Joe Biden Tells San Francisco Crowd 'The Giants' Are Going To The Super Bowl

Vice President Joe Biden made a cardinal sin while speaking in San Francisco this week, muffing a football analogy and inadvertently suggesting to a crowd that he thought the 49ers would lose to the New York Giants on Sunday.

"The Giants [are] on their way to the Super Bowl," Biden enthusiastically told a group gathered at a private fundraiser, apparently referring to one of New York's NFL teams. He received "good-natured boos" for the comment, according to a pool report.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports that Biden attempted to make a rapid recovery:

After suggesting that the Giants were heading to the Super Bowl, Biden quickly recognized the gaffe and explained he was accustomed to thinking in terms of the San Francisco Giants and their baseball wins. His next reference was to the "49ers on their way" to the Big Game.

According to the Oakland Tribune, the event cost between $2,500 to $10,000 per ticket and brought in a total sum in the range of $275,000 to $1.1 million.

It's not unusual for the intersection of sports and politics to create some clumsy exchanges. Last year, Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R) tried to give a rousing speech about comebacks, but he instead accidentally jabbed at the heart of Cleveland sports fans.

"We never thought (former Cleveland Browns quarterback) Bernie Kosar would bring the Browns back and win that big championship game," Kasich said in November, amid signs that his controversial anti-union bill would be defeated at the polls. Of course, Kosar never actually won a championship game with Cleveland, losing in all three attempts. Kasich's anti-union measure would go on to meet a similar fate.

Comments

[Ted Glass]

05:01 PM on 01/21/2012

He was right, Giants in the Bowl!!

[SparkyDash]

09:55 PM on 01/20/2012

Interesting...I was in the audience and we gave Joe a bad time, he laughed and corrected, and we moved on.

He made a beautiful presentation, especially his advocacy for America's middle class, and we loved it. He said a hundred wonderful things, and made one off comment. SF wanted to make sure he didn't confuse their niners :)

We gave VP Joe Biden a standing ovation that he more than deserved.

[Ted Glass]

05:00 PM on 01/21/2012

Because he got confused for 10 seconds? No wonder you want Obama's College Transcripts you want to pore over them for any little nugget to criticize with. Ridiculous

[SparkyDash]

09:40 AM on 01/23/2012

Ah, Joe Biden's biggest fan, LOL.

I know all about VP Biden. You can't shovel here. But here's something of actual truth you can chew on: Our Vice President is a brilliant, talented, and generous individual we are lucky to have working for us in the nation's second highest office. He and President Obama will be reelected.

Little will matter what you think :-)

[PrincipiaChamp]

09:58 AM on 01/23/2012

Hey Sparky! I heard the audience loved Joe's speech and that he took time to talk with them. I hope you were one of the lucky ones to get to talk with him. What an interesting life he's led and what a wonderful and true public servant.

[SparkyDash]

06:11 AM on 01/24/2012

I was honored with an invite; very honored.

[Dale Birmingham]

06:45 PM on 01/19/2012

Of course he did. Garbage in garbage out.

[Politidelic]

06:21 PM on 01/19/2012

Aw Joe ya big lunk! GO NINERS!

[media4me2]

06:11 PM on 01/19/2012

Main page headlines if this were said by a conservative.

[Politidelic]

06:21 PM on 01/19/2012

aw, poor little conservatives get no love......

[TheTightwireGuy]

05:10 PM on 01/19/2012

This story also reminds of the following phrase: Loose lips sink ships.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loose_lips_sink_ships

But despite his tendency to make titanic verbal gaffes, Mr. Biden also reminds me of this larger-than-life figure in history whose notoriety is due in part to her surviving the sinking of the Titanic:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Brown

Cheers and be well, wherever you gaffe, Mr. Biden!

The Tightwire Guy

[vmf211]

12:46 AM on 01/20/2012

I'm going with stupid is as stupid does.

[3dtrix]

12:55 PM on 01/20/2012

One assumes that's because you're small-minded and hateful - we who admire Joe know that good-natured gaffes are part of who he is - and accept that - also in good nature.

Must seem like an alternate reality to folks like yourself...

[pkafin]

07:34 AM on 01/21/2012

Nobody actually thinks Joe Biden is stupid.. Even those who disagree with his policies don't level that accusation. Things do fly out of his mouth from time to time, however, that are comically wrong. As it is usually a matter of misspeak, I've never known him to double down on it the way someone like Sarah Palin did when talking about Paul Revere making a ride to warn the British not to take our guns away.

Joe's a big enough man to laugh at such statements and correct himself. Truth be told, as VP he's made a disappointingly few comical missteps with his mouth. I was expecting a bit more entertainment value out of him.

[SparkyDash]

09:56 PM on 01/20/2012

The only large gaffe is what the media makes it.

