Dr. Oz is a bit weird, and I’m bothered by his apparent mixed loyalties. Still, I’m pulling for him. I assume a good heart surgeon learns, processes, acts. And apparently he did very well. Secondly, I only watched one of his shows but he listened closely to his guest (with a certain modesty, as in his response to Oprah). I like patents – we need people who analyze, define, and solve problems. We are less sure of what he will be than we are of more conventional candidates. Still, a life time of work done well make it less of a gamble.
Then there’s Fetterman – with remarkably few accomplishments, he would fight crime and increase energy with flailing, contradictory slogans. His party praised his “performances”. But senators reason, and it is the reasoning before the vote, the give and take with opponents, that defines a Senator’s value. A Senator is, after all, joining one of the great, if not the greatest, of deliberative bodies. Some, we hear in their ads, still see that role. But is that even a majority? And how much do the parties differ?
His party wanted to own his vote. Their job is to elect sufficient pawns to give a majority. Then, they give up the power of their vote to the leaders who give up theirs to the swamp, leading to a populace more and more restless and less and less able to fight free of the octopus. And so it matters little that Fetterman can not deliberate. In his stabs at making an argument for his candidacy, he says he’ll be the 51st vote. Of course. Not as a representative of Pennsylvanians. That vote and not that voice is what made him worth millions. And so he is elected by the party, not the people.
We can’t possibly know what Oz will be like as senator; however, we all know what Fetterman will be.
And is his role as cipher all that different from Biden’s? Or even the without-the-excuse of a stroke or senility, Kamala Harris? How much applies to other members of Congress, some even more visibly impaired (Diane Feinstein, for instance).
