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

[citizenZ]

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.

[Crumpets]

Since it will never again be relevant to the political discussion, I must take this opportunity to post this wonderful video exploring the Eagles-Cowboys rivalry and its relationship to union culture.

[wbrocks67]

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.

[7,052,770]

https://twitter.com/briantylercohen/status/1580007135814950912

[citizenZ]

Fetterman people apparently mad on twitter that NBC News is playing up his incoherent issues so close to the election. It matters. Look how long Mark Kirk was out and then ineffective until his eventual defeat in Illinois.

[Calthrina950]

Fetterman people apparently mad on twitter that NBC News is playing up his incoherent issues so close to the election. It matters. Look how long Mark Kirk was out and then ineffective until his eventual defeat in Illinois.

And not just Kirk. Another example I can think of where health issues cost a candidate is the 2000 Senatorial election in Delaware, when Tom Carper defeated William Roth. Roth was in poor health and apparently collapsed at one of his rallies that year, and that affected the outcome in that race. He died less than three years after leaving office.

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

Fetterman people apparently mad on twitter that NBC News is playing up his incoherent issues so close to the election. It matters. Look how long Mark Kirk was out and then ineffective until his eventual defeat in Illinois.

Mark Kirk outran the top of the ticket by 2% despite making a blatantly racist statement at a debate.

[sting in the rafters]

Since it will never again be relevant to the political discussion, I must take this opportunity to post this wonderful video exploring the Eagles-Cowboys rivalry and its relationship to union culture.

Nothing but respect for MY blue-collar true sack record holder Reggie White who did it in only 12 games and wasn't spoon-fed via Brett Favre lying down for his final sack the way Michael Strahan was!

[GALeftist]

Fetterman people apparently mad on twitter that NBC News is playing up his incoherent issues so close to the election. It matters. Look how long Mark Kirk was out and then ineffective until his eventual defeat in Illinois.

Mark Kirk outran the top of the ticket by 2% despite making a blatantly racist statement at a debate.

On top of that, Mark Kirk's stroke was pretty clearly very different from Fetterman's; in Kirk's case, the stroke was sadly pretty bad for his actual mental faculties, whereas Fetterman's stroke seems to have basically given him hearing difficulties which he can overcome handily with closed captioning or whatever. I legitimately can't tell if people actually don't see the distinction here or are just being hackish.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Fetterman people apparently mad on twitter that NBC News is playing up his incoherent issues so close to the election. It matters. Look how long Mark Kirk was out and then ineffective until his eventual defeat in Illinois.

Mark Kirk outran the top of the ticket by 2% despite making a blatantly racist statement at a debate.

On top of that, Mark Kirk's stroke was pretty clearly very different from Fetterman's; in Kirk's case, the stroke was sadly pretty bad for his actual mental faculties, whereas Fetterman's stroke seems to have basically given him hearing difficulties which he can overcome handily with closed captioning or whatever. I legitimately can't tell if people actually don't see the distinction here or are just being hackish.

Whenever this type of question is asked, it's a pretty good bet that they (for any "they") are being hackish.

[citizenZ]

If you're on the left, do you really expect Oz to be a Trumpian or a more moderate Toomey-like figure if he (as seems more likely) gets elected?

[Roll Roons]

Fetterman people apparently mad on twitter that NBC News is playing up his incoherent issues so close to the election. It matters. Look how long Mark Kirk was out and then ineffective until his eventual defeat in Illinois.

Mark Kirk outran the top of the ticket by 2% despite making a blatantly racist statement at a debate.

in Kirk's case, the stroke was sadly pretty bad for his actual mental faculties,

Mark Kirk won reelection to his House seat by 6 points in arguably the biggest blue wave year in recent memory and while the favorite son presidential candidate was carrying the district by 23 points to boot.

That shows how strong he really was before the stroke and how badly it destroyed him. It's so sad.

[ProgressiveModerate]

If you're on the left, do you really expect Oz to be a Trumpian or a more moderate Toomey-like figure if he (as seems more likely) gets elected?

The issue with Oz generally is he lacks coherent principles. Toomey very much ran on being this sane reasonable conservative voice in his election whereas Oz has been all over the place.

At the end of the day, I tend to agree he won't be at the extreme end of the caucus, but I also don't think he has convictions to really stand up for what's right when needed in the way Toomey at least did a little bit.

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

Fetterman people apparently mad on twitter that NBC News is playing up his incoherent issues so close to the election. It matters. Look how long Mark Kirk was out and then ineffective until his eventual defeat in Illinois.

Mark Kirk outran the top of the ticket by 2% despite making a blatantly racist statement at a debate.

in Kirk's case, the stroke was sadly pretty bad for his actual mental faculties,

Mark Kirk won reelection to his House seat by 6 points in arguably the biggest blue wave year in recent memory and while the favorite son presidential candidate was carrying the district by 23 points to boot.

That shows how strong he really was before the stroke and how badly it destroyed him. It's so sad.

Polarization greatly increased between 2008 and 2016, House races are different than Senate races (ask Peter Roskam that same year) and I say that as someone who very much likes Mark Kirk.

[Person Man]

ah, found it

https://twitter.com/PoliticsPA/status/1579964184846303239

This just makes him and his supporters look like scum. Can you imagine any sane or moral person doing such things?

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

ah, found it

https://twitter.com/PoliticsPA/status/1579964184846303239

This just makes him and his supporters look like scum. Can you imagine any sane or moral person doing such things?

