US vice presidential debate: Mike Pence dominates Kamala Harris
For a man who has spent most of his career in the business of leveraging assets, it’s kind of amazing that Donald Trump has spent the past four years not taking advantage of what Mike Pence brings to the table.
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For a man who has spent most of his career in the business of leveraging assets, it’s kind of amazing that Donald Trump has spent the past four years not taking advantage of what Mike Pence brings to the table.
In a 90-minute debate in Salt Lake City, the little seen Vice President revealed himself as a leader straight out of central casting: composed, courteous, and deeply across his brief.
In short, Trump’s critics would say, everything that the off the cuff and on the fly president is not.
Kamala Harris, meanwhile, reminded viewers of why she bombed out so early in the Democratic primary process.
From the start, it was clear that this would be no donnybrook of the sort we saw last week between Trump and Joe Biden.
Moderator Susan Page from USA Today kept things moving, and allowed both candidates to run over time to finish their points – and put points to their opponents, in contrast to presidential moderator Chris Wallace, who seemed keen to jump on any rhetorical grenade that landed too close to Biden.
And in doing so, she allowed both sides to reveal their essence.
On issue after issue, Pence’s answers were deep and detailed, while Harris’s were glib, often repeating Twitter talking points.
What’s worse, she ducked important questions such as what conversations she’s had with Biden about his health – instead pivoting to talk about Trump’s tax returns.
Harris also got caught out in a number of contradictions, from whether her plan to repeal the Trump administration tax cuts would leave families worse off (if cancelled in full, a family of four would lose US$2000 a year) to whether Joe Biden would ban fracking (she said no, but his previous statements are contradictory at best).
For Australians watching, there were shades of Bill Shorten’s attempts to sell one message to city audiences and another to the regions.
That’s not all.
Harris’s answer on US-China relations was barely comprehensible, while in China itself, censors cut transmission of the debate while Pence called Joe Biden “a cheerleader for communist China”.
Her scepticism of a vaccine developed under the Trump administration suggests she might be up for a holiday with Pete Evans if the election doesn’t work out for her.
And, crucially, she ducked and weaved and refused to answer a question about whether a Biden administration would “pack”, or add justices to, the Supreme Court to give it a permanent leftward bias. Instead, she waffled on about the picks the Trump administration had made for already existing judgeships over the past three and a half years.
With Joe Biden’s mental faculties in doubt, and the president recovering from a hit of coronavirus, the question of succession has not been more important in recent memory.
Pence appeared presidential and across his brief and like he could step into the chair tomorrow.
Kamala, by contrast, came across like she had no deeper understanding than the talking points.
There’s a big difference.