About Biden's Public Physicality

I’ve been seeing some of the footage, some of it several years old and often openly, publicly available, of former vice-president and presumed 2020 presidential candidate Joe Biden getting close to various women, leaning over them and whispering, and the like. The “scandal” about Joe’s “creepy” behavior was sparked by a Nevada state legislator for whom he campaigned in 2014 and who claimed that he kissed the back of her head onstage...this she now says bothered her. Of course, nothing was said at the time and guess what! it turns out she’s a big supporter of Bernie Sanders, second in the polls right now to Biden. How cynical...Biden’s been on visual record as being close and familiar with everyone...male and female...although his contacts with women seem more intimate. Back in 2015 Jon Stewart made fun of him for this tendency on his Daily Show comedy program,.  But now he’s being crucified, especially by the Democratic left and its plethora of frustrated presidential candidates, for just being himself. In public.  Yes, I think Biden overstepped, but did so in innocence in spite of the self-serving, expedient political correctness going on now to knock him out of the race before he's even started. I’d like to assemble a video recording of all those politicians criticizing Biden’s behavior showing all the times THEY are publicly, physically close with those around them...

Now that I've dispensed with the political spin on Biden's obvious public physicality, let me address my own feelings about public embracing and people getting into each others' physical spaces.  I remember the old opening segment of The Mary Tyler Moore Show where Lou, Murray, and Ted are taking turns hugging Mary...seems like this kind of set in motion the idea that in order to express simple friendship, folks have to get into it physically...Biden seems to have adopted this notion, one with which I strongly disagree.  But whereas a simple, brief hug...and my preferred, more respectful alternative, the half-hug...have been largely accepted as common social discourse, there are people who regularly tend to get too close as well as those who feel the need to "reach out and touch" when they are engaged in dialogue.  In this I'm like the women complaining about Biden...get out of my space!  But I'm not going to act at the time like everything's hunky-dory and then come out years later like it was some kind of traumatic event...if this is part of the "Me Too" movement, then they need to sort out their priorities.  Personally, I don't even like to shake hands, preferring instead to give a friendly wave of my hand or the "thumbs up" sign.  But I'm just one person in the ocean of humanity and sometimes "going with the flow" is dictated...