PA-SN 2022 megathread: Shrek vs. The Wizard of Oz

[Aurelius]

I am shocked - SHOCKED, I say - that you think Dr. Oz should not be taken seriously. A searing indictment of his campaign and truly a death knell for Republicans nationwide.

I strongly recommend to you what another user on here recommended to me via PM — a more liberal use of the 'hard ignore' option (not 'soft ignore') for posters who aren’t interested in actual discussion and view this space as their personal echo chamber, place for name-calling, etc. I was hesitant to make use of this at first, but it’s pretty clear that it’s by far the best way to deal with the most 'vocal' posters in particular. It really enhances your forum experience, and you really don’t miss out on anything.

I can see the option in my settings to more thoroughly hide posts from those on my ignore list. But how do I "hard ignore" some users while soft-ignoring others? I'd like to hard-ignore spammers and dunces while soft-ignoring those who I merely find annoying.

[Aurelius]

This has to be one of the weirdest Senate races in a long time, in terms of the things the candidates are hitting each other about.

[Aurelius]

This has to be one of the weirdest Senate races in a long time, in terms of the things the candidates are hitting each other about.

People need to stop talking about things they don't know about.

If you honestly don't think that someone running in Pennsylvania would not hit their opponent on tweeting about the Cowboys then you literally don't know this area at all.

That is not what I am talking about. At all.

[Aurelius]

This has to be one of the weirdest Senate races in a long time, in terms of the things the candidates are hitting each other about.

People need to stop talking about things they don't know about.

If you honestly don't think that someone running in Pennsylvania would not hit their opponent on tweeting about the Cowboys then you literally don't know this area at all.

That is not what I am talking about. At all.

Then what are you talking about?

Prominent issues in this campaign have been Fetterman's stroke and general health, Oz's eating habits, Fetterman's eating habits, Oz's residency, Fetterman's reluctance to debate, and Oz's medical research. It has even less to do with the issues than a typical modern campaign, and it doesn't fit the typical pattern of GOP candidate appealing to the beer track and the Dem appealing to the wine track.

[Aurelius]

This has to be one of the weirdest Senate races in a long time, in terms of the things the candidates are hitting each other about.

People need to stop talking about things they don't know about.

If you honestly don't think that someone running in Pennsylvania would not hit their opponent on tweeting about the Cowboys then you literally don't know this area at all.

That is not what I am talking about. At all.

Then what are you talking about?

Prominent issues in this campaign have been Fetterman's stroke and general health, Oz's eating habits, Fetterman's eating habits, Oz's residency, Fetterman's reluctance to debate, and Oz's medical research. It has even less to do with the issues than a typical modern campaign, and it doesn't fit the typical pattern of GOP candidate appealing to the beer track and the Dem appealing to the wine track.

So basically a PA version of 2012 but the candidates *really* hate eachother.

2012 was actually the most "normal", issues-based presidential campaign I can remember. And college whites mostly hadn't fled the GOP yet so the wine/beer track sorting wasn't as strong as today. It's also not just that Oz is wine track and Fetterman is beer track, it's that they are both such extreme caricatures of the respective tracks.

[Aurelius]

https://twitter.com/MeghanMcCain/status/1579936754161053697
This poor man is a mess. NBC News hitting him hard on this.

I'm very skeptical he wins.

Ah yes, we're back on the narrative of if you have a disability you can't get a job. Funny how there's been no similar coverage of the strokes of two U.S. senators this year, or even someone like Collins who clearly has a speech impediment. Because they can still do their job at the end of the day - a disability doesn't prevent you from doing that.

John was literally upfront about having some auditory processing issues with closed captioning. So then they're going to hit him on .... having some issues that he owned up to? This is some straight up ablest sh*t. It's gross.

Even grosser is conservatives once again trying to act as if having a disability of any sort somehow portends you from holding office.

But we've seen what they're willing to do with Walker, so it's not surprising they're stooping so low here.

I am not making any comment on Fetterman's stroke in particular, but so-called "ableism" is absolutely good and relevant when it fundamentally impacts the candidate's ability to do their job. Slapping an ism or phobia label on something does not automatically make it bad.

[Aurelius]

https://twitter.com/MeghanMcCain/status/1579936754161053697
This poor man is a mess. NBC News hitting him hard on this.

I'm very skeptical he wins.

Ah yes, we're back on the narrative of if you have a disability you can't get a job. Funny how there's been no similar coverage of the strokes of two U.S. senators this year, or even someone like Collins who clearly has a speech impediment. Because they can still do their job at the end of the day - a disability doesn't prevent you from doing that.