[TheTightwireGuy]

10:37 PM on 01/20/2012

Sparky,

Your comment here reminded me that I often now think that the landscape of political reporting by so much of the commercial media is a "vast wasteland" where

a) pulpy and nutrient-poor detritus is first harvested,

b) then packaged with distortions and exaggerations into easily consumable bundles of political infotainment,

c) that are in turn feed on a media conveyor belt to the political masses,

d) who for the most part, have no idea that most of what they is fed to them as "news" is nothing more than sensationalism,

e) which in turn is intended to stir their appetites for even MORE mostly useless but emotionally-stirring infotainment units.

But I've read somewhere recently that "less is more" in certain cases, so I'll leave this mini-rant at that.

Keep well 'til we chat next.

TTG

[DinSea]

05:08 PM on 01/19/2012

This is why Joe is the right hand man, sharing his vast political knowledge in the meeting room way more than he is placed out in front with the "hot mic". WE LOVE YOU, JOE!

OBAMA-BIDEN 2012 The only real choice for America.
Any other choice is for another agenda - not for the benefit of our country.

[media4me2]

06:11 PM on 01/19/2012

Stand up Chuck.....
Oh, never mind.

[DinSea]

07:25 PM on 01/19/2012

-or- "What's up Chuck?" ... my friend used to reply with the description of upchuck

[vmf211]

12:46 AM on 01/20/2012

Joe is like the punchline of a bad joke.

[SparkyDash]

09:57 PM on 01/20/2012

Oh, I'm sure that title goes to you :)

[TheTightwireGuy]

05:02 PM on 01/19/2012

"The Giants [are] on their way to the Super Bowl..."

This reminds me a story a former and much-older-than-me girlfriend told me about her father as a means to help me understand something about myself: Her father had this "nack" for saying the WORSE thing possible to someone even though it was true AND she was sure that he meant well in doing so. He just couldn't help himself.

Why do I say "true" here? Because as a Packers fan, my own 2012 Super Bowl hopes for my team (I also own a share of the Packers organization) were COMPLETELY destroyed by the unbelievably surging New York Football Giants:

http://scores.espn.go.com/nfl/recap?gameId=320115009

So here is my props to ever hopeful, and deservedly so, Giants fans for their team's decimation of my beloved Packers this past weekend:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8PpirBQPSo

And may the better team win in the upcoming Giants/Forty Niners playoff game:

http://www.kansascity.com/2012/01/19/3379928/nfl-playoff-preview-ny-giants.html

The (again humbled) Tightwire Guy

[momwhosbeenthroughitall]

04:05 PM on 01/19/2012

Personally, I'd rather hear our VP make a mistake like that about a sports team, than about how many justices sit on the Supreme Court....or about who exactly Paul Revere was warning when he undertook his famous ride. Or what that whole "situation in Libya" was about. Makes me feel confident he has his priorities straight.

[vmf211]

12:50 AM on 01/20/2012

Or that we have 57 states and not 50,or they speak Austrian in Austria, or that he called a navy corpman a navy corspe-man 4 times,or canceling the polish defence missile shield to protect them from Russian missiles on the 70th aniversary of teh Russian's invading Poland.
Now that was smart. We need more like him.

[momwhosbeenthroughitall]

10:10 AM on 01/20/2012

Actually, we do need more like him. Intelligent, thoughtful, insightful, compassionate individuals who have shown leadership and true values rather than the hateful, vitriolic rhetoric that has come out of the GOP candidates these months. I have never heard our President garner cheers when speaking about someone being hurt, dying, or referring to a minority, such as when the crowd booed a military serviceman because he was gay.

[rebel9999]

04:03 PM on 01/19/2012

At least he didn't make fun of Special Olympians.

[bullthull]

03:43 PM on 01/19/2012

Biden, what can you say. The only reason I pray for Obama is Biden.

[TitaniumAvatar]

03:38 PM on 01/19/2012

He meant to say the 49ers are going to the World Series.

[Politidelic]

06:24 PM on 01/19/2012

No that name is already occupied by G.W., Rick Perry, Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum, Michelle Bachmann, Mitt Romney.........shall I go on?

[vmf211]

12:51 AM on 01/20/2012

I thought he ment to say the 49ers would win the world cup.

[jbon911647]

03:32 PM on 01/19/2012

Really? Is this the level of our elected politicians? And Americans actually sit around and wonder what is wrong with America.

[SaveTheMarshMouse]

04:03 PM on 01/19/2012

Actually I would hope he has more important things on his mind (like foreign affairs) than football...

[Politidelic]

06:24 PM on 01/19/2012

Save the drama for your mama. It was a football gaffe.

[jbon911647]

07:35 AM on 01/20/2012

It's called " Situational Awareness", if you don't have that, then you have no business representing Americans.

WAKE UP.

[tapley]

03:32 PM on 01/19/2012

They say a gaff is when you accidentally tell the truth. He's right, the Giants ARE going to the Superbowl.

[Windpiper]

03:38 PM on 01/19/2012

Yep!!

[Politidelic]

06:25 PM on 01/19/2012

Nope! Not on our home field they're not.

[blurredmolly]

03:25 PM on 01/19/2012

ahhh Uncle Joe, God love 'em.