Joe Biden is not the antidote to Hillary Clinton

The vice president's ascendancy in the 2016 race is mostly a media fabrication

Joe Biden
(Image credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

From the way the political press is acting, you'd think that millions of Americans, or millions of Democrats anyway, were sitting up nights fretting about whether their beloved Joe Biden would finally heed the call of a desperate nation and jump in to the presidential race.

Reporters are writing profiles of the people around Biden, looking desperately for clues to his intentions, asking people like Dick Cheney whether they think he should run, and interpreting everything he does through the frame of a possible presidential campaign. On Wednesday, The New York Times ran a story entitled "Biden trip to Florida raises speculation about presidential run," in which we learn that...Biden is going to Florida. Though the story admits that Biden has made 30 trips to the state since he became vice president, "this time is different," not because of anything he's doing but because it comes at a time when people (like that very reporter!) are speculating about whether he'll run for president.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
To continue reading this article...
Continue reading this article and get limited website access each month.
Get unlimited website access, exclusive newsletters plus much more.
Cancel or pause at any time.
Already a subscriber to The Week?
Not sure which email you used for your subscription? Contact us
Paul Waldman

Paul Waldman is a senior writer with The American Prospect magazine and a blogger for The Washington Post. His writing has appeared in dozens of newspapers, magazines, and web sites, and he is the author or co-author of four books on media and politics.