Hack

It's clear to me now that Joe Biden is a hack.

I'll confess that I didn't know all that much about Biden before he was selected as Obama's running mate. Secretly I was giving him the benefit of the doubt. All I hear from the mainstream media is what a genius he is, so I couldn't just conclude the opposite until presented with sufficient evidence one way or the other.

The new wave of various Biden gaffes have been catalogued for weeks now and yesterday reached a crescendo with the outrageously candid confession that Obama would face an international incident within 6 months of being elected and react slowly. See my previous post.

But for me there is a rhetorical moment where someone reveals themselves to be an intellectual hack. A final "Jump The Shark" moment.

In a campaign rally today Biden discussed the exchange in the recent debate where McCain turned to Obama and said, "I'm not George Bush, if you wanted to run against him you should have run four years ago." An effective line to be sure.

Biden's response to this line today was, "Methinks he doth protest too much." How original... quoting Shakespeare. Only, if you find yourself to be a political junkie like myself, you know that this exact turn of phrase was used just yesterday to describe Biden's own phony outrage that his own patriotism has been questioned one too many times.

The discussion goes like this: Why is it that Democrats are always whining about people questioning their patriotism? Methinks they doth protest too much. That turn of phrase was used in a recent article, I don't remember where at the moment, in reference to Joe Biden's vociferous phony outrage about people questioning the patriotism of Democrats. Awww... people question the patriotism of leftists. Cue the tiny violins.

It appears as though Joe Biden is essentially back to his old plagiarizing ways. This time not whole passages of text at least, but he must have heard the Shakespearean turn of phrase applied to him just yesterday. Surely some aide showed him the article that called to task his phony outrage by effectively invoking Shakespeare.

But because Democrats like Biden are generally rhetorically unoriginal, he must have thought that it was a turn of phrase worth "borrowing" I suppose. But then he massacres the saying by using in an unconvincing fashion. It really is the height of lameness when you rip off the exact turn of phrase that was just used effectively against you, only to have it not make much sense and in turn, not resonate.

Many McCain supporters were wondering when McCain was going to more forcefully attempt to separate himself from President Bush for months now.

The Obama campaign strategy, for its part it seems, was written when Bush won the last election four years ago: Vote Obama because (insert the Republican candidate's name here) is another four years of Bush.

And the Democrats, with their getaway driver the mainstream media, have been routing for things to go badly in America for as long as I can remember at this point in order to drum into the heads of Americans this as their 2008 winning campaign theme.

Things go badly in the war: good for Democrats. Things go badly in the economy: good for Democrats.

So now that McCain has for the first time pointed out that he is not Bush, after months of letting the charge go unchallenged, he's protesting too much?

What???

If you're going to purloin rhetoric, you should at least employ it in an effective manner. To not do so is a blatant example of intellectual hackery. Many have followed Biden for years and have drawn their own conclusions. It now seems that it was largely a function of time, but I now join the chorus that declares Joe Biden to be a hack.

Together with the voluminous body of work of his constant gaffes, his previous history of plagiarism, his propensity to play fast and loose with the facts, and his ongoing rhetorical unoriginality the truth is clear now.

This guy is a joke, a hack, a charlatan.