In his first three nights as host of CBS’ Late Show, Stephen Colbert has made it clear he has no intention of pretending to be neutral. About anything. His emotional encounter Thursday night with Joseph R. Biden focused primarily on the Vice President’s experience of tragedy, most recently the May death from brain cancer of his son Beau, and his wife and infant daughter in a 1972 auto accident. It was riveting television, at once compassionate and revealing, and it almost incidentally lifted the issue of faith to a far higher level in the national conversation than any of the fatuous debates and sparring among the announced candidates have done so far.

“Everybody likes Joe Biden,” Colbert said, introducing his first guest of the evening. “I think it’s because when we see you, we think we’re seeing the real Joe Biden…We’re inspired by the way you have responded” to unimaginable loss.