Joe Biden - making jokes, irritating Obama

Hey, Joe Biden's back in the news! And it's just like the campaign!

This time he poked fun at Supreme Court Justice John Roberts's flubbing of the oath of office and President Obama didn't get the joke.

Keep it in the family

Just a couple days ago, Biden's wife - perhaps sensing that her husband hadn't made news in awhile - took over as chief gaffemeister of the family announcing to Oprah that Joe could have had either the job of vice president or secretary of state.

Hours later, a press release went out from the vice president elect's office "clarifying" what Jill meant.  Click here to read this story.

Swearing-in

Yesterday, President Obama and Vice President Biden were up in room 450 of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building to welcome in new staff and to have White House senior staff take their oaths of office.

The vice president is the one who administers this oath and appeared to forget about it (video below).

"Joe, you want to administer the oath?," he prodded his number two.

"Am I doing this again? Oh! For the senior staff," he suddenly remembered.

"My memory's not as good as Justice Roberts' ... Chief Justice Roberts," referencing the Chief Justice's failed attempt to administer the presidential oath of office by heart.

Attendees groaned and a smattering of laughter was heard. But President Obama was stone-faced. Some described his reaction as grim.

Nudge

Some eagle-eye observers saw even more.

"What wasn't noticed so widely was that instantly Obama's right hand went out and gave Biden's elbow a warning squeeze. This isn't Delaware, Dorothy," wrote the LA Times's Andy Malcolm.

Oath, part II

By the way, President Obama was in a more jovial mood later in the day when Justice Roberts went to the White House to re-administer the oath of office (just to be sure).

You can read about this odd event (and watch the video) by going here.