Vice President Joe Biden told students at the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh that presidential challenger Mitt Romney’s Republican policies and social views were set in a long ago era, the time of Mad Men.
“I guess they got caught up in Mad Men . That’s straight out of the ’50s!” the vice president said.
Opinions about the Obama administration a possible Romney administration notwithstanding, a simple fact check shows that Mad Men is actually set in the 1960s, not the 50s.
ABC News reports that Biden has been choosing various decades to represent his views on Republican policy. He has compared Republican foreign policy to the 1980s, economic policy to the 1920s and now social policy to the 1950s. The show Mad Men follows morally dubious ad executives in the 1960s.
Biden didn’t appear to realize his mistake at the event, but Politico reports he did realize that his mostly college-aged audience consisted of people born in the 1990s.
“As you can tell, I’m a very old guy,” Vice President Joe Biden joked. Biden, 69, is the oldest candidate on either major ticket. President Barack Obama is 51. Mitt Romney is 65 and Paul Ryan is 42.
The Atlantic Wire reported back in June that Mad Men is among President Obama’s favorite shows. He particularly seemed fond of character Peggy Olsen, played by actress Elisabeth Moss.
“That’s my grandmother, you know, starting out with the low-level secretary job and working her way up,” Obama said at the time. Olsen works her way through the ranks in a male dominated business where women are generally viewed more as sexual objects than as workplace equals.
