RUTHFULLY YOURS

In May, John Fetterman was on his way to a Democratic-primary campaign event in Pennsylvania when it became clear to his wife that he needed urgent medical attention. Later, doctors confirmed that Fetterman had suffered a stroke — a life-threatening condition in which the blood supply to the brain is temporarily blocked or reduced.

According to the CDC, strokes can “cause lasting brain damage, long-term disability, or even death.” Annually, about 700,000 people in the United States have strokes. For any of them, it would be uncontroversial to recommend that they not pressure themselves with high-stakes performance in the months that follow. But Fetterman’s campaign and the entire Democratic apparatus — and perhaps the candidate himself — had a strong incentive to prioritize his political career instead.

Whether a person is fit to return to work after a stroke depends on both the degree of damage and the nature of the work. Given the objectively grave diagnosis, as well as the responsibility of the office of senator, it was reasonable for voters to demand necessary assurances. But Fetterman refused to release his medical records, instead offering a one-page doctor’s letter saying he “has no work restrictions and can work full duty in public office.” He maintained a conspicuously low profile.

In early October, Fetterman gave an interview to NBC reporter Dasha Burns using closed captioning to compensate for his problems with auditory processing. Burns observed that during their small talk before the closed captioning was turned on, “it wasn’t clear that he could understand what we were saying.” For this, she was attacked by Fetterman’s wife as an “ableist.” The American Association of People with Disabilities likewise complained that coverage of the Burns interview was “riddled with ableism.” A disability activist, Charis Hill, told BuzzFeed News that “the way Burns handled that interview will only worsen attitudes and violence towards disabled people.”

The Center for Disability Rights defines “ableism” as “a set of beliefs or practices that devalue and discriminate against people with physical, intellectual, or psychiatric disabilities and often rests on the assumption that disabled people need to be ‘fixed’ in one form or another.” Insofar as disability-rights advocates focus their efforts on fighting unfair discrimination — for instance, how assisted suicide targets those with disabilities — this is a noble cause. But in the context of employment, not every disability can be adequately adjusted for in every situation.

Evidently, many agree. A CBS News/YouGov poll conducted before the debate between Fetterman and his Republican opponent, Mehmet Oz, found that 46 percent of respondents believed it was important for the candidates to address Fetterman’s health. Fetterman anticipated this concern in his opening remarks: “I had a stroke,” he began. “He’s never let me forget that. . . . I might miss some words during this debate, mush two words together, but it knocked me down, and I’m going to keep coming back up.” Really, it was Fetterman’s performance that made his stroke impossible to forget. One of the worst moments was his reply to the moderator’s question about his flip-flop on fracking: “I do support fracking. And I don’t, I don’t. I support fracking, and I stand, and I do support fracking.”

As MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough noted, “John Fetterman’s ability to communicate is seriously impaired. Pennsylvania voters will be talking about this obvious fact even if many in the media will not.” In a USA Today–Suffolk University poll, 7 percent of Pennsylvania voters said they would have voted for Fetterman had he not had a stroke but were supporting other candidates or remained undecided.

Of course, the thinking here is not that a stroke automatically disqualifies a person from office — only that Fetterman’s brain injury could hinder him in the role of senator since communication is an essential part of the job. The public can’t take his comprehension on trust. This unfortunate scenario is not unique to politicians. A football player who suffers an injury may need to retire earlier than planned, for his own health and the good of his team. A soldier who develops an impairment may be honorably discharged for similar reasons. Though it can be politically convenient to pretend otherwise, bodily limitations are not a basis for superiority or inferiority. They are, in fact, a great leveler. Even if we are blessed with lifelong good health, all of us are born in a state of dependency, and those of us who make it to old age will likely leave this world the same way. It is not a question of whether our bodies will fail us, only when and how.

