Quo Vadis, Democrats?

[Valmy]

Americans - explain John Fetterman to me.

Just seeing his latest on Venezuela and Greenland.

(Also how is it Republicans are always so good at finding these Democratic Senators like Sinema etc while the Democrats hold on for 25 years for Susan Collins to do anything but express "concern"? )

He had a stroke. It is kind of tragic. His relationship with his staff and his wife fell apart. He got really weird and paranoid and hawkish about foreign policy stuff, which is so weird. He was elected because he was this progressive working man's ally type guy who was going to fight for the common people. Instead all he seems to care about is endless paranoia of foreign threats.

Sinema ran as a progressive but was lying. Fetterman just had a brain changing incident. Just our luck right?

[Sheilbh]

I knew about the stroke - but you guys really think that's what's behind it? That's interesting and slightly odd.

U.S. Senator John Fetterman
@SenFettermanPA
I believe Greenland has massive strategic benefits for the United States.

I do not support taking it by force.

America is not a bully.

Ideally, we purchase it—similar to our purchases of Alaska or the Louisiana Purchase.

Acquiring Greenland is a many decades old conversation.

It just seems very strange or a bit unexpected - I think the only Democrat to talk remotely positively about this. I suppose foreign policy wasn't an issue in his election.

[Tonitrus]

Could he have these views if he was perfectly healthy?  Sure.

Should he be saying anything about the issue...arguably yes, it is topical.  But even if I shared his view as stated (that is "having Greenland would be cool, but using force is stupid"), I would keep myself very quiet about it out of politeness and decorum before a friendly ally and also reject the jingoistic rhetoric surrounding the issue in the present day.

That said...there are 100 Senators.  Some in each party will be have views outside the party line, and some will be have views that in isolation make them out to be cranks.  We might cry about the Fettermans, Sinemas and Munchins...but they are inevitable.  Just as MAGAs will cry about Murkowski and Collins.

[Oexmelin]

Except that Murkowski and Collins are all theatre. They are good soldiers, and keep voting with the Republicans.

[Grey Fox]

Fetterman is just like any other regular Joe in America. When he found himself with time in felled into the Joe Rogan/YOUTUBE algorithmic filled bender that is the modern Anglo internet and he now thinks that nothing but power can be trusted or true.

[HisMajestyBOB]

Democrat senators go out of line while in office, while Republican senators wait until they leave office.

[DGuller]

Except that Murkowski and Collins are all theatre. They are good soldiers, and keep voting with the Republicans.

All Republicans vote with Republicans much more often than not, just like all Democrats vote with Democrats much more often than not.  However, when some Republican senators to defect, Murkowski and Collins are almost always among them, and that's why they consistently score as the least "loyal" senators.  They may not always be genuine about being open to being a swing vote, but I don't think the "all theatre" claim is fair.

[Admiral Yi]

Democrat senators go out of line while in office, while Republican senators wait until they leave office.

7 Rep Senators voted to convict Trump at his impeachment trial.

[Sheilbh]

I don't think that helps. For me that is very low for a president who basically incitedan insurection against the constitutional government of the US.

To me that number doesn't provide evidence of independence of mind but how effectively the GOP holds together and have been transformed by Trump.

[Admiral Yi]

I don't think that helps.

I think it helps quite a bit in refuting Bob's statement.

[HisMajestyBOB]

Democrat senators go out of line while in office, while Republican senators wait until they leave office.

7 Rep Senators voted to convict Trump at his impeachment trial.

Ok, or are imminently leaving office.

[Admiral Yi]

"Seven GOP senators voted with Democrats — the most bipartisan impeachment vote in U.S. history — but well short of the 17 needed to convict the former president.

Of those seven Republicans, two are retiring and only one — Alaska's Lisa Murkowski — faces her state's voters in the next election cycle, 2022."

From npr.org.

[viper37]

Fetterman is just like any other regular Joe in America. When he found himself with time in felled into the Joe Rogan/YOUTUBE algorithmic filled bender that is the modern Anglo internet and he now thinks that nothing but power can be trusted or true.

He suffered a stroke, IIRC, and he began to change after that, didn't he?

[Zoupa]

He chased after a black man with a shotgun, before his stroke. Liberals thought he was the new Bernie Sanders because he dresses like shit. That's the level of politics in the US these days.