My heart really does go out to all the super PAC-funded, John Podesta-approved, focus-grouped pro-Wall Street anti-single-payer health care centrist Democrats, none of whom are wealthy or possess credentials from elite institutions or have any powerful and influential friends. There they are at the fringes of American public discourse, shut out by the mainstream media, their talking points dismissed out of hand, slandered, hated, shunned. The last thing they need is some smart-ass financial lawyer from Harvard, a school where no one agrees with them about anything, talking down to them from her lofty perch.

This line of attack from Biden is painfully silly. But it is also brilliant. Say what you want about centrist Democrats, but they know how the game works. They might have decided that they are no longer actually interested in winning general elections, but when it comes to keeping their progressive enemies in their own party at bay, they do a much better job than anyone, Donald Trump included. The approach is always the same. Call whatever incomprehensible Band-Aid policy you are proposing “common sense”; as soon as anyone tries to explain why it won’t work, shout him down. The very act of protesting vindicates your position that they are out-of-touch intellectuals more concerned with ivory tower abstractions than with getting things done.