Clarity in Pennsylvania

For John, BLUF:  In the 2022 election I saw Candidate John Fedderman as weak and undesirable.  As he has recovered his health he has shown his true colors and his down the middle views.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

John Fetterman Plays Against Type

Here is the sub-headline:

His emergence as a pro-Israel moderate hasn’t surprised Pennsylvania political observers.

From The Wall Street Journal, by Reporter Salena Zito, 1 January 2024, 1:09 pm ET.

Here is the lede plus three:

It’s a warm December morning, and Sen. John Fetterman is walking along the Great Allegheny Passage across the Monongahela River from his home in Braddock.  “I spend as much time as I can out here,” he says of the trail, which runs 150 miles from downtown Pittsburgh to Cumberland, Md.

Mr. Fetterman has been in the U.S. Senate just under a year, during which he’s recovered from a campaign-season stroke, checked himself into Walter Reed hospital for depression, and ruffled feathers on both sides of the aisle.  In September it was reported that Majority Leader Chuck Schumer had relaxed the Senate’s unofficial dress code to accommodate Mr. Fetterman’s preference for wearing hoodies and shorts.  (That move backfired, leading the body to adopt a formal requirement of business attire.)

Of late, however, Mr. Fetterman has drawn the ire of the Democratic left for his unapologetic support of Israel, for his support of a bipartisan solution to the border crisis, and for his cheeky criticisms of the indicted Sen. Bob Menendez (D., N.J.).

None of this is a surprise to Pennsylvania political observers.  “Now that his health has finally improved, the national press and the country are finding out the real John Fetterman,” says Jeffrey Brauer, a political scientist at Keystone College.  Mr. Brauer thinks that Mr. Fetterman’s difficulty communicating after his May 2022 stroke, combined with his casual dress and his combative approach to moderate primary opponent Conor Lamb led outsiders to assume Mr. Fetterman was a card-carrying progressive.

I admit that Ms Zito provides a different picture of Senator John Fetterman from the one I have been holding up until just recently.  I will say that I have a lot of trust in what Ms Zito says on the political front.  She always rings true to me.

The question is, oin my mind, how will this impact any shake-out in the Democatic Party.  For sure the war between Israel and Gaza has brought strains within the Party,♠  Part of our natinoal strength over the last two and a quarter centuries has been our ability to cut a deal.  The last time we forgot how to do that we had a Civil War.&nbs; I am hoping the varioous strains in the Democratic Party will find a way to work together, for the good of the nation.

Mr. Fetterman said “I would be the last man standing to be absolutely there on the Israeli side on this with no conditions.”  On this point he will not be alone.  I will be there with him.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Is Israel at war with all of Gaza or is it just at war with Hamas?  This may sound like a nuance, but if there are two million Gazans made at Israel it is a major issue.  It is just tens of thousands of members of Hamas it is a different issue.  The hopes for peace turn on this.