John Fetterman shows Democrats how to ditch the loony left https://nypost.com/2024/01/19/opinion/john-fetterman-shows-democrats-how-to-ditch-the-loony-left/ John Fetterman, as someone put it, is doing a Bulworth in reverse. Bulworth was a fictional California senator in the 1990s movie of the same name who suddenly abandoned his establishment politics for an outspoken leftism, and all ended happily ever after. Fetterman is the real Pennsylvania senator who has suddenly modulated his leftist politics, outraging his former supporters and pleasing his former critics. The senator is demonstrating how — through theatrical dissent from a few fashionable left-wing causes and strategic rebranding — it’s possible to create a Democratic politics shorn of some of its dumbest, most unnecessary cultural vulnerabilities. Fetterman has distanced himself from the excesses of the left on a couple of key things and done it with a devil-may-care verve that has drawn added attention and underlined his independence. He has had, to use the term from the Clinton years, some Sister Souljah moments. (The term derives from Bill Clinton criticizing a pro-riot statement by a not-very-important rapper.) One of the advantages of such a moment is that, when done correctly, it generates benefits out of all proportion to the significance of the underlying issue. That’s not to say that the Israel-Gaza war or the border, the two substantive issues where Fetterman has gone his own way, aren’t important. But how much is Fetterman really giving away ideologically by robustly favoring Israel in a war with a terrorist group or acknowledging the crisis at the border? You can still favor Medicare for All while saying Israel should finish the job against Hamas, and you can still support a $15 minimum wage while saying we should get a better handle on the border. Similarly, it doesn’t cost Fetterman anything to say that Bob Menendez of New Jersey, indicted for corruption, is a disgrace who doesn’t belong in the Senate. It’s not as though Fetterman is the Senate majority leader. Fetterman, though, has made his points in pungent, showy ways that gives them more resonance. He says he’s going to return a $5,000 donation from Menendez’s PAC in envelopes of cash. He puts up posters of Israeli kidnap victims on his office walls. He irreverently shuts down an anti-Israel heckler. Fetterman isn’t really departing from Democratic orthodoxy per se: Other Democrats are pro-Israel and anti-Menendez, while the party didn’t used to be as committed to a de facto open border as Biden has been. What he’s doing is declaring his independence from the radicalism of the Left and from the progressive brand. Now, after proudly declaring himself a progressive for years, he says he’s never been one. Fetterman is also triggering the right people: Earning the contempt of angry and childish pro-Hamas protesters helpfully pushes his image to the center. The new Fetterman is a throwback to an earlier version of Bernie Sanders, who represented a non-woke socialism. Not too long ago, Sanders was willing to say that unchecked immigration wouldn’t serve the interests of the United States. Another benefit of Fetterman’s high-profile acts of heterodoxy is that they put him on the popular side of these issues. According to a recent Quinnipiac poll, 26% of voters think more favorably of Fetterman for expressing strong support for Israel, whereas 14% say this makes them think less favorably of him. On the border, people favor his position 35%-9%. In sum, Fetterman is pointing to a different path for the Democrats where the party doesn’t have to cater to its left, and in fact, can pivot off of it to appear more reasonable. Make no mistake, Fetterman will use whatever additional credibility he earns with his new tack to try to help President Joe Biden win Pennsylvania in November. He’s still a progressive in all but self-description. Yet he’s probably going to be more popular and harder to beat, and definitely more interesting. Democrats should pay attention, although they probably won’t — ensuring that Fetterman has lots of running room to brand himself as a different kind of Democrat.
If Dem voters wanted a moderate democrat they would have voted for Conner Lamb. Fetterman will be a one and done like Biden and Senima.
Fetterman's "why i left the left" grift in full swing now. Maybe you ought to join Texans usurping federal powers to help drown brown kids John. ‘There is a crisis’ “It’s not so much that I left the title, the title left me,” said Fetterman, 54, who edged out Dr. Oz in 2022 to help keep the U.S. Senate blue, and once vowed that “Progressive values” were the heart of his political identity. “Increasingly, [progressives] moved and migrated into some positions that I don’t agree with and I really just feel much more comfortable just being a Democrat,” the controversial Pennsylvania lawmaker told The Post this week during an exclusive sitdown in his D.C. office. “There is a crisis,” he said. “We have a crisis at our border, and it can’t be controversial that we should have a secure border.” “Nobody should ever have trusted John Fetterman,” said Nathan J. Robinson, a socialist and editor of the far-left magazine Current Affairs. “He repeatedly lied and betrayed his progressive supporters.” Conservatives, meanwhile, have taken an approving second look. “How is it possible that John Fetterman in the last few months has seemingly become more based than half of the senate GOP???” said Donald Trump Jr. in an X posting last week, using internet slang for conservative.
Fetterman is spot on. There is no chance of peace in Gaza until Hamas is completely eliminated. John Fetterman and Joe Manchin decline to back resolution supporting a 2-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict https://www.businessinsider.com/joh...n-israel-two-state-solution-resolution-2024-1 Sen. Brian Schatz is sponsoring an amendment affirming support for a two state solution in Israel. Just two Democratic senators didn't sign on: John Fetterman and Joe Manchin. A spokesman for Fetterman said the resolution should "include language stipulating the destruction of Hamas" (More at above url)
or put more accurately, is dead wrong: Just two Democrats did not sign on: "centrist" Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.), a one-time progressive who has rebranded himself as a firmly pro-Israel moderate since the Oct. 7 attack.
I'll tip my hat to him, & respect the hustle of using his 1st amendment right to troll and not be a fascist pussy like GWB who wanted protesters jailed for protesting outside justices' homes:
Protestors who intimidate politicians by protesting at their homes where their families and children live should be arrested. Protesting outside official public buildings should be allowed. Protesting at the private homes at politicians should be clearly written into law at illegal. I will note that we have the pro-Hamas idiots in Raleigh and Durham protesting outside the homes of the mayor(s) and city council members demanding that they pass a proclamation demanding a cease fire. Can someone tell me what local politicians have to do with Middle East politics. And why local politicians should be wasting 90% of their time recently with this nonsense rather than roads, services, zoning, and other proper local issues they have control over?
Tax payers paid for those streets and sidewalks. Don't like our constitutional freedoms? Move to Israel.