The most memorable moments of the vice presidential debates

Vice President Mike Pence and Senator Kamala Harris will face each other in Salt Lake City for the 2020 US election vice presidential debate.

In the wake of Donald Trump interrupting and derailing his way through the hectic first presidential debate, it's likely Americans will be looking to the vice presidential candidates to deliver not just some normalcy, but also their vision for the country.

With both Mr Trump and his Democratic challenger former vice president Joe Biden both well into their 70s - and Mr Trump fresh off a days-long hospital stay due to a coronavirus infection - it is practical, if not a bit morbid, to assume that one of the participants in the vice presidential debate will ascend to the Oval Office before 2024.

Wednesday night's debate will be historic not only because of the events preceding it, but because of its participants; Ms Harris, the first woman of color vice presidential candidate, and Mr Pence, who holds the office during a time of social unrest and pandemic-born weariness in the American populace.

While vice presidential debates aren't usually the history-defining events that general election debates tend to be - who remembers a single line from Tim Kaine's faceoff with Mr Pence in 2016? - there have been a few well-remembered moments.

Vice presidential debates as we know them began in 1976, when Democrat Walter Mondale took on Gerald Ford's "hatchetman" Republican Bob Dole.

While Gen X-ers and Millennials may have a perspective of Bob Dole as the sleepy, utterly un-cool challenger to incumbent President Bill Clinton in 1996, his reputation for the bulk of his political career was as a compassionate but biting and hardline political operative.

During the debate, Mr Dole took an anti-war stance and tried to pin 1.6m American war deaths on the Democrats.

"I figured it up the other day: If we added up the killed and wounded in Democrat wars in this century, it would be about 1.5 million Americans - enough to fill the city of Detroit," he said.

Those wars would have included both World Wars, the Korean War and the Vietnam War.

"I think Senator Dole has richly earned his reputation as a hatchet man tonight," Mr Mondale said, cementing Mr Dole's nickname for the rest of his political career. "Does he really mean that there was a partisan difference over our involvement in the fight against Nazi Germany?"

A little more than a decade later, another pair of vice presidential hopefuls made debate history. Then Republican Senator Dan Quayle, running alongside George H W Bush faced Democratic Senator Lloyd Bentsen, running with Michael Dukakis, during the vice presidential debates in 1988.

Mr Quayle was only 41 when he became Mr Bush's running mate, and his experience was frequently challenged. During the debate, moderators Tom Brokaw and Judge Woodruff asked Mr Quayle how he would lead the nation if he had to take over the presidency if Mr Bush were to be incapacitated.

"Three times that I've had this question—and I will try to answer it again for you, as clearly as I can, because the question you're asking is, 'What kind of qualifications does Dan Quayle have to be president,' 'What kind of qualifications do I have,' and 'What would I do in this kind of a situation?' And what would I do in this situation?" Mr Quayle said. "I have far more experience than many others that sought the office of vice president of this country. I have as much experience in the Congress as Jack Kennedy did when he sought the presidency. I will be prepared to deal with the people in the Bush administration, if that unfortunate event would ever occur."

Mr Bentsen, whose team had prepared him for Mr Quayle to compare himself to former President John Kennedy, fired off a line in response that earned him shouts and applause from the crowd.

"Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy. I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy," he said.

"That was really uncalled for, Senator," Mr Quayle said, prompting its own crowd reaction.

"You are the one that was making the comparison, Senator—and I'm one who knew him well. And frankly I think you are so far apart in the objectives you choose for your country that I did not think the comparison was well-taken," Mr Bentsen said.

Eventually Mr Bush and Mr Quayle would go on to defeat Mr Dukakis and Mr Bentsen, but Mr Quayle's reputation never managed to shake that debate moment. It was so well known that Democrat Al Gore referenced it in 1992 when he debated Mr Quayle, saying "I'll make you a deal this evening. If you don't try to compare George Bush to Harry Truman, I won't compare you to Jack Kennedy."

Geraldine Ferraro made history in 1984 when she debated George H W Bush by becoming the first woman to participate in the vice presidential debates, and probably the first to call out an instance of man-splaining on a national debate stage.

During the debate, rather than disagreeing with Ms Ferraro on a national security matter, he attacked her intellect, saying "Let me help you with the difference, Mrs Ferraro, between Iran and the embassy in Lebanon."

She fired back "Let me say first of all that I almost resent, Vice President Bush, your patronising attitude that you have to teach me about foreign policy," she said.

Years later, the second woman to participate in the debates, Republican Governor Sarah Palin, squared off with then Democratic vice presidential nominee Joe Biden.

Though there were a few memorable moments from the debate - Ms Palin asking Mr Biden "Can I call you Joe?", and her response to Mr Biden invoking Ronald Reagan in an answer, saying "Say it ain't so, Joe, there you go again pointing backwards again" - the legacy of Ms Palin's debate didn't actually happen during the debate.

The debate - along with several disastrous interviews she participated in before and after - served to cement the caricature of Ms Palin as a folksy kook who occasionally struggled with facts that would be immortalised by Saturday Night Live actor Tina Fey's impression of her.

In 2012, Mr Biden had his own memorable moment that would go on to birth his short-lived 2020 campaign slogan.

During his debate with Republican Paul Ryan, Mr Ryan made an eloquent argument that US actions under Barack Obama's first term made the country look weak to our allies and enemies. Midway through his lecture, Mr Biden cut him off.

"With all due respect, that's a bunch of malarkey," the vice president said, invoking the old timey word that would come to be associated with him during his presidential campaign.

At one point Mr Biden's tour buses were emblazoned with the phrase "No Malarkey" across the side, though the word proved a little too antiquated for most voters and the campaign abandoned the slogan.

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