My overarching takeaway is that while JD Vance is a more polished formal debater than Tim Walz, and a born natural like Pete Buttigieg might’ve done a better job exploiting the opportunity, Walz still won.
Through the first hour and a half of the debate, I found myself frustrated by Walz’s excessive civility, and by watching him miss opportunities to twist the knife. But Walz elicited what I think will be the only exchange that will escape the black hole of VP debates: