Has the Labour Party won it for Joe Biden?

Had Corbyn won the election last year, writes John Rentoul, it might have strengthened Sanders’ case

Democrats may not have shifted towards Joe Biden were another septuagenarian now in No 10 (Getty)

A generation ago, Joe Biden’s career was derailed by the British Labour Party. In a speech in Iowa in 1987 he copied a line from Neil Kinnock, the Labour leader, asking: “Why is it that Joe Biden is the first in his family ever to go to a university? Why is it that my wife who is sitting out there in the audience is the first in her family to ever go to college? Is it because our fathers and mothers were not bright?”

The answer, as Biden went on to explain, but which was known to anyone who had seen Neil Kinnock’s broadcast for the 1987 British election, is that they did not have a “platform” on which to stand – a platform provided by the welfare state.

The reporting of Biden’s plagiarism finished his campaign; Michael Dukakis went on to win the Democratic nomination, then lost to George Bush Sr in the general election.