With all due respect to John Nance Garner, seen above conducting one of the essential duties of the Vice Presidency, the #2 spot in an executive branch is the appendix of the American political system. Garner called accepting the VP nomination “the worst damn fool mistake I ever made.” Harry Truman said the vice president “is about as useful as a cow’s fifth teat.” Our first VP, John Adams, called it “the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived or his imagination conceived.”

And yet, here in Vermont, we’re seeing a relative land rush for our equivalent of the vice presidency. There will be, mirabile dictu, contested primaries for lieutenant governor on the Democratic and Republican ballots in August. Despite the hollowness of the actual office, the two primaries and the general election to follow offer a rare hint of intrigue in what promises to be a suspense-free campaign season as far as the statewide ballot is concerned.

I’ve covered the Democratic contest previously. But now we have two announced candidates on the Republican side, an embarrassment of riches for a party that has given multiple nominations to H. Brooke Paige in recent years. Rutland accountant, January 6 field trip organizer, and multiple-time loser Gregory Thayer has been in the race for months, not that anyone has noticed. He has now been joined by former Democratic state senator John Rodgers, last seen biffing his re-election bid to the Senate by failing to get his nominating petitions in on time.

Well, that’s not true. He was quite recently seen amidst a motley crew of The Disaffected in a pair of Statehouse rallies late in this year’s session. These events may have convinced Mr. Rodgers to abandon his Neighborhood for another shot at electoral glory.

It has been suggested by some that Rodgers has a real chance at unseating Lt. Gov. David Zuckerman. The idea is that he could appeal to centrist and moderate Democrats and also capitalize on a rising tide of disaffection in the grassroots, mainly due to this year’s robust property tax increases but also including a cornucopia of alleged alienations, from gun control to large-scale renewable energy to taxes to Gummint Overreach to the scourge of Drag Queen Story Hour to you name it.

I don’t buy Rodgers as a real threat. First, he would have to win the Republican primary, whose participants represent a very narrow, self-selected slice of our political spectrum. As Christina Nolan could tell you, they tend to value loyalty to the Trump brand of politics over all else.

But let’s assume Rodgers is the GOP nominee and would face either Zuckerman or the not-to-be-underestimated Thomas Renner in November. This is where his hypothetical appeal as a former Democrat would shine through. Right?

Ehh, about that. Two points.

Second one first. He’s never run outside his home turf in the Northeast Kingdom. Sorry, strike that: He ran for governor as a write-in candidate in the 2018 Democratic primary. At the time, the late political columnist Jon Margolis gave him a puncher’s chance as a centrist in a left-leaning field.

Spoiler alert: He didn’t win. The Secretary of State’s elections archive doesn’t list write-in recipients (presumably because That Way Lies Madness), but the total write-in vote was only 4,143 out of more than 70,000 votes cast.

So let’s say he’s never run a viable, visible campaign outside the Kingdom. Generally speaking, state lawmakers vastly overestimate their appeal and name recognition. Hey, everybody knows me, right?

Well, yeah, everybody in the Statehouse. And pretty much nobody else except the more politically attuned of your constituents. Rodgers is about to find that out.

If, that is, he bothers to actively campaign at all. He didn’t really try in 2018. He lost his Senate seat in 2020 because he just didn’t pay attention to basic procedure. Does this sound like someone who’s raring to go? Someone who’ll put tens of thousands of miles on his vehicle traveling to all corners of the state? No, not really.

Second point, and the more pertinent. Of the small number of Democrats who know who John Rodgers is, the vast majority despise him. He is not going to pull large quantities of Democratic votes. Back in 2020 I wrote a piece about Rodgers entitled “The Most Annoying Man in Montpelier,” which included the following passage:

Rodgers is a not terribly effective lawmaker. He’s a showboat who often seems more intent on sowing division than on getting stuff done. He has no interest in being anyone’s friend, or engaging in the kind of relationship-building that helps lawmakers work together. He’s a thorn in the majority’s side.

That’s his problem. Democratic voters who don’t know him will have no reason to vote for him. Those who do, would never support him. No one in the party, or anywhere near it, will raise a finger to help his candidacy.

I will give him this much. He would be a stronger general election candidate than Thayer. But that means Rodgers might have a 2% chance at winning while Thayer would have maybe a 0.2% chance.

I will also give him this. If it’s Rodgers vs. Zuckerman in the general election, those debates are going to be must-see TV. There’s no love lost there, and Rodgers isn’t the type to pull any punches. In a statewide campaign season likely to be full of uncompetitive contests, that’s something to look forward to.