Being Gracious and Polite is No Longer Politically Correct

The other day our previous vice-president...and possible 2020 presidential candidate...Joe Biden happened to mention the current VP, Mike Pence.  Biden, in the noble tradition of speaking kindly of another political leader from the opposing party, graciously stated that he thought Pence was a decent man.  That's all.  And you would have thought ol' Joe had said "Heil Hitler" from the reaction he got from his own party.  You see, it's not politically correct anymore to state your own beliefs and respectfully point out how another's differing perspective might be mistaken and worthy of correction.  No, nowadays in order to get in good with your own crowd, you have to personally denigrate the other's character and completely reject them as either insane, stupid, crooked, treasonous, bigoted...or a combination thereof.  After receiving a firestorm of criticism for his respectful depiction of a figure who is worthy of that deference if for no other reason than that he occupies such a significant place in our elected government, Biden backed down and tempered his remark to limit it to his assessment of Pence in the context of foreign policy.  In my opinion, Biden shouldn't have done that...he had been correct and proper in the first place for being courteous toward Pence. The particular special interest group that is so hatefully opposed to our vice-president and which called out Biden for his "decent" characterization of him is a victim of its own self-victimizing narrative, having distorted and misrepresented some of Pence's recent statements and positions regarding them.  I lost a bit of respect for Joseph Biden because of his hasty retreat from civility and wonder from this incident whether he could truly be a strong and effective president should he somehow manage to find himself elected to that office next year...he's starting to sound awfully weak to me...