Today, the Big Red Car sits down with former Vice President Joe Biden to discuss his campaign to obtain the Democrat nomination for President and, ultimately, his thoughts on the general election.

“Welcome, Vice President Biden.”

“Thanks, Big Red, wow are you looking good. By the way, where have we met before?”

“I don’t think we have, but I was born in 1966 and there are a lot of impostors out there. You would have been 24 back in 1966.”

“Well, you sure do look familiar. So where do we start, Big Red?”

“Quick overview of your political journey? I note that you first were elected to office in 1970 as a member of the New Castle County Council. In 1972, you were elected to the United States Senate from Delaware. You served in the Senate until 2009. Right so far?”

“Bingo. You did your research.”

“Following your Senate career — 36 years — you were elected as Vice President of the United States with Barack Obama in 2008 and served until 2017. This makes your total service in elected office 46 years.”

“Indeed. That represents a lot of Amtrak rides.”

“We’re going to talk about Amtrak in a few minutes, but you have been a politician all your life, haven’t you?”

“Yes, and a damn good one.”

“But, Mr. Vice President, what do you say to your critics who suggest you have no real world experience, having spent an entire career in politics and only politics? Are they wrong?”

“I say I must be damn good at this political thing cause I keep getting re-elected.”

“Fine, you have also run twice for President. You were not elected to that office, were you?”

“Do we have to go there? The plagiarism thing is so much baloney. I was doing fine in the 1988 Democrat presidential nomination — raised a ton of money for the times — when the plagiarism thing came out. First, in law school, I failed to properly footnote some things. In the speech, I failed to note that it was based on a speech given by Neil Kinnoch, a Brit. That’s all there ever was to it. Baloney. Total baloney.”

“Very good, how about 2008, your run for President then?”

“I should have won that nomination. Here I was a stalwart of the Senate with 36 years of substantive service and I get beat by a phenomenon named Barack Obama who hadn’t been in the Senate for two years yet. It was his time.”

“Your quote about Barack Obama? Does that haunt you?”

“Sure, it does, but it was a compliment.”

“How would people take it today — ‘I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy, I mean, that’s a storybook, man.’ Do you think there is a whiff of racism to it? I’d like to give you a chance to defend yourself.”

“Look, it was an awkward turn of a phrase, but even Senator Obama didn’t think it was racist. Give me a break.”

“It did tank your presidential campaign didn’t it?”

“What tanked my campaign was a guy named Barack Obama who won the presidency and had a damn good Vice President by his side.  Me.”

“If former President Obama holds you in such great esteem, how do you explain his failure to endorse you?”

“I asked him not to endorse.”

The Big Red Car suffered a bout of laughing before he resumed his questions.

“And, you think people believe that explanation?”

“They have to. Let’s move on.”

“Fine, sir. In the Senate you oversaw the Bork and Thomas Supreme Court confirmations. In the Bork case, you unleashed a fierce character assassination which ultimately was successful in denying the President his nominee. Some say that is the well spring for the horrific treatment of recent SCOTUS nominations. What say you?”

“I say that Robert Bork was not qualified and he got what he deserved.”

“But the American bar considers Robert Bork to have been one of the top five legal scholars ever produced in US history. How can that be?”

“Let’s move on. I’m sure you want to skewer me on Anita Hill.”

“And?”

“Those were different times. Miss Hill came forth after the hearing was completed. Teddy Kennedy’s idea by the way. I allowed her to testify. Her testimony was not conclusive and the nomination was passed out of the Judiciary Committee to the Senate where Justice Thomas was confirmed. End of story.”

“Is it though? Many say your treatment of her was insensitive both from a racial and a feminist perspective. How do you respond?”

“I say it is ancient history. I called her to apologize before I announced my campaign, but she was something less than gracious.”

“You passed a law — The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, which incidentally contained the Federal Assault Weapons Ban — that put a lot of black people in jail. Some say disproportionately so, flooded our prisons. What say you?”

“It may have been a little too harsh.”

“President Trump just signed the First Step Act that reverses much of your bill. What say you to that?”

“Good on him. Can we move on?”

“So, why does this battle for the nomination end up differently than those earlier two campaigns?”

“Cause this time I win?”

“Let’s take a second to discuss the competition, shall we?”

“Sure. Field of muppets mostly.”

“Bernie Sanders has built a national campaign apparatus and many say should have won the nomination the last time around. He’s raking the money in wholesale using the Internet. How do you counter his progressive momentum?”

“Senator Sanders and I have known each other in the Senate for years — long before he was a closet capitalist making millions selling books to lobbyists. The guy has never sponsored a substantive bill that became law. He has never served as a committee chair. He’s the only guy in the race older than me. I will beat Bernie Sanders like a rented mule.”

“How about his criticism that you’re a ‘digital dolt’?”

“Fuck him. Pardon my French. I have people who understand that stuff.”

“I was not expecting that, that level of pugnaciousness.”

“I was a first rate football player in high school, baseball also. Believe me, I can take that tired, old Communist. This is what I really think of him.”

“Kamala Harris?”

“Ask Willie Brown about her. OK, that was mean. Senator Harris has a questionable background that reflects a complete absence of character. She, literally, slept her way into office doing some of her best work under Willie Brown when he was the Speaker of the California House and the Mayor of San Francisco. Better yet, ask Mrs. Brown what she thinks of Kamala.”

“Cory Booker?”

“Is he still in the race? I thought he dropped out. You know he played college football at Stanford, right? Oh, yeah, he finally got a girlfriend. How convenient, no?”

“Fine, sir. Mayor Pete.”

