As Bill Clinton might say, “It depends on what the meaning of ‘qualified’ is.”
The Vice-President has only two clearly defined jobs. The first is to preside over the Senate, and that’s a job even Joe Biden could do in his current state of confusion. The second job is to be the President’s back-up, insurance policy, and stunt-man. That’s a bit trickier, and as Kamala Harris has proven, it’s too challenging for some people. Still, paraphrasing Woody Allen, “Ninety percent of success as Vice-President is just showing up.”
I have this idealistic notion that a VP candidate should be at least minimally qualified to be President, since 9 out of 45 Presidents got the job when the top of their ticket couldn’t perform his duties any more. That’s 20%, one in five. Despite these ominous odds, most Presidential candidates choose their understudies without any concern about their fitness to be President, not to say that most of the choices weren’t at least theoretically qualified. Joe Biden was, in my view, one of the least qualified VPs ever, and look where he ended up.
I believe that a possible President should have demonstrated leadership experience. Does Vance? He’s never held an elected executive office, and he’s only been a U.S. Senator for less than two years. He served in the Marines, but not in combat or as an officer. He’s a lawyer—not a significant qualification to be President. He’s been a partner in a law firm, a venture capital firm and an investment company. He has about as much relevant experience as Trump did before he was elected, maybe a bit less. In other words, not much.
To give him his due, Vance appears to be smart, unlike…well, unlike several recent VPs. At Ohio State University he earned a summa cum laude Bachelor of Arts degree in political science and philosophy and he was an editor of the Yale Law Journal. Those credentials aren’t proof positive of an IQ above freezing, but they do provide a certain comfort level. And, famously, he wrote a best-selling novel, presumably by himself unlike other pre-Presidency authors like Jack Kennedy, who got a Pulitzer Prize for his ghost-written “Profiles in Courage.”
Being smart, unfortunately, has a very weak correlation with successful Presidencies. It is such a unique job that no background can prepare one for it, although Ronald Reagan was correct that being an actor helps, and Eisenhower once mused that after commanding the Allied forces in Europe during WWII, being President was relatively easy. Some of the least qualified VPs elevated to the big job did surprisingly well (Truman, Arthur). Some of the most qualified or smartest elected Presidents were flops (Buchanan, Taft, Wilson, Bush I).
Taking all of this together, I must conclude that—well, let me put it this way: J.D. Vance is qualified enough by precedent and by clearing a very low bar. Nonetheless, it seems clear that Trump picked him because he will be an asset during the campaign, and his virtues as a potential successor never entered Trump’s mind. It is fair to say that Vance has been so unflaggingly loyal to Trump that maybe Trump thinks he would, unlike Mike Pence, really try to delay the certification of an election if asked. I suspect, I hope, that Vance is too smart for that.
I will give Trump integrity points for not pandering to the DEI zeitgeist by choosing a running mate based on color, ethnicity or lady parts. The pool he was considering was far from stellar: none of them warranted the slot on merit with the exception of Nikki Haley, and she had disqualified herself by descending into outrageous weaseldom.
Ethics Alarms 
Would Glenn Youngkin have been a reasonably “qualified” choice on the government executive experience front? Maybe Trump was a little tepid on choosing another governor. Maybe he was talked into Pence.
I have the same concern about Vance. I didn’t even know he’d done anything at all other than write “Hillbilly Elegy,” I believe? At least he’s demonstrated a very high level of SAT smarts and finance smarts. So, he’s got that going for him. That’s pretty reassuring, frankly, compared to Kamala Harris and Joe Biden and Dan Quayle.
Sorry to go back to the assassination attempt again, but why is there an “independent investigation” of the Secret Service being ground down to nothing by the bureaucracy, er, begun? Why wasn’t the head of the Secret Service brought into the Oval Office Saturday night and told “Resign, or I’ll fire you. Your choice”? Isn’t incompetent leadership unethical? Grr.
And someone tell me again that Trump doesn’t, or can’t because they won’t work for him, hire competent people, but all the usual suspects, er, the usual swamp critters, er, lifetime civil servants and rent seekers, er, the highly qualified veteran experts the Biden administration is stocked with are preferable?
https://www.cbsnews.com/live-updates/trump-shooting-statement-joe-biden-updates/
It gets worse for swat and the secret service. Simply a boondoggle of incompetence
Well, he’s probably more qualified than Dan Quayle or Kamala Harris.
Damnation by faint praise, I know.
It seems the vast majority of VP candidates in the 20th and 21st century (and since Eisenhower, VP’s themselves) have been from the Senate.
I would deem him qualified by current standards. There are better choices, but none Trump would even minimally trust.
