Foolish Assertion

As a man who is explaining to people, women included, I must be mansplaining here. At least Nicole Wallace would think so.

In which a strong, independent woman with a national TV platform turns two other strong, independent women with national TV platforms and the power to literally silence Vance into victims who cannot handle… a man ✨talking✨ during a debate. https://t.co/KmzBJD9uSV

— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) October 2, 2024

Ironically, Wallace's argument would be stronger if she had claimed that Vance was simply incorrect. It is debatable (pun intended) whether there had been an agreement for the moderators of the vice-presidential faceoff not to challenge the candidates on the validity of their statements.

Preceding Tuesday night, articles describing or even listing rules of the debate appeared in, presumably among others, The Washington Post, The New Republic, The New York Times, USA Today, and TIME. Although it had been widely assumed prior to the debate that there would be no fact-checking by CBS' O'Donnell and Brennan, none of these pieces addressed the issue.

One exception was a article on the website of NBC Chicago, which was entitled Fact-checking and more: What are the rules for tonight's VP debate? There, we could read "unlike the September presidential debate, CBS announced Friday that it will be up to the candidates to keep each other honest at Tuesday's debate."

Presumably, the reporters did not make this up out of whole cloth. Rather, it is likely that while there was no written agreement on the matter of fact-checking, the two sides had agreed informally that the moderators would avoid it. I would characterize that in, in the traditional manner, as a "gentleman's agreement," if it weren't likely to trigger Nicole Wallace.

This is the exchange to which Wallace refers was referring

MB: Thank you, Governor. And just to clarify for our viewers, Springfield, Ohio does have a large number of Haitian migrants who have legal status. Temporary protected status. Norah.

JDV: Well, Margaret, Margaret, I think it's important because…

MB: Thank you, senator. We have so much to get to.

NO: We're going to turn out of the economy. Thank you.

JDV: Margaret. The rules were that you guys weren't going to fact check, and since you're fact checking me, I think it's important to say what's actually going on. So there's an application called the CBP One app where you can go on as an illegal migrant, apply for asylum or apply for parole and be granted legal status at the wave of a Kamala Harris open border wand. That is not a person coming in, applying for a green card and waiting for ten years.

MB: Thank you, Senator.

JDV: That is the facilitation of illegal immigration, Margaret, by our own leadership. And Kamala Harris opened up that pathway.

 MB: Thank you, Senator, for describing the legal process. We have so much to get to.

There probably was an understanding between the two camps that "you guys weren't going to fact check," as J.D. Vance alleged. If there were not, either Norah O'Donnell or Margaret Brennan should have stated so following what Wallace labeled "mansplaining" by the GOP vice presidential candidate. 

Obviously, there was no such interjection by the moderators. We can only assume, therefore, that Vance was essentially correct, which suggests that, spontaneously or by design, the CBS duo itself broke the rules of the debate.

Even in the unlikely event that Vance was incorrect in his charge, his objection must not be written off as "mansplaining." He would have been as likely to respond assertively to what he believed, or at least claimed, was a breech of an agreement. 

The cynical might suggest that Wallace's accusation is as credible as one might expect from  a news host who frequently has her husband as a guest husband Michael Schmidt without ever revealing her relationship to him. If not so cynical, one should merely maintain that Wallace's nonsense is beneath her.

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One Candidate Speaking Truth

Will Bunch is disappointed in a comment made by Tim Walz at his debate Tuesday night against J.D. Vance.

"I've become friends with school shooters" was an unfortunate Walz misstatement

— Will Bunch (@Will_Bunch) October 2, 2024

It certainly was a misstatement, a stupid thing to say on national television. Given the context of his statement, as well as common sense, the Minnesotan evidently meant the parents or family of school shooters or of his victims. The statement was preceded by "Yeah, I sat in that office with those Sandy Hook parents" and followed by

I've seen it. Look, the NRA. I was the NRA guy for a long time. They used to teach gun safety. I'm of an age where my shotgun was in my car so I could pheasant hunt after football practice. That's not where we live today. And several things I want to mention on this is talking about cities and where it's at. The number one, where the most firearm deaths happen in Minnesota are rural suicides. And we have an epidemic of children getting guns and shooting themselves. And so we have, and we should look at all of the issues, making sure folks have healthcare and all that. But I want to be very careful. This idea of stigmatizing mental health, just because you have a mental health issue doesn't mean you're violent. And I think what we end up doing is we start looking for a scapegoat. Sometimes it just is the guns. It's just the guns. And there are things that you can do about it. But I do think that this is one, and I think this is a healthy conversation. I think there's a capacity to find solutions on this that work, protect Second Amendment, protect our children. That's our priority.

