First off, fully half of the twenty-five complaints you list are at least 19 years old. Not all people change of time, but some do. Biden did. For instance, President Obama directly gave him credit for push him to accept and legalize marriage equality.

Second, he happened to shake a bad man’s hand? Welcome to politics. Every politician is going to wind up meeting bad people and put into positions where they often unintentionally are used as a photo-op by the aforementioned bad men. The politicians to watch out for are the ones who actively support those bad men. Like this one candidate named Trump….

Third, Voltaire once pointed out that perfect is the enemy of good. If you’re demanding that the candidate you support must be ideologically perfect, you’re either going to wind up with one who can’t win…or one who will be a tyrant. A functioning democracy is one that excels in the art of compromise. If you’re unwilling to compromise, then you shouldn’t be involved in a small-d democratic government at all. This is why they refer to legislation as “sausage-making” — the process is very ugly, but the result is usually very good indeed.

Idealism is the province of preachers and pundits, and having preachers and pundits as kingmakers is how the GOP got to be as bad as it is today (just as Barry Goldwater predicted). Beware of idealism. Your watchword should instead be pragmatism, rejecting demands for the perfect so that one can reliably achieve the good.