A ‘Rorschach-test debate.’ ABC News says last night’s confrontation between vice-presidential candidates JD Vance and Tim Walz gave voters on each side something to like about their favored ticket.
■ Popular Information’s Judd Legum: Vance demonstrated that he’s “a much better debater than former President Donald Trump.”
■ Variety critic Owen Glieberman: “Walz had better policy points, but his agitated delivery rolled right off JD Vance’s Reaganesque smoothness.”
■ Variety critic Owen Glieberman: “Walz had better policy points, but his agitated delivery rolled right off JD Vance’s Reaganesque smoothness.”
■ Columnist Charlie Madigan: “I kept thinking, ‘Dang, the Republicans have put the wrong guy on the top of the ticket.’”
■ The Bulwark: Vance “may have made Trump more palatable.”
■ Law prof Joyce Vance: “If only voters would forget the 2020 election, Vance might get away with it.”
■ The Sun-Times’ Lynn Sweet: “Walz at times looked like a deer caught in headlights” …
■ … but, in what TPM’s David Kurtz calls a fourth-quarter comeback, Walz smacked Vance down for “a damning non-answer” when asked directly if Trump lost in 2020.
■ Pod Save America co-host Dan Pfeiffer: “The pundits who instantly claimed Vance mopped the floor with Walz reveal a real disconnect from the voters who will decide the election.”
■ CBS moderators fact-checked Vance more than Walz …
■ … and even cut his mic after he objected to a correction.
■ Media critic Oliver Darcy praises the moderators: “By clearly—and authoritatively—stating the facts on issues such as climate change and immigration, O’Donnell and Brennan ensured that reality was not warped by Vance.”
■ Vance racked up way more “false” ratings from PolitiFact than Walz.
■ The American Prospect’s Harold Meyerson (no relation): While projecting “a fictitious moderation,” Vance “managed to advance some memorably ridiculous arguments.”
■ CNN’s Brian Stelter sees one true loser: “The Commission on Presidential Debates is a relic of the past.”
Went to bed early? LateNighter has you covered with the 50 best jokes from last night’s post-debate comedy shows …
■ … including The Daily Show’s Michael Kosta: “The most crucial VP debate in history? The only other VP debate in history anyone remembers is the time that a fly got stuck on Mike Pence’s head. The bar is low.” …
■ … and Stephen Colbert, who compared the debate to “having Thanksgiving with your most nervous uncle and your smuggest nephew. It was unpleasant, awkward—and thankfully you only have to do it once every four years.”
■ Satirist Andy Borowitz: “Walz Demolished Vance, According to Poll of Cats.”
‘The most important takeaway from the vice presidential debate.’ USA Today’s Rex Huppke says it was that “lunatic Donald Trump remains the GOP’s presidential nominee, and he spent time before and during the debate again showing Americans how wildly unqualified he is to lead the country.”
■ Trump yesterday confusedly and falsely accused Vice President Harris of “murder.”
■ 404 Media: A cache of internal emails reveals the chaos caused in Springfield, Ohio, by Trump and Vance’s unfounded racist conspiracy theory that Haitian immigrants are “eating the pets.”
Ill winds. Hurricane Helene’s impact on voting in North Carolina could decide the presidency.
■ In a move that could cripple the supply chain for intravenous and peritoneal dialysis solutions across the country, Deerfield-based Baxter’s temporarily shuttered its hurricane-damaged largest plant.
■ Helene-triggered flooding swept away 11 workers—and Tennessee's government is asking how that happened.
■ Men Yell at Me columnist Lyz Lenz recalls losing power for a month after what amounted to a hurricane ravaged her home in Iowa: “There is nothing like a natural disaster to remind you of your powerlessness.”
■ The Chicago City Council’s weighing new approaches to protecting residents during extreme weather.
‘Did Ed Burke try to shake me down? Sure felt like it.’ Writing for the Tribune, former League of Chicago Theaters CEO* Marj Halperin recalls a creepy 1998 meeting with the now-convicted dean of the City Council.
■ The council’s poised to OK another $332,500 in settlement of a claim against a Chicago cop with a $10 million history of misconduct cases.
■ Block Club Chicago: A fatal police chase on the Southwest Side puts the cops’ pursuit policy back in the spotlight.
‘My first impulse was Ixnay on the whole Jewish New Year thing.’ The Sun-Times’ Neil Steinberg: “Forgiving ourselves for any past mistakes, say, involving occupied territories … would only be asking for trouble. But difficult times are exactly the moment when you should stand up, manifest yourself and be counted.”
■ Columnist, NPR alumnus and atheist Bob Garfield: Trump’s use of the phrase Jewish person is a tell: “Shout it out. Jew. Jew. Jew. That isn’t an insult, asshole.”
■ Live updates from the AP: “Iran and Israel swap threats following Tehran’s missile barrage.”
■ The legacy of last year’s wave of campus protests against Israel: Overhauled guidelines for political speech in Chicago and across the country.
■ The Reader: “Did Northwestern bow to congressional pressure in canceling a Medill professor’s classes?”
‘A lethal health record monopolist.’ If you have an online relationship with a doctor or hospital, odds are it’s courtesy of Epic Systems, a Wisconsin-based company whose product tech critic Cory Doctorow says means that “for every hour a doctor spends with a patient, they have to spend two hours doing clinically useless bureaucratic data-entry.”
■ Robert Kuttner at The American Standard: “The demands by Epic’s system on physician time have increasingly taken over the practice of medicine.”
■ Block Club: “The owner of a Chicago COVID-19 testing lab has pleaded guilty to a $14 million scheme where his company provided fake negative results to people getting tested—while billing the government for the tests.”
■ Illinois whooping cough cases are running nearly five times higher than last year.
Chicago Public Square mailbag. In response to yesterday’s published complaint about Square’s treatment of Donald Trump, reader Joe Hass writes: “Mr. Virshbo used the word journalism in regards to publishing the fact that there aren’t enough nice words about Donald Trump in your daily publication. Speaking on behalf of a lot of people who want to keep journalism alive, as a wise giant [correction: Inigo Montoya] once said, ‘I do not think it means what you think it means.’ By the way, Barry: The lady kept the money, so Trump didn’t pay for shit.”
■ Marge Arnold: “Re: tRump being nice … even when he tries to be nice he still manages to be weird … creepy and condescending. YIKES! 😳”
■ Ila Lewis: “Trump … is well-deserving of such treatment and even more.”
■ Tom O’Malley: “Virshbo has fallen into the Drumpf abyss and can’t get up.”
■ Mike Braden made this edition better.
A Square public service announcement
Square columnist Charlie Meyerson will be one of the evening’s storytellers.
* And former teammate with your Square columnist at WXRT’s gone-but-not-forgotten news department.