Check…check…check..check….check.
Senators usually can talk well. They are not inherently qualified to do anything else. Most qualified VP since Teddy Roosevelt? Nelson Rockefeller, by far.
I’d say Johnson was a close second, but yeah, Rockefeller had a lot of government and private sector leadership experience.
Johnson, a natural leader, a gifted political deal-maker, smart and ruthless.
If only someone had taught him how to speak in public…..
Meh, he’s an Ohio pick which is traditionally what an East Coast candidate wants in a running mate to appeal to Middle America. He may be more “loyal” – the way Trump defines loyalty – than Mike Pence. That part may be what defines him as qualified or unqualified, for better or for worse.
Yikes. When I first read this I thought you wrote “Ohio prick.”
Nicolle Wallace laughably predicts that Harris will, and I quote, Wipe The Floor With Vance in the VP debates.
I predict the exact opposite, with Harris being embarrassingly outed as an intellectual flyweight.
PWS
Heck, Mike Pence outdebated Harris, and Vance is much quicker than The Man From Glad.
Not that a single vote is ever changed by a VP debate.
Do the VP candidates have a debate?!?
…just kidding…
I actually watched the Pence/Kaine debate way back in 2016 and Pence was super smart. He said very little and just kept doling out the rope to poor Tim so he could hang himself on his own words.
Vance isn’t qualified…as though any Senator really could be. But Noem shot herself in the dog, Reynolds – she’s our governor and has done an outstanding job – probably wasn’t asked (and would have likely turned it down anyway), Youngkin apparently didn’t want it, and the guy from North Dakota has no name recognition and governs a state with minimal population that already votes 70% Republican.
Vance is also unknown (until today), but represents a rust-belt battleground state – though Trump has a solid lead there if polls are to be trusted. Plucking Vance won’t cost a Senate seat at least for now, since DeWine will appoint a Republican to serve out the term.
And VP Harris couldn’t wipe the floor with a mop, so she won’t do so with Vance.
Remember the Halcyon days when Paul Ryan debated Biden?
And Martha Raddatz let Biden cheat, and Ryan, that pathetic weenie, did nothing? Yeah, I remember.
I remember during the Obama presidency when Joe Biden was known enough to be a complete dismal character that while the media did everything they could to spin him as a likeable guy – even the Onion got on board with covering for his abject lack of everything presidential knowing he’d be in the hot seat one day.
The Onion did a regular series on him recounting the rakish behavior of a libertine, trying to cast him as a lovable and harmless rapscallion up to juvenile antics.
I hardly knew much about Biden’s background at that point, but seeing the Onion’s fairly pathetic attempt to make him likable pretty much told me everything I needed to know.
I’m curious: am I the only one who made that connection? Does it date me to a ridiculous and humiliating extent? Is it the reason I could never take Pence seriously?
Yes 😉
Chronologically I am old enough to remember him, but I don’t remember him.
Oh crap, maybe I am too old to remember him.
Then again maybe that qualifies me to be President. As Carl in Caddy Shack said, “so, I got that going for me”.
These are among the things I remember that Grace used to tell me to “erase” because the information is useless and she was sure I was going blow my hard drive and become a drooling vegetable.
Of course Harris is going to win the debate. I don’t know how you could question that. Just ask MSNBC after the debate if you have doubts.
I am still moderately amazed that MSNBC didn’t proclaim Biden the winner of the debate last month. Guess they drank a bit too much of their own kool aid.
More like too much of their own bath water. Jennifer Rubin just posted that Harris is eyeing the debate like a kid eyeing a candy store. I think Jen has legit lost her mind. 😜🤪
1) he’s 35.
2) he’s natural born citizen
3) he’s actually loyal to Trump and “MAGA”
4) where Trump’s unclear bombast has a certain value to it, the clarity it lacks and still needs will be filled in by J D Vance
5) the final qualification will come if they are elected
He’s on the “very” end of the Ukraine-aid-skepticism continuum. Not exactly my taste. But as VP he’d never be able to act on this unless for some reason the Senate is tied on a vote related to Ukraine aid.
But, I think he’ll moderate his views and certainly his rhetoric depending on the direction Trump thinks the United States should encourage the war to develop should he become president again.
Otherwise – all the most unethical progressives are already flipping out about the Vance pick – and while most of the conniptions are performative theatrics they reserve for any republican, the fact that he’s hated by Progressives is at least a good sign that he can’t be all bad.
That presents an interesting contrast when compared to my response four years ago upon learning that Kamala Harris was Joe Biden’s pick for VP: uproarious laughter.
Isn’t Vance every bit as qualified as Barack Obama was when nominated?
I’d give Barack the edge.