            

This was  a substantive response from a candidate more substantial than his running mate who recognizes that gun ownership ought to be put into context." I was the NRA guy for a long time. They used to teach gun safety. I'm of an age where my shotgun was in my car so I could pheasant hunt after football practice. That's not where we live today."

That's not where we live today is an acknowledgement few politicians are willing to make- that circumstances in America have changed. It's not a statement Kamala Harris would make. However, Walz is, or at least once was, a guy who owned a weapon when men of that time and place did so.. 

At her own debate, Harris was queried about her current health care plan because she had supported "Bernie Sanders' proposal to do away with private insurance" and since then has "proposed a plan that included a private insurance option." She replied in part

And then this business about taking everyone's guns away. Tim Walz and I are both gun owners. We're not taking anybody's guns away. So stop with the continuous lying about this stuff. As it relates to the Affordable Care Act.

Asked about health care (health care!), the presidential nominee managed to remind viewers that she owns a gun. Congratulations, Madame Vice President; we're impressed that you're a kickass woman. One individual who admits that he is not a psychologist or sociologist nonetheless defines "out-of-nowhere brags" as "rather rare. Typically the occur when the speaker wants that dopamine rush of sharing perceived superiority so badly that they can't bring themselves to wait until the right moment arises."

By contrast, not only did Walz note the importance of not stigmatizing mental illness, he put the importance of mental health in context as of less importance than firearm possession,, which he clearly believes is serious business. He explained

This idea of stigmatizing mental health, just because you have a mental health issue doesn't mean you're violent. And I think what we end up doing is we start looking for a scapegoat. Sometimes it just is the guns. It's just the guns. And there are things that you can do about it.

Sometimes it just is the guns. This is a bold statement, though it shouldn't be. It's bold because no one else says it. Not Harris, not her fellow Democrats (though Connecticut's Chris Murphy comes close), and certainly not Republicans, who generally worship firearms. As Walz recognizes, mental illness cannot be ignored- but it has become a scapegoat. In the hands of the wrong person, or occasionally the right person at the wrong moment, the gun becomes the most deadly weapon a civilian can possess.

Tim Walz probably is not ready to become a presidential candidate, and he is not one. The once very unpopular Kamala Harris has proven herself a viable presidential candidate as her surge in polls the last couple of months has demonstrated. However, unlike the former California senator and the deeply dishonest Republican candidates J.D. Vance and Donald J. Trump, Tim Walz is one candidate for national office who has principles he's ready to defend.

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Losing the Narrative

We need to heed the eleventh chapter of Genesis (New International Version).

1 Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. 2 As people moved eastward,[a] they found a plain in Shinar[b] and settled there.

3 They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. 4 Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”

5 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. 6 The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”

8 So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city.

This bears relevance to a tweet from a prominent far-right blogger and a statement by the governor of Minnesota.

In newly unearthed video, Tim Walz BRAGS about overwhelming small-town America with migrants:

"We have more refugees per capita than any other state. That's not just morally a good thing, it's our economic and cultural future.

"This beautiful diversity we see out in… pic.twitter.com/oRwpr8KPs3

— Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) October 1, 2024

Acceptance of a huge number of immigrants is a moral good. It probably will prove to be a significant part of Minnesota's cultural future. And it will be a part of the state's economic future, although I'm guessing whites, Asian-American and Pacific Islanders, Latinos, generational African-Americans and other blacks, and possibly even tribal individuals also will be contribute to Minnesota's future.

Nonetheless, fifty languages being spoken in the school is nothing to brag about, merely a reality which must be addressed. It will be a very costly reality, whether that cost is borne by the federal government, state government, or local taxpayers. Failing to support (even assist) them in an effort to become fluent in English is necessary if they are to participate in all respects -"holistically," as Kamala Harris probably would put it- in our nation's culture.  It's also critical in order to engage in- again, as Harris would term it- an "opportunity economy." In short, to become Americans.

