Joe Biden in The Obamians, by James Mann
On Foreign Policy:
GOP too tough but not smart; Dems not tough enough
Joe Biden, who was then lining up to run for the 1988 Democratic presidential nomination, aptly summarized the obstacles the party faced. Biden argued that the Democrats needed to shake off a sense of drift and paralysis in foreign policy caused by its
reaction to Vietnam. "The American people have grave doubts about the Democrats' willingness to back diplomacy with power," Biden said in 1986. "People think the Republicans are too tough but not very smart, and the Democrats are not tough enough."
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p. 26
Jun 14, 2012
On Foreign Policy:
VP role: bring experience, but not deciding voice
In her early days as secretary of state, Hillary Clinton seemed uncertain of her role within the administration and eager to show she was no wild-eyed idealist (as Republicans liked to portray her).
Vice President Joe Biden seemed to sympathize with those who favored an emphasis on democracy and human rights, but
Biden was not the deciding voice in the administration; he'd been put on the ticket not to make foreign policy, but to demonstrate to voters that the Obama administration would have foreign policy experience.
No one expected Secretary of Defense Gates to be anything other than a realist; the Pentagon is not typically the place from which to lead a campaign to spread democracy.
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p.169
Jun 14, 2012
On Homeland Security:
1970s: control CIA from outside; 1980s: time to lay off
Presidents of both parties chafed at and sought to circumvent post-Vietnam restrictions on their authority such as the ban on assassinations imposed in 1976 or the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. By the end of the 1970s, however, the mood
in Congress had begun to shift and the reform era came to an end.[For example], in the mid-70s Biden participated in the congressional efforts to investigate the CIA and get it under outside control. A few years later, however, as the country was
shifting to the right, he served notice at a Senate hearing that it was time to lay off. "The momentum is moving the other way," Biden told representatives of the ACLU. Yes, he agreed with their views, Biden said, but the issue of writing rules for the
CIA did not have [much] popular appeal.
"Let me tell you something," Biden declared. "The folks don't care. The average American could care less right now about any of this. You keep talking about public concern. There ain't none."
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p. 18
Jun 14, 2012
On War & Peace:
Opposed Vietnam but didn't identify with anti-war movement
Joe Biden, the young senator from Delaware. Like other Democrats outside the South, he had opposed the Vietnam War. Yet Biden was never closely identified with the antiwar movement; graduating in 1965, he was a little too old and too interested
in electoral politics. "You're looking at a middle-class guy. I am who I am," he once quipped. "I'm not big on flak jackets and tie-dye shirts and--you know, that's not me."
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p. 18
Jun 14, 2012
On War & Peace:
1990 Gulf War: reason enough to send generation to war?
Most of the congressional Democrats determinedly opposed the Persian Gulf War. When Saddam Hussein sent Iraqi troops into Kuwait in August 1990, the Bush administration sought authorization from Congress for the use of force to reverse the invasion.
The debate on Capitol Hill made clear that most Democrats still held to the core beliefs that had dominated the thinking of the liberal wing of the party since Vietnam.
The Democrats exhibited a deep aversion to the use of force, even for the purpose of repelling one country's invasion of another."The president says he's angry and impatient, but God bless him, so are all of us.
But is that a reason to send a whole generation to war?" asked Biden.
"The price is in body bags, in babies killed," said Barbara Boxer, then a member of the House of Representatives.
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p. 28-29
Jun 14, 2012
On War & Peace:
1990s: Military intervention to stop Bosnia ethnic cleansing
One of the earliest critics of Clinton's foreign policy was Senator Joseph Biden. From his position on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Biden became a staunch proponent of US military intervention in Bosnia to deter Bosnian Serbs from their
campaigns of "ethnic cleansing" against Muslims. Three months after Clinton was sworn in, Biden upbraided the administration for not doing "a damn thing" to stop the Serbs from bombarding women and children in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica.
Biden called for air strikes by the US and its NATO allies.They were the vanguard of change for the Democrats. In the 1990s, as Biden demonstrated, some of the liberals who had opposed the use of force in the
Persian Gulf were willing to support military intervention for the humanitarian purpose of preventing genocide in the Balkans. America was now viewed as, potentially, a force for good in the world, if only it had the will to act.
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p. 35
Jun 14, 2012
On War & Peace:
OpEd: Iraq war follows tradition of active US leadership
The administration was clearly and openly moving toward war with Iraq. The Democrats did little to slow down Bush's momentum. In the fall of 2002, their acquiescence in this hurried process had been a huge blunder. Most of the prominent Democrats in
Congress, including Senators John Kerry, Hillary Clinton, John Edwards and Joe Biden, decided to support the Iraq resolution, casting votes that they would all find themselves obligated to justify for years afterwards.At the grass roots, the
Democratic Party included millions of liberals who, since Vietnam, had been instinctively skeptical about the use of force or other assertions of American power abroad. By contrast, many of the party's foreign policy hands, particularly the alumni of the
Clinton administration, had a different outlook. They viewed themselves as heirs to the foreign policy traditions of Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman and John Kennedy, all proponents of national strength and an active leadership role for the US.
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p. 47
Jun 14, 2012
On War & Peace:
Drones against al Qaeda instead of ground troops
Obama decided to step up the use of unmanned drones in Pakistan. Vice President Joe Biden recommended that the administration rely primarily on drones or missile attacks against al-Qaeda leaders instead of sending more ground troops. While Obama rejected
that approach and decided instead on new troop deployments, the president nonetheless expanded the CIA's drone program.The Obama administration referred to these drone attacks as "targeted killing," rather than "assassinations." The euphemism was of
legal significance. In the 1970s, President Ford issued an executive order that banned assassinations. The administration's formal reasoning for why its overseas killings did not constitute assassination went like this: Congress had authorized the use of
force against al-Qaeda. Therefore, America was at war, and under the law of war, America had the right to defend itself "by targeting persons such as high-level al-Qaeda leaders who are planning attacks." Therefore the practice wasn't illegal.
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p.217
Jun 14, 2012
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