mehmet oz
The Rise of Celebrity-Politicians Is Bad for Democracy
The direct line between celebrity and political ascendance is altering the conventional dynamics of political power in anti-democratic ways.
In a matter of days Americans will vote on a new cohort of U.S. Senators in a midterm election cycle with significant bearing on the nation's future. Among those vying for what is actually a tedious, bureaucratic "sausage-making" job, is a crop of celebrity-politicians whose electoral success, along with that of Donald Trump's, is signaling what could be a fundamental change in the way political power works in America.
In Georgia, the state's first Black U.S. Senator, a respected pastor, is being challenged by a football star who claims that Darwin's theory of evolution is a hoax. If humans evolved from apes, he has opined, why are there still apes? Running for Ohio's seat is a bestselling author and conservative personality who's suggested that victims of domestic violence should just suck it up in the name of preserving the sanctity of "the family." In Pennsylvania, one of the nominees is celebrity doctor, Dr. Mehmet Oz, known to peddle unproven health products on his Emmy-winning TV show and prescribe psychic mediums, relaying messages from the dead, to aid grieving families.
Once upon a time, in the not-so-distant past, the culture industry seemed content to play a supporting role in our politics. Celebrities surrogated for candidates, and reproduced social hierarchies through their conspicuous consumption and the characters they played. A notable exception, Dr. Oz's mentor Oprah Winfrey helped to infuse "rugged individualism" into America's cultural common sense, using her top-rated TV show to explain away the cruelties of Reaganism--and subsequent administrations' bipartisan attacks on poor and working-class people--as consequences of personal failure and individual pathology, putting a therapeutic face on their brutal executions of state power.
On the flipside, politicians have long been content to just dabble in the world of show business: Eisenhower appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show, JFK went on late-night TV, Clinton donned shades while playing sax on Arsenio Hall, Obama slow-jammed the news with Jimmy Fallon. Today, however, the direct line between celebrity and political ascendance is altering the conventional dynamics of political power in anti-democratic ways. JFK and Obama may have used pop culture to achieve political ends, but they still employed legal-rational means, and the tools of bureaucratic administration, to govern. Trump, conversely, was a purely charismatic leader who exploited the tools of government to expand his celebrity, exercising a distinctly anti-institutional form of authority that derived its legitimacy not from laws and reason, but from loyalty and emotion.
According to classical sociologist Max Weber, charismatic leaders tend to gain traction when rational forms of government and institutions fail, when people lose faith in the establishment and desire escape from the dehumanizing and alienating effects of bureaucratic life. Unlike kings who draw power from legacy and tradition, or heads of state whose authority is vested in their role in the legal-rational order, a charismatic leader's power is rooted in his or her followers' beliefs and yearnings for transcendence.
Recent history bears this out. A few years before Trump was elected, pollster Patrick Caddell conducted a study of Republicans' waning popularity and found an extraordinarily high level of discontent among voters and desires for "an outsider" to fix Washington. Similar trends could be seen in Europe, Turkey, the Philippines, and now Italy and elsewhere: reactionism was on the rise as quality of life and access to basic needs were on the decline and the contradictions of "free market" capitalism deepening. The rise of the antiestablishment celebrity-politician is a consequence of this decline--and of the gaping contradiction between political elites' rhetoric about safeguarding freedom and democracy, and the unfreedoms and powerlessness that most people face.
Trump exploited these dynamics, playing up his celebrity and outsider status and appealing to Americans' distrust of the establishment and desires to be entertained. The many who have tried to delegitimize his power on rational grounds--citing his grifting, nonsensical claims, embellishing of wins, and distracting from failures--have ultimately failed, perhaps because his mass of supporters hold him to a different set of standards based on how they came to know him. After all, reality TV audiences know the shows are staged, and that cast members are performing images of their authentic selves, but they tune in faithfully and take pleasure in it anyway.
In this regard, the phenomenon of Trump and the celebrity-politician may be exposing some inconvenient truths about elite power and the culture industries operating on its behalf. Among them is the prospect that masses of people may be choosing emotional stimulation and entertainment over strivings for actual democratic power. Or worse, that they prefer the corruption they have come to expect to be at the hands of charlatan-entertainers rather than run through the regular, bureaucratic channels of technocratic political elites.
'Belongs Nowhere Near the US Senate': Oz Says Local Politicians Should Play a Role in Abortion Decisions
"After months of trying to hide his extreme abortion position, Oz let it slip on the debate stage on Tuesday," said a spokesperson for John Fetterman's campaign.
Republican U.S. Senate nominee Dr. Mehmet Oz said on the Pennsylvania debate stage Tuesday night that "local political leaders" have a role to play in abortion decisions, drawing swift condemnation from reproductive rights advocates and Democratic candidate John Fetterman, whose campaign is planning to run ads highlighting the comment.
