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The Policy Angle to Kamala Harris’ VP Pick You May Not Have Noticed

As you know, we try to stay away as much as possible from horse race politics news, here. (If you don’t trust us, read our latest article, which is on monetary policy!)

However, we do think there’s a policy angle that most people may not have picked up on, concerning Kamala Harris’s selection of Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate.

Our sense is that Harris (or whoever makes decisions for her) decided to go for the anti-JD Vance candidate. Walz’s resume reads in many ways as a parallel to Vance’s : poor(-ish) rural(-ish) family, Midwestern, military service… In a recent interview with the New York Times’ Ezra Klein, he kept talking about Vance’s “hillbillies” as “my people.”

But even more significant, in our view, is the fact that Tim Walz made his signature goal as Governor of Minnesota to make Minnesota “the best place in the world to raise a family”–wonderful goal!

And, to his great credit, this materialized as a set of actual policies: paid family and medical leave, universal free school meals, a child tax credit, and “investments” in child care and early childhood education.

Meanwhile, the Democrats have chosen as an anti-Vance line of attack old comments where he referred to “childless cat ladies.” More broadly, Republicans who claim to be pro-family open themselves up to an easy (and not-unreasonable) critique from Democrats: that they are pro-family up until the moment when families have to be supported in terms of material resources, when they switch back to being small-government ideologues. This is not an accurate description of Vance as either a policy thinker or a Senator, but given that he has not put his name on significant pro-family legislation (hardly a score against him given that he’s been in the Senate for so little time) and that he is constrained as the vice-presidential nominee to be a spokesman for the top of the ticket, he can be painted with that brush.

While Republicans can be accused of being too miserly, Democrats are of course happy to spend taxpayer money on “family,” as on everything else, but their views in this area are also shaped by their own ideological priorities, and blinders. For example, Democrats love the idea of universal day care; while Democrats certainly love the idea of creating a new class of credentialed service workers beholden to government largess, this idea reflects the priorities of two-parent meritocratic families, which don’t match up with most Americans’ priorities. This is something Vance has pointed out in the past, but it is a difficult argument to make. Will he have to do it again?

Much more could be said, of course. But the Harris camp may be trying to turn this campaign, at least in part, into an argument on pro-family policy, contrasting Republican policy which is long on sermons and short on handouts to a Democratic policy which is the opposite. In which case, this might actually make a shockingly substance-free and vibes-based campaign interesting…

Policy Links

#Space – Mike Solana, the plugged-in editor of Pirate Wires, an excellent Silicon Valley-based magazine covering tech, politics, and culture, has a good “take” (his term) on the saga of the totally-not-stranded astronauts (they’re just, er, resting). “[S]ources say there’s a ‘greater than 50-50’ chance SpaceX will be tapped to bring them home,” he reports. Why is this taking too long? The problem is not related to technology and safety, he avers: “If Boeing loses this return, the Starliner program could cease to exist. That would obviously be bad for Boeing, or at least as bad as every other Boeing headline this year. But it would also suck for Democrats, who would lose their only alternative to SpaceX. A business coup for AOC’s most hated billionaire founder, investor, philanthropist, baby daddy? That would sting like hell. Which is probably why this is taking so long.” We find it hard to disagree with this analysis.

#Space – Speaking of space, interesting analogy from AEI’s Todd Harrison: it’s not a space race, it’s a Space Olympics. That is to say, there are several different events in which to medal: commercial space, military space, lunar exploration, and so on. It’s an interesting take.

#Reg – We greatly appreciated this interview of Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch by David French in the New York Times, about his new book, “Over Ruled: The Human Toll of Too Much Law.” The book is a straightforward brief against overregulation, and the unintended effects of bad regulation, backed by human interest stories that give it color. Gorsuch in particular goes through a case during his time as a Court of Appeals judge when he was constrained by Chevron into following an agency rule that was not the correct interpretation of the law, which we found enlightening. You’ll enjoy the stories and his nuanced philosophy on regulation.

#Tech – Brookings has a new report out on Project 2025’s “media and technology policies.” Put aside the fact that the “Project 2025” that exists in public consciousness and media coverage is vastly different from the actual Project 2025, and that there is yet more difference between Project 2025 and what a second Trump Administration could do. Still, it’s interesting. The bottomline: Project 2025 doesn’t like Big Tech, wants to ban Chinese tech companies, increase antitrust enforcement, and reforming Section 230; on AI, they are less concerned with “safety” than with beating China.

#Tech – Speaking of tech regulation, AEI’s Clay Calvert notes that Justice Amy Coney Barrett seems to be quite the tech expert, and takes a closer look at her tech jurisprudence.

#Life #FreeSpeech – According to stunning new research from Rep. Chip Roy’s office, 97% of all FACE Act prosecutions are against pro-lifers. (Via) Whatever one’s views on life issues, pro-life activists and protestors should be allowed to exercise their First Amendment rights like every other American.

#TaxPolicy – We really enjoy the Tax Foundation’s interactive web pages on various aspects of tax policy. This time: how high are gas tax rates in your state? We were not surprised by California, Illinois, and Texas. We were surprised, however, by Pennsylvania and New York.

#Wages – Speaking of interactive tools from think tanks, the Hamilton Project’s wage interactive lets you explore changes in real pay from the fourth quarter of each year from 2019 to 2023 through the second quarter of 2024. Interesting!

#Economics – The excellent Dr Samuel Gregg writes about a topic near and dear to our heart (seriously): pre-Enlightenment Jesuit economic thinkers. Yes, they exist, and yes, they are important, much more than you think. Juan de Mariana, for example, is a forgotten pioneer of economics. More here.

#Politics – Fun: Bruce Mehlman explains–with charts–why this election is “the Seinfeld election.”

Chart of the Day

US manufacturing jobs between the 1990s and now. You see that part around 2000 when it falls off a cliff? That’s when China joined the WTO.

Meme of the Day