Schools- public, non-charter- play a major role in that. Ian Bremmer on Friday's Overtime segment of Real Time with Bill Maher, responded to survey data indicating that young men are now more religious than young women. He noted (at 2:02) 

I mean in the sense that it's just one more sign of society atomizing, you know- not as much time with families, not as much belief in church. You know, more people going to private schools as opposed to more in public. That's something I worry about generally.

 

           

When God wanted to destroy the dreams of the Babylonians, he confused their language, which disrupted their work and made it impossible for them to communicate with each other.  No longer able to have a stable society with a common language, they scattered to the ends of earth. Therein is a message we should embrace. Now atomized, the Babylonians had become mere individuals with no sense of community.

Approving and encouraging the American mosaic does not require turning a blind eye to the immense problems we will increasingly encounter, especially in schools, with a multiplicity of languages commonly and routinely spoken. The value of diversity must not lend itself to glorifying the babble of languages spoken in schools which, while at this moment unavoidable, is an obstacle to promoting academic achievement.

The likes of Charlie Kirk and Donald Trump, unconcerned with aiding immigrants and hostile to diversity generally, will not fully understand that.  Yet it's something that much of the American left, including vice-presidential hopeful Tim Walz, should grasp but are disregarding or have lost sight of.

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Stop the Bloviating

There are several wise rules which will prevail at the debate between vice presidential nominees Tim Walz and J.D. Vance, to be held on October 1 and moderated by Norah O'Donnell and Margaret Brennan of CBS News.

As with the presidential debate between Harris and Trump, each candidate will be standing at a lectern. Thankfully, there will be no opening statements and most importantly, no live audience.

There also will be no real-time fact-checking by the moderators. Instead, as Chris Cillizza explains on substack, CBS will offer viewers the opportunity to use an on-screen QR code which can take viewers to a live fact-checking site staffed by CBS journalists. Cillizza explains why this will be little utilized, and hence very nearly worthless. However, as to the more general issue of fact-checking in a debate, the veteran journalist explains

I believe, deeply, that there are objective facts. Like, say, the 2020 election was not stolen.

But, I also know that ALL politicians shade and shape facts and figures to work for them. And that these “facts” aren’t necessarily outright false but absolutely need more context in order to give a viewer or reader the full picture.

(To be clear: Trump does this sort of shaping and shading — and outright lying — more than any other politician I have ever encountered. But, they all do at least some of it.)

Given that, I think moderators wading into the fact-checking waters is a very slippery slope. If moderators stopped the debate to fact check everything a candidate says that is not objectively and unquestionably true, they would be interjecting on nearly every answer.

Which would make the moderators the focus of the debate. And the arbiters of who won and who lost. Which is a bad thing.

With or without live fact-checking, which Cillizza obviously recognizes as misleading, there is a rule ubiquitous to political debates which turn them into spectacles with a premium on empty rhetoric and showmanship, a rule so unquestioned it practically takes on the status of law. TIME reports that when the moderators ask the candidates a question, he will be

allotted two minutes to respond. This will be followed by one-minute rebuttals and responses to the rebuttals. CBX News said that the moderators may at their discretion give the candidates an additional minute to continue a discussion. Lights will appear in front of the candidates to alert them to their remaining speaking time.

At the presidential debate in early September, Harris and Trump were allotted two minutes to answer a question, followed by "two minutes for rebuttals and one minute for follow-ups, clarifications or responses."

This is how it always goes, with a substantial period offered a candidate to respond to a question. In the case of the two debates this cycle, the period is two minutes. 

This is far two long, by approximately one-and-a-half minutes. It shouldn't take candidates more than 30 seconds to answer a question. Were they tempted to give a complete, thorough response, it would take longer.

But they are never so tempted, for fear it might enlighten voters and/or give an opening to their opponent.. Instead, at some point during the two minutes, they will address the issue posed in some broad manner., yet spend the remaining time saying nothing which reveals what they really believe. In the presidential debate, it was Donald Trump using most of the two minutes to ramble belligerently with a string of lies and other baseless claims, occasionally interrupted with a half-truth.   With Kamala Harris, it was a slick repetition of her talking points interspersed with a precious few moments of near-candor.

