Former Vice President Joe Biden likes to talk about the Affordable Care Act and how, at the 2010 White House signing ceremony, he was the one who famously called the law a big fucking deal .

Bidens assessment was spot on. Obamacare turned out to be the administrations most consequential domestic policy achievement. Biden felt genuine joy when it passed, former administration officials tell HuffPost, and during the legislative process he was instrumental in locking down wavering Democratic senators who threatened to sink the entire enterprise.

But one year earlier, according to several former officials, Biden was among the many advisers urging President Barack Obama not to pursue comprehensive health care reform right away either because it would distract from addressing the economic crisis, or because similar efforts had been disastrous for previous Democratic presidencies, or both.

Although memories of exactly what Biden said and why have grown fuzzy, one former official recalled a Roosevelt Room meeting in early 2009 in which Biden made a strident 10-minute argument. It was very, very strongly phrased and very long, and I have heard very few things like it over the years, the former official said, adding that it would be fair to call it a tirade.