Obama adds Biden to the ticket

The Democratic National Convention kicks off in Denver on Monday.

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) — Barack Obama introduced Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware on Saturday as “a leader ready to step in and be president,” and the newly named running mate quickly converted his debut on the Democratic ticket into a slashing attack on Republican John McCain.

The GOP presidential contender will have to “figure out which of the seven kitchen tables to sit at” when considering his own economic future, said Biden, jabbing at the man he nevertheless called his personal friend.

It was a reference to McCain’s recent inartful admission — in a time of economic uncertainty — that he was not sure how many homes he owns.

Before a vast crowd spilling out from the front of the Old State Capitol, Obama said Biden was “what many others pretend to be — a statesman with sound judgment who doesn’t have to hide behind bluster to keep America strong.”

Democrats coalesced quickly around the 47-year-old Obama’s selection of a seasoned veteran of three decades in the Senate — a choice meant to provide foreign policy heft to the party’s ticket for the fall campaign against McCain and the Republicans.

Polls show Obama rates relatively poorly against McCain on foreign policy issues, and Biden is chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee with extensive experience in that area.

The 65-year-old congressional veteran emerged as Obama’s choice after a secretive selection process that reviewed at least a half-dozen contenders — but evidently not Hillary Rodham Clinton, the former first lady who was Obama’s tenacious rival across the primaries and caucuses of winter and spring.

Obama made a symbolic choice for the site of the ticket’s first joint appearance.

It was a brutally cold winter day more than a year ago when he stood outside the historic structure in the Illinois capital to launch his quest for the White House.

He returned this day in sunshine, the party’s improbable nominee-in-waiting, a black man in his first Senate term who outdistanced a crowded field of far better-known and more experienced rivals for the nomination.

The Democratic National Convention opens in Denver on Monday to nominate him as president and Biden as vice president, the ticket that Democrats hope to ride into the White House after eight years of Republican rule.

Polls indicate a highly competitive race at the end of a summer in which McCain eroded what had been Obama’s slender advantage in the national surveys.

A security fence sprung up overnight around the Pepsi Center as the pace of preparations accelerated in advance of Monday night’s opening session, and police on bicycles patrolled nearby streets.

Inside the sports arena, even the Zamboni machine — the lumbering, wheeled vehicle used to resurface the ice between periods of hockey games — had been moved out to make room for the Democrats.

McCain’s convention opens on Labor Day in St. Paul, Minn. He has yet to select a running mate.

Obama brought Biden on stage with his glowing introduction to the strains of Bruce Springsteen’s “The Rising.”

The newly named running mate moved center stage at a brisk trot that belied his 65 years, and embraced Obama.

“I’m glad to be here,” said the man who has twice sought the presidency. Thousands of newly printed signs bearing the words Obama/Biden sprouted in the crowd that waited in anticipation in 90-degree temperatures.