Beyond the attacks, aides say the former vice president agonizes over how his hyper-public position has added to the formidable burdens of being his remaining son. If Hunter sounds down on the phone, Biden aides say, it can send his father into a funk and inflict a melancholy that lingers. Mr. Biden will rarely bring up Hunter himself, they say, although others certainly will. Aides become tense knowing that Mr. Biden might lash out. “It’s almost a cliché now,” said Ted Kaufman, Mr. Biden’s longtime chief of staff and short-term successor in the Senate after Mr. Biden became vice president in 2009.

Source: New York Times October 30, 2020 22:34 UTC