This is like Harry Reid alleging that Romney didn't pay his taxes in 2012. It ultimately was something of a misrepresentation, but this is politics...

[ProgressiveModerate]

Fetterman people apparently mad on twitter that NBC News is playing up his incoherent issues so close to the election. It matters. Look how long Mark Kirk was out and then ineffective until his eventual defeat in Illinois.

Mark Kirk outran the top of the ticket by 2% despite making a blatantly racist statement at a debate.

in Kirk's case, the stroke was sadly pretty bad for his actual mental faculties,

Mark Kirk won reelection to his House seat by 6 points in arguably the biggest blue wave year in recent memory and while the favorite son presidential candidate was carrying the district by 23 points to boot.

That shows how strong he really was before the stroke and how badly it destroyed him. It's so sad.

Polarization greatly increased between 2008 and 2016, House races are different than Senate races (ask Peter Roskam that same year) and I say that as someone who very much likes Mark Kirk.

At the time IL-10 was also still relatively swingy and Obama likely did better than a generic Dem in the district not only because of the wave but a favorite son boost. The district only narrowly voted for Kerry and Gore and suburbs even back then tended to be more R downballot.

[Senator Incitatus]

If the Fetterman campaign is minimizing the severe effects of his stroke (and I would expect them or any other campaign to do so), don't they think those issues will be exposed in a live debate? Are they playing for time, hoping his symptoms improve or that too few voters witness it to matter?

I would think it's not actually that bad or they'd be setting expectations lower, but refusing to release the records seems like a bad move. Just release them and say he'll recover. That seems fairly plausible.

[bagelman]

If you're on the left, do you really expect Oz to be a Trumpian or a more moderate Toomey-like figure if he (as seems more likely) gets elected?

I expect him to be something different: he has a long career of being a scam artist, so as Senator he will work to protect MLMs and scams.

[GALeftist]

The way certain media figures have been treating Fetterman's aphasia/need for closed captioning is frankly extremely callous and disheartening, yet unsurprising, to see. One reason this race is really dangerous for me, personally: the people who find Fetterman most objectionable (movement conservatives, alt-centrists/KHive, "reasonable" Republicans who remain partisan hacks, journalists more interested in ensuring a close horse race than anything else) pretty neatly line up with the people I on a personal level find to be the most irritating. If Fetterman loses, OK, I've seen better candidates whiff more important races before and I almost certainly will again at some point in the future, but if he wins I may die of schadenfreude.

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

https://twitter.com/JohnFetterman/status/1579983502073860097?cxt=HHwWgsC4gfinne0...

He seems fine here.

[Orwell]

If you're on the left, do you really expect Oz to be a Trumpian or a more moderate Toomey-like figure if he (as seems more likely) gets elected?

The issue with Oz generally is he lacks coherent principles. Toomey very much ran on being this sane reasonable conservative voice in his election whereas Oz has been all over the place.

At the end of the day, I tend to agree he won't be at the extreme end of the caucus, but I also don't think he has convictions to really stand up for what's right when needed in the way Toomey at least did a little bit.

I find it hilarious that Toomey is now considered a moderate conciliatory Republican, back in 2010 and especially during his primary fight with Specter in 2004 Toomey was Mr.GOP, and Santorum got some decent blowback from the right for helping Specter in his primary in 2004.

[Devils30]

If you're on the left, do you really expect Oz to be a Trumpian or a more moderate Toomey-like figure if he (as seems more likely) gets elected?

The issue with Oz generally is he lacks coherent principles. Toomey very much ran on being this sane reasonable conservative voice in his election whereas Oz has been all over the place.

At the end of the day, I tend to agree he won't be at the extreme end of the caucus, but I also don't think he has convictions to really stand up for what's right when needed in the way Toomey at least did a little bit.

Fetterman’s health is a concern but I don’t know if voters will just switch to Oz. His favorables are brutal and he comes off as a bully.

[wbrocks67]

If you watch the actual NBC interview, he's fine. He admits he stumbles over a few words sometimes, as he does there - and he owns it. And that's pretty expected with someone who had a stroke!

The problem lies in where Burns has now said on every single hit she's done about this story about "small talk" before, and is just very vague about their conversation. Her whole "I'm not sure he was understanding..." - okay, but if you're going to provide an anecdote for us that was not filmed and you control the narrative here, maybe be a more specific? Was he a deer in the headlights the entire time? Did he miss a few words you said? Just being vague and general about it comes off like you're trying to set some narrative about it.

Nonetheless, again, we've seen Fetterman out on the trail with no closed captioning and him talking to voters and other public figures numerous times, so that's why I think it's a bit egregious for her to act as if he had no idea what she was saying.

Very unsurprising too that national political press figures are making very ablest comments about it (and not surprising either that none of these people have laid a finger on Oz up to this point)

[wbrocks67]

At any rate, I suspect that Dasha Burns comment will make the rounds on all the right wing social media accounts. However, i don't imagine the GOP using this attack line in any ads because any time they've tried to hit him on the stroke, it has backfired on them and just makes Fetterman look more sympathetic.

As with that, if you watch the NBC interview without Burns' extra commentary, most people would probably see someone who had a health issue and is clawing their way back. If this was a normal person, it would be a puff piece for gods sake on how people come back from health problems. But since it's a Senator, it's twisted.

I did appreciate that Savannah pushed back on Dash this morning, saying that other journalists did not have the problems she claimed to have. Dasha appeared clearly annoyed.

https://twitter.com/TODAYshow/status/1580155825611362304