VP debate: Pence and Harris dodge the questions that matter most

It’s really a shame there won’t be a second vice presidential debate this year. The first one never really started.

For 90 minutes, vice president Mike Pence and Democratic nominee Kamala Harris reinvented the filibuster. It was fitting for a sitting senator and former House Republican Conference chairman. These two creatures of the Washington “swamp” dodged the toughest questions they got from moderator Susan Page of USA Today and spent the rest of the time bickering about interruptions and running out the clock with canned talking points.

Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres were waging what appeared a fun battle in Game 2 of their National League Division Series.

One suspects quite a few American televisions found their way to the baseball playoff game as the senator smirked and shook her head as Mr Pence spoke and the Donald Trump loyalist smirked and took more time than should have been allowed to defend his boss and attack the Democratic candidates.

Baseball is, after all, technically still America’s pastime.

By the end of the lone VP debate, after hearing from each candidate on each ticket in a debate setting, and because we hear from them so often in other venues and mediums, one could be excused from thinking it is past time that we just get on with the actual vote.

Ms Harris’s smile and smirk were gone when she was asked if Democrats intend to “pack the court” if she and Mr Biden win and the party takes control of the Senate.

Mr Pence lost his half-smile when the heat was turned up about whether the president really and truly will keep his promise by protecting Americans with pre-existing conditions.

Neither came close to an answer.

The issues are the kind that might sway an undecided voter.

Americans deserved answers. After all, all four candidates have at one point or another called this the most important election in American history.

Still, both Mr Pence and Ms Harris did what they likely intended in Salt Lake City, Utah.

He, as always, defended Mr Trump and did little to turn off more suburban women and senior voters. Both have long ago left the Trump coalition. But Mr Pence cannot win just enough back to stay in office; he needs the president to pull off what feels more and more like a gargantuan task – unless their campaign staffers are correct that a mass “shy” Trump voting group is skewing polls too far in Mr Biden’s favour.

She effectively talked up Mr Biden’s strengths: empathy, experience and foreign policy. Ms Harris also appeared to secure a narrow victory with her attacks on the administration’s handling of the coronavirus. Her strongest moment was contending Mr Trump and Mr Pence “forfeited” a second term with “the greatest failure of any presidential administration”, referring to their coronavirus response.

Reams and years of polling data and research prove American voters do not base their votes on the name on the VP candidate line, much less how they did in one 90-minute debate in the middle of the week.

Neither Mr Pence nor Ms Harris gave them much of a reason to on 3 November.