This sort of thing, which in some form or another will be repeated when Tim Walz and J.D. Vance square off against each other tonight, serves the interests of no one- except the politicians themselves.  And so Americans are subjected to 90 minutes in which the individuals compete in a contest to be the more cunning, deceptive candidate and thereby be declared the winner.

   

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The Good and the Weak

In the interests of joy and of being unburdened by what has been, it's a day to be ambivalent about our Democratic nominee for President. A very pro-Israel tweeter is largely wrong:

Asking for 350 million friends. pic.twitter.com/BqlZPtxmXJ

— Hillel Fuld (@HilzFuld) August 29, 2024

The Vice-President did not kneecap President Biden. After the latter's disastrous debate against Donald Trump, it became clear to an increasing number of voters, then of pundits and prominent Democrats, that the incumbent would be a sure loser in November. (And in the unlikely event of victory, he probably could not serve another four years.)

These powerful Democrats included former President Obama, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, National Democratic Redistricting Committee chairman and former Attorney General Eric Holder, and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi. And no one crosses Nancy Pelosi and lives to tell about it.

At a critical time, in the moments following that epic June 27 debate, the Vice President had been queried about the President's performance of that evening and defended him defiantly and eloquently, remarking "He got into a groove where it counted. Our president showed that he will win the election." It was something that she had no choice but to do because she couldn't be seen undercutting the President. Nonetheless, she was as positive as possible without getting laughed out of the room.

Vice-President Harris was given two- two- primary tasks, one by President Biden and the other by the Constitution. In the first, she to take major strides in helping secure the southern border, a task nearly impossible without cooperation by the United States Congress, and very difficult with. She made little progress, as should have been expected.

The vice-president is constitutionally empowered to cast the deciding vote in the United States Senate in case of a tie.  She set a record by doing so 32 times and was very effective performing that task.

Nevertheless, the tweeter is essentially correct that Ms. Harris refuses to be interviewed for the new position. Tonight, CNN will broadcast a taped interview with the Democratic presidential nominee. Infamously, however, she agreed to appear only with her Emotional Support Governor and running mate Tim Walz. (In the interests of full disclosure, credit must be given to this person, something I've never wanted to do.)

Coincidentally, this puts Harris into a role in which she has excelled. As vice-president, she is de facto required to cast the deciding vote in the Senate as her male supervisor, President Biden, wishes. And now she has bowed to the justified demands of the press that she be interviewed, and will do so only in the presence of another man. I am woman, hear me roar!  Such progress! 

Yet, if the sentiment was good enough for the late Bill Withers, it should be- and apparently is- good enough for Tim Walz and Kamala Harris.

 

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Deft Dodge

This is a good question and an interesting answer. Well, sort of and sort of.

Harris campaign co-chair Gretchen Whitmer says Gov. Tim Walz giving illegals driver’s licenses, free college, and free health care is sensible policy that’s liked by Americanspic.twitter.com/9bF7iC8t81

— Paul A. Szypula 🇺🇸 (@Bubblebathgirl) August 18, 2024

Kristin Welker asks

Well, let me ask you about her running mate, Tim Walz, and particularly on the issue of immigration. Obviously some of his policies in his state have come into focus. He signed into law initiatives allowing undocumented immigrants to apply for driver's licenses, quality free – for free tuition at public universities, and enroll in the state's free health care program for low income residents. Would you like to see the Harris administration adopt those same policies, Governor?

Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer, a Harris-Walz surrogate, answers

Well, I could tell you, you know, Tim Walz is a pragmatic guy. He's a Midwesterner just like me. And I think some of the wonderful things he's done in Minnesota resonate with, you know, Americans in all states. We know that when you give – when you provide free breakfast and lunch for all the school kids in your state, you're saving parents $850 bucks a year per student just on the grocery bill. So I think what you see in Tim Walz is a pragmatist who wants to make sure that we are a beacon that people come to. You need to come legally. We need to secure our borders. But we also know that the great history of this country is that we were the place that people came to for an opportunity. And that’s got to be the great future of it too

Outsiders "need to come legally" and "we need to secure our borders" is boilerplate; no Democrat publicly admits to being partial to illegal immigration. However, Whitmer did not respond to whether Harris-Walz should adopt the radical proposals.

