Vice President Walter Mondale has died at the age of 93. In an era when we read endless negative stories about politicians, it’s worth noting that many of them are really good people. In that spirit, let’s celebrate the life of Walter Mondale with a great, moving story from my (virtual) friend Joe Trippi.

+ “Harry Truman, Roosevelt’s final VP, didn’t even learn about the Manhattan Project to build the atom bomb until after FDR died and he took over as the commander-in-chief. Dwight Eisenhower’s view of his No. 2, Richard Nixon, can be summed up in his reply to a reporter who asked for an example of an idea of Nixon’s that the president had adopted: ‘If you give me a week, I might think of one.'” Fred Kaplan in Slate: The Vice Presidency Was a Joke Before Walter Mondale.