In Case You Missed It: Analysis: Biden pick shows lack of confidence

By Ron Fournier
Associated Press
August 23, 2008

The candidate of change went with the status quo.

In picking Sen. Joe Biden to be his running mate, Barack Obama sought to shore up his weakness — inexperience in office and on foreign policy — rather than underscore his strength as a new-generation candidate defying political conventions. …

The picks say something profound about Obama: For all his self-confidence, the 47-year-old Illinois senator worried that he couldn't beat Republican John McCain without help from a seasoned politician willing to attack. The Biden pick is the next logistical step in an Obama campaign that has become more negative — a strategic decision that may be necessary but threatens to run counter to his image.

Democratic strategists, fretting over polls that showed McCain erasing Obama's lead this summer, welcomed the move. They, too, worried that Obama needed a more conventional — read: tougher — approach to McCain. …

A senior Obama adviser, speaking on condition of anonymity, said his boss has expressed impatience with what he calls a "reverence" inside his campaign for his message of change and new politics. In other words, Obama is willing — even eager — to risk what got him this far if it gets him to the White House. …

So the question is whether Biden's depth counters Obama's inexperience — or highlights it?

After all, Biden is anything but a change agent, having been in office longer than half of all Americans have been alive. Longer than McCain.

And he talks too much.

On the same day he announced his second bid for the presidency, Biden found himself explaining why he had described Obama as "clean."

And there's the 2007 ABC interview in which Biden said he would stand by an earlier statement that Obama was not ready to serve as president.

It seems Obama is worried that some voters are starting to agree.

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