'He is completely devoid of filters': Obama frankly said what he thinks of Biden

In 2008, Barack Obama considered Joe Biden "unfiltered" and "willing to happily share whatever comes into his head," but he chose the then-senator as his vice president because he was "decent, honest and loyal." The 44th President of the United States wrote about this in his memoirs, released today, November 17. An extract from them was prepared by the publication The Wall Street Journal.

Photo: Shutterstock

The book A Promised Land Obama reflects openly on his presidency, race issues and politics. The first of two planned volumes, at 768 pages, also provides an inside look at Obama's decision to elect Biden as vice president. We learn a lot from the book about Biden's character and his foreign policy disagreements with Obama.

Team of opposites

Obama characterizes Biden as his political opposite. In 2008, he found it useful, because such a person on his team could ultimately rally people of different political views around Obama. The 44th president admitted that he was convinced that Republicans in Congress would be willing to negotiate with Biden.

“One of the reasons I chose Joe to mediate—in addition to his Senate experience and legislative acumen—was my understanding that [Mitch] McConnell believed negotiating with such a vice president would not irritate the Republican base. base in a way that would anger them at any sign of cooperation with (black, Muslim socialist) Obama,” the president’s book says.

Obama also recalls some of his concerns about asking Biden to join him in 2008. Biden was 19 years his senior and was a longtime member of the Senate, while at the time of his nomination he was more of an outsider for Washington. Describing himself as a "calm and collected" person, Obama calls Biden "a person without filters, who is happy to share whatever comes into his head."

“The lack of a filter got him into trouble periodically, such as when during the primaries he called me 'an articulate, smart, clean, good-looking guy.' The phrase was undoubtedly intended as a compliment, but some interpreted it as suggesting that such traits in a black man were worthy of attention,” the memoir states.

In the end, Obama concluded that Biden's accidental oversights were "of little consequence compared to his strengths," and that Joe's decades in government made up for Obama's own relative inexperience in national politics.

On the subject: The death of his wife and children, a record career and a 30-year journey to the White House: the personal story of Joe Biden

“I liked that Joe was more than willing to take over the presidency if anything happened to me, and that it reassured those who were worried that I was too young,” Obama writes. “But what mattered most was what my gut told me—that Joe was decent, honest, and loyal. It seemed to me that this man really cared about ordinary people, and that if things got bad, I could trust him. In the end, I was not disappointed."

Photo: Shutterstock

Foreign policy differences

According to the 44th US President, Biden expressed concerns about the troop build-up in Afghanistan, which began in 2009, advising Obama not to climb into the "dangerous swamp" without a clear strategy. Obama decided that Biden's opinion was in part due to the fact that he was "burned" by his support for the Iraq war a few years earlier.

Obama also writes that Biden has expressed skepticism about the plans for the raid that killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in May 2011, suggesting that the president weigh "the enormous consequences of possible failure" and consider waiting until more accurate data will not be obtained.

“I tried to get to the truth in every major decision I made as president,” Obama writes, “and I appreciated Joe’s willingness to confront prevailing sentiments and ask tough questions. Often this provided me with the space I needed for my own internal reasoning."

“As the helicopters took off for the raid against the al-Qaeda leader, Joe put his hand on my shoulder and squeezed it. “Congratulations, boss,” he said,” Obama recalls of the big day.

The Trump Phenomenon

Obama believes that Donald Trump's popularity in national politics was made possible by millions of Americans who were worried about the fact that the president of the United States was an African American.

“My very presence in the White House seemed to induce deep panic, a sense that the natural order had been disrupted,” Obama writes. “Donald Trump understood this and used it when he began to promote the idea that I was not born in the United States and, therefore, was an illegitimate president. For the millions of Americans frightened by a black man in the White House, he promised a cure for their racial anxieties.”

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Obama says he did not meet with Trump during his presidency. His impression of the man who eventually became his successor in the White House was based on Trump's desire to attract everyone's attention. Obama reduces his strategy to "a TV presenter who positioned himself and his brand as the pinnacle of capitalist success and thoughtless consumption."

He writes that in 2010, Trump called Obama's senior adviser, David Axelrod, and offered to hold him accountable for the Deepwater Horizon oil spill response in the Gulf of Mexico. According to Obama, Trump also said he was ready to build a "beautiful ballroom" on the grounds of the White House. Both proposals from the billionaire were rejected.

The memoir, which took 2,5 years longer than expected to complete, became Obama's third book. They follow on from former First Lady Michelle Obama's 2018 memoir Becoming.

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