According to Margaret Hartmann of the Daily Intelligencer, Vice President Biden did not make up his mind until the last moment.
Politico reports that finally, advisers who wanted him to run said he needed to give an answer before Thursday, when Hillary Clinton will testify before the House Select Committee on Benghazi. They felt that if Biden waited, it would look like he was waiting to evaluate Clinton’s performance, and hurt both of them. […]
Biden greatly admires Clyburn, and his pseudo campaign got a boost when the congressman from South Carolina (a crucial early primary state for Biden) said a month ago that he was open to seeing Biden in the race. But on Monday, the congressman suddenly said “I would not advise him to get in” during a Huffington Post interview. The two men’s staffers began trying to figure out what had changed, and Biden was reportedly deeply discouraged by Clyburn’s change of heart. […]
Even on Wednesday morning, President Obama didn’t know which way Biden was leaning. With advisers pushing Biden to make an announcement, he said on Tuesday night that he needed to sleep on it. The next morning he went to the Oval Office and told President Obama he’d decided not to run. According to the AP, they talked for about 30 minutes, and Obama told Biden he wanted to be by his side during his address in the Rose Garden. The event was thrown together so hastily that Biden staffers had to dash over to the White House to watch the speech, and several people who had been strategizing with Biden for months learned that he’d made a decision from news reports.
I am not sure I believe all that. But if all of the above is true, yeah, he made the right decision. To run for the Presidency of the United States is not something you are unsure about. It is not something you sleep on. You either believe it is your God-given destiny to run and be President. Or you don’t. And if you don’t, then you are not going to convince anyone else to vote for you.