If there is one thing you can say for the Democrats, it is that once they get a winning formula, they will follow it again and again in their quest for power.
They’ve done this for decades. Playing the race card, manipulating the language, and demonizing both their opponents as well as those who support their opponents. In 2020, we saw the emergence of another tactic: hiding the candidate.
In 2020, the Democrats kept their presidential candidate, Joe Biden, pretty much under wraps for much of the campaign, and let’s face it, based on Biden’s post-inaugural performance, it wasn’t a bad idea. The president’s stumbling, bumbling, mumbling behavior in public has become a central characteristic of his administration; multiple slips and falls, making incoherent statements, shaking hands with the air, blank stares, and wandering off in the wrong direction requiring his minders to redirect him.
His performance has become so bad that the “keep Joe in the basement” strategy is back in play, with long vacations and short days becoming the norm. It’s gotten to the point where his handlers only get him out and dust him off for short appearances such as bill-signings, where he can make a short statement and then turn tail to avoid questions from the press. About the only thing keeping President Biden from getting the 25th Amendment treatment is a vice president who is more incompetent than he is.
Pennsylvania Democrats have taken note of the “hide the candidate” strategy and are using it with their senatorial candidate, Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, whose campaign has consisted of a few memes sandwiched around a handful of very brief public appearances.
Fetterman had a stroke two days before the primary election in May which required both the removal of a blood clot in his brain and the implantation of a pacemaker. The stroke also brought out that Fetterman had never disclosed that he suffers from atrial fibrillation and cardiomyopathy, both serious diseases of the heart.
Despite the official line that he is in full recovery, it has become obvious to about everyone, including many in a sympathetic media, that the large lieutenant governor is not a well man, struggling to deliver even short remarks in a 5 minute speech to union steelworkers recently. It’s no wonder that he won’t agree to debate his Republican opponent, Dr. Mehmet Oz, who has accepted invitations from media and civic organizations for five debates.
Ill health is not the only reason that Fetterman is being kept away from the voters. His policy positions are radical, even for a Democrat. He is a Bernie Sanders lefty and a phony populist, never having had a real job outside of politics.
As lieutenant governor, he chairs the state parole board, and under his tenure, recommendations for clemency and commutation of life sentences have skyrocketed, resulting in convicted murderers being put back on the street. Since Fetterman assumed office, 46 recommendations for clemency have been forwarded to the governor, five times the number from his predecessor, and Wolf has approved 45 of them.
As an example, in February 2021, Wolf commuted the sentences of 13 convicted murderers based on Fetterman’s parole board recommendations. He has stated that he opposes life sentences for felony murder, where a participant in a felony can be held similarly responsible even if an accomplice caused the actual murder.
Fetterman is also in favor of “decriminalizing” all drugs, sanctuary cities and is anti-fracking and anti-oil. He truly represents the radical wing of the radical wing of the Democratic Party and would be a disastrous pick for the U.S. Senate.
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote that Republicans in Pennsylvania could be headed for trouble, but despite the slanted in-state reporting you will find about the race, the advantage Fetterman enjoyed over Oz in early polls is melting away rapidly. Two reliable polls that have come out in the last week show the gap now down to four points or so.
One slanted Pennsylvania political website has trumpeted an outlier Franklin and Marshall poll of five hundred or so registered voters giving Fetterman a 13-point lead while ignoring a much more scientific Emerson poll of over a thousand likely voters showing the race with a 4-point margin, nearly within the margin of error, even though the polls were published the same day.
It’s pretty clear that as the voters find out more about John Fetterman, the less likely they are to elect him. That’s why Fetterman is employing the Biden strategy of hiding in the basement and avoiding the real issues, preferring to talk about veggie trays and where his opponent resides.
It’s also why Fetterman won’t accept any of the five invitations to debate Dr. Oz. Republicans need to come together and make the maximum effort to educate voters about Fetterman’s radical policy ideas and his fragile health. If they can do that, the Senate seat now occupied by Pat Toomey will stay in Republican hands, boosting the GOP’s chances of taking the U.S. Senate.
Dwight Weidman is a resident of Greene Township and is a graduate of Shepherd University. He is retired from the United States Department of Defense, where his career included assignments In Europe, Asia and Central America. He has been in leadership roles for the Republican Party in two states, most recently serving two terms as Chairman of the Franklin County Republican Party. Involved in web publishing since 1996, he is the publisher of The Franklin County Journal. He has been an Amateur Radio Operator since 1988, getting his first license in Germany, and is a past volunteer with both Navy and Army MARS, Military Auxiliary Radio Service, and is also an NRA-certified firearms instructor.
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