Biden's "Test" Talk Indicative of Obama's Authoritarian Style

When Joe Biden says Obama would not respond to an international crisis the way people would want him to, he is indicating that Obama will govern by his own playbook, regardless of America's interests or historical ties. Obama's personality reinforces this impression.

Biden's comment was not meant to appeal to supporters for their backing in the response to an expected crisis. On the contrary, Biden spoke to the American public, knowing his words would be made public very quickly. He knows how Obama will respond and he knows that Obama's hard core supporters will approve of his response. He also knows that the rest of the American people will disapprove of Obama's reaction.

An example is an Iranian attack on Israel. Here Obama can respond in two ways that would be disliked by the majority of Americans. He can choose to do nothing and instead plead for both parties to talk (the "Georgia" response) or he can choose to retaliate against Israel if Israel strikes Iran. The latter is an incredulous action to almost every American, but it is not inconceivable that an Obama administration would choose to punish Israel for either striking pre-emptively against Iran, or for responding to an attempted Iranian attack. Obama has long time associations who are strongly anti-Israel and appears to harbor the same feelings, as became evident during one of his debates with McCain. He also expressed very strong sympathy for the Palestinians this past summer.

Another example would be an attempt by China to seize Taiwan. In this case Obama would obviously respond by pulling back American naval forces from the region. There would be no attempt by a president Obama to secure Taiwan's independence.