Friday 22 August 2008

Joe Biden and Neil Kinnock

The US Presidential campaign has been pushed out of the news agenda by the Olympic Games but it has been slowly grinding on as we looked towards China and after glancing at the Olympic Medal Table to make sure we were still above Australia, i went to have a look at what Obama and McCain had been up to since the last time i looked in.
Seems that the down to earth, man of the people McCain has lost track of how many houses he owns (don't you just hate it when that happens) and Obama is about to announce his Vice President with the hot favourite being Senator Joe Biden.
Now Joe Biden is not well known name outside of America but his name once briefly graced our newspaper headlines for an association with Neil Kinnock of all people. Or rather one of the firebrand Socialist and former Labour Party Leaders speeches in particular.
Let's go back to the 1987 Democrat nominations and there's Mr Biden making an emotive speech about education.
The Biden speech had gone: "I started thinking as I was coming over here, why is it that Joe Biden is the first in his family ever to go to a university? Why is it that my wife who is sitting out there in the audience is the first in her family to ever go to college?"
Pretty impressive or it would be if it hadn't been lifted almost word for word from what Kinnock had said earlier about himself and his wife Glenys in a tear-jerking account of his deprived Welsh upbringing.
The scandal that followed in America made sure Senator Biden's Presidential chances were done for and although it was over 20 years ago, someone on the Republican side is sure to remember or stumble across it while googling one day and throw it at Biden to question Obama's VP selection.
This reminiscing does give us the chance to remember Neil Kinnock especially the time when he humorously fell over on a beach as he tried to escape a wave and got his expensive suit soaked. Neil Kinnock, remembered for making himself look a prat and for his short lived career as muse to American Vice Presidential wannabe's.

5 comments:

Anne said...

Senator Biden seems pretty alright, as politicians go. Not the heftiest compliment, but honest. Trust is tough to come by nowadays.

Nog said...

Biden has more "nonthreatening cred" than anyone on the planet. He's a "moderate" "white male" from Delaware (a middle state). And he's pretty old to.

Falling on a bruise said...

I don't know anything about him except for this Neil Kinnock thing which, if you knew Neil Kinnock, is kinda funny. The ultimate Welsh windbag.

Cheezy said...

How very sad that Team Obama has chosen to dilute one of the critical differences between their man and McCain by choosing for his running mate someone who - in his role as chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee - was instrumental in the fraud leading up to the invasion of Iraq under false pretenses. Sad but not surprising.

Falling on a bruise said...

Very true Cheezy. I have been asking around about this Biden chap and apart from the Neil Kinnock thing, he has a history of plagarising other peoples work and it seems he not only voted for the war on Iraq but was pro the Kosovan conflict also. He was against the 1st Gu7lf war though which is in his favour. As you say, the gap on the crucial issue between the McCain camp and the Obama camp has been narrowed with this appointment. Only hope is McCain appoints someone worse, Rudy Giuliani's name has been mentioned a few times.