Why Biden?

Jonah Goldberg, with his trademark humor and in this USA Today column here, explains why Biden was invited to the "beer conference" between Obama, Crowley, and Gates.

Given that the scheduled attendees looked more awkward than Sen. Robert Byrd at the NAACP Image Awards, Biden's presence made lots of sense. If you were Obama, wouldn't you want an oxygen-sucker such as Joltin' Joe to Hoover through all those painful silences with a vomit of words?

No doubt, Obama figured: It doesn't matter what he has to say, so long as he keeps talking long enough for the press to get its photo-op without Crowley tasing Gates or Gates flipping over the table to shout, "Do you know who I am?" Biden could just simply switch on his mouth's autopilot and jibber-jabber about Iraqi Kurds, socket wrenches, gay basset hounds, Social Security, World War II, World War II-and-a-Half, World War II-and-Three-Quarters and whatever else popped into his mind. Anything to eat up the time would do.

This theory's appeal lies in that it's very hard to figure out what Joe Biden is doing in the Obama administration in the first place, especially since every time he lends the benefit of his experience and insight, the White House corrects him.

If you want a laugh today, read the whole thing.

PS - I'll give a signed copy of my husband's book to the first person who can show me proof that Goldberg's prediction about Joe Biden saying, "squirrels would taste more like ice cream if goats were only taller." came true.