The sheer awfulness of Hillary Clinton’s candidacy is sinking in on the power elite of the Democratic Party, and signals are being sent. It is going to be stiletto time soon. The lethal combination of her scandals and her unappealing, wooden, personality that reeks of phoniness could bring down not only her presidential campaign, but the entire down-ticket of the Dems. Thus it is that the semi-official party organ, the New York Times is signaling major donors, campaign workers, and apparatchiki of the party that it is time to think the unthinkable, and turn to the unlikeliest of saviors, Joe Biden.

Two high profile pieces in the Times tell the story. The first, a front page article yesterday by Amy Chozick, normally on the Hillary beat,  builds the case for a Biden run:

The support Mr. Biden has garnered speaks to growing concerns among Democrats that Mrs. Clinton could lose in Iowa and New Hampshire, as the populist message of one of her opponents, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, draws swelling crowds.

“The reality is it’s going to be a tough, even-steven kind of race, and there’s that moment when a lot of party establishment would start exactly this kind of rumble: ‘Is there anybody else?’ ” said Joe Trippi, a Democratic strategist.

Bernie Sanders is a unacceptable choice to party elites. He isn’t even in the party; he is a socialist who caucuses in the Senate with Democrats. He actually believes the stuff he says -- he isn’t faking being a leftist, which makes him anathema to the Wall Street insiders who fund the party and to the crony capitalists who fear their loan guarantees, ethanol mandates, and open borders policies would not survive a Sanders presidency, no matter how unlikely that is. 

He’s also (ahem) Jewish, and even though we’re not supposed to notice, the hard truth is that driving black turnout for a ticket headed by a Jew will be so difficult that the down-ticket candidates would be in danger of losing their seats. And if that happens, the GOP’s domination of state-level politics could increase to the point that an Article V Constitutional Convention becomes a real possibility, and with that could come structural changes that would shift the balance of power against the Dems.

So, Bernie is not going to go anywhere, no matter how enthusiastic the crowds he draws. A comparison to Donald Trump has some merit, except that Sanders cannot self-finance.

Elizabeth Warren has steadfastly refused to run, and is a rookie senator. For the moment, she is out of consideration, though who knows what will happen? But the party puppet masters for the moment are not pressuring her. The others, like Webb and O’Malley, are just not taken seriously for various reasons. That leaves Biden:

“The No. 1 thing voters want is a candidate who is honest and trustworthy, and the veep is leading in those polls,” said William Pierce, executive director of Draft Biden, a “super PAC” that is trying to build enthusiasm for a possible candidacy. (snip)

Mr. Biden could still decide not to run. Confidants say they expect him to make something official by early September. Other than by not ruling out a run, and by holding preliminary meetings, he has not openly fueled speculation about his candidacy. As of Saturday, he had no trips planned to Iowa or New Hampshire in the coming weeks. But an intermediary recruited by the vice president’s office has been in touch with potential staff members who have not yet signed on to the Clinton campaign.

I think Biden is being coy. He doesn’t want to be seen to knife Hillary, and he is aware that his own liabilities as a candidate are legion. He doesn’t realize that he is an amiable simpleton, but he does know that his mouth runs faster than his brain and that this gets him in trouble. But there is a method to counteract this fault: The Beau Strategy.

The Beau Strategy paints Biden as a victim, a father in mourning over his beloved son, determined to fulfill the destiny the departed saintly Beau endowed him with. The Democratic Party and the entire academic/cultural apparatus is now devoted to the notion that victimhood endows one with political superpowers, including invulnerability to attacks. Attack a designated victim, and the fury of the attack bounces off the Invisible Shield of Victimhood and weakens the attacker.  Thus, if  when Biden says something idiotic in a presidential debate, his Republican opponent will be attacked for pouncing on the opportunity. “Have you no decency? The man is mourning his son!”

Okay, it’s not quite the same mojo as being black or a woman would provide, but it will do in a pinch. Give him a smart, black running mate (Hello, Senator Cory Booker!) and victory is at least thinkable.

If you doubt me, read either Maureen Dowd’s maudlin column titled, “Joe Biden in 2016: What Would Beau Do?,” or better yet, scan Bill Kristol’s astute blog in the Weekly Standard pointing out that the catty columnist could only have gotten the information in her columen from Biden himself or a close family member. 

Biden is in on the game and biden’ his time (pardon the pun). If Hillary were the least bit intuitive, she would be feeling a little tingle in area of her back between her shoulder blades.