Joe Biden is always half a step ahead of the conventional wisdom about his presidential plans. When it was widely assumed he wouldn’t run, it was soon reported that he was at least thinking about it. When the consensus shifted to Biden laying in wait for a Hillary Clinton collapse, it was soon reported that he was “increasingly leaning toward” running.
So while Biden may yet surprise Washington again, it seems we do know a few things. The first is that Biden wants to be president. That’s been true since at least the 1980s, before he torpedoed his 1988 campaign, and he might have wanted to be president his whole career.
Once that bug bites a politician, the condition can be treated but seldom cured. Think of George McGovern bumping into Richard Nixon on an airplane in the early 1990s and asking the man who beat him in a humiliating 49-state landslide for advice about seeking the Democratic nomination in 1992.
The best evidence for that in Biden’s case was his 2008 presidential bid. Unlike in 1988, Biden really had no realistic path to nomination. Hillary Clinton was the heavy favorite – some things never change – with Barack Obama and John Edwards the likeliest alternatives.
Biden ran anyway. At age 65, he wasn’t likely to get another chance. It’s the logic that has George Pataki running a far less plausible campaign this year. Worst case scenario was that even if Biden bombed, as he did (he got less than 1 percent of the vote in the Iowa caucuses that year), he would go back to the Senate and it would be a mere footnote to his long career, like Orrin Hatch’s presidential campaign in 2000 and Chris Dodd’s that same year.
The vice presidency has extended Biden’s window for a presidential run by eight years. His chances of beating Hillary might not be great, but as a sitting vice president he’s in better shape than he was in 2008. So why not run?
The answer, of course, is that whatever happens in the 2016 campaign has the potential to have a more lasting impact on Biden’s legacy than the 2008 bid. Biden may suffer a crushing defeat at the hands of the Clinton machine, perhaps even getting fewer votes than Bernie Sanders. An incumbent vice president who can’t beat a socialist from Vermont?
Alternatively, Biden could go down in history as the man who stopped Hillary from being the first woman president. It was easier to forgive Obama for defeating the most serious female presidential candidate in history because he went on to be the first black president. Biden would just be another old white guy in a party where that’s no longer in vogue.
It’s conceivable that Biden could be the first Democrat to make concerns about Clinton’s handling of her email while secretary of state less of a taboo subject in the party. Then having drawn first blood, maybe he isn’t the person who ultimately benefits. If the email story gets worse for Clinton, the race could become a free-for-all. Old white guy stops first woman president, doesn’t get to the White House himself.
That’s what makes Biden’s meeting with Elizabeth Warren so intriguing. An alliance with Warren could potentially defuse both obstacles to his candidacy and maybe even a third – getting the money and organization together at this late date. Biden’s candidacy could gain the support of one of the rising female leaders of the Democratic Party, someone with greater cachet on the left than Sanders.
Announcing a running mate before the convention didn’t work for Ronald Reagan and Richard Schweiker in 1976. But it could work for Biden-Warren 40 years later. Warren should be good for attract women, progressives and campaign contributions, all things Biden needs if he is going to make a go at it.
That’s the scenario that will probably tantalize Biden as it would anyone who has long wanted to be president, even if it is not the likeliest one: the possibility that he could win.
