Vice President Dunphy
A Political and Cultural Analysis
It’s been a truly bizarre week in American politics, as the Law of Averages catches up with everyone.
I don’t know how to begin to describe the utter, unrelenting awfulness of the Trump Campaign. Yes, we can talk about them being Christian Nationalists, or theocratic twits, or the vengeance of the 16th century for being discarded 500 years ago, but there’s just something terribly, deeply, and darkly off-putting and disturbing about them all. As an American, I know those words have been weaponized, so, as another person pointed out, “You’re deliberately confusing ‘Early Wes Anderson character weird’ with, ‘Cousin you never, ever invite to family events because all of the kids are scared of him’ and we all know the difference.”
That difference was made not only stark, but a photo inverse negative this week, with the mid-season introduction of VP nominees, JD Vance, and Tim Walz. This is going to be a political piece about character and entertainment, because I don’t have the mental fortitude to describe the policy differences between Project 2025 and the Constitution; so, it’s all personality and entertainment!
When it comes to personality and “vibes,” JD Vance is an unrelentingly awful character. I think the only way to describe him is that nobody in their right mind would leave him alone in a fucking furniture store. And, I have to clarify that I mean, “a stupid store that sells furniture, not a store in whi-” See? What do you write about a man who can’t escape allegations of furniture rape? And, more disturbingly, how do you write about a figure who, in the face of uncertain allegations (it was, apparently, in the first edition of his memoir, Hillbilly Elegy, and cut from later editions), everyone collectively says, “Yeah, it adds up?” I know that I have my flaws and faults, but I also feel that if anyone heard a rumor about me fondling an ottoman, most people would assume it was a scurrilous rumor. I would like to think. I hope. I did not have sexual relations with that desk lamp!
Sorry, I couldn’t help myself. JD Vance haunts the conscious of people like me because he also represents a very dark, troubling aspect of my identity: violence and oppression. He wrote the forward to Project 2025 (one assumes, after a tryst with the desk), he failed to even rhetorically defend his own wife and children from his lynch mob supporters, offering the line, “I know she’s not white, but…” Yes, he said that. Husband of the year, JD Vance. I didn’t expect him to get into it with the Klan on-camera, but there’s actually an established, rote script for American politicians to use when political opponents attack their family, and it is, “Look, if you have a problem with my political positions or decisions, fine; you call my office, you contact me, but leave my family out of this.”
JD Vance represents a recently-recognized phenomenon, toxic masculinity, and much has been written about it. All I will say is that, the next time you see that term, just think of JD Vance, and you will immediately know what I’m talking about.
My own mother asked me if there was a cultural counter to toxic masculinity, several years ago, and I responded that the idiom she wanted was “wholesome masculinity.” This week, I would have simply said, “Oh, Tim Walz.”
In Walz and Vance, there are not only two separate, diametrically opposed philosophies of governance, there are two competing models of masculinity. One is represented by the likes of Jordan Peterson, Joe Rogan, and that asshole at the end of the bar who won’t shut up about how he “only dates 10s.” The other is represented by Coach Taylor, Ted Lasso, and Aragorn, son of Arathorn. Yes, I’m being highly prejudicial in those examples, but only because there’s a clear, obvious difference between which group you would rather spend a three day weekend with. And it most definitely is not the anhedonics who view human identities as a grim, grueling, death march to the grave.
At this point, we really do have to talk about masculine enthusiasm. I know that could be a club in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco, but, for us, gents, here’s what I mean: there was a time, in your life, when you first learned something that absolutely blew your mind. Probably around age five or so; maybe it was dinosaurs and rockets, maybe it was race cars, maybe it was the alphabet, there was something in your youth that just energized you and you wouldn’t stop talking about it for months. I promise you, it happened, and your relatives remember it, they can tell you about it. And then, maybe that enthusiasm faded, or was beat down by the system, or you just lost interest for a few years, and, then, something new took its place. Maybe that new thing was computer programming, pogs, horses, dating, or school, it was some new love someone encouraged, and it got you through that patch until your next big thing. If your lucky, you can live life going from one passion to the next. I don’t get any sort of love or joy or passion from the toxic masculinity crowd. I could be dead wrong, maybe they all get together to play pool and share beers after a long day of fuming about why women would rather hang out with bears than them, but they all seem determinedly dour. Who wants to experience that sort of experience when we could talk about dinosaurs, or Axis and Allies, or even hair replacement procedures? Why would anyone want a Gilead-like existence of constantly proving themselves to distant judgmental strangers when Medium exists for that reason?
