White House Press Secretary Jay Carney brushed off the suggestion that Vice President Joe Biden was “condescending” towards Paul Ryan during the debate last night.

“I think it is for the American people to decide,” Carney initially replied when asked to comment on the criticism of Biden’s demeanor. “The person I saw up there last night was someone . . . who comes to his job — this many years in to serving his country in the Senate and now the White House — with an enormous amount of passion and joy.”

The Associated Press had this to say of Biden: “who needed a ‘Sesame Street’ character to grab all the post-debate attention when there was Joe Biden’s smile- or laugh, chuckle, grimace, grin, smirk, or ‘goofy face,’ according to various descriptions?”

Carney did add that Biden laughed at Ryan over Ryan’s criticism of the stimulus. “He knew how hypocritical that was,” Carney said of Biden’s reaction to his rival.

The Washington Examiner’s Charlie Spiering dubbed the Joker’s laugh over video of the vice president’s facial expressions during the debate.