Rove: Biden is a "blowhard doofus"

Honestly the most surprising thing about the comment made by Karl Rove at a dinner at the GOP convention was that he didn't curse. Now I know that there are a lot of differing opinions about Karl Rove and his tactics but everyone has to admit, the guy is a genius of winning campaigns. He's the James Carville of the 2000's.

Rove was telling a room full of people that what he thought of Obama's VP pick when he relayed to them the fact that everyone in Washington who is familiar with the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee knows that Joseph Biden (the chair) is verbose and often doesn't know when to stop talking. In Rove's words that makes him a "blowhard doofus".

This comment could be serving one of two purposes - he could have just spoke this off the top of his head to a little table full of die-hard GOPers or he could have been aware that someone was bound to leak this to the press (as any Rove quote seems to do) and would prompt the media to seriously ask the question, "Is Biden really a blowhard doofus?!" Since the Press seems to have replaced with ratings mongerers and people who believe the press's role is primarily to entertain not inform, the quote is makings its rounds on all the 24 hr cable news channels.

Biden loves making his point.. and another.. and another..

But.. is he? and what does that mean? Biden is very, very, very talkative. If there was some sort of superlative for verbose... I'd call him that. (Incidentally, if you know one tell me) I've been to, watched, and listened to quite a few of his Committee hearings and boy.. does he talk. His problem is that he has so much knowledge to share and tends to go on tangents.. so one tangent leads to another, leads to another.. This is where the gaffe-machine comes in. Every once in awhile, he says something that while you can tell it is purely innocent sounds TERRIBLE without context. I don't think anyone really thinks Biden is sexist, racist or a bigot of any kind but sometime the way stuff comes out of his mouth and then get printed... it makes people who are unfamiliar with him wonder.

Does that disqualify him or reduce his ability to be Vice-President? No, not really but it does give some serious heartburn to the Obama press team who have to be ready to put out fires wherever Biden goes. If I remember correctly, the current President wasn't exactly the well-oiled slick nominee that Barack Obama is.. and he managed to win. There is a fundamental difference between a lovable doofus and an incompetent one. The real task comes down to Joe Biden working his hardest to keep himself focused and reduce his talk time. The backup task goes to the Democratic PR people to present Biden as a loveable guy who just has so many good stories he can't stop himself.. a guy that just wants to share.. and share.. and share.

If they can do that they will be able to reduce the effectiveness of the Republicans who will pounce on every misstep or missquote. So far however Obama is looking like a Teflon Nominee and Biden may change that or just cling to the Teflon just as hard as he can!


Links:

Biden reacts to Rove insult - CNN