Biden: What I Meant Was ...
Delaware Sen. Joe Biden said he meant no harm nor racist foul when he cracked wise about Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, one of several fellow Democrats seeking the party's 2008 presidential nomination.
"I believe I was quoted accurately, but they weren't meant to be shots," Biden said of a story [in which] he is quoted saying of Obama: “I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean.."
Asked whether he wanted to throw down the gauntlet and respond to Biden's quoted remarks, Obama refused to be drawn into the fight.
"I am not going parse his words that carefully. ... You'd have to ask Senator Biden what he was thinking," Obama said.
In an afternoon conference call to discuss his presidency, Biden said he's sure the African-American community isn't taking offense at his description of Obama as "articulate," a no-no that can be traced back at least to the 1996 effort to draft Colin Powell for a run for the president. At the time, comedian Chris Rock slammed the description of Powell as articulate in a riotous stand-up routine that forever put the expression in the trash bin of backhanded compliments.
Thank goodness for that Biden "air of dignity". Otherwise who knows what embarrasing thing he might say next.