So Welker now follows-up with largely the same question but with a twist:  "But – but – so do you – would you support the Harris administration, if she were to be elected, adopting those proposals I just laid out for you? For example, driver's licenses for those who are undocumented?"

Whitmer's response is revealing:

I think what we need to do is have a system – an immigration system that works, number one. We need to secure the border, we need to make sure that when people are in this country, that they have access to have some form of ID. That's really important. And I think to the spirit of those things, I think, should be a part of any vision for the – for the country, and our security, and how we bring great people into this country legally.

Democrats, learning to say "we need to secure the border," believe it gives them cover for policies which encourage immigration, legal and illegal. The phrase has lost almost all meaning.  Last year, when the border was even more porous than it is no, the Vice President could say with a (rare) straight face 

 

There is no constitutional requirement that individuals illegally residing in the USA  have "access" to "some form of ID." They are here illegally, and to award them with- well, to award them anything- is noxious.

When it appeared that President Biden might be forced from the race, I speculated that the Democrat's strongest nominee for 2024 would be Gretchen Whitmer, though I myself was ambivalent about her beliefs. Speaking to Welker, the Michigan governor suggested that "I.D." be offered' as if it would be an uncomplicated act of compassion, rather than opening the floodgates to additional benefits. Very likely, that would include such things as free tuition at public colleges, free health care, and a driver's license. 

Governor Whitmer herself appears to support these initiatives and even more obviously would support adoption of those moves if Kamala Harris were elected. Avoiding specifics by referring to "beacon" and  "ID" to mollify the left and "secure border" to mollify centrists is increasingly popular strategy. 

As Whitmer demonstrated, these questions are navigable if proper rhetoric is invoked, coupled with a recognition that most interviewers will ask one question with maybe a follow-up, then drop the entire subject.  Now an experienced politician, Kamala Harris recognizes that this is her path to mitigating the damage her tolerance for surges at the border would do to her candidacy.

Both the Democratic nominee and the Republican nominee have embraced extremist views on immigration. The election must assume the responsibility of fleshing out and exposing these views, and more effectively than was done on Sunday's Meet the Press.

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Assume Nothing

There are bad reasons to vote for Donald Trump; very bad reasons to vote for Donald Trump; and extremely bad reasons to vote for Donald Trump. This is the worst, and a tweeter whose timeline clearly indicates that he is on the left side of the political spectrum has it exactly right until the end:

Why do you keep policing how families behave?
Who cares if he took his wife's hand and gave her an "awkward" hug? It was an awkward situation, on stage in front of millions of people. They're not rehearsed politicians, they're just normal people.

— KO Murphy (@klcmurphy) August 11, 2024

. 

The essential problem, as this liberal tweeter recognizes, is policing how families behave. Vance has been guilty of this, with CNN noting his "childless cat ladies" assessment and

In November 2020, Vance said on a conservative podcast that childless Americans, especially those in the country’s “leadership class,” were “more sociopathic” than those with children and made the country “less mentally stable.” Vance added that the “most deranged” and “most psychotic” commentators on Twitter – now known as X - were typically childless.

In August 2021, one month after launching his candidacy for the Senate, Vance’s campaign sent fundraising emails referring to the “radical childless leaders in this country” following his appearance on “Tucker Carlson Tonight” where he made comments deriding “childless cat ladies” and leaders running the country. The comments sparked a widespread backlash against Vance when they resurfaced on social media following his nomination to the Republican presidential ticket.

(Little did we know before Vance's remark that childless George Washington was radical.) 

Handshakes? How 20th century. If emotion is not exhibited, most Americans evidently believe, the sentiment cannot be authentic.

Relationships among people- especially within marriages- are difficult to evaluate accurately and depth of devotion to a person or a cause cannot be assumed by the degree of fervor publicly demonstrated. At the Democratic National Convention in 2000, Al and Tipper Gore seemed to share a moment of joy and love

              :

Ten years later, they were divorced. Perhaps- perhaps- their marriage deteriorated only following Al's devastating (for him and for the country) loss in the presidential election a few months later. Or maybe it was scripted.  We don't know- and we should assume nothing from a handshake instead of a kiss, its sincerity or what it symbolizes.. 

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What He Didn't Say

The proper answer is "I didn't say that."

