Vice Presidential Debate – Steal the show

It was Vice Presidential candidates’ day in Salt Lake City, Utah tonight Norwegian time. Vice President Mike Pence met with Democratic Vice Presidential candidate Kamala Harris a week later the scandalous debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden. And Kamala Harris went straight to Pence’s throat, saying that the Trump administration’s treatment of the coronavirus was “the biggest defeat for any administration ever.”

Men Trump ville obviously not let anyone else star in tonight either. And just minutes into the Vice Presidential debate, the corona-sick president tweeted: “I think it was a blessing from God that I was infected. It was a blessing in disguise.

President Donald Trump was known to be “blessed” last week, after performing as one superspreder without paying significant attention to infection control. Nearly 20 key advisers and staff in the president’s circle are now infected. Against this background, it was obvious that the corona crisis, which has so far killed 210,000 Americans, would be the main theme of the debate between the vice presidential candidates.

Harris, who is a senator and former State Attorney in California, went on the offensive, recalling that Trump himself has admitted to leading the American people behind the light by undermining the seriousness of the pandemic that is ravaging the world. Pence responded with an obvious lie, namely that the Trump administration has “always” told the American people the truth. Trump has been lied to more than 20,000 times – more than 20 times a day – since he became president three and a half years ago. And Pence followed up by assuring the openness and “transparency” that has characterized the president’s illness. While the doctors who treated Trump in the beginning would not answer whether Trump had received oxygen, and then came up with several contradictions regarding the treatment. Now we know that Trump is instead “blessed” with infection, and therefore know what he is talking about when he says that the virus is not something to be afraid of.

It was the vice presidential candidates of two elderly gentlemen who met in Salt Lake City. Trump is 74 years old and corona-infected, and Biden will be 78 years old when he is sworn in as president, if he wins the election in a month. There is therefore a greater than normal possibility that either Pence (61) or Harris (55) will take over as president during the next presidential term. There was a reason why there was more interest in tonight’s debate than is normally the case with the vice presidential candidate debates in American election campaigns.

The two were off infection control considerations separated by two layers of Plexiglas. So it was not just the rhetoric that reminded me of the inadequacy of the Trump administration in fighting the pandemic. The stage for the debate was also reminiscent of this, and that was probably the reason why the Republicans did not want the physical barriers between the candidates.

The debate was in tax and economics, where Harris reminded that in 2016 and 2017, Trump only paid $ 750 in taxes, only a fraction of what a teacher or nurse has to pay. While Pence said the first thing Biden would do as president was raise taxes, Harris protested by saying that Biden would not raise taxes for those with an income of less than $ 400,000 a year, approx. 3.5 million kroner.

The dividing lines were clear about green commitment, where Pence acted as a climate denier, while Harris said that a Biden administration would follow the recommendations of researchers, and make the Paris Agreement also applicable to the United States. In one of the debate’s dramatic sessions, Pence Harris pushed for Joe Biden to extend the Supreme Court to more than nine judges. This is a controversial issue because Trump will have to appoint the third judge to the Supreme Court in his term even before the election. With an extension of the Supreme Court, the Democrats – if they win the election in a month – will be able to neutralize the conservative dominance in the politically important court. It can both determine the result of this autumn’s presidential election, if there is a dispute about the outcome. And it will be able to roll back federal abortion legislation.