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The annual progressive gathering known as Netroots Nation wraps up its annual conference in Detroit this weekend.

In the hallways and the meeting rooms, much of the buzz was about the presidential race in 2016 — and who might run on the Democratic side.

But Vice President Joe Biden, who gave the keynote address on opening day, didn't factor much into that speculation, despite being President Obama's wingman on everything from the stimulus package to the Affordable Care Act.

Biden was even ahead of the administration's position on same-sex marriage.

"We literally saved this country from moving from a great recession into a depression," he said in his speech Thursday. "And we established that progressive government did and does have a role in the economic health and well being of the American people."

On foreign policy, Biden has been a key player for decades dating back to his days in the Senate — he showcased those credentials as he explained why he was late to his Netroots speech.

It turns out he was on the phone, getting details about the Malaysia Airlines plane crash from the president of Ukraine.

"I was on the phone for a better part of a half an hour with President Poroshenko, and I've been in contact with our president as well as our national security team," he said.

Biden has more than just experience. His political style is one-of-a-kind.

He's known to give it to you straight. No filler.

It's exactly what people say they want in presidential candidate. But here, among the party's progressive wing, that candidate ain't Joe Biden.

Outside the main ballroom, where Biden spoke the day before, the group Ready for Warren is hard at work. They are passing out hats and signs trying to draft Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren for a White House run.

Another group that backs former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton co-sponsored a party last night.

There was nothing like that for Biden.

Gabriela Lemus says she's been working in the progressive movement for years. She talks of the vice president almost like they are related.

"Uncle Joe ... yeah. That's what we lovingly call him," she said. "He's our uncle. I look at it from a familial term. Like he's part of the family, you know."

Lemus says Biden's been a good adviser to the president. But she admits that as a potential candidate, Biden just isn't resonating with her.

"Maybe sometimes if it's too familiar, you kind of overlook it even if it is the right person," she said.

That's not the case for Rick Massell. He says there are many reasons why Biden shouldn't be the party's nominee in 2016.

The main reason? Too many gaffes, he says.

"Maybe I'm being too hard on the guy, maybe it does make him more human and maybe we should have someone that is more human, but he also misspeaks a lot. I don't know if you can ever overcome that," said Massell.

Sandra Kurtz, on the other hand, says she's glad the vice president came to Netroots.

Kurtz says he's got the right experience on both foreign and domestic issues but she's just not quite sure what to make of a potential Biden run. And then it hits her — she's got the perfect job for him.

"For Joe? I don't know, I'd personally like to see him as VP for life, but that's just me," she laughs.

The election is still a long way off. The vice president hasn't announced any plans for 2016 just yet.

But if Biden is doing his due diligence — kicking the tires on what would be his third run at the White House — he's still got quite a bit of work to do to excite the Democrat base.

The Senate is expected to vote on a temporary transportation spending bill later this week — with an emphasis on the word temporary.

The bill would keep highway funding flowing through May of next year, and avert a looming infrastructure crisis. Without congressional action, the highway trust fund would run out of cash in August.

The short-term fix follows a familiar pattern. It goes something like this:

First, panic erupts because the government is going to shut down — or a program is going to run out of money — or a tax will automatically rise. Whatever it is, without congressional action, something really terrible will happen.

Then, just when it seems like there's no hope, a deal emerges. Often it's a bipartisan solution, not a big one, and not a permanent fix. A temporary one, for a few weeks or a few months.

Then when the next deadline draws near, the countdown clocks come out once again.

It's All Politics

Temporary Fix For Highway Money Is Well-Traveled Road

As part of a series called "My Big Break," All Things Considered is collecting stories of triumph, big and small. These are the moments when everything seems to click, and people leap forward into their careers.

Shaun Thompson, better known as Shaun T, is the man behind the fast-paced, strenuous fitness programs Insanity, Focus T25 and Hip Hop Abs. He got his start as a choreographer. The story of his big break begins with someone breaking him down.

Thompson says he was in an emotionally and physically abusive relationship for "four years too long." When he got his first big choreography job in his home state of New Jersey, his partner was not supportive.

"After the show, I mean, people wanted my autograph, and I was really no one," says Thompson. "My partner at the time said, 'You'll never be a professional dancer so you can immediately delete that dream from your head.' "

That was the final straw in the relationship.

"No one out there is going to stop me from living the life that I want to live," says Thompson. "I gained up enough strength to leave that relationship."

A friend invited him to come to Los Angeles for a vacation at his beach house. His friend had one demand: He wanted Thompson to get some headshots taken before making the trip.

"Let me tell you, those abs were poppin' on those shots," Thompson says.

When he got to Los Angeles, he checked out a dance school in North Hollywood and found out about an audition for a new dance agency that was happening around the corner.

With his headshots in his car, Thompson decided to go in.

"I was frickin' living in these dance moves. I was like, 'I don't care what happens. They're gonna remember me even thought I don't live here,' " he says.

Out of hundreds of people auditioning, seven men and five women were left at the end of the cuts. Thompson was one of them. The judges said they would contact the dancers in a couple weeks if the agency was interested.

"I literally left there like, 'Whatever, this doesn't really matter. I don't even really care,' " he says.

He returned home to New Jersey and two weeks later, found out that audition would change his life.

"I was at the laundry mat, with my pocket full of quarters, when I got the phone call that the agency wanted me to move to LA to pursue a career in dance," Thompson says.

When he moved to LA, he was teaching workout dance classes at the gym, in between auditions and dance gigs. His classes got really popular.

"My big break came when a friend called me and said, 'Hey, there's this company called Beach Body that wants you to see if you can develop a project with them,' " Thompson says.

Thompson had a two-hour meeting with Beach Body, which produces many popular in-home fitness workouts, and left with a contract for his first video, Hip Hop Abs.

The Insanity Workout

Bernie Schupbach needed to sell his home in the height of the real estate crash.

His home in Yorkville, Ill., was unoccupied. It had lingered on the market for a long time — and Schupbach, a radiologist in Aurora, Ill., was growing uncomfortable.

"To me, you worry about a pipe breaking in winter. You worry about the heat going out. You worry about vandals. You worry about animal infestation," he says. "My big concern was: There's nobody there, I'm 30 miles away."

Then somebody mentioned Showhomes to Schupbach and his wife, Lynn.

Showhomes is a home-staging company that helps people sells their homes. Its employees make minor suggestions like changing a paint color or fixing up a front door, but also de-clutter and depersonalize a home.

And nothing depersonalizes a home more than having another person, couple or family living in it — meet Showhomes' unique Home Managers program.

Home managers are actively recruited — and vetted — by the staging company, through avenues like real estate agents and Craigslist. Showhomes gets paid by both the homeowner and the home manager.

The home manager pays a fee that's one-third to half of what traditional rent in a specific market might be plus utilities, says Matt Kelton, chief operating officer of Showhomes.

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