Reporter: You have repeatedly suggested that the only reason Kamala Harris didn't pick Josh Shapiro is because of his Jewish faith. Do you have any evidence to support that assertion that a person who is married to a Jewish man is somehow anti-semitic.. pic.twitter.com/EZD2GqXJ1a

— Acyn (@Acyn) August 7, 2024

The New York Post has reported

GOP veep nominee Sen. JD Vance on Tuesday accused VP Kamala Harris of bending to the Democrats’ “far left’’ to choose Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate over Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro.

Walz is one of the “most far-left radicals in the entire United States,” said Vance (R-Ohio), arguing that Harris chose him to “fit the needs of the far left of the party.”

“She selected Tim Walz — a guy who wants to ship more manufacturing jobs to China, who wants to get an illegal aliens driver’s license and who wants to make the financial crisis … so much worse because he refuses to do his job and actually make it easier for American citizens and non-illegal aliens to live a good life,” Vance said.

The Republican vice-presidential hopeful’s remarks came after far-left groups dubbed Shapiro “Genocide Josh” over his support for Israel in the Gaza war, as Harris was deliberating over a potential running mate….

Vance also said Harris’ selection of Walz proved that the current veep “is running as a San Francisco liberal,” accusing the Minnesota governor and native Nebraskan of being California-minded….

Vance also answered a question from The Post about how he feels about his opponent being Walz — whom the Republican accused of having a “joke record” — over the far more well-known Shapiro, who was reportedly Harris’ second choice.

“I genuinely feel bad that for days, maybe weeks, [Shapiro] actually had to run away from his Jewish heritage because of what the Democrats are saying about [him],” Vance told The Post. “I think that’s scandalous, disgraceful — [regardless of] whatever you believe or whatever disagreements on policy you have about somebody.”

“The fact that that race — the vice presidential race on the Democratic side — became so focused on his ethnicity, I think it’s absolutely disgraceful, and it’s insulting to Americans, whatever background you’re from,” Vance added.

Shapiro was reported as a top candidate under Harris’ consideration and the final decision is reported to have been between the battleground governor and Walz, who was not one of the top contenders whom voters expected to get the nomination given his geography.

Vance didn't say that Kamala Harris didn't pick Josh Shapiro because of the latter's faith. He said Shapiro

actually had to run away from his Jewish heritage because of what the Democrats were saying about (him). The vice presidential race on the Democratic side became so focused on his ethnicity, I think it's absolutely disgraceful, and it's insulting to Americans, whatever background you're from.

There is a lot to unpack here, even aside from Vance starting one sentence with "the fact that that race" before he corrected himself. Hopefully, he was thinking "vice presidential race," which obviously exists, rather than "Jewish race," which doesn't.

There is no indication that Shapiro "ran (run) away from his Jewish heritage"- or even that if he had, he would have been selected by Harris. No doubt Shapiro's views on Israel played a role in the vice-president's selection, given concern about losing votes from anti-Israel Muslims and others and likely protests at the upcoming Democratic convention in Chicago. It was not primarily the governor's religion which was a factor, but rather his opinion of the Israeli war effort, however informed that is by his own religious faith or affiliation.

There were other factors involved in the choice of Walz. His superior (compared to Shapiro and the presidential candidate) likability, his relatability. Additionally, the vibe he creates and the personal style he reflects are far different than which characterize Ms. Harris.

Additionally, the NY Post cites "sources" who indicate one of the reasons the presidential candidate bypassed Mr. Shapiro is "her fear that he would steal the 'spotlight.'" The latter appears to value personal ambition over principle and personal integrity, and in that regard would not balance the ticket.

The evidence that Kamala Harris does not dislike Jews is that there is no evidence that she does, rather than a very secular (Protestant) marrying a very secular Jew. Although evidently unbeknownst to the reporter who confronted Vance, one person may marry another for any number of reasons. The stronger evidence that Kamala Harris does not dislike Jews is that there is no evidence that she does, rather than a very secular (Protestant) marrying a very secular Jew.

Nonetheless, as a politician, J.D. Vance cannot go there because it is a little complicated and serves no strategic purpose. The better response would have been "I didn't ay that" and put it back into the reporter's court. It also would have revealed a little hostility toward the media, which is always a winning pose to strike.

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