Markup View

Author: jamespolk

Mar 29th 2013 at 9:40:04 AM

I think this trope, should it be designated a trope, should probably mention how the VP's only official duties are to preside over the Senate (which is ceremonial) and cast tie-breaking votes.  We might also note how this is sometimes related to KickedUpstairs.

Also, somebody, maybe Gillimer, should organize those examples given in the first post into a proper example list.  I would do it but unfortunately I haven't seen any of the examples cited by Gillimer.

Live-Action TV

* The HBO series ''Series/{{Veep}}'' is about an ineffectual, bumbling Vice President, played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who is ignored by the President and mocked by the media.

Real Life

* Mostly true for the first 190 years or so of American history.  The precedent was set right off the bat, when George Washington excluded John Adams from Cabinet meetings, much to Adams's displeasure.  John Nance Garner, the first of FDR's three vice presidents, famously [[http://www.cah.utexas.edu/news/press_release.php?press=press_bucket  described]] the office as "not worth a bucket of warm piss" (the quote was {{Bowdlerized}} to "warm spit").  Starting with Walter Mondale, this has been less true, as Vice Presidents have been more influential, with Dick Cheney being the most notable example of a VP who wielded real power.
* Also true of the only Confederate Vice President, Alexander Stephens, whose relationship with President Jefferson Davis turned so bad that Stephens left Richmond in 1862 and spent most of the rest of the war at his home in Georgia.