Biden said I went from been ng a jet pilot to wanting to be a trial lawyer.
https://web.archive.org/web/20080919060037/http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/washington/cleubsdorf/stories/082308dnpolbiden87profile.4d6e19b.html
by the tragic car accident that killed Neilia and the youngest of their three children.
Now 44, Biden is trying to fulfill the second half of his ambitious goal by becoming the youngest man to win the presidency since John F. Kennedy was elected in 1960.
He brings to the campaign an ingratiating manner and a quick wit with considerable Irish charm plus an ability to rouse audiences that few Democrats can match.
But he also brings a reputation as a showboater and a hothead with a penchant for windiness.
His candidacy was delayed earlier this year when he became chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. It was further complicated when President Reagan nominated appeals Judge Robert H. Bork to the Supreme Court and Biden became enmeshed in controversy over a series of outspoken – and, some felt, inconsistent – statements.
Some saw a familiar pattern.
"I was in Maine when I read about what he said about Bork," said Richard Sincock, a veteran Delaware Republican officeholder.
"I thought to myself, 'Same old Joe Biden,'" said Sincock, who served with Biden on the New Castle County Council in the late 1960s. "He's always been inclined to be brash and that hasn't changed."
Biden said, "I've been honest about what I think. I don't mean I've always been right. But I've never pussyfooted around."
"He's very quick to look at an issue and perhaps maybe too quick to formulate opinions on occasion," said Sen. Nancy Kassebaum, R-Kan., who worked closely with Biden on budget matters. "He is bright . . . (and) genuinely cares about public issues. The question is whether he can convince people he can command and control."
For Biden, that question will get its severest public test when the Judiciary Committee opens hearings Sept. 15 on the Bork nomination.
"That's his New Hampshire primary," analyst William Schneider said recently. Biden's presidential prospects will be strongly affected by the impression voters receive from the way he conducts the hearings and subsequent floor debate.
The senator can't remember when he first thought of seeking election to the White House. Though his parents had no particular interest in politics, his sister Valerie, who managed each of his campaigns, said he was always interested but wanted to be a senator, not president.
Biden was born in Scranton, Pa., where his parents met, but moved to Wilmington when he was 10. His father sold cars and the family wasn't wealthy. But the close-knit clan sometimes is compared to the Kennedys – a logical comparison, given its Irish Catholicism, and one that some say has been deliberately fostered by Biden family members.
Biden was a perennial class president, and friends said he would someday hold the nation's highest office, recalled David Walsh, a high school classmate at Archmere Academy and later Biden's law partner.
"Since he was such an obvious leader and very articulate and certainly not shy, everybody would say he'd make a great politician," Walsh said.
Biden said, "I went from wanting to be a jet fighter pilot to wanting to be a trial lawyer." But he added