Joe Biden

Fitzgerald: Joe Biden is fine until he opens his mouth

Joe Fitzgerald Sunday, March 25, 2018

Credit: Courtesy

(052417 Cambridge, MA) Former Vice President Joe Biden speaks during Class Day at Harvard University in Cambridge on Wednesday, May 24, 2017. Staff Photo by Nancy Lane

Abe Lincoln surely had someone like Joe Biden in mind when he suggested it’s better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.

There’s not much doubt about Joe.

Photogenic and charismatic with a million-dollar smile, he brings all the makings of a political heavyweight to a microphone, then fouls his own nest when he tries to be clever.

Remember the St. Patrick’s Day dinner at the White House in 2010, when he so movingly grieved the passing of the Irish prime minister’s mother? It was a real heart-grabber, until someone whispered to our then-VP that the PM’s dear old Ma was still on this side of the grass, fit as a fiddle.

       

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An awkward moment? You bet, though not as awkward as the time he urged Missouri state Sen. Chuck Graham to take a bow. When the latter smiled, graciously demurring, Biden would not be dissuaded.

“Stand up, Chuck!” he playfully ordered. “Let ’em see you! Oh, God, we love you.”

That’s when another aide informed him Graham was confined to a wheelchair.

Standing on his feet, Biden certainly looks presidential.

But thinking on his feet? Please. The man is a train wreck.

Remember his effusive praise of Barack Obama as “the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy”?

Look it up. That’s exactly what he said, though he obviously didn’t mean it the ham-handed way it sounded.

Imagine if Donald Trump had muttered anything close to that.

Now, clearly hungering for the attention he commanded as Obama’s VP, Joe just told a Miami rally he’d like to “beat the hell” out of Trump, picking up where he left off in the 2016 campaign when he said, “I wish we were in high school and I could take him behind the gym.”

Whatever ails Joe appears to be getting worse.

Then again, compared to Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton and — heaven forbid — Elizabeth Warren, all of whom are licking their chops to topple Trump in 2020, the bumbling Biden seems Churchillian.

Now here we go again, with Joe reprising his role of the good-natured dope as he tests the presidential waters.

Trump’s team must be loving it.

The belief here is that Trump didn’t beat Hillary because of all the people who voted for him. No. He won because of all the people who voted against her.

That’s why you can almost hear from inside the Oval Office: “Keep talking, Joe! Just keep talking.”