Clark had indeed made that clear, as did the other senators, who jumped in to reiterate the fact. Even the ultra-liberal Senator Alan Cranston (D-CA) rushed to Clark’s defense. Biden didn’t care.

The damage to Clark was done. Joe Biden may have been “sorry, Judge, really,” but he had so humiliated Clark that the judge became the laughing stock of the world, as the press lampooned him with headlines such as, “A Truly Open Mind” (Newsweek), “Next Question: A Clean Slate for State” (Time), and “Boning up at the State Department” (U.S. News and World Report). Foreign papers called him a “nitwit” and the “Don’t Know Man.” The London Daily Mirror editorialized: “America’s allies in Europe—Europe, Mr. Clark, you must have heard of it—will hope he is never in charge at a time of crisis.”

Most appreciative of Biden’s performance were the Soviets, who turned Biden’s work into a TASS press release. The official Soviet news agency stated: “In the course of the committee’s hearing it became clear that Clark is not competent.” TASS repeated the examples that Biden had elicited. “Still,” added TASS incredulously, “members of the committee supported Clark’s nomination to such a responsible post… But for all practical purposes he knows hardly anything about foreign policy.”

What the Soviets could not admit publicly is that they recognized Clark was a threat to their interests—that he would aid Reagan’s campaign to undermine the Evil Empire. They needed a way to discredit him. Biden handed them a gem of propaganda to employ against Clark—worldwide—and they exercised it with vigor.

The press feeding frenzy abated momentarily on February 24, when Clark’s appointment came before the full Senate, which easily approved his nomination.

Clark stoically took the beating. A devout man, he seems to have seen it as his cross to bear, as some overdue suffering that he ought to be willing to take.

And his humility was such that he never publicly shared Biden’s off-camera, quasi-apology to him, which he told to me over 20 years later. Biden casually pulled Clark aside in the hallway, away from reporters, and said, “Hey, Judge, no hard feelings…. And don’t worry: I didn’t know the answers to those questions either.”

This would hardly be the first time that Senator Biden did this sort of thing. He would do similar things to Ed Meese—with Meese’s wife and kids looking on—when Meese was recommended as attorney general under Reagan, and also to Clarence Thomas, when Thomas was recommended for the Supreme Court. Thomas recounts Biden’s treatment of him in his recent memoirs. There, too, Biden finished the “high-tech lynching” with the same no-hard-feelings smile.

That brings me to Sarah Palin, John McCain’s running mate on the Republican presidential ticket. She is a superb pick as a vice-presidential candidate. Her vulnerability, however, is a lack of foreign-policy experience (just like Barack Obama). Thus, we can expect Biden, who liberals hail for his foreign-policy experience, to attack that vulnerability.

Of course, any opponent would do that. That’s understandable. But, given his track record, we can expect Biden to expose this vulnerability in a nasty way, to try to humiliate Sarah Palin, to embarrass her before her family, the country, and the world. My advice is that she be ready.