I wrote for Politico today about the Biden touching scandal:
Biden’s conduct is obviously different and less blameworthy than the men caught up in #MeToo: It’s not furtive, but out in the open, not sexual, but affectionate. He doesn’t stand accused of cruelly manipulating anyone or creating a hostile workplace.
No, his fundamental offense is not realizing that some people might not be as into Joe Biden as Joe Biden is into Joe Biden. He has an ego, not a libido, problem.
Biden lost all self-awareness somewhere in the Senate chamber about 40 years ago.
It’s not just that Biden’s a figure from a different era; he’s been in the bubble, deferred to and adored as a matter of course, for decades. He won his first Senate race at 29. He served with Barry Goldwater, William Fulbright, Adlai Stevenson and Sam Ervin. He was in the Senate for 36 years, before moving to the even more rarefied air of the vice presidency.
So, he’s clueless in the way that old Washington hands who refer to themselves in the third person and consider themselves living legends always are—only more so.
To use Biden’s own term, he believes his own malarkey.
He really thinks he’s the most charming man in the room and a master at human interaction. In his view, he’s doing everyone a favor by giving them a warm bath of Biden.