“That kid wasn’t born when I was in the Senate. He’s a quarter inch deep and a yard wide. You think running South Bend qualifies you to run the United States? I was Vice President for eight years. Mayor Pete is history in a month.”

“Beto?”

“Look, my mother was a Finnegan. We’re proud, poor Irish — scrappy. This clown is an Irishman who wants to be a Mexican? Give me a break. The American people are not that stupid. He’s toast.”

“Who do you fear as a competitor?”

“Nobody. I’ll have this little soiree wrapped in six months and then I can get down to kicking Donald Trump’s ass.”

“Sleepy Joe Biden? What say you?”

“I say I ride on Amtrak to and from Washington DC. I’m a man of the people and he’s a billionaire. Must be nice being a billionaire.”

“You once said famously that you would ‘…take him behind the gym.’ What does that mean?”

“Just what I said. Donald Trump is a bully and a punk. I’d whip his ass good.”

“One subject that hasn’t been explored is your draft status during the Vietnam War Era. You called Donald Trump a ‘draft dodger’ when, in fact, you also avoided service with a series of student deferments during college and law school. After you were admitted to the Delaware Bar your Draft Board elected not to call you to serve. Is that true?”

“Yes. Move on, Big Red Car.”

“Your critics say you voted for a number of wars, but declined to serve yourself. They call you a chicken hawk.”

“So what? Wars are good for Dupont and they’re from Delaware. So what?”

“OK, let’s turn to the issues, shall we? The economy is on fire and many attribute that to President Trump. What are the issues that will define this race?”

“Look, Big Red Car, me and Barack set that fire. Trump is just stoking it. We had the country headed in the right direction.”

“There are many who will dispute that notion, Mr. Vice President. Many say that President Trump’s elimination of excessive regulation passed during the Obama-Biden administration, the tax cuts, the confrontation of bad trade and foreign policy agreements — NAFTA, the TransPacific Partnership, the EU Agreement, Canadian trade, the Paris Accords, the Iran nuclear deal — and his use of the bully pulpit on steel and coal are at the core of the economic resurgence. Are they wrong?”

“Look, we could have done all of that stuff.”

“But, the simple truth is that you didn’t. How about ISIS? It came to life during your tenure and hasn’t President Trump kept a campaign promise to destroy it?”

“OK, Trump gets high marks for wiping out ISIS, for castrating the Caliph, and for eliminating the Caliphate, but we got Osama Bin Laden — right?”

“Yes, you did. So, back to the issues. What issues get you elected, Mr. Vice President?”

“Number Uno, Big Red Car, is that I am not Donald J Trump. In case you haven’t noticed, the guy is a nut case.”

“But on policy and results, you just acknowledged that he had gotten things done that you and Barack Obama hadn’t or couldn’t.”

“You got me there. Still, I’m not Donald J Trump.”

“Will that win or lose you votes, Mr. Vice President? Is that your entire program?”

“Don’t be a smart ass, Big Red Car. Move on.”

“Seriously, Mr. Vice President, you want the American people to turn away from the best economy in a century, record low female/black/Hispanic unemployment, and elect you because you are NOT Donald J Trump.”

The Vice President glared at the Big Red Car, but said nothing.

“Who is the intellectual leader of the Democrat Party today? Some say it is Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and her New Green Deal is at the core of it.”

“If we are discussing getting ride of internal combustion engines in ten years during this campaign, then just give President Trump the victory and save us all some time. AOC is everything that is wrong with the progressive wing of our party — tell her to serve a decade in Congress and then all me. Give away everything that people should work for and take everything you get from hard work? She thinks the American people sent us to DC to do that? I am the center left candidate. I am a moderate. The only way we win this thing is from the center where the real world lives. Amtrak. I am Amtrak. Amtrak riders vote.”

“Abortion? Post birth abortion?”

“Shut up, Big Red Car. That’s murder. Look, I’m some kind of Catholic. So is Nancy Pelosi. You can’t kill babies who make it out of the womb.”

“So, you break with the other candidates who embrace abortion until third grade? Will you speak out against it?”

“Move on, Big Red Car.”

“OK, Mr. Vice President, you have made some news recently with your hair sniffing and groping. How do you frame those issues?”

“First, I was not trying to get laid. I just love fresh hair, that spring time scent. I have touched a few people, but — face it — I’m an Irish glad handler. Sometimes that comes across as a little creepy. OK, I got the message. No more Creepy Joe. There is nothing wrong with this, but know this — my groping and sniffing days are behind me. I pledge not to sniff a single woman on the campaign trail. I pledge to keep my hands to myself and use my words to show my affection.”

“Good enough. How do you evaluate your chances against President Trump.”

“Well, to be brutally honest, if the guy ever stopped with his silly Tweets he would run the damn table. Economy on fire. The Mueller Report turns out to be a fart in a hurricane. Hillary got beat because she sucked and he was better. Deal with it. Getting us out of wars. Securing the border. Guy’s also a great campaigner and beat Hillary spending half the money she did. So, yeah, he’s going to be a tough nut to crack. But, I will.”

“Anything else you want to share with our audience?”

“Not really, you wore me out, Big Red Car.”

Joe looked at his watch.

“Wow, I’m late for my next appointment. I need to run.”

“Where next?”

“Nap time, Big Red Car. Don’t tell anybody, but Sleepy Joe needs his nap. God bless all of you.”

And, dear readers, there you have it. The man leading the Democrat polls for the nomination, Mr. Joseph Robinette Biden, career politician, with one more big race left in him.

But, hey, what the Hell do I really know anyway? I’m just a Big Red Car. Be good to yourself. You deserve it.