Disrespecting our Commander-in-Chief in Wartime.

Honestly? I am starting to pity Joe Biden.

Carolyn Kaster/AP

What the press is leaving out of Mr. Obama's "joke" opening of calling Biden his vice president here, is that before the hug and the admission that Barry and Kali were just funning with slow ole Joe is that Joe Biden stepped forward and saluted Mr. Obama before that hug where they finally let him in on the joke... 

"This was all set up, Joe."

It's cool to be black and hip and young and loved. And rich!  Harris and Obama came up in the "reparations" days of black achievement -- others got bloodied breaking down barriers so these two could walk right in, at such a young age when the standards for blacks were lowered to accommodate the racial history of discrimination in parts of our country.

But there's a lot of older, wiser, more dignified white guys than Joe, who haven't yet lost their mental faculties, who have independent professions that make the country work, who still vote and they vote Republican.  Careful when you disrespect that... they are a big part of the American team, still.  Without them, the country likely would not run as effectively as it currently does.  Don't tear down substance for style.  Don't replace integrity with the coolkids factor.

Hunter knew he could play his father.

So does Kamala.  So does Barack.  

But to see them shame him so publicly, especially when he is so down in the polls and politically lost ... I feel sorry for Joe Biden today.  You almost wish they'd just put him out to pasture before he gets himself in any real trouble, nevermind what his words are already doing to the world...

If he keeps talking, and pushing for assassinations of foreign leaders and charging soldiers with war crimes for killing innocents, the Golden Rule tells me that is going to come back to haunt America.

The rest of the world thought ill of Cheney Bush for their war crimes, but you didn't see a big publicity show about bringing them to justice for their evil deeds.  God will judge that.

But what his alleged political friends and allies are doing to an old man right now, and how he is being played by the press, it's just sad, and we can all judge that in our own time.

Barack Obama returned to the White House on Tuesday for the first time in five years and, as he started speaking, referred to Joe Biden as “vice president.”

 I guess even the press just found it too pathetic or painful to report old Joe's "salute"...  

“That was a joke,” Obama said, with the current president and current vice president by his side.

He then gave Biden a hug.

“That was all set up. My president, Joe Biden. Vice President Harris,” Obama said.

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Added: Dana Milbank channels the late Margot Kidder as Lois Lane in Superman, looking up to the skies as the city crumbles in destruction:

President Obama, your country needs you

Opinion by Dana Milbank 

"Superman!  Where are you?!?"