"There should not be involvement from the federal government in how states decide their abortion decisions," Oz said when asked about his position on abortion, which has become a central midterm issue following the U.S. Supreme Court's June decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization.
"I want women, doctors, local political leaders letting the democracy that's always allowed our nation to thrive to put the best ideas forward so states can decide for themselves," Oz added.
Asked specifically about whether he would support Sen. Lindsey Graham's (R-S.C.) proposal to ban abortion nationwide after 15 weeks of pregnancy, Oz refused to provide a yes or no answer, reiterating that he opposes federal involvement.
"I'm not going to support federal rules that block the ability of states to do what they wish to do," said Oz, who has previously called abortion at any stage of pregnancy "murder."
Alexis McGill Johnson, the president of Planned Parenthood, responded that "no politician should make this decision. Period."
Fetterman, Pennsylvania's lieutenant governor, contrasted his stance with Oz's by stressing his support for codifying Roe v. Wade into federal law, something the currently razor-thin Democratic majority has repeatedly failed to do because of obstruction from right-wing members of the caucus.
"If you believe that the choice for abortion belongs between you and your doctor, that's what I fight for," Fetterman said in the first and only debate in the battleground race that could decide which party controls the Senate next year.
Fetterman's campaign wasted no time seizing on Dr. Oz's stated support for giving local politicians a say in reproductive health decisions, a view he expressed as Republican legislatures across the U.S. are imposing draconian abortion bans that are denying pregnant people basic healthcare.
In a statement following Tuesday's debate, Fetterman's campaign announced it will be unveiling an ad Wednesday that spotlights Oz's "radical, out-of-touch" comment.
"Our campaign will be putting money behind making sure as many women as possible hear Dr. Oz's radical belief that 'local political leaders' should have as much say over a woman's abortion decisions as women themselves and their doctors," said Joe Calvello, a spokesperson for the Fetterman campaign. "After months of trying to hide his extreme abortion position, Oz let it slip on the debate stage on Tuesday."
"Oz belongs nowhere near the U.S. Senate," Calvello added, "and suburban voters across Pennsylvania will see just how out-of-touch Oz is on this issue."
'Dr. Oz Is a Puppy Killer': Fetterman Campaign Responds to Reporting on Animal Testing
"This is who Dr. Oz is: unconscionable and a danger to others," said Fetterman's wife, activist Gisele Barreto Fetterman.
Hours after pointing to extensive evidence that Republican U.S. Senate candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz has misled millions of people about dangerous and ineffective so-called "miracle" cures and supplements, Democratic candidate John Fetterman's campaign on Monday urged Pennsylvania voters to consider another factor in Oz's pre-politics career: His time leading scientific research that led to the deaths of more than 300 dogs and hundreds of other animals.
"What kind of person, let alone doctor, would do something like this? The same person who made his career and fortune off of peddling fake--and sometimes harmful--miracle pills."
"We know what the stakes are in this election," tweeted Fetterman's wife, activist Gisele Barreto Fetterman. "Add one more: PUPPIES. Puppies are on the line."
Jezebel on Monday reported that its review of 75 studies published by Oz between 1989 and 2010, when he was principal investigator at the Columbia University Institute of Comparative Medicine, revealed that 329 dogs died as a result of 34 of his experiments.
More than 660 rabbits and rodents and more than 30 pigs were also killed as a result of dozens of the cardiothoracic surgeon and TV host's experiments.
Methods used by the lab--where Oz took "full scientific, administrative, and fiscal responsibility for the conduct" of the studies he led--violated the Animal Welfare Act, according to testimony given in 2005 by Catherine Dell'Orto, a veterinarian who worked there.
According to Dell'Orto, dogs who were experiencing painful medical conditions including vomiting, paralysis, and kidney failure were kept alive for days and even weeks so Oz's team could experiment on them. The Republican candidate also led an experiment in which the team injected expired drugs into the hearts of a litter of puppies without using sedation, killing them.
"Upon being killed, the puppies were allegedly left in a garbage bag with living puppies who were their littermates," reported Jezebel.
According to the website, "Columbia declined to comment" on the report, "and Oz's campaign has yet to respond" to a request for comment.
After the report was published, Fetterman tweeted a succinct message: "Dr. Oz is a puppy killer."
\u201cBREAKING: Dr. Oz is a puppy killer. https://t.co/SXgRSUO2TK\u201d— John Fetterman (@John Fetterman) 1664823565
"This is a truly heartbreaking report," said Barreto Fetterman. "What kind of person, let alone doctor, would do something like this? The same person who made his career and fortune off of peddling fake--and sometimes harmful--miracle pills. The same person who knowingly pushed dangerous diets to his audience."
"This is who Dr. Oz is: unconscionable and a danger to others," she added.