The one point about Pence that has always made me wonder about his intentions that day is this: He had no plan whatsoever for where he and his wife would live when they left the Vice Presidential residence. They made a very last-minute decision to “stay with friends” for a few months after leaving Washington.
I do think that his personal conceit is that he is a Great Man of God, chosen for high and mighty moral causes. As such, I believe he saw the violence and danger of the insurrection as signs that this was His Moment. While one can hardly discount his reported fury that the crowd put his wife and children in danger, I nonetheless believe that he sees himself as “meant” to be there.
But if he went there determined to do the right thing, then why was he not also making plans for the future? It seems as though he expected to remain in DC for the next four years.
Agree. And he probably was waiting to see what his boss was going to do. Little did he know his boss was planning to send the bus his way, for him to be thrown under. I am sure any sign of plans for a future not involving being VP would be a sign of weakness and defeat, not to mention disloyalty.
Prior to the Nov 3rd voting day any plans by an incumbent to move out of DC would be pretty damning. And a pretty dumb thing to do regardless of any pre-election polling.
After the vote result was announced on Nov 4 or whenever it finally became unequivocal (to sane people) in the next couple of days the situation is different. An honest Administration knows by then it is a lame duck and needs to begin the transition process. Which may include some members leaving DC not long after the inauguration
Pence publicly, albeit quietly, planning during the time from late Nov through mid Jan to leave DC in late January would simply be normal.
That he apparently wasn’t doing that is “interesting” in the Chinese proverb sense of the word.
Well, there’s also the fact that, were Trump to learn Pence was shopping for real estate, Trump would immediately turn on him, and denounce him as a deep-state false flag RINO Never-Trumper, which would pretty much put paid to any future political aspirations that Pence might have been holding on to at that point.
We see Pence now in light of the January 6th insurrection. But had that not happened, what would we be thinking? “Sure, Pence hung in there during all those stupid court cases Trump lost, but that’s no big deal.” Pence could have come out of this as the presumptive nominee for 2024, instead of as the guy who failed Trump on January 6th.
Insurrection or no, fake “steal” or no, I see Pence as a guy with no political future from the moment he joined up with Trump in 2016.
In the eyes of Ds he would be forever tainted as a Trump toady / apologist and would incite massive voting against himself. Meanwhile, from the R POV …
If the R’s collectively went even Trumpier in 2024 despite Trump himself somehow being eliminated from the race, Pence would be not nearly Trumpy enough for that future. Conversely, if the R’s fever dream broke after the 4 chaotic unproductive years of Trump and now they were / are reverting to traditional movement conservatism, Pence would still be too tainted and frankly untalented versus the more mainstream faction of the R competition.
So IMO, Pence is in a “Heads I lose, tails I lose, and edges I lose” situation and has been since 2016. He might harbor hopes to the contrary, but they’re unrealistic hopes IMO. Then again, politicos of all stripes are prone to hubris.
Good analysis. I see a dead candidate who doesn’t know he’s dead yet. You can’t win a primary without embracing the crazies but the crazies see him as a traitor. If the party sobers up from its drunken stupor, Pence remains a figure from the crazy era. If Pence had sense he’d realize that his political future is over so he’d go down in history for the better if he started to name names, spill the beans, and kick some ass.
Maybe. If you’ve been a politician as long as Pence has, it’s the only job you know. Figuring out what different thing to do next is not easy and involves a lot of personal re-invention. He’s not obvious talk-show host material. He’s got money, but not insane money.
As to naming names and spilling beans, he’s probably well aware of how badly politicized the judiciary is. Lotta ways for him to “spill the beans” and end with nothing but death threats from the MAGAts and no scalps to his name.
I think it’s a pretty good bet that the only public opinion he cares about is that of the right-leaning half of the electorate. Even if somehow the left half of the US declared him the Second Coming of Truth and Light he’d yawn at that. And we know that ain’t happening.
Said another way, suppose he writes a tell-all book that really does tell all. Hard core lefties would never buy it, hard core righties would never buy it. That leaves academics and libraries. Which is not a market to get rich from. His voter appeal is similarly limited.
Hubris. It’s an almost bottomless well with those sorts of folks. With a healthy dollop of wishful thinking.
Don’t forget that Pence and folks like him have a whole bunch of hangers-on (“staffers”) whose job ends when the Boss admits he’s a has-been and retires “to spend more time with his family”. Those hangers-on are pretty good cheerleaders for the Boss to keep trying. As the saying goes: “It’s very hard to get a person to believe something when their livelihood depends on them not believing it.”
Honestly, probably the best Pence could hope for is a gig heading up the Heritage Foundation or some other conservative think tank. His days in elected office are over. The Republican base views him as a traitor, so I can’t see a commentator gig on Fox News or the even Trumpier Newsmax or OANN working out for him. But, he’s someone who probably still has a number of friends in the Republican establishment who might be willing to throw him a bone.
I only quote this to point out that, before he became trump’s vice president, Mike was hosting a radio show.
(I’m not saying he was any good, of course. So the ‘not obvious’ part still stands)
I really think he is. You have to be dumb to be that noticeably clueless. He reminds me of George McFly (before he punched Biff)
“Now Mr. Trump, you said that this time you would let me follow the law instead of having to do whatever you wanted” with absolutely no sense that the only reason he isn’t getting his ass kicked is because he has some perceived utility (before the election it was “get the evangelical vote”, then he was ignored until he had the supposed power to reject the electoral vote - for all the criticism of “what Kamala Harris is doing” I defy you to name anything that Pence “accomplished” as Veep).
The proof of Pence’s stupidity is his goofy habit of including in his speeches that slow stilted pronunciation of each word for dramatic emphasis.
Even worse, instead of just doing on the last 2 or 3 words of an applause line (e.g. “we will fight the opposition to ensure that AMERICA STAYS FREE”) he’ll do it for an entire sentence. And he loves doing it - it’s like some sort of preacher thing for him, I think. It’s so awkward.
He got out of the Trump morass without being accused of any wrongdoing. Of course, then he’d have had to be doing something, so it’s a mixed bag. What was he doing as VP, anyway, apart from aping the Chief Baboon?
It was a great gig, didn’t have to do much at all, but he had elevated his chances at being POTUS from about 0.001% (which is where a Congresscritter stands, not much above flat 0%) to maybe 10% or more given Trump’s age, his health, and the sheer number of people who hate his guts.
But asserting a crucial and blatantly illegal role in the insurrection greatly increased the downside to Pence: it probably wouldn’t succeed, and if it failed, he would face serious jail time. So he folded his hand. That took some smarts.
As I recall from living in Indiana, back in 2016 many people assumed that after the Trump-Pence ticket lost to Clinton (as everyone took for granted would happen), that Pence would be offered the presidency of some university or other, where he would spend the next few years in relatively well-compensated quiet while he planned his own presidential run.
I can’t see that happening now.
He is a lawyer. One would think he might be able to return to private practice, but I’m not sure who would want to hire him.