Biden naiveté watch

Score one for naiveté at Washington Monthly, where Steve Benen thinks Ted Kaufmann’s appointment to keep Joe Biden’s Senate seat warm for Beau Biden is:

[A]rguably the least offensive way to do it. Joe Biden was, just this month, re-elected to a seventh term. Real nepotism would be handing Biden's seat over to his son now, but by having a place-holder senator, who understands the chamber and will vote as Biden would have, voters will be able to choose Biden's replacement at the ballot box in 2010. That's likely to be Beau Biden, but he would at least have to earn it through public support, rather than inherit the seat directly through gubernatorial appointment.

Wrong motive on why this came down, Steve.

It’s that, even in an insular fiefdom like Delaware, the Bidens peré and fils, along with Gov. Ruth Ann Minner, knew that even “First State” voters would gag on the unseemliness of having a Beau Biden who is still in Iraq rammed down their throats.

So, it’s not that this is the least offensive way of doing nepotism, it’s that it’s the only politically realistic way of doing it. at Washington Monthly, where Steve Benen thinks Ted Kaufmann’s appointment to keep Joe Biden’s Senate seat warm for Beau Biden is:

[A]rguably the least offensive way to do it. Joe Biden was, just this month, re-elected to a seventh term. Real nepotism would be handing Biden's seat over to his son now, but by having a place-holder senator, who understands the chamber and will vote as Biden would have, voters will be able to choose Biden's replacement at the ballot box in 2010. That's likely to be Beau Biden, but he would at least have to earn it through public support, rather than inherit the seat directly through gubernatorial appointment.

Wrong motive on why this came down, Steve.

It’s that, even in an insular fiefdom like Delaware, the Bidens peré and fils, along with Gov. Ruth Ann Minner, knew that even “First State” voters would gag on the unseemliness of having a Beau Biden who is still in Iraq rammed down their throats.

So, it’s not that this is the least offensive way of doing nepotism, it’s that it’s the only politically realistic way of doing it.