We are about to find out how Joe Biden defines the challenge in front of him.

If he decides that the task at hand is simply to unite the Democratic Party and energize its activist elements, then he has a solid handful of potential vice presidential nominees from which to choose. For good reason, he may opt for a woman of color. Kamala Harris may well be the safest such bet, with her senatorial credential and having been tested, at least for a while, on the presidential stage.

Another name reportedly on Biden’s list is that of Susan Rice, a substantial intellect and former Obama United Nations ambassador and national security advisor.

But what if Biden were to think more expansively? What if he were to understand that he is firmly in the driver’s seat with a party already quite united behind him, no matter a flurry of noise here and a flare-up there, if not due to frenzied excitement for his candidacy then as a result of anathema for the other guy very much on the ropes?

What if he were to think past the election and grasp that he is likely to be handed the solemn responsibility of fixing this mess come next January? As he ponders his selection, what if he were to conclude that it is not a rather congealed party that needs another glob of glue, but a deeply fractured nation that requires healing?

If Biden has the capacity and inclination to think beyond November, and to worry more about the accolades of the history books than the Zoom cheers of a virtual nominating convention, there is a tailor-made vice presidential pick who meets the criteria of gender, skin tone and deep vetting.

The moment, Mr. Biden, calls not for Susan Rice, but for Condoleezza Rice.

Of course, you can already hear the squeals that would inevitably follow such an expectation-breaking, history-making move. “But she’s a Republican.” “But…Iraq.” “But she’s not sufficiently, adamantly pro-choice.” “But, but, but.”

All of which Biden should answer with his own emphatically-offered “but.” As in, “But there are far bigger things at stake.”

What a contrast that would be – a politician, in this case a would-be president, talking truth to his party’s vehement base and telling them that the national interest takes priority.

As consolation to the Bernie Sanders and AOC wing of his party, Biden can add to this boldest of strokes by promising to serve a single term. This will assure the progressives of an open nominating contest in 2024 at which they will have a fair shot.

In fact, this would provide the country with a desperately-sought four-year period of adult supervision to be then followed by open contests through which both parties can choose their direction and presumably elevate a newer generation.

Biden would exit the stage at age 82 and allow a bevy of Democratic talent to come to the fore and a new agenda to emerge. Based on what we saw in the January and February contests, there will be no shortage of able contenders. On the GOP side, they will have four long years to sort through the Trump post-mortem and decide what it means to be a Republican in the aftermath.

The process can be a necessary and healthy one on both sides.

Vice President Condoleezza Rice will have performed noble service, but it is almost impossible to imagine her a 2024 contestant, not being a Democrat and being regarded as a deserter among Republicans.

Despite some transitory howls from the left and the ultra-partisan, think of the optics of a break-the-mold Biden-Rice ticket. Imagine the advertising visuals of him having grown up amidst the Scranton mills and her in the shadow of the Birmingham church bombing.

Such a ticket would constitute an earnest, open invitation to Republicans to join in not only defeating Donald Trump, but in administering the total, cleansing repudiation that is warranted and required.

There is winning and then there is governing. Biden can well defeat Trump by painting within the lines. Depending on the complexion of the Senate, he may even succeed briefly in passing a few agenda items off the Democratic wish-list. But those well-worn lines will render him no more lasting success than other recent presidents have found in altering America’s poisoned, hyper-polarized, dysfunctional politics.

Anyone think it might be time to look outside those lines?

This virus may be only a half-year old, but the calamity in which America finds itself has been a long time coming. It did not start with Trump, though he has magnified it immeasurably. There is public policy to be made in a Biden administration. But the far bigger task is one of healing, restoration and righting a teetering republic in crisis.

What little Biden would sacrifice in party politics or even in willingly announcing himself a lame duck, he would more than make up for in moral authority. That is an invaluable commodity, and one these days thought of as a quaint notion or foreign object.

Back to those visuals, jump ahead to early next February and President Biden’s first State of the Union speech. In keeping with this time of historical reckoning and redress, picture Biden at the lectern of the House chambers with directly behind him the bipartisan but decidedly black tandem of Vice President Condi Rice and newly-installed Speaker Hakeem Jeffries.

That would be indeed historic – on multiple levels. Does Joe Biden have it in him to rise to the occasion?