Axelrod won't rule out Biden being dropped from the ticket

[milhouse24]

Biden's 70 years old.  
He's a drag on the ticket but he won't be dropped.  

I think voters clearly don't want a 70 year old as VP or President.  
Though its unfair, the age issue will be a big deal in the campaign and on election day.  
Its not easy to hope for change that a 70 year old can deliver it.  It was a significant factor in dooming McCain's campaign.  

The Republicans will make a big deal, and scare the Republican voters and independents that it will be dangerous to have a senile, rambling, 70 year old, one step away from the Presidency.  

This is clearly a scare tactic used to energize Republican and Independent voters.  

Democrats should be happy to have Biden on the ticket, even if his age scares Republican and Independent voters.

[milhouse24]

It will actually be a lot smarter for Obama to pick Mark Warner as VP. 
IF Obama can keep Virginia, then he is guaranteed to win re-election. 
This would actually be a smart decision from an electoral standpoint.

[milhouse24]

I think voters clearly don't want a 70 year old as VP or President.  

You should ask President Mondale if that's true.

Obama's no Ron Reagan.

Reagan was also shown to have been going senile during his second term. 

Biden is not Ronald Reagan either.

[milhouse24]

Biden is not Ronald Reagan either.

You're right. I'd take Biden over Reagan any day.

Seriously though, few voters know how old Biden is. He certainly acts alive and vigorous. Yes, four years ago he brought experience and wisdom (particularly foreign policy) to a ticket with a young man who had been criticized on experience, and today that plus is no longer as relevant. But it'd still be a bad idea to drop him from the ticket for the reasons Cobbler said.

Speaking of which, how much foreign policy experience does the Romney-Ryan ticket have? Is Ryan really seasoned enough to step into the shoes of the President? Or is that not even being discussed in this election?

I guess you can say Biden's economy is better than Reagan's economy, not gonna argue with you there, lol. 

People thought John McCain was old, and they'll think Biden is old.  You're not going to stop people from seeing it with their own eyes.  Biden was unusually on message in 2008, but he's gonna say more crazy things, which he is known for, after all he's a clean, articulate guy; and the republicans are going to make a bigger issue out of his senility compared to Romney/Ryan. 

Paul Ryan has 14 years of govt experience.  He's about as experienced as Bill Clinton was in 1992. 
Also, Democrats can't say anything about Ryan's young age and experience, when Obama was nominated with just 3 years of Senate experience.  Obama lowered the bar for everyone else. 

[milhouse24]

Forgot about that. And the 79-80 Recession was based almost entirely around interest rates and inflation. It was actually quite simple. The 2008 Crisis was more of 2 or 3 Recession in one.
1. The Housing Bubble Popped
2. Lehman Brothers Collapsed
3. International Financial Crisis
Those three things made it 26 x worse than 79-80. Beet could explain it better than me.

Actually, no.  Unemployment was about a point lower, but inflation and lack of real growth were the problems.  In terms of the misery index, it was substantially worse.  In 1979-80, you had an oil shock, one brokerage house collapse, gigantic inflation and a the metals market going insane.

The 1980 recession was one of choice. The Federal Reserve deliberately tipped the economy into recession. In light of the inflation rate at the time, I believe it was the correct decision, even though, as I have said, Volcker tried to manipulate the timing for political purposes. Meanwhile, the 'recovery' was an illusion-- it was built on unprecedented and rapidly growing debts-- consumer, banking, and government-- as well as a rise in trade deficits, all of which continued each cycle until 2008.

If things feel better today than they did in 1980, it's because we are 3 years into a steady recovery, whether Republicans want to admit it or not. It'd also have a lot to do with the massive amounts of federal intervention and unprecedented actions the government had to take to stave off full-blown depression. And no, as a Democrat I am not happy about that. Contrary to the accusations of us being all big-government enthusiasts, I would have preferred the government didn't have to intervene in the economy or spend so much money stimulating it. But the empirical evidence could not be more clear. The interventions were inevitable and staved off a complete collapse of the free enterprise system in the US (nothing even remotely close to that was at stake in 1980). Even Paul Ryan knew as much when he begged Congress to pass TARP in 2008. Businesses should be thanking Obama for saving their asses, but that would be too much justice.

Well, in that case, could Obama not be getting enough credit because things didn't get as bad as when Jimmy Carter was in office.  Perhaps Americans have become pampered, and expected Reagan's success compared to Carter's failures on the average person's life.  There are no gas lines but no one's exactly optimistic about the next 2-4 years even if Obama stays in office.  We're not drowning like during Carter's years, but the water level is still just above the neck.  I don't know what the misery index is right now, but it doesn't feel great, at least not to me.  It doesn't seem like "morning in america."  I think the unemployment rate is still too high, and people are feeling it, particularly young people.  There is a lot more employment angst and apprehension among the 30 and under that wasn't there in 2008.  We thought we could overcome the 2008 recession, turns out just barely, and the "new normal" is 8% unemployment.