Joe Biden needs a brilliant running-mate to stand any chance of beating Trump

On his own I doubt Joe Biden has any chance of beating Donald Trump in November. He just doesn't come across as tough enough to take on the world's problems, not that Trump has had much, if any, success in confronting the biggest foreign policy challenges around right now - China, Iran, North Korea, Russia , Syria, Hong Kong etc. But Biden as the leader of the free world? I don't see it. I'm reading Robert Gates's book, Duty: Memoirs of a Secretary at War and it seems that Biden, then vice-president when Gates was defence secretary under Obama, was a nightmare to deal with, constantly teaming up with the White House national security staff (NSS) to undermine both Gates at the Pentagon and Hillary Clinton at the State Department, especially over policy on Afghanistan. Biden and his mates at the White House including Tom Donilon, deputy national security adviser, believed the military were trying to gang-bang Obama into making decisions to send thousands more troops to Afghanistan and they did everything they could to thwart the defence department. Gates was pretty rude about Biden's competence in his memoir, and it set me thinking that if the former vice president became president, could he once again be a nightmare to deal with? Barack Obama was bad enough in coming to decisions but after endless toing and froing he generally sided with the Pentagon and the military when Gates wanted the commander-in-chief to go one way when Biden and co wanted to go the other way. I suspect that Biden, as president, would also demand endless Situation Room meetings before coming to any security policy decisions. It is obviously sensible for the president to mull over all the options before making a decision, but if, as was the case in the Obama administration, there are rival camps fighting each other for the president's ear, then decisive, authoritative government tends to get undermined. Trump is the opposite. He wakes up in the morning and says what he wants to do: warn Iran he's going to bomb them out of the water if they attack US ships in the Gulf, reduce North Korea to rubble if they threaten America, increase the trade war with China etc etc. That style of government has its problems too, of course. But somehow, dithering over decisions doesn't boost confidence, and I think Biden would be a ditherer. That may be unfair but I'm looking at his past record. So, if he is going to have any chance of beating Trump in November he has got to find himself a whizz bang presidential running mate who would be a sensational vice president. Someone tough and decisive and persuasive. I don't know the VP candidates well enough to know which of the many on the long list of candidates would have those qualities once esconced in the VP's office next to the West Wing. Some say it must be Elizabeth Warren but she and Biden don't look as if they are great mates. It has to be somebody whom he trusts and likes and someone who is tough as hell but charismatic with it. That's a lot to ask. It could be Senator Kamala Harris - my choice - or Senator Amy Klobuchar or Representative Val Demings of Florida. Biden doesn't have to decide until July but it will be the most important decision he has to make. Right now, on his own, he doesn't look like he is up to being the next president of the United States.