Joe Biden

This afternoon I drove to Washington to see Sen. Joe Biden at the public library. I left Wellman a bit late and though it had been snowing I figured the roads would be a bit better than they were. He was scheduled to arrive at 3:30 and I figured he would be late as well so I wasn't to worried. I parked across the street, helped a guy with directions who I found out was working for Obama, and was there to try and lure people coming to see Biden to visit the Obama office instead. I got inside, started running up the steps, and nearly ran into the Biden entourage.

There were 50-60 people in the room. A neighbor of mine was introducing him. I will only note that said neighbor was wearing sweatpants which did not have a hole in them, unlike the pair he was wearing a couple of years ago. He also had on a new t-shirt.

Biden introduced us to some of his family members including his granddaughter. He talked for about 20 minutes outlining some of his policies, focusing particularly on Iraq, Iran, economic policies, education, health care, and social security. It seemed he felt comfortable speaking about foreign policy more than some of the domestic issues. After the stump speech he asked for questions.

The first question had to do with taxes and campaign strategy, the second dealt with energy policy and the third was about Iraq. I was standing in the back of the room and it seemed the people he called on were ones wearing name tags or were people he seemed to know, so I figured I might not get a chance to ask a question. I was taking notes and trying to maintain eye contact when he pointed towards me and said, did you have a question, so I said "yes, I do." I said I had the opportunity to be in the West Bank for two weeks this past summer and I would like to know how he would approach the conflict between Israel and Palestine, and what he would do to improve conditions for Palestinians.

This was his response, First, he said the President of the U.S. needs to be engaged on an almost daily basis with the leaders of Israel, Palestine and other middle eastern countries. He said he favors a two state solution with the borders being more or less the green line. He talked about a "hectare for hectare" land swap where Israeli settlements which have been in place for more than 20 years would be allowed to remain, if land was granted to a Palestinian state elsewhere by Israel. He said there needs to be free entry to Jerusalem and east Jerusalem, and that there can be no guaranteed right of return because it would mean the destruction of Israel.

He went on to talk about the neocon approach to foreign relations which he said discounts diplomacy and focuses on a strong military approach. He talked about this being a time when a peace settlement might be possible. He talked about the Sunni Arab countries being more afraid of radical Shiia countries than of Israel, of Syria being key to solving the situation. It was apparent he is knowledgeable about the middle east and competent in foreign affairs.

I have no idea how Palestinians would respond to his ideas, particularly the idea of leaving some settlements in place, or his comments about east Jerusalem, though I suppose many would not be happy.

He answered two or three more questions. During his answer he went on a rant about letting Republicans talk about morality and religion. "How dare we let Mitt Romney lecture us self-righteously about morality, how dare we let some one like Guliani claim the moral high ground."

I was impressed with Senator Biden. He was dignified, intelligent, he had a sense of humor, he tried to keep from saying the word "hell" to often, and it was clear he has a lot of foreign policy experience. Biden would make a good President, much better than the person now filling the office.