The media really, really want a far-left Democrat named John Fetterman to win a Senate seat in Pennsylvania this fall, facing off against either Dr. Mehmet Oz or former hedge-fund CEO David McCormick, one of whom will be the GOP nominee.
Fetterman stands 6’8” and dresses like a mechanic/lumberjack, and the media’s hope is that a set of Bernie Sanders–like policy positions can be slipped past the electorate provided that their advocate looks like a guy who has multiple Trump flags draped over his house. Fetterman supports Medicare for All (i.e., abolishing your health-insurance plan and dumping you onto a federal one), says there should be no legal limits on abortion, backed Bernie Sanders for president in 2016, calls Elizabeth Warren a “luminary,” thinks biological males should be allowed to participate in girls’ and women’s sports, and wants a “de facto” moratorium on fracking.
Oh, and he chased down a black jogger with a loaded shotgun in 2013. The jogger said Fetterman pointed the shotgun at his chest; Fetterman denies this but allows that his intent was to detain the jogger. At the time, Fetterman was mayor of a small town in Pennsylvania. Trip Gabriel of the New York Times frets, “The GOP use of this 2013 incident . . . has begun.” Gabriel previously published a detailed account of this episode that puts the gentlest imaginable spin on events but . . . Fetterman chased down an innocent, unarmed black jogger with a shotgun and detained him.
Gabriel thinks the GOP is opportunistically publicizing this episode which, as ancient history (way back in 2013, when the earth was young and before chasing down unarmed black people for no reason was discovered to be wrong), should be forgotten by all involved as it gives us no useful information about the character of a man running for the U.S. Senate. In other words, this is a “GOP pounces story,” or Gabriel wishes it were. The media would have us believe it is unfair for Republicans to draw attention to a Democrat chasing down an unarmed black jogger with a shotgun; naturally, Democrats would not be opportunistic about the situation and would quietly let the matter rest were Fetterman a Republican.