Debate Wrap-Up: Tim Kaine and Mike Pence Agreed on Some Terrifying Policies

Tim Kaine and Mike Pence quarreled and quibbled over a number of issues Tuesday night, the central one being the condition of Donald Trump’s soul, but the biggest takeaway of the debate may be the things the two men agreed about — all of which are scary.

They agreed that Russia is evil and terrifying and must be aggressively countered. They agreed that the U.S. should militarily intervene in Syria. They agreed that the national debt is frightening. They agreed that community policing, a euphemism for doing nothing, is going to make everything better again. And they agreed to talk over the female moderator, Elaine Quijano.

The Intercept’s staff liveblogged the debate, sympathizing with the routinely ignored moderator, while at the same time marveling over the irrelevance of some of her questions – fearmongering about the debt and Social Security? Seriously? With all the real things we should be worrying about?

Glenn Greenwald wrote about how “Mike Pence and Tim Kaine puffed up their chests and grappled with one another over who can be more antagonistic to Russia and who can scare Vladimir Putin more.” In Pence’s case, this happened in spite of the fact that Trump has called for a de-escalation of tensions with Russia, which has in turn led to Democrats’ “repeated accusations that he is some sort of agent of the Kremlin.”

While Trump has favored isolationist rhetoric, both of their running mates sounded distinctly neocon themes in the context of the Middle East. Lee Fang noted that “Mike Pence broke in a big way with the top of his ticket on foreign policy during the debate, declaring that his administration would be prepared to ‘strike military targets of the Assad regime.'” Zaid Jilani pointed out that Pence and Kaine “surprisingly agreed on establishing ‘safe zones’ in Syria for beleaguered civilians,” while both also “failed to mention the troop commitments such zones would take to defend.”

Kaine and Pence also agreed on some domestic issues. Alice Speri wrote about how they both enthusiastically support community policing because “It sounds great. It means basically nothing.”

We noted that, in a debate that barely focused on the two vice presidential candidates themselves at all, Kaine ended up somehow straddling some wide moral chasms: He repeatedly noted his missionary work in Honduras, while ducking Hillary Clinton’s warm relations with military coup leaders there and their U.S. enablers; he spoke about carrying out executions even though it violated his personal convictions.

We fact-checked Mike Pence’s claim that he didn’t support Social Security privatization; his claim that foreign money isn’t at play in U.S. elections, and his assertion that our military is weak; and his assertion that Trump’s economic plans would help solve our debt problems.

And to kick the evening off, Jeremy Scahill exploded The Daily Beast’s cheap exercise in red-baiting with a post about Tim Kaine, John Negroponte and the Priest Who Was Thrown From a Helicopter.

Here are our posts from the evening:

Domestic issues

• Mike Pence and Donald Trump have both supported privatizing social security
• Tim Kaine boasts of carrying out executions even though he found them immoral
• Kaine and Pence agree on community policing because it sounds good, means nothing

Foreign policy

• Mike Pence and Tim Kaine’s Syrian “Safe Zone” would require thousands of troops
• Mike Pence remakes Trump foreign policy, calls for strikes on Syrian military
• Bizarre moments: Mike Pence echoes Democrats, advocates confrontation with Russia and Putin
• Court overruled Pence on blocking Syrian refugees
• Mike Pence and America’s favorite Christian crusader

Media

• The networks tasked political hacks to evaluate the debate, not Americans impacted by it
• NPR does us all a service with live transcript

Sexism

• People wanted Quijano to talk about women, then the men on stage did
• Men are talking over women — again

The debate and the moderator

• Sympathy for the moderator
• Debate moderator cites billionaire front group to fearmonger about national debt
• Why the Greens and Libertarians aren’t in tonight’s debate

Fact check

• Mike Pence is wrong; foreigners absolutely can put money into U.S. elections
• Pence is wrong: The U.S. spends way too much on its military
• Whoever the next president is, she or he will love dictators
• No, Social Security is not in any danger of going bankrupt
• Donald Trump would massively cut taxes for richest one percent, add trillions to debt

Donald Trump

• Donald Trump quotes from exchange with fan worried about “white genocide”
• Donald Trump already attacking Megyn Kelly

Hillary Clinton

• What do Hillary Clinton and the Contra death squads in Nicaragua have in common?
• Kaine brags about his time in Honduras, not his running mate’s record there