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These two sides of Joe Biden — conciliator and "regular guy" — have both helped and hurt him throughout his political life.

In the mid-1980s, some Democrats, notably onetime Jimmy Carter political adviser Patrick Caddell, saw Biden as one of the first presidential candidates who could enthrall the baby-boom generation. Biden briefly made a presidential bid in 1987, but his proclivity to talk and talk got him in trouble.

In a television ad, Biden used, without attribution, the words of British Labour Party leader Neil Kinnock during a debate in Iowa.

"Why is it that Joe Biden is the first in his family ever to go to a university?" Biden asked. "Why is it that my wife, who is sitting out there in the audience, is the first in her family ever to go to college?"

Kinnock had earlier asked, "Why am I the first Kinnock in a thousand generations to be able to get to university? Why is Glenys (his wife) the first woman in her family in a thousand generations to be able to get to university?"

But while the incident derailed the White House bid, few back in the Senate were upset; they saw it as Biden being Biden.

He was Senate Judiciary Committee chairman at the time, and quickly rebounded as he led the fight to deny Robert Bork, President Reagan's Supreme Court nominee, nomination.

He got broad support from colleagues, including Bork loyalists. "Hang on tight," Republican Sen. Alan Simpson said at the time. "You have at least had the guts to throw yourself in the public arena, to run for the presidency.

"And that's better than a lot of faint-hearted detractors will ever do in this world," Simpson said.

Biden's judiciary work made him a favorite enemy of conservatives, though in 1991 he first had to deal with annoyed women's groups.

He chaired the committee in 1991 during the Clarence Thomas hearings and was criticized for not being quick to scrutinize allegations by Anita Hill that Thomas harassed her. Biden did eventually convene hearings examining the charges and voted against Thomas.

Biden the deal-maker was instrumental four years later in shepherding President Clinton's crime initiative through Congress. The legislation aimed to add 100,000 police officers on America's streets, but also expanded the use of the federal death penalty.

He became chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee when Democrats regained control of the Senate in 2001, and a year later was battling many leaders in his own party over whether to give President Bush broad authority to wage war in Iraq.

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