I guess I would take the Joe Rogans and Jordy Petermans of the world a little more seriously if they offered a coherent vision of masculinity that wasn’t “Buy my merch, and you’ll be a Real Man.”
I don’t know where these wayward lost boys went wrong and lost that inner spark of… well, whatever it is that keeps us going in dark times… and surrendured to the darkness, but it’s clear that someone seriously hurt them early on, and they never healed.
Which is a damned shame, because, for the rest of America, as I’ve mentioned, there already exists a superior model of masculinity, as exemplified by your first grade teacher, your Scout Master, your JV Basketball coach, pretty much every well-adjusted man you’ve ever met, and it is best exemplified by our favorite Sit-Com Dads, like Phil Dunphy. I’m bringing all of this up because we were collectively introduced to America’s Newest Favorite Kooky Midwestern Dad, Tim Walz.
If JD Vance is 45 crazy political scandals in a trenchcoat, Walz is an amalgamation of every nauseatingly wholesome male figure in American culture. JD Vance is the bully who challenges you to a game of pick-up basketball, and bloodies your nose in front of your friends. Walz is the kindly elderly neighbor who picks you up, offers you tea and cookies, and tells you that, “Sometimes you can do everything right, and life still sucks, but if you let that destroy you, slugger, the bullies win.” The man just exudes calm, quiet emotional support and wholesomeness.
And he’s all about basic, retail politics. Republican attempts to smear him as a socialist fail because Walz just talks about feeding kids and building roads, just like your neighbor on the city council. You can’t discuss some sort of sinister Soviet-style centralization against a guy who just wants to build schools and hospitals, especially when that group is arguing for an Orwellian surveillance state that monitors women’s periods.
I honestly think that the GOP is completely caught off-guard by sane people who experience joy and don’t view society as a brutal, Thunderdome cage match. I honestly don’t think Americans were expecting that we’d get a VP candidate who constantly reminds us of a beloved Great Uncle who housed us during a rocky Sophomore semester in undergrad. So, attacks on Mr. Walz from the right have failed to gain traction, mostly because Walz just oozes warm Americana. Fortunately, I am on-hand to ennumerate Mr. Walz’s numerous, grievous flaws, starting with the fact that he’s throwing my knowledge of apostrophes and the letter “S” into confusion.
A Detailed, comprehensive List of Tim Walz’s Moral, Political, and Personal Failings
He makes weird noises at 900 decibels when he sleeps. At the risk of being cruelly stereotypical, everyone in America has shared a building with a heavy-set Midwestern man. We’ve all recoiled the minute they entered REM sleep, because they sound like a dying water buffalo. I’m going to make various ugly insinuations about the Walz family, but hear me when I tell you, that man’s entire extended family buys ear plugs when they have to share a room (or house). It’s off-putting and America deserves a decent night’s sleep.
He has a vast collection of rusty, nasty, bent nails in his basement. Just like the weird noise thing, I promise you that there is at least one very large jar in that man’s house filled with bent finishing nails and possibly even screws, that he will, one day, eventually straighten and use on another project. “Eventually” is a lie, he’s going to die and leave that disgusting jar of nails on to future generations to move out of the garage. He can not be trusted with our children’s future if he’s going to improperly store nails in his garage.
He developed an unhealthy attachment to that one weird pet his kids brought home. You know someone in his family — against Walz’s express objections — brought a weird animal home, once. In Vance’s Amerikkka, the kids are beaten for disobeying father, and the animal is slaughtered on the family altar to The Donald. Given the karmic nature of these events, and the Midwestern nature of the Walzs (Walz’s? Walzes?), I’d venture a daughter brought home some mortally wounded wild animal (Walz seems like a birder, so, I’m thinking a crow or raven), and threw a tantrum until Dad sighed and took it to the vet. At the vetrinarian’s practice, Walz was probably handed a bill in the five-figure range, and, after much squabbling and arguing, he probably sighed and paid the bill. And from that moment, Walz and the raven were bizarrely inseparable. Walz probably had to start therapy when the raven died, because he’s capable of emotional attachment. The pet was weird, and America needs to know the dangers of a man who spent several years refusing to leave the room without that weird pet.
