Instead of representing the United States in Paris this weekend and leading 40 other world leaders in standing up for free speech and denouncing last week’s terrorist attack, Joe Biden decided he would rather relax at his home in Delaware. He even had administration officials try to spin his absence to Bloomberg.
The lack of American representation in Paris has been called a mistake, an embarrassment and even CNN’s Jake Tapper said he was ashamed.
I say this as an American – not as a journalist, not as a representative of CNN – but as an American: I was ashamed.
I certainly understand the security concerns when it comes to sending President Barack Obama, though I can’t imagine they’re necessarily any greater than
sending the lineup of other world leaders, especially in aggregate.But I find it hard to believe that collectively President Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State John Kerry, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, Treasury Secretary Jack Lew and Attorney General Eric Holder – who was actually in France that day for a conference on counterterrorism – just had no time in their schedules on Sunday. Holder had time to do the Sunday shows via satellite but not to show the world that he stood with the people of France?
Hopefully the time at home was worth it Joe.