John was literally upfront about having some auditory processing issues with closed captioning. So then they're going to hit him on .... having some issues that he owned up to? This is some straight up ablest sh*t. It's gross.

Even grosser is conservatives once again trying to act as if having a disability of any sort somehow portends you from holding office.

But we've seen what they're willing to do with Walker, so it's not surprising they're stooping so low here.

I am not making any comment on Fetterman's stroke in particular, but so-called "ableism" is absolutely good and relevant when it fundamentally impacts the candidate's ability to do their job. Slapping an ism or phobia label on something does not automatically make it bad.

Greg Abbott can do his job. So can Duckworth. So can Collins, so can Biden. So can Lujan. Disabilities do not prevent you from being to do a job. Fetterman has some lingering hearing issues from his stroke that clearly do not affect his mental acuity - when he answers questions, he answers them fine. The insinuation among all of this is that because you have a disability that you're not fit for office.

It depends on the disability. If you have cognitive impairment on the level of current-year Feinstein you are not fit to serve. Calling it "ableist" to say that is not meaningful.

[Aurelius]

Good to know what the national media's response to a candidate with Down syndrome or autism would be. I mean, surely if someone who has a stroke cannot serve in government, that means that someone with one of those disorders would also be unfit to serve?

I mean yeah, someone with Down syndrome does not have the basic cognitive capabilities to serve in elected office. So yes, I absolutely do hope that if by some freak occurrence a major party nominated a candidate with Down syndrome that the media would constantly beat that drum and not let anyone forget it. And it would be cruel to nominate such a candidate in the first place!

Autism is an almost meaningless term nowadays because it covers such a wide spectrum from people who need round-the-clock care all the way to fully-functioning people who are a bit "quirky". There are definitely politicians who have been somewhere on the spectrum.

[Aurelius]

Good to know what the national media's response to a candidate with Down syndrome or autism would be. ... someone with one of those disorders would also be unfit to serve?

I can't tell if you're subversively trying to make Fetterman's condition seem worse by this or draw people into defending him, but yes, an adult with Down syndrome would not be fit to serve as a United States Senator. Are you serious? How would they even win the nomination of a major party in a competitive Senate race?

"Autism" is obviously different, since it refers to a spectrum of disorders, but a non-verbal severely autistic adult or one with high support needs would also be unfit. I feel like I was dosed with one of Oz's quack pills reading this.

It makes a lot more sense when you realized that despite all the talk about Saving Democracy, many of these people don't value democracy one bit. They simply see The People as a vehicle to be browbeaten into legitimizing their Correct Politics at the ballot box. Hence how everything from Dobbs to Brexit to god knows what else is a ~~~threat to democracy~~~.

[Aurelius]

https://twitter.com/NoLieWithBTC/status/1581007715115339776

First reply to the tweet:

https://twitter.com/TheChefsGardens/status/1580997775319179264

lmao. Another reminder that Twitter is not real life

[Aurelius]

I think the mainstream media still has a lot of respect for Oz as one of their own, plus Fetterman doesn't fit in with the intolerable Democrats that they like, so I'm not surprised they're going all in against him.

Plus Fetterman, for lack of a better word, is a weirdo. The whole hoodie-lives in his mom's basement-thing just gives off vibes that tell me the white male vote will go heavily against him.

Both of the candidates strike a lot of people as weirdos.

[Aurelius]

Rumor making the rounds (I haven't been able to confirm yet) is that there's a poll showing the PA-12 race within the margin of error, apparently due to both Summer Lee's vulnerabilities and confusion about incumbent Mike Doyle/Republican candidate Mike Doyle. The top of the ticket races are said to be closer to baseline partisanship/in line with expectations so it seems to be unique to the weird factors at hand in the Congressional race.

If true, I called it!

[Aurelius]

Honestly, it's reminding me right now of WI-2016, with the differences being that Fetterman was never as strong a candidate as Russ Feingold, and Dr. Oz isn't the incumbent.

Except Johnson was seen as a heavy underdog all the way up to Election Day.

Eh, I remember hearing a lot about late Johnson momentum in the last two or three weeks.

[Aurelius]

I’m done with this board

Every single moderate, fair person I follow on Twitter is in agreement that fetterman sounds awful

The partisanship required to defend this performance is off the charts

*follows a bunch of hack libs on Twitter and is watching the debate through Acyn clips that probably have parts cut out*

"Fetterman is doing great!!!"

This is is what some of y'all on here sound like.

