If there’s one thing Americans learned from Wednesday’s vice presidential debate, it’s that there was a lot more separating the candidates than those plexiglass screens! It’d be tough to find two people more unalike in character, style, substance, and demeanor than the pair sharing the stage in Salt Lake City Wednesday night. But in a debate of startling contrasts, there were still important distinctions to be made. Distinctions between — not just Mike Pence and Senator Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) — but between the two prevailing visions for this country. And when those questions did arise, viewers couldn’t help but notice: the barriers may have been transparent, but Kamala Harris rarely was.

After the first presidential debate, a dumpster fire of inaudible cross-talk and one-sided moderating, Wednesday night’s event at least gave voters a chance to hear a somewhat civil discussion (even though Harris did seem determined to alienate as many people as possible with her smug disrespect and split-screen condescension). Mike Pence was everything Americans have come to expect from him — disciplined, calm, focused, and reassuring. But he was also some things that people didn’t see coming — aggressive, assertive, with a killer instinct when needed. He was poised, and as the night went on, the vice president was what voters needed most — persistent.

When moderator Susan Page wouldn’t demand the answers to questions she herself asked, Pence made very sure the Democrats took ownership of the radical agenda they’re selling. When Kamala dodged questions about the Green New Deal or outright lied about fracking and Joe Biden’s tax plan, the vice president got right to the bottom line. “She just told you, on Day One, Joe Biden’s going to raise your taxes,” he said looking straight into the camera. Things got even more desperate for the Democrat on matters like the Supreme Court, where Harris’s only defense for her past behavior with Brett Kavanaugh or Amy Coney Barrett was to feign outrage over the insinuation that she, as a person “of faith” would “knock” someone for their beliefs. But this was no insinuation. Thanks to a little thing called the congressional record, there’s plenty of evidence that not only has the senator attacked Barrett, but several others in her wake. The Left never should have stooped to that level, NRO’s Alexandria Desanctis argued — nor should they get away with pretending like they haven’t.

But it was Harris’s non-answer on the court that may have been her biggest disaster of the night. “People are voting right now. They’d like to know if you and Joe Biden are gonna pack the Supreme Court if you don’t get your way in [stopping Barrett’s] nomination.” “I’m answering now,” Harris replied, then stopped, thinking better of it. Her silence, Pence told voters, said volumes. “If you haven’t figured it out yet,” he told the American people, “the straight answer is they are going to pack the Supreme Court if they somehow win this election.” Of course, Harris can’t admit that for the same reason she can’t be honest about the rest of the Biden-Sanders agenda — the American people oppose it.

In the Washington Examiner/YouGov poll that came out this week, voters — by a 47-34 percent margin — think Democrats should leave the Supreme Court numbers alone. “Your party,” Pence said, “is openly advocating adding seats to the Supreme Court which has had nine seats for 150 years… This is a classic case of if you can’t win by the rules, you’re going to change the rules.”

Speaking of terrifying changes, like reinstating the Iran deal and cozying up with China, Kamala thinks we should pattern the next administration on her job as attorney general in California. “… [T]he work that I did is a model of what our nation needs to do…” Let’s see. As the Golden State’s AG, she a) attacked pro-lifer David Daleiden for daring to expose the truth about Planned Parenthood’s baby body parts ring; b) demanded that California pregnancy centers affirm and promote abortion; c) targeted businesses with moral objections to paying for abortifacients; and d) fought to stop other states from raising the safety standards for women in abortion clinics. (Not to mention, as Pence deftly pointed out, her abysmal record as prosecutor.)

If she wants to add to that her “model” resume in the Senate, we could also throw in her support for legal infanticide, late-term abortion, taxpayer-funded abortion, the freedom-crushing Equality Act, transgender bathroom, shower, and locker room mandates, legal prostitution, and her contempt for school choice, girls’ sports, religious liberty, the Hyde amendment, constitutionalist judges, and so much more. Add that all up and the next administration would be, as Newsweek said of Harris now, “more liberal than Bernie Sanders.”

Maybe, for other vice presidential candidates, her record wouldn’t matter so much. But in a race where the man at the top of her ticket is plagued by questions about his age and mental fitness, it might matter more than it ever has. “There’s a very good chance,” Laura Ingraham said soberly, “that if Biden wins, the woman you saw tonight will become the next president of the United States.” So while the pundits trip over themselves to say Wednesday night’s debate didn’t matter, the reality is, they’re wrong. Whether Biden is incapacitated by illness or just by his deal with the radical Left, this will be Harris’s administration one way or another. And Americans need to take a good, hard look at what that means.

