And The Hill actually has this headline: “Dems hope Biden can blunt Romney momentum post-debate.”

Democratic strategists are eyeing the forthcoming debate between Vice President Biden and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) with a mix of hope and nervousness in the wake of President Obama’s widely panned performance in his leadoff encounter with Mitt Romney Wednesday night.

On the plus side, some Democrats feel that a strong performance from Biden next Thursday could turn the page on the president’s near-debacle in Denver.

But they also worry that Biden’s legendary capacity to state his views in an inartful fashion could backfire.

In other words, he tends to say lots of very stupid things, very loudly. This may present a problem.

Biden does benefit from diminished expectations, of course. All he has to do is avoid drooling on himself too much, keep the racial slurs and open profanity to a minimum, and some people will give him the win no matter what Ryan says.

But first, there’s an even more fundamental step Joe Biden can take that will put him ahead of his boss.

He can show up.

Clint Eastwood was right. But then, you knew that already.