So Barack Obama fills in the so-called foreign policy weakness with Joe Biden. From that perspective, I think this is strong selection for the Democrats. If anything, the Democratic ticket just got a lot tougher and more willing to directly fight John McCain and the Republicans. History suggests Vice-Presidential nominees have little effect on Presidential elections, but Biden plays well in Pennsylvania (originally from Scranton), with blue-collar voters, and maybe most importantly with the over 65 crowd. This reader from Andrew Sullivan's blog calls Biden his Mom's boyfriend.

Despite his garrulous, confrontational style, I think he's got a level-head with regard to foreign affairs. He is tough when he needs to be tough, but he is always outspoken about our country's need to be part of genuine international coalitions - not agreements like the laughable "Coalition of the Willing" that Bush-Cheney-Rice-Rumsfeld put together.

Here are some clips from Joe Biden that give a good flavor for some of what's in store in the near future. For the record, I couldn't disagree more with his comments at the end about Chinese imports.  "Flat shutting down" imports from China would have disastrous economic consequences.  This holds true even if he was talking about shutting down only toy imports.