Opinion: Would you commit to support the party’s candidate?

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Delaware’s Sen. Joe Biden had perhaps the best line of the night a few minutes ago during the Democratic debate on CNN.

All of the candidates on stage were asked if they would commit right now to support the nominee of the Democratic Party next year? Almost all of the candidates said they would, including John Edwards, who seemed to fudge on that point once recently. ‘Is that a planted question?’ he asked.

They went down the line of candidates -- yes, yes, yes. Dennis Kucinich conditioned his support on the nominee renouncing war as an instrument of national policy. The last candidate was Biden. Would he support the candidate, whomever that was?

‘Hell, no,’ he said, ‘I wouldn’t support any of these guys.’

He got a huge round of laughter and applause, as he added, yes, of course, he would.

The Times’ story by Mark Z. Barabak and Scott Martelle is available here. The complete debate transcript is available here.

--Andrew Malcolm