And no, I did not think Walker did well in his debate.

[Aurelius]

Yeah, from what I've seen Oz is sounding bad in a different way.

[Aurelius]

Oz's abortion comment is all over Twitter right more, way more than any of Fetterman's issues.

I assume you follow a bunch of liberals on twitter, if your feed is anything like the content you post on here. Similarly, conservative twitter is abuzz with all of Fetterman's bad moments. Partisan echo chambers are not objective!

God I wish I could put mods on ignore.

[Aurelius]

The abortion line was pretty stupid in a state like Pennsylvania. Obviously Roe isn't going to be the only issue in the election, but saying abortion should be "between a woman, her doctor, and local political leaders" is very stupid. Got to imagine that gem ends up in some late ads.

Yeah, normally I'd say this debate was a disaster for Fetterman based on what I've seen, but that quote is a goldmine for his team. Wouldn't surprise me if there are more undecided voters now than a couple hours ago.

[Aurelius]

Fetterman might be the worst debater I’ve ever seen in my life

To be fair he did have a stroke. I'm sure he'd be better than Herschel Walker at least before that.

But you can only grade on a curve so much. Lots of voters will be evaluating Fetterman as he is right now, not Fetterman as he was a year ago or as he might potentially be in a couple years.

Normally I think dodging debates is an extremely dumb move, but in Fetterman's unique case I can see why they tried.

[Aurelius]

Fetterman talked about his stroke and recovery in a way I think a lot of people, including most persuadables, will sympathize with. But that won't necessarily be enough. There were some *really* rough moments. The abortion comment was a big own goal for Oz (and it reminds me of Trump's foot-in-mouth moments when someone who doesn't really care about abortion misunderstands the internal logic of how his base thinks about it, tries to play along, and sounds like a fool). But people already know he's an arrogant prick. He's been on TV since before many of us were born. So I bet that part is already baked in.

[Aurelius]

Didn't watch but was this the only debate?

Yes.

[Aurelius]

Relatively surprised that some non-Dems are agreeing that Oz didn't look that good either.

Georgia was an obvious dub for Democrats and Arizona didn't really matter, but is Nevada having a debate?

I'm a partisan hack in my voting, but I try not to be in my #analysis. It can be hard to separate the two but those who can are usually the best posters on here. Watching the debate via clips on Acyn's feed and following the reactions of a bunch of Media Matters fellows is not going to give a full picture of how it went down.

[Aurelius]

Hot take but this debate will change nothing and people will forget about it by election day as with pretty much every other debate in the last 6 years.

Not that hot of a take (and I agree). I'm a bit shocked this debate is generating so much attention.

World famous TV star vs guy who just had a stroke and may soon be in an important office and lots of people want to see just how good/bad he's doing.

[Aurelius]

I think Democrats have this vision every few years of a bunch of 35 year old single moms dropping their kids off at school and then electing Democrats all over the country because of abortion.

The fact is, most of those women are too busy to vote, and if they do, half of them vote like their Trump loving husbands, or their cop fathers, or their Trump-loving moms.

This is a bad take.  Women turn out at slightly higher rates than men, and most don't just vote based on how the men in their lives think. The real issue that a lot of people miss is that women aren't monolithically pro-choice. In general, if you believe issue polling, women are a bit more pro-choice in aggregate than men, although not overwhelmingly so, and women on both sides of the issue tend to feel much more strongly about it than men.

[Aurelius]

https://twitter.com/RobTornoe/status/1588360004364443648

Real nice language coming from a "hero".

I figure you go to hell on earth on the other side of the world to fight for this country and your buddies die right beside you, you have sure as hell earned the freedom to drop a few four letter words. I cannot stand prudes!

[Aurelius]

https://twitter.com/RobTornoe/status/1588360004364443648

Real nice language coming from a "hero".

I figure you go to hell on earth on the other side of the world to fight for this country you have sure as hell earned the freedom to drop a few four letter words. I cannot stand prudes!

It's just not appropriate for an ad. I know Fetterman isn't thinking for himself picking out ads, but if they think it's "edgy" or something, they're wrong. It's just offensive.

I know the whole "I live in my moms basement and smoke weed" vote is critical to his less likely victory, but you don't have to be vulgar.

The sort of people like that guy in the ad are about as far as you can get from the "live in my moms basement and smoke weed" types. I would know, I've worked with a bunch of those crazy motherf--kers and I've lived in a ski town full of wooks.

Most people are not prissy, uptight holy rollers who swoon when they hear someone say damn or hell! Especially not in Pennsylvania!