Biden: Obama would have been "one-term president" if bin Laden mission had failed
If the U.S. forces who took out Osama bin Laden in his Pakistan compound last May had failed, President Obama would likely have been a "one-term president," his vice president, Joe Biden, told donors Monday night.
The vice president, speaking at a fundraiser hosted by Senator John Kerry and his wife at their tony Washington home, praised the president for his "backbone" - and for pressing ahead with a risky mission to take down bin Laden even while "his presidency was on the line."
"This guy's got a backbone like a ramrod," Biden said, of Mr. Obama's decision, according to a White House pool report. "He said, 'Go,' knowing his presidency was on the line. Had he failed in that audacious mission, he would've been a one-term president."
Osama bin Laden was killed almost a year ago after Mr. Obama approved a top-secret raid, carried out by an elite team of United States Navy SEALs, at a highly fortified compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, where bin Laden, mastermind of the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, had been living.
At the event, a private fundraiser for Mr. Obama's re-election campaign which cost a minimum of $10,000 per couple, Biden lauded the president for what he cast as a series of accomplishments in his first term.
"Osama bin Laden is dead. General Motors is alive," Biden said. "This guy's the real deal. He may say it differently than some of you are used to hearing, but this guy's the real deal... and his policies are working."
Biden thanked the guests for their donations, which he cited as crucial for the president's re-election efforts.
"We're not going to be able to compete in terms of the super PAC money," he said. "The truth of the matter is we can't match it."
He argued that fundraising the "old-fashioned" way would combat what he anticipates as a "barrage of negative ads that will inundate the airwaves that you have never ever seen in any of your careers."
