Former Vice President Joe Biden, whose notorious mouth often has left audiences aghast – remember when he shouted to an Iowa crowd, “Where’s my old butt buddy”? – apparently is much more demanding about what other people say.
About him.
The London Daily Mail reported a provision of his proposed agreement to speak at the University of Utah is that he not be called “former” vice president.
He also wanted the university to buy 1,000 copies of his latest book and provide a private plane.
But the ban on “former” was in one of several notable riders in the proposed contract, the paper said.
The 76-year-old served as Barack Obama’s vice president. But he’s also been unsuccessful in several attempts to gain the Oval Office. Nevertheless, he’s being rumored as a possible Democratic nominee for president in 2020.
Biden originally was supposed to have received a “reduced” speaking fee of $100,000. But he ended up declining it, because part of the amount would be funded by students, which violates his personal policy.
Explained the report: “It is not entirely clear what Biden’s beef with the ‘former’ part of his title might be. He served as vice president from 2009 until early 2017 during the Obama administration, after serving in the Senate from 1973 until 2009.”
The Daily Mail said the University of Utah “appeared to comply with the demand while promoting the event – using the preferred title as well as plugging his book, which covers the death of his son Beau, died of brain cancer as Biden was contemplating a potential run against Hillary Clinton to succeed Obama.”
A promotion said: “As part of The University of Utah MUSE Project’s Theme Year on ‘Purpose,’ Vice President Joe Biden offers a keynote address and discusses his #1 New York Times Bestseller Promise Me, Dad: A Year of Hope, Hardship, and Purpose.'”
The Daily Mail said details of the contract proposal by his agency, Creative Artists, were contained in a longer story about Biden’s earnings as well as his work to get his associates jobs at various foundations and universities.
Biden, who has admitted he regrets not challenging Hillary Clinton for the 2016 nomination, has a long record of verbal gaffes.
He once called supporters of President Trump the “dregs” of society.
He called “jobs” a three-letter word” and praised President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s response “on television” to the 1929 market crash.
At an AARP town hall meeting in 2009, he said: “You’re telling me we have to go spend money to keep from going bankrupt?’ The answer is yes, that’s what I’m telling you.”
Biden has suggested that today’s immigration standards would have kept Barack Obama’s ancestors at their shoemaking business in Ireland.
In an audio recording posted by the Washington Examiner, Biden is heard saying: “If the restrictions we’re insisting on today existed when my great great-grandfather emigrated from Ireland, came in 1950, worked a year and then sent for his family.”
He continues: “I might point out that particular grandfather left the same county in Ireland as a shoemaker within a month of Barack Obama’s great great great-grandfather leaving the same county as a shoemaker at the same time.
“Isn’t that amazing? Barack Obama and I are president now, and vice president of the United States of America. If we applied the same standards as we’re applying today, that wouldn’t have happened,” he said.
At a gun-control press conference with New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Biden said, “Think about what happened out in – when Gabby Giffords, my good friend, was shot and mortally wounded.”
Former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., was critically injured by a gunshot to the head in 2011, but she survived.
Biden encountered two nuns outside of St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican after he attended the Inauguration Mass of Pope Francis. Biden somehow divined from the nuns’ smiles that they agreed with his views on immigration and gun control.
“It translates at home with the simple things like making sure we fix the broken immigration system, making sure we make our neighborhoods safer by having rational gun safety and international relations, reaching out and have war as the last option to protect our interests and so it was an exciting time. It gave me a lot of hope and, again, I’ll close where I began. Just look at the expression in the faces of those two nuns. You can tell they share my view,” he said.
During an onlineown hall, Biden said, “If you want to protect yourself, get a double-barrel shotgun, just fire two blasts outside the house.”
He didn’t explain how a two-shot shotgun could be used as a defensive weapon after firing both shots.
Biden followed with more advice in an interview with Field and Stream magazine, advising gun owners to “just fire the shotgun through the door.”
