Senator Slick and Governor Good Guy faced off in the vice presidential debate last week.  Expectations were not high – a vice presidential debate generally checks boxes about each campaign’s strategy and gives the secondary candidates some air time, but few voters actually make their decisions based on the number two position.  Nevertheless, the Vance/Walz debate provided very significant differences between the two candidates, both of whom were described as “midwestern nice” by media critics.  

​Senator Vance was aggressive at times, arguing with CBS moderators Norah O’Donnell and Margaret Brennan about their questions, and talking over them as they tried to keep to time limits for responses.  Often, he did not answer the questions, or he provided a complete revision of Donald Trump’s actions as president.  Senator Vance was elected to the Senate in November of 2022, so has less than two years of legislative experience on his resume, and wasn’t in office during the Trump years.  Maybe that explains why he insisted that President Trump saved Obamacare (fact check: Trump repeatedly tried to overturn or abolish the Affordable Care Act, both legislatively and through the courts).  Or why Senator Vance believes that there was a peaceful transition of power in January of 2021.  Anyone who was at the siege of the Capitol (Members of Congress, their staffs, and the Capitol Police as well as the rioters) on January 6, or watched it on TV, knows it was not peaceful, incited by Mr. Trump to overturn the Constitutionally-required counting of electoral votes. Denying that he had anything to do with that dark day, Mr. Trump stalked out of Washington in the early hours of January 20, 2021, much to the relief of many observers.  As awkward as that was, his departure avoided what could have been even more awkward – a defeated president, prone to misbehavior, on the West Front platform with the new president. 

​Governor Walz appeared nervous in the first half of the debate, but seemed to find his footing as the debate wore on.  Not as polished as Senator Vance, he nevertheless held his own, and demonstrated both a grasp of issues and his legislative (House of Representatives for six terms) and executive experience (Minnesota governor since 2019).  His best answers focused on his decision-making as governor, especially feeding kids and women’s health care.  Plain-spoken, he reminded me a bit of President Harry Truman, who often did not hold back in his estimation of people and issues, although he might not have described himself as a “knucklehead” in public! Governor Walz saved his best for last, when he zeroed in on whether Donald Trump lost the 2020 election. Senator Vance obfuscated, sayingthat he wanted to focus on the future, not on whether Trump lost.  “That is a damning non-answer,” Governor Walz retorted.  Nothing else needed to be said; the point was made, brilliantly.

​ Each candidate tried his best to appear moderate and likeable.  Senator Vance certainly looked like a Yale Law graduate experienced in classroom debates but, despite his Ivy League education, his grasp of history and civics was more than questionable.  The constitutional role of a vice president is narrow – preside over the Senate and break tie votes, assume the presidency in the event of the death or incapacity of the president, and count presidential electors votes as president of the Senate.  When Senator Vance blames Vice President Kamala Harris for not fixing the border or many other issues during her term, he misrepresents, and perhaps misunderstands, the role of vice president.  One college student interviewed after the debate noted that he took high school civics, and learned what a vice president can do, and what they can’t do, and was incredulous that Senator Vance didn’t know that, too. Governor Walz didn’t display artifice, and was earnest in many responses, pointing out that stronger locks and windows in schools aren’t the answer for school shootings.  “It’s the guns,” he said.

​Throughout the debate, I noticed that Governor Walz addressed his opponent by his title “Senator Vance” every time; Senator Vance, however, addressed his opponent as “Tim” every time.  Perhaps he was trying to be an everyman, but it seemed disrespectful to address a former member of Congress, current governor, and man twenty years older by his first name in a formal debate.  His “Memaw” would have been appalled.