A Good Enough Debate

J.D. Vance is a smooth talker and a far more disciplined debater than the man he is running with. He knows how to evade answering a question, how to sound more reasonable than he really is, and how to stick to a plan and stay on-script. He made the case that Donald Trump literally forgot all about, notwithstanding his aides having previewed it to reporters beforehand, that Kamala Harris is promoting change after three and a half years as vice president. He made the case against the Biden administration's immigration policy without resorting to scurrilous rumors about Haitian immigrants eating their neighbors' cats and dogs. He tried to soften the tone about the Republican stance on reproductive freedom by promising families more choices, without castigating "childless cat ladies," or being called on it.

Tim Walz is not as smooth. He seemed nervous at the outset, and warmed up as the night wore on. He clearly won some critical exchanges: on abortion rights, where he told the stories of women who have been seriously injured and even died because Roe v. Wade was overruled by Trump's appointees to the Supreme Court; on health care, where he rightly attacked Trump for trying, and almost succeeding, to repeal the Affordable Care Act; and on censorship, where he pointed out that he didn't run Facebook, and that book banning is censorship, not trying to police misinformation online. He even got in his licks on immigration, getting into detail about how Trump singlehandedly blocked a bipartisan bill drafted largely by a conservative Republican to deal with the crisis at the border.

And in what was perhaps the most memorable moment of the debate, he won the exchange on Jan. 6 when Vance refused to answer Walz's question of whether Trump lost the 2020 election, and claimed that Trump had presided over the peaceful transfer of power, notwithstanding the very unpeaceful events of Jan. 6.

It was a more policy-oriented debate, and a calmer and more collegial debate than the two it followed. The candidates went out of their way to agree on some things before attacking their opponents' presidential candidates.

All of which is to say it probably convinced no one. If you came into the debate favoring Trump, you probably came out relieved. Vance did not come across as the most unpopular vice presidential candidate of recent -- and not so recent -- years, which is how he has come across since his selection. If you came into the debate favoring Harris, you probably came out understanding why Harris picked Walz -- a regular guy who would stand up for her, promote her, and take on the politics of fear and loathing that Trump embodies.

For those who hoped that Walz would wipe the floor with the vulnerable Vance, like Kamala did in her debate with Trump, that frankly didn't happen. Vance simply evaded the questions he didn't want to answer, about mass deportations that would separate parents who came here illegally from their children born in this country, or what would happen to people with preexisting conditions without Obamacare, or whether Donald Trump would sign a federal abortion ban. He ducked on Iran and blamed everything else on immigration. He sold the politics of fear, albeit in measured terms.

For those who hoped that Walz, as the less TV-smooth candidate, would collapse somehow as Biden did in his debate with the reality TV star, that didn't happen either. There were more "um's" from Walz than there were from Vance, but the Minnesota governor effectively used his leadership of his home state as proof that many of the problems Americans care most about can indeed be addressed by effective governing.

Vice presidential debates, history teaches, generally don't change election results. I was with Lloyd Bentsen in Omaha, Nebraska, the night he in fact did wipe the floor with Dan Quayle with his famous line, in response to Quayle comparing himself to John F. Kennedy, that: "I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. And Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy." I remember Lee Atwater, George H.W. Bush's campaign manager, trying to spin that the debate was a "draw," when it was anything but. But the horserace barely changed.

Vice presidential selections matter both because the person selected may become the president (or the likely candidate next time around) and because of what it says about the judgment of the person who picked him or her. In this case, Vance, by his television performance, may allay some voters' concerns about Trump's choice of him, concerns that were never as pronounced on the Democratic side. Walz didn't do great, but he did fine, and that is good enough for a vice presidential debate.

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To find out more about Susan Estrich and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.