The Role of the VP

I think it's safe to say that we all know that the biggest perk of being the VP is that, should the President die, resign, or lose his marbles, they get to run the show (which has happened a total of 9 times). If you didn't know that until right now, then you've been living under a rock because, from what I understand, everyone is freaking out about McCain because he's kind of an old dude and everyone worries that if he dies and Palin takes over the world will explode. Or something similar to that.

But aside from that, do you know what the VP does? I don't ... really. I mean, I know that I took government last semester but that kind of stuff fades real fast when you barely learned it in the first place. So, I decided that I wanted to know just what was going on behind that fancy office door that I'm sure the VP gets as a consolation prize for not getting a neato office named after a shape, and this is what I found:

• The VP is also the president of the Senate, but they don't get to vote unless there is a tie that needs to be broken. Which means that the VP really doesn't spend a whole lot of time in the Senate. (John Adams is the current record holder with 29 total votes)
  
• The VP receives and opens the state ballots, in the presence of the House and the Senate, and get to announce the next president. (4 VP's have had the honor of announcing themselves as the new President)
• The job has evolved into more of an executive position and the VP now works much more closely to the President than in the past.
• They get to attend cabinet meetings, sessions of the National Security Council, meetings of the president’s chief advisory panel for formulating and implementing policies related to the military, foreign relations, and other national security issues.
• The VP also gets to travel on behalf of the head cheese (aka the President) to appear at international conferences, the funerals of foreign dignitaries, and other important events.
• When the head cheese is busy or out of state, the VP greets all sorts of White House guests.

Wow. I have a new found respect for the office of VP. They actually do quite a bit. I had always envisioned it in my mind as kind of a fluff job. You hang out in the Senate, you travel all over the place to represent the U.S. and wait for the Pres to kick off (but certainly not hope for it ... that's just bad manners).

So there you go. That is the job description of VP, the one that will be filled with Palin or Biden ... whoever is attached to the winning candidate. May the best *person* win.

In case you were interested in reading up on this yourself, I got my information from the U.S. Senate Art and History page and the MSN version of Encarta.