Some people are highly functioning well into their eighties and nineties. The late Queen Elizabeth II, for instance, swore in a new prime minister just days before she died. But others are not so lucky. When the 2020 election was at stake, observations of Biden’s age-related mental decline were dismissed as “ageism.” Over the past two years, as the president’s gaffes became more frequent, and, critically, as Democrats realized his evident decline could harm their reelection chances, their attitudes changed. A New York Times/Siena College poll found that 64 percent of Democrats want a different presidential nominee in 2024, the most-cited reason being that they think Biden is too old.

In July, the New York Times reported that “more than a dozen current and former senior officials and advisers” acknowledged that the president’s “energy level, while impressive for a man of his age, is not what it was, and some aides quietly watch out for him. He often shuffles when he walks, and aides worry he will trip on a wire. He stumbles over words during public events, and they hold their breath to see if he makes it to the end without a gaffe.” Michelle Goldberg, a Times columnist, compared watching Biden speak to “seeing someone wobble on a tightrope.” It’s a rare occasion when National Review’s Jim Geraghty agrees with Goldberg, and yet he does in his piece for this issue.

In the run-up to the midterms, Democrats were experiencing a credibility problem. They may have insisted they were “following the science” on Covid, but a poll conducted by Democratic campaigners earlier this year found that in the 60 most competitive House districts for the 2022 midterms, 57 percent of voters agreed with the statement that “Democrats in Congress have taken things too far in their pandemic response,” while 66 percent of self-identified swing voters agreed.

Even post-pandemic, the “party of science” regularly denies inconvenient facts. During the Michigan gubernatorial debate, Democratic incumbent Gretchen Whitmer claimed that schools had been closed for only three months, when, as every parent in the state knows, it was much longer. The president has tried to pull a similar stunt with inflation, telling CBS viewers that inflation was “up just an inch, hardly at all,” when voters can clearly see gas and grocery prices for themselves.

Even worse than this sort of politically convenient denial is the stark denial of basic human biology. One bodily limitation that we do not choose and cannot change is our sex. Whether we are male or female is determined at conception. In most cases, it is possible to tell a person’s sex at a glance. That’s one reason why nearly two-thirds of Americans oppose allowing males into female sports and spaces. And why the issue had Kansas governor Laura Kelly on the back foot. In an ad countering a Republican attack ad, the Democratic incumbent said, “Of course men should not play girls’ sports. Okay, we all agree there.” Yet she had vetoed bills guaranteeing just that on the grounds that they were “hateful, discriminatory legislation.”

Even the issue of abortion has been poorly pitched to moderates. The mantra “My body, my choice” has popular appeal when the body of the unborn is in its nascent stages (i.e., he or she looks less like a baby). But developments in ultrasound technology have made it that much clearer that there are two bodies in question. A post-Dobbs Harvard/Harris poll found that 72 percent of voters — including 75 percent of women, 70 percent of independents, and 60 percent of rank-and-file Democrats — believe there should be limits on abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy. Yet when asked about limits they would support, most Democrats have refused to name one.

In July, during a Senate hearing about the consequences of overturning Roe v. Wade, Senator Josh Hawley (R., Mo.) questioned Khiara Bridges, a professor at the UC Berkeley School of Law, on whether by “people with a capacity for pregnancy” she meant women. Bridges responded by saying that his “line of questioning is transphobic.” Her response suggests she believes that it is morally wrong to acknowledge limitations to the processes of pregnancy imposed by biology — never mind those set by lawmakers. We saw the same argument attempted in the aftermath of the Fetterman–Oz debate. What voters expected was a debate about Fetterman’s (and Oz’s) policy positions. What they got instead was a debate about whether it is morally wrong to acknowledge Fetterman’s difficulties in expressing himself.

Only the most hardened partisan ideologue insists that it is morally offensive to acknowledge the limitations of the human body — whether from infirmity, age, or sex. Such insistence is not only a denial of common sense, but a denial of humanity. All of us can expect our bodies to disappoint us ultimately; this is a universal truth and a basis of empathy. People may disagree on politics, but most can agree that politics should be moored in reality. Democrats’ suggestions to the contrary may come at a high political price.