Delightful, as are so many of Greasy Joe’s public pronouncements. The peg for this is Biden rushing to Obama’s defense after Jim DeMint wondered why he hadn’t yet gotten around to holding a meeting on Afghanistan despite having chaired a senate subcommittee that covers NATO for the past year and a half. Biden’s answer today? Afghanistan’s being dealt with at the full committee level, hence there was no need. Biden’s answer in August 2007?

Biden’s letter brought attention to the fact that Obama did not attend two of those three [full committee] hearings — and for the third, on March 8, 2007, Obama only asked one question, one unrelated to Afghanistan.

How do I know the latter fact? From an August 2007 press release from Biden himself, when he was running for president.

“BIDEN CAMPAIGN CONGRATULATES SEN. OBAMA FOR JOHNNY-COME-LATELY POSITION,” it read. Noting that at the March 2007 hearing, “Sen. Obama asked one question that was unrelated to Taliban or Afghanistan.”

And that ain’t all. NBC asked Biden’s spokesman for further comment at the time. Quote:

“We find it a little disingenuous that Sen. Obama is hailing this as a new bold initiative when he has neglected to join his colleagues in the Senate when the opportunities have been there to redirect our forces into Afghanistan” Biden campaign manager Luis Navarro said at the time. “It’s good to see Sen. Obama has finally arrived at the right position, but this can hardly be considered bold leadership.” Ouch.

The RNC fact sheet on this has cites aplenty, including the comforting detail tucked away at the end that the man who’s itching to fight the “real war” has never so much as visited Afghanistan, let alone called a hearing on it. Exit question: Who’s the most prominent Democrat to have laid into Obama for his dereliction of duty on this issue? No, it’s not Biden. No, it’s not Joe Wilson either, but that’s a good guess. Anyone remember this ad? The substance of it got overlooked in the nutroots’ rush to focus on the Real Issues in the campaign by doing elaborate skin-tone color comparisons, but it’s worth revisiting now. Click the image to watch.