Mike Pence Wins VP Debate, But It Doesn’t Really Matter

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Mike Pence won the vice-presidential debate in terms of style points, but it is not likely to affect the election very much. At best it changes the conversation this news cycle away from the most recent round of stupid things said by Donald Trump to the debate, but it is a safe bet that Trump will soon dominate the news with new stupid comments. While Pence did a better job than Tim Kaine, it was not at the level of Joe Biden reviving the ticket after Barack Obama’s lackadaisical first debate against Mitt Romney four years ago. Of course Pence had a much harder job which would require going well beyond style points to make up for Donald Trump.

Both candidates had many factual errors which kept the fact checkers busy. Both candidates did the best when attacking the opposing presidential candidate, and ran into trouble trying to defend their own awful running mates. Rather than defending his statements, Pence denied that Trump made the statements Kaine confronted him with. In rare cases Kaine’s accusations weren’t entirely true, but for the most part they were.

Pence had the advantage with his previous professional career in radio, allowing him to win if looking purely at style, and ignoring his atrocious record. Pence gave the appearance of someone who could perhaps be a stabilizing figure in a Trump administration–or the 2020 Republican nominee. He very likely would be leading, as any sane candidate would, if he was the one now running against Hillary Clinton.

Kaine came off poorly, but certainly not at the depths of some past candidates such as Sarah Palin or Dan Quayle. It was amusing to see the hypocrisy after the debate as Clinton supporters who were appalled at how Trump would interrupt Clinton had no problems with how Kaine was constantly interrupting Pence.

While Pence wins on points, he could not get a victory which is likely to be significant enough to actually impact the election results. Actually defending, as opposed to ignoring, Trump’s faults is beyond the abilities of any mere mortal. Pence also had mixed results in trying to attack Hillary Clinton. He did get in some blows, but somewhat like Trump, he could not articulate a better alternative even when there were grounds to attack Clinton.

Pence raised Clinton’s scandals, but the Republicans have not been able to simply articulate grounds for why this really matters. Her mishandling of classified information is certainly worth mentioning, but the scandal was fundamentally about her failure to follow rules designed to increase government transparency and reduce corruption. Clinton violated the ethics agreements she entered into before being confirmed as Secretary of State. That alone should disqualify her from further government positions.

Pence was also limited in valid grounds to attack on policy. It was bad enough that he opposed abortion rights, and made his case even weaker when bringing up the right wing’s nonsensical talking points on “partial birth abortions.” Pence had the usual Republican difficulty in attacking ObamaCare (even if Bill Clinton foolishly helped out the Republicans), as he has no better alternative to offer.

It was amusing to see that, for obvious reasons, Kaine did not disagree when Pence falsely tied the entire foreign policy of the Obama administration to Clinton. In reality, Clinton was a failed Secretary of State. She was a glorified diplomat, but actual policy was generally made in the White House, with the Obama administration almost always overriding her hawkish inclinations. While they did listen to her regarding Libya, Obama subsequently agreed it was a disaster and the worst mistake of his presidency.

If Trump and Pence were coherent on foreign policy, they could make a case that it is time for the United States to stop being the world’s policeman (while footing the bill), along with questioning the risk of war with Russia under Clinton. Neither Republican is capable of articulating such an argument, and Trump’s naivety towards Putin is almost as bad as Clinton’s belligerence. Both Pence and Kaine were clueless on dealing with terrorism, believing that we can someday kill them all. Neither realizes (or if they do realize it, will admit) that such policies only lead to creating more terrorists.

This was basically two conservative career politicians (one more conservative than the other) defending either the DLC/neocon status quo or the Republican fantasy worldview. Neither presented a true candidate of meaningful change, and liberal views remained absent, as has been the case since Bernie Sanders left the race. Green Party candidate Ajamu Baraka and Libertarian Party candidate William Weld (who appears to be giving up the third party fight to concentrate on taking down Trump) both used social media to respond, but their views are being kept out of the nationally televised debates.

4 Comments

  1. 1
    Mike Hatcher says:

    I agree, the VP debate will have little to no impact. In fact, I am now convinced that Trump is just too consistent in his political self destruction to have any chance of derailing a win for Hillary.  About two months ago I thought Hillary might find a path to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, but not anymore.  Trump's unwillingness to even try to curb his abrasive habits will, IMO, secure his defeat even if Assange were to come up with any new substantial scandals on Hillary. I know there are places one can legally wager on the election, I'm not sure enough to bet my life savings on a Hillary win, but if I were to gain access to one of those outlets, I'm ready to put a chunk of money at the current ratio of having to risk 3 dollars to win 1 dollar, that Clinton will win this election.

  2. 2
    KP says:

    Access:  http://www.paddypower.com/bet/politics/other-politics/us-politics?ev_oc_grp_ids=791149

    I found myself agreeing with Bill about Obamacare, declaring it crazy. Can he move the odds?

  3. 3
    Ron Chusid says:

    The problem with Bill attacking Obamacare is that Hillary's plan, which he supported, had more serious problems. Plus Hillary campaigned against single payer this year.

  4. 4
    Ron Chusid says:

    Hillary could conceivably still snatch defeat, but it is not likely. It will probably take something unpredictable occurring to shake up the race for her to lose.

    I have been skeptical that Assange would really change the outcome. More scandals along the same lines as we already know about will not make much of a difference. Voters already distrust Clinton but she leads Trump (who is also distrusted). I think that if he had something which would really change the election he wold have already released it–but there is an outside chance he wants to wait to hit Hillary with something new very late in the election when she doesn't have much time to respond.

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