To see the differences between the two tickets for yourself, don’t miss FRC Action’s “Biden and Harris on the Issues.”

Originally published here.

The Media’s Fact Wreckers

Only nine percent of the country has a good deal of trust in the media, Gallup just announced. And after the last two presidential debates, most of us are wondering how it’s that high! In an environment where the press is “functionally running the Biden campaign,” Mollie Hemingway points out, it’s difficult to see how anyone can take the commentators, moderators, and fact-checkers (or maybe they’re frack-checkers after Wednesday night) seriously.

First there were the debate questions themselves, which, as Michael Goodwin argued, “sounded like they were ripped from the headlines of the Trump-hating Washington Post and New York Times.” Then, there was the disparate treatment of the candidates, with moderator Susan Page (like Chris Wallace before her) asking pointed things of the vice president while letting Senator Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) off the hook. It is, unfortunately, the favoritism we’ve come to expect from these media-driven forums, as they try to prop up their liberal candidates.

Now, apparently, it isn’t enough for the media to be the debate-framers — they want to be the lie detectors too. And here’s the funny part. The American people don’t think the media is telling the truth to begin with, so why would they trust them to start now? Just because you put “fact” in their title doesn’t mean they’ll distort the truth any less. Most of these people are just regular reporters anyway. Putting them on this assignment doesn’t mean they’ll suddenly be less biased.

Case in point: NBC. For weeks, the outlet has hammered President Trump and Mike Pence on the issue of abortion. Jane Timm, who’s made it her mission to cover up the radicalism of the Democratic candidates, was at it again Wednesday night — trying to soften the inhumanity of Harris’s agenda. Asked if she would agree to any limits on abortion, the senator refused to answer, saying only, “I will always fight for a woman’s right to make a decision about her own body.” Those “decisions,” as we know from her Senate record, include Harris’s support for birth day abortion, late-term abortion, and newborn “abortion” (or, as most people know it as: infanticide).

Mike Pence, after explaining that he was unapologetically prolife, took the chance to educate viewers on his opponent’s extremism. “Joe Biden and Kamala Harris support taxpayer funding of abortion up to the moment of birth,” he said. A fact we know is true based on their support for Roe v. Wade, which allows abortion through all nine months of pregnancy, and their unified opposition to the Hyde amendment, which bars taxpayer-funded abortion.

Timm, rather than concede the candidates’ radicalism — which is also a matter of their Senate records — instead called Pence’s statement “misleading.” “Biden supports abortion rights,” she wrote, “and elective abortions do not occur ‘up until the moment of birth’” — a lie so outrageous that you have to wonder how the media manages any credibility in this country. A whopping 22 states — almost half — allow abortion up to the very second of birth. And in seven of those, women don’t need a reason. A pregnant mom at 39 weeks can literally walk into a willing clinic and ask for an abortion, no questions asked. We also know from hundreds of former abortion workers that these horrors exist. Listen to Abby Johnson talk about what goes on behind the closed doors of Planned Parenthood at this year’s Values Voter Summit. It will astound you what’s going on every single day in every single community.

But unfortunately, NBC didn’t stop there. Timm also tried to cushion the blow of this barbaric practice by saying that “just” 1.2 abortions “occur after 21 weeks of gestation, according to the latest data.” First of all, those aren’t complete numbers, as we know from the lax and uneven state reporting requirements. Secondly, personal testimony has suggested for years that the “1.2 percent” number is a farce. Late-term abortions happen all the time, Abby explained matter-of-factly. Third, and perhaps most important, 1.2 percent is actually 5,597 children a year — more than double the casualties on 9/11. Imagine if someone remarked, just as casually, “America just lost 2,977 lives on September 11th.” One life is one life too many.

The media needs to stop with its “fact checks” and try a reality check instead. There’s no glossing over the truth about these two parties or their agendas. The reason networks can’t stand Pence challenging Harris’s abortion agenda is because it shows viewers exactly where she’ll take America if she has the chance. And it’s the one place most voters would never choose to be.

Originally published here.

This is a publication of the Family Research Council. Mr. Perkins is president of FRC.