Vance won the debate. From the start, his polished look and articulate responses conveyed the confidence of someone who knows what he is talking about and is comfortable combatting the hostile media on a big stage.
There was no searching for the answer or stumbling on the words from Vance. Most importantly, he understood who the real audience is – the American people and, in these last few weeks, undecided swing voters. These voters are very worried about providing for themselves and their families future in an environment where lay offs are announced every day and prices for the essentials are up 20% and likely not coming down.
If voters were listening, especially women, a voting block that the Democrats desperately need to persuade in order to win, then Vance did all that he could to assuage their fear that Republicans are going to put in a nation-wide abortion ban or ban IVF. On this topic, Vance could have provided more specifics on the Amber Thurman death that resulted in complications from the use of the abortion pill that were not picked up by the emergency room doctor in time to save her life. Read about that case here: https://thefederalist.com/2024/09/20/amber-thurman-died-from-the-abortion-pill-not-pro-life-laws/
Shockingly, taxpayer funded childcare was given time in a 90-minute debate with much more pressing issues to discuss such as education, energy, Ukraine, China, and transgenders invading women’s sports. On this topic, both Vance and Walz pandered to working moms. Unleash Prosperity wrote about the issue in their email today. I agree 100% with them. Why should women who stay home not receive a benefit for taking care of their own kids while a family with two working parents, that likely have a higher income, receive a taxpayer subsidy. As they mentioned – just expand the child tax credit for all.
Here is a link to their email – please read it: https://committeetounleashprosperity.com/hotlines/the-case-against-federal-child-care-subsidies/
Vance also did a good job on every issue reminding the audience that Harris has been in charge for over three years now – she owns the bad policies on Iran terror in the Mideast, inflation, illegal immigration, and more.
One more note on Vance – he didn’t take the bait Walz was trying to dish out. Vance stayed above the fray. It was if he had studied Walz. He knew Walz wants to be the agreeable “coach” by nature – so Vance got him to nod along on nearly all issues. It threw Walz off.
It also was a bit too chummy for my liking, but again, Vance was playing to the undecided swing voter who is only casually paying attention. He came off as likeable, knowledgeable, caring and principled.
Walz, on the other hand, looked like a deer in headlights and his first response left a bad first impression as he stuttered through the answer and visually seem to lose track of his thoughts. I was seriously wondering if he would be able to be composed enough to even get through the whole debate. He recovered enough to give his talking points and was lucky that the moderators weren’t fact checking his responses or pressing him on his myriad of lies and progressive policies.
The moderators asked nothing about his COVID response, the burning of Minneappolis during the Floyd riots, the high taxes in Minnesota, and other items. When they asked about his lie about being in China during the Tiananmen Square massacre, Walz admitted to being a knucklehead and misspeaking. Overall, Walz was not impressive.
The moderators were terrible again. Biased questions, fact-checking Vance but not Walz when they announced they wouldn’t fact-check at all.