MEMPHIS, Tenn. — “Hello. You’ve won too many damn awards for me to be interviewed by you. How are you?”
“We’d like to stand over here if you could Mr. Vice President.”
“Sure. Be happy to.”
Yes. The Vice President is as nice as they say, and although he would talk about other topics, he didn’t want to sell short the reason why he came here.
He even brought a map illustrating that when it comes to transportation, Memphis matters more than ever.
“More tonnage. More material rolls up and down this old Mississippi River. It’s the source of industrial strength in the entire Midwest and this is critically important here,” he said.
Was it a waste of taxpayer dollars to make this trip?
Mr. Biden says no.
He’s not here to brag about the past.
He’s here making a pitch for the future.
“We’ve got to make it clear to the American people we’ve got to invest in infrastructure in order to maintain our leading position in the world as the greatest economy in the world. That’s what this is about,” he said.
President Obama appointed Biden to make sure fraud and waste from the stimulus packaged was kept to a minimum and he says he delivered.
He said two-tenths of one percent was spent unwisely.
Now his focus in the cancer moonshot, to speed up the race for a cure.
“St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital is at the forefront of that. Great hospital,” Biden said.
“Is there anything you can tell the folks in Memphis in terms of the role, if any, as you start this project that St. Jude might have?”
“St. Jude will play a major role as all the major research hospitals in the nation are.”
Biden said he’d like to come back to Memphis soon to see St. Jude.
And what about the Supreme Court vacancy?
He says he’s working with the President on a nominee and is glad some Senate Republicans are softening their stance on blocking that idea.
“If we don’t appoint someone now and get the process going, it’ll be a year and a half before we have a nominee on the court and we already have a dysfunctional Congress. We can’t afford a dysfunctional Supreme Court.”
Finally, we asked him the number one question our followers on Facebook wanted us to ask: might he still get into a Presidential campaign that gets stranger by the day?
He still says his decision is no.
“I know the time has passed now and I’m prepared to support whomever the Democrats nominate,” he replied.
“There’s no scenario?”
“None that I can see.”
“Do you see yourself lending your support to either of the two candidates running?”
“I will. Whomever the nominee is.”
“Not beforehand?”
“Not beforehand. That’s something we should allow the rank and file of the party to decide,” he said.
