Sen. Joe Biden has been tapped as Sen. Barack Obama’s running mate.  Biden has been in Washington since 1972 when he was first elected to the United States Senate.  He is a smart guy but a rather loquacious fellow, which has gotten him in trouble several times.  Clearly, the Obama campaign felt the need to offset Sen. Obama’s gross lack of experience on national security and believed that Sen. Biden would do just that.  Sen. Biden is currently the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

However, this pick is a sign of desperation for the Obama campaign, which has begun to see the writing on the wall.  The reality is that Obama’s small lead in public opinion polls has completely evaporated.  First, Biden is a life-long senator and has no executive experience.  Second, it will be difficult to advance the “change message,” which Obama has built his entire campaign on.  Biden has been in the Senate longer than John McCain.  Third, Biden is a loose cannon, who will most likely make several verbals gaffes during the next two months.  Fourth, Biden will likely enflame supporters of Sen. Hillary Clinton, who simply felt that Clinton–who received an impressive 18 million votes during the primary–should have been on the ticket.  Fifth, Biden supported going to war in Iraq–obviously a substantive policy difference.  Plus, Biden doesn’t even think Obama’s ready to be president and he loves John McCain (see the ad below)!