Biden's decision and its consequences

It has been quite a week for political junkies.  The bitter infighting among House Republicans, Paul Ryan's imitation of Hamlet, the looming Benghazi confrontation between Trey Gowdy's transparently political agenda and Hillary and finally, Joe Biden's decision not to get pummeled by another losing Presidential campaign.  Among the pundits and insiders in D.C., Joe Biden is universally well liked, mostly because he plays the inside political game as well as anyone ever has.  Outside the beltway, he is mostly known as a gaffe prone politician with wandering hands.  Fortunately for him, someone with common sense convinced him even with a first class organization he was going nowhere unless he  was willing to become an attack dog.  That doesn't fit with his image and would have been a stretch.  On policy questions there is little or no daylight between him and Hillary and he could not credibly gone after Bernie's fans without denying his own legacy.   A Biden presidency would have been a disaster for Democrats as he would have either cheerfully given away the store to the opposition in the name of bipartisanship, or he would retreat into a fetal position because of his hurt when the Republicans inevitably made a mockery of his attempts at comity.  So now the field is clear.  If Hillary handles 8 hours of testimony today, she will have basically tied up the nomination.  If she stumbles, all bets are off.