This week, as JD Vance continues to settle into his new role as former president Donald Trump’s running mate, his old blog, “The Ruminations of JD Hamel,” resurfaced on Twitter. The Ohio Senator’s musings haven’t been updated since 2010 when Vance was still a law student at Yale, but it’s most certainly bringing the beleaguered of 2024—namely, me—a lot of joy in these exceedingly trying times.
Before I get into the blog’s four posts, I feel I must first remind everyone that no New York Times bestseller should ever be confused for a creative or even intelligent person. Anyway! Vance’s “ruminations” began in 2005 with a post titled “Start Up,” which the veteran Marine published before departing for Iraq on July 11.
“There are obviously a lot of personal things I’m going to want to say through email and phone, but this thing will serve its own purpose, and also be a recorded journal of all my thoughts and feelings over the 7-month deployment,” Vance wrote to his readers. “I’ll also be able to post some photos of myself up here, either in this website or in another forum I’ll have to create once I’m in Iraq.”
“I couldn’t watch Garden State because New Jersey’s landscape is so much like Ohio’s,” Vance wrote. Side note: I wonder if Zach Braff knows he’s responsible for making the ultimate millennial sad boys’ film? “The music is so relevant to my life right now, and the story of a guy returning home, realizing that home isn’t what it used to be, etc. made me want to tear up. The comment he makes about realizing that the place he grew up isn’t really home anymore, and his theory that people settle down because when you lose your home you want to make a new one really resonates with me right now, and I’m sure it does with some of you too.”
It gets better. Vance was apparently so overcome with sadness that he: “felt more like a female than I think I ever have or will.” Big “fellas, is it gay to feel basic human emotion?” vibes. Don’t worry. He worked through it by reading a Winston Churchill biography and the Bible before noting that he’s only ever cried three times since he was 13 years old.
One month later he arrived in Iraq.
“As the saying goes, my boots just hit the ground, around 4 am Iraq time, which is 8pm (the previous day) your time,” he began in the post entitled, “In Iraq.” Vance then offered a “brief rundown” of his travel day…which was not very brief at all. To keep it brief for this blog: It was 125 degrees in Kuwait where he arrived before moving onto Camp Victory to “chill out” before his final destination.
“All’s I did was call home as much as I could, sleep, read and basically just chill out,” he recalled. Brave! After he arrived in Iraq, he wrote about a forthcoming tour of the base and his plans for afterward: “Tomorrow I get an official tour from the outgoing public affairs people, and I’m hoping to hit a movie stand we affectionately refer to as the ‘Hajji DVDs’. Basically, these Iraqi dudes pirate movies and sell them here the same day they come out in theaters in the US, at a cost of $2.50 apiece, other than that I’m going to continue adjusting and hopefully I’ll get to work Monday.”
Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians were brutally killed during the Iraq war but congrats to him that he got to watch Hitch before most people, I guess?
“That’s all for now, I’m a little homesick, but mostly happy to be here and finally contribute, even if only a small part, to our country’s mission,” Vance concluded the post. “I’m excited about getting out of here and interacting with the Iraqis, and seeing what life is like from their eyes. Don’t worry about me, I’m fine and am not worried about myself, so you shouldn’t be either (this means you, Aunt Wee and Lindsay).” Aunt Wee and Lindsay, I’ll note, are two of the only family members he didn’t go on to sell down the Great Miami River in Hillbilly Elegy.
Let’s keep going! The final rumination is brief, which is fitting since it’s literally titled: “Brief.”
“Most of first-year students at Yale Law School are mired in a 30-page writing assignment called a ‘brief,’ which is a misnomer if I’ve ever heard one,” Vance wrote. “Anyways, apparently the Whiffenpoofs (or something like that), a Yale acappella group, is having an open-bar event to celebrate their appearance on some reality show. Hopefully I can get done in time to go…” And that’s it, we’re left with a cliffhanger. His mind!
I’ll be honest, reading these posts almost made me feel bad for Vance. Then, I remembered he would like to outlaw abortion and divorce. So, if you’re in need of an exceptionally immature morale boost before November, you know where to go…