In a 2013 visit to London, Biden said the U.S. and Britain have an “open relationship.”
After attending a U.K. national security council meeting he stated, “I spent half my life on our national security council.” Biden at the time was 70. He has been on the U.S. National Security Council for four years.
Biden mistook Portugal for Poland in a statement later corrected on the official White House transcript. Referring to the European debt crisis, he spoke of “Greece, Ireland, Poland, Spain and Italy.” Poland was not suffering a debt crisis and is not even a member of the Eurozone.
In Munich, Biden mixed up former Sens. Sam Nunn and Richard Lugar. Again, the official White House transcript fixed the error.
Also in Munich, Biden said then-President Obama, the commander in chief, does not want to go to Iraq and Afghanistan.
“I have traveled over 640,000 miles since I’ve been vice president, and most of the time the president sends me to places that he doesn’t want to go. (Laughter.) So I’ve spent an awful lot of time with McCain and others in Afghanistan and Iraq, and so it’s nice to be here in Germany,” he quipped.
Americans paid quite a price for Biden’s trip to deliver misstatements, literally. A government document shows Biden’s stay at the five-star Hotel Intercontinental Paris Le Grand cost taxpayers $585,000.50. He stayed there one night.
At the Iowa State Society inauguration ball, Biden declared, “I’m proud to be president of the United States.” He corrected himself after the audience began to laugh, saying, “I’m proud to be vice president of the United States. And I’m prouder to be Barack Obama, President Barack Obama’s vice president,” he confusingly added.
Biden’s gaffes through the years include many memorable turns of phrase.
- Aug. 22, 2012: “Folks, I can tell you I’ve known eight presidents, three of them intimately.”
- Aug. 14, 2012 (to a largely African-American audience): “Look at what [Republicans] value, and look at their budget. And look what they’re proposing. [Romney] said in the first 100 days, he’s going to let the big banks write their own rules – unchain Wall Street. They’re going to put y’all back in chains.”
- May 16, 2012: “My mother believed and my father believed that if I wanted to be president of the United States, I could be vice president!”
- April 26, 2012: “I promise you, the president has a big stick. I promise you.”
- March 23, 2010 (to President Obama, during the health-care law signing ceremony): “This is a big f—ing deal!”
- March 17, 2010: “His mom lived in Long Island for 10 years or so. God rest her soul. And – although, she’s – wait – your mom’s still – your mom’s still alive. Your dad passed. God bless [his] soul.”
- Feb. 6, 2009: “If we do everything right, if we do it with absolute certainty, there’s still a 30 percent chance we’re going to get it wrong.”
- Jan. 20, 2009 (referring to Justice John Paul Stevens): “Jill and I had the great honor of standing on that stage, looking across at one of the great justices, Justice Stewart.”
- Oct. 15, 2008: “… a three-letter word: jobs. J-O-B-S, jobs.”
- Sept. 22, 2008: “When the stock market crashed, Franklin D. Roosevelt got on the television and didn’t just talk about the, you know, the princes of greed. He said, ‘Look, here’s what happened.” (The market crashed in 1929, before FDR was president.)
- Sept. 12, 2008 (to wheelchair-bound Missouri state Sen. Chuck Graham): “Stand up, Chuck, let ’em see ya.”
- Sept. 10, 2008: “Hillary Clinton is as qualified or more qualified than I am to be vice president of the United States of America. Quite frankly, it might have been a better pick than me.”
- Aug. 23, 2008: “A man I’m proud to call my friend. A man who will be the next president of the United States — Barack America!”
- Jan. 31, 2007: “I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy. I mean, that’s a storybook, man.”
- June 2006: “You cannot go to a 7-11 or a Dunkin’ Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent. … I’m not joking.”
His behavior at times also has been notable.
He was accused of nuzzling the wife of Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter, and later, found it awkward when the daughter of a senator rejected his attempt to kiss her.