He has at least one truly off-putting hobby. I don’t know what it is; Walz strikes me as the kind of guy who would be a bass player in a Dad Band, or have an unhealthy obsession with dry aging steak and sports statistics; I could go either way. But that man has at least one bizarre hobby that his family have forbidden him from participation, and, like any other red-blooded American man, Walz lies to his family, arranges an alibi, and sneaks off at 1 am for guitar lesssons, or dry rub seminars. He has at least one kooky hobby, America deserves to know whether Walz has other ones, and, more importantly, if he’ll shut up about them at dinner. It’s also possible that his wife has taken dairy out of his diet after the cholesterol results, and he has to sneak off to a diner for a cheeseburger, like a cuck. Or a normal, mostly-happily-married man after decades in a relationship.
Women prefer him to the bear in the woods. This is serious. Several women in my life have noted that if they have to choose between being in the woods with a bear, or Tim Walz, they would choose Walz. If women prefer him to bears, who’s to say that bears don’t prefer Walz over other bears? Could we be heading toward a presidential administration in which animals regularly flock to the Oval Office, like some Disney film? Who wants to live in a country overrun by wild animals? I’m just asking questions!
He spends far too much money on the holidays. Just look at him. His family has undoubtedly had interventions in February after seeing the credit card bill and the mountains of Christmas lights (stored right next to the rusty nail jar). He refuses to listen, my friends, and, can we afford a VP who has to cut back on the Groundhog Day celebration because he can’t budget for a turkey?
He spends too much time outdoors. There are a flood of images of Walz hunting with his dogs and fishing. This is an image carefully crafted over many years of associating fresh air and weather with joy, rather than money. It’s anticapitalist and I, for one, am tired of these Midwestern Elites who are in the pocket of Big Nature. It’s likely that he’s spent time hunting and fishing without catching and killing something, and America won’t stand for losers like that.
He makes passive aggressive remarks when he’s upset. Instead of pulling out a weapon or having a temper tantrum, like a normal grown man, Walz probably makes catty comments when he’s angry or sad. Both of his daughters have probably had lengthy conversations after a family dinner to discuss if Dad was being mean to the new boyfriend. If he publicly makes a snide comment that Russian elections are as reliable as that country’s economy, it might spark nuclear war.
He spends entire weekends running errands. We live in a potential multitude of differing universes; but there is no universe in which Tim Walz doesn’t regularly spend 8 hours a week in a Costco or Loews and repairing an obscure drain in the air conditioning. America is tired of boring, family men who invest personal time and resources in the household logistics (after putting on sneakers that can be seen from space). He can hire a domestic staff, like God and Peter Thiel intended.
For everyone still reading, it’s indicative of how the next four years of American politics will unfold that a truly monstrous political candidate decided to invite one of the Boys from Brazil onto the ticket, and, in response, the DNC nominated the sanest, most aggressively normal suburban dad in the world. A man who has no interest in parents getting more votes, because he doesn’t need the mishegas of arguing with the kids how they want him to vote, because, Jesus H. Christ, it’s already 6 pm and we told Mom we’d be home already. No, the dogs do not need jerky, we have jerky and dog treats at home.
If the goal of Joe Biden’s Campaign was to draw a contrast between himself and Trump, and failed because Trump can be shrewd and canny; the VP nominations turn the campaigns into photo negative images of each other. And Trump’s embrace of Vance, split-screen projected next to Walz’s nomination, mean that, although the Trump Campaign can be shrewd and wily on occasion, they can never, ever be normal or welcoming. Walz’s nomination signals that the Harris Campaign seeks to be aggressively normal, sane, and dangerously relatable and empathetic. And, in a delightful twist, Walz seems to have more skeletons in his closet than Vance does, it’s simply that all of Walz’s are of the novelty Halloween variety that he won in a primary school raffle in 1998 that he hasn’t thrown out, yet.
