What’s the difference between Dianne Feinstein and John Fetterman?
Tiana Lowe
Although his party kept control of Congress’s upper chamber in 2022, President Joe Biden is once again stuck sending Kamala Harris to cast tiebreaking Senate votes. The vice president is keen to get out of town and on the de facto campaign trail for her boss, but the president’s agenda is currently imperiled by two senators who, dealing with chronic health issues, cannot show up for work.
The absence of Dianne Feinstein, who says she’s currently dealing with shingles, has finally sparked calls from House Democrats for the almost 90-year-old Californian to resign. But the party has remained mum on John Fetterman, who has missed 86% of all roll-call votes thus far while institutionalized for depression after suffering a perilous stroke last year and at all times concealing the full truth about his medical condition.
REPLACING FEINSTEIN ON COMMITTEE MAY BE UPHILL CLIMB FOR DEMOCRATS
What is the difference between Feinstein and the Pennsylvania freshman? Why can some Democrats summon the courage to call only on her resignation and not his?
The first California Democrat to call for Feinstein’s resignation was Rep. Ro Khanna, a heterodox “progressive capitalist” whom Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom could plausibly choose as her replacement.
It would be one thing if Democrats were only cynical enough to want to keep a man constitutionally unable to fulfill his duty as a benchwarmer out of fear that Republicans could beat them. But if Fetterman were to resign, a Democrat, Gov. Josh Shapiro, would choose his replacement anyway.
Feinstein and Fetterman both occupy (or rather, do not occupy) positions on crucial committees. Whatever argument that could be made about Feinstein’s absence from the Judiciary Committee could also be made about Fetterman’s absence from the Banking Committee. Considering that we recently saw the second-largest bank failure in history, would it not be wise to have a full bench on the Banking Committee?
There’s not really much practical difference between the absences of Feinstein and Fetterman except for the fact that Democrats already got pounds of egg on their faces dragging him to victory. The media branded any reporter willing to point out Fetterman’s obvious cognitive decline as a racist. (Yes, even though he’s the white guy who threatened a black jogger with a shotgun.)
After all that effort, Fetterman’s career remains the only thing to justify the sunk costs of their embarrassment. To keep him is a fallacy, but pride is not a logical emotion.