It’d be a much different world if style and appeal didn’t count for so much in human affairs. If unadorned virtues of knowledgeability, honesty and competency were all that mattered … well, I’d take my chances with that world.

Sadly we’ve only got this world and cosmetics matter … a lot. Which is why last night’s VP debate between JD Vance, as slick a practitioner of the cunning media arts as we have at the moment, and our guy Tim Walz, a mostly ingenuous political bus driver, ended in a tie in so many people’s eyes.

On substance it was Walz in a walk. You can’t outright lie and bullshit as much as Vance did and score any points for veracity. But Vance understood the game he was playing last night better than Walz did. Which largely explains the uneasiness that settled over me a few minutes in as he began referring to “Tim” and proffering how much they actually had in common. That “bro” vibe seduced Walz into playing along, as a fundamentally cordial, non-confrontational Minnesota guy is wont to do.

The tones and verbiage of camaraderie Vance used sucked Walz into competing with Vance as though he were a guy who hasn’t been saying all the noxious, racist, unabashedly assholish things he’s been saying during the campaign. It may also explain why instead of dropping the guillotine on Vance when he pirouetted around his frequent, unequivocal support for a national abortion ban, he instead made his and Harris’ impassioned support for women’s basic freedoms.

It was heartfelt, sincere and a politically viable response … but it failed to leave viewers with the fair and accurate impression that Vance is both a liar and a deeply cynical huckster.

I don’t know, but I hope that the primary takeaway from the night was the closing exchange over January 6 and Vance’s refusal to say that Trump lost in 2020 and that he’ll accept a loss if it happens next month. Walz, who most pundits agree sounded steadier in the second half, prosecuted that piece of fundamental MAGA claptrap quite well, although, were it me, I would have given the whole “dangerous and delusional” thing a few more whacks of the verbal hammer.

As for Walz’ truly cringy response to saying he was in Beijing for the Tiananmen Square massacre, his debate prep clearly didn’t arm him for that one. (True, it only popped up in the news a day before … but still.)

Again, were it me, I would have gone with what it sounded like he wanted to go with when he described himself as capable of “being a knucklehead” sometimes.

What ordinary guy you might run into at the hardware store isn’t, or hasn’t been a knucklehead at some point?

“Yeah, I got out ahead of my skis on that one. I don’t know what I was trying to say other than I was in China that summer. A knucklehead moment to be sure. But it happens. If you don’t believe me ask my wife.

“So yes. My apologies for that. But get back to me if you ever hearing me lying about an election I lost and inciting a riot to attack the Capitol.”