KerryVision

If you're a Senate Foreign Relations junkie like we are or a fan of the Sunday morning news shows, you're already pretty familiar with Joe Biden. You probably know that he talks A LOT, and that he's not afraid to say exactly what's on his mind. I think when Senators Kerry, Biden and Hagel had to make that emergency helicopter landing in the mountains of Afghanistan last February and Senator Kerry joked that if the Taliban came, they would just "talk them to death", Kerry and Hagel likely intended to send Biden out first knowing they might not have to take a turn.

Biden is the anti-Cheney. Where Dick spent most of the past seven and a half years underground, planning unnecessary wars and seeing to oil company profits, I expect Joe will be pretty accessible to the American public and highly visible as he helps the Obama administration reverse the effects of the dark legacy of Bush/Cheney.

I've learned a few other things about Joe In addition to his reputation for verbosity. I know that his son Beau is in the military and is set to be deployed to Iraq in a few weeks. I know that Joe's been in the Senate for a very long time (35 years), is the Chairman of the SFRC and a member of the Judiciary Committee. I had heard that he lost his first wife in a car accident, and that he commutes between Washington and Delaware to be with his family. Not sure if I knew that he's Catholic, but I do love this quote:

"If I'm the nominee, Republicans will be sorry," he said. "The next Republican that tells me I'm not religious I'm going to shove my rosary beads down their throat."

My old grade school principal is probably pissed she didn't come up with that one first, it's a classic. Between that quote, Obama chastising Brownback for claiming religion as the property of the other side, and McCain's sordid past, ugly temper and Catholic problem, it looks like we've got plenty of ammo to use when the far right makes their inevitable attempt at co-opting the 'values vote'.

There are a lot of details about Joe Biden, though, that I didn't know. This clip from the primaries takes a look at what makes Biden 'tick', and how surviving tragedy and admitting and learning from his mistakes has influenced his life.