Basta: enough already! It's not that John Heilemann thinks Joe Biden is a liar, it's just that he's not convinced that Biden knows his own mind yet. And so it was that on today's Morning Joe, Heilemann declared "if he called me this morning and said I'm going to get in today at noon, I wouldn't believe him because I think there's a chance that by noon he'd change his mind."
Heilemann used two words with rhyming Middle English endings to describe Biden's charged emotional state: fraught and wrought.
So, what's the betting among NB readers: in or out? I say Joe jumps in.
JOE SCARBOROUGH: John Heilemann, what's your latest reporting on Joe Biden?JOHN HEILEMANN: I've given up.
JOE: You can't guess.
HEILEMANN: At this point all the conversation -- I don't believe in any of the reporting I read. I don't think -- I think at this point it's down to him in a deeply personal, deeply psychologically, emotionally fraught way. All the political arguments have been made. I don't think they matter. I don't think how Hillary did in the debate performance matters. I don't think how she does in the Benghazi hearings on Thursday matters. For him, I think he's at that point where everybody gets you ultimately just have to do the final gut check and decide. And if he called me this morning and said I'm going to get in today at noon I wouldn't believe him because I think there's a chance that by noon he'd change his mind.
JOE: Well, you know, he has been calling people, telling, based on all the reporting, Willie, that he's going to get into the race. It's been seen and reported this weekend after he talk to the head of the firefighters union that he was going to be getting into the race. We've heard, unequivocally, Joe Biden calling, saying I'm going to get into the race. But I'm with you, John.
HEILEMANN: Until the moment I hear him announce it, I just, not that I don't believe that the reports of him saying these things are true. I just think he's been so emotionally wrought for the last couple months and everything I know from people who have talked to him say that he's gone back and forth repeatedly for the last eight weeks. So I just --
JOE: It actually goes to what we heard in the Bloomberg News, Willie: if he can't make up his mind, he shouldn't run.
