Dr. Oz Announces Run for Senate in Pennsylvania

[Cow Poke]

The Republicans appear to be warming to Oz (even as they confess they know little about his positions) as he steps forward to replace the retiring Sen. Pat Toomey (also Republican) after Trump-endorsed candidate Sean Parnell dropped out after a nasty custody battle which he lost.

Rep. Guy Reschenthaler (R-Pa.), a member of House GOP leadership, declared that,

"I’m endorsing Dr. Oz for Senate because Dr. Oz is our clearest path to victory in this election."

While not endorsing him Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) is giving Oz a warm welcome:

"It’s a good sign for the Republican Party that somebody of his standing and stature would want to run under the Republican banner. He’s got an incredible background and personal story. It’s good news for the Republican Party, and I think he’d be very competitive."

Likewise with Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.):

"It's great to have someone who certainly is a game-changer the very first moment,” said Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.). “Who doesn't love a guy that’s got 100 percent name ID and a whole bunch of money?"

And Sam DeMarco, chair of the Allegheny County Republican Party, has said he talked with Oz recently and "came away very impressed."

Still others aren't convinced and are backing other candidates, like Rep. Dan Meuser (P-Pa.) who says he backs David McCormick (former Treasury Secretary under Bush), who he says is:

“an America First/PA First Senator” and “FROM PENNSYLVANIA!!"

Ironically McCormick is also moving from in from out of state (Connecticut) to Pennsylvania to run.


If Oz does run and win he would be the first Republican Muslim in Congress (and the first Muslim elected to the Senate).

Interesting - I didn't know about the Muslim part, but he sure sounded "pro-American". Much different from some of the liberal muslims about.

[Cow Poke]

Interesting - I didn't know about the Muslim part, but he sure sounded "pro-American". Much different from some of the liberal muslims about.

So....
The Swedenborgian Church of North America
A Welcoming Community of Seekers Exploring the Teachings of Emanuel Swedenborg

Dr. Mehmet Oz

Oz grew up in a mixed Muslim environment where his father’s family practiced more traditional Islam, while his mother’s family were more secular Muslims. Oz identifies himself as a Muslim and says that he has been influenced by the mysticism of Sufi Muslims from Central Turkey, as well as the ideas of Emanuel Swedenborg, the Swedish scientist, philosopher, and Christian theologian.

Oz is a practitioner of transcendental meditation. “When I meditate, I go to that place where truth lives”, he said. “I can see what reality really is, and it is so much easier to form good relationships then.”

In the November/December 2007 issue of Spirituality and Health, a glossy bimonthly devoted to New Age topics, Oz coauthored an article titled “Mehmet Oz Finds His Teacher,” about how his wife Lisa introduced him to the theology of Swedenborg (Dr. Oz’s wife Lisa is from the Swedenborgian community of Bryn Athyn, Pennsylvania).

[rogue06]

So....
The Swedenborgian Church of North America
A Welcoming Community of Seekers Exploring the Teachings of Emanuel Swedenborg

Dr. Mehmet Oz

Oz grew up in a mixed Muslim environment where his father’s family practiced more traditional Islam, while his mother’s family were more secular Muslims. Oz identifies himself as a Muslim and says that he has been influenced by the mysticism of Sufi Muslims from Central Turkey, as well as the ideas of Emanuel Swedenborg, the Swedish scientist, philosopher, and Christian theologian.

Oz is a practitioner of transcendental meditation. “When I meditate, I go to that place where truth lives”, he said. “I can see what reality really is, and it is so much easier to form good relationships then.”

In the November/December 2007 issue of Spirituality and Health, a glossy bimonthly devoted to New Age topics, Oz coauthored an article titled “Mehmet Oz Finds His Teacher,” about how his wife Lisa introduced him to the theology of Swedenborg (Dr. Oz’s wife Lisa is from the Swedenborgian community of Bryn Athyn, Pennsylvania).

A Swedenborg Sufi. That makes for a rather unique combination.

[Cow Poke]

A Swedenborg Sufi. That makes for a rather unique combination.

Who knew!

[Sparko]

wow. They are definitely a cult.

https://www.gotquestions.org/Swedenborgianism.html

[mossrose]

I was extremely disturbed when, several years ago, Rick Warren started a diet, working closely with Oz, and wanted everyone in his church to go on the diet with him. Now that I know Oz is a cult member, that disturbs me even more.

Warren and his ilk have zero discernment.

[Cow Poke]

Dr. Oz, Running For U.S. Senate As A Republican, Has A History Of Donating To Democrats

Dr. Mehmet Oz, who announced his GOP candidacy for U.S. Senate last week, has a long history of donating to Democratic campaigns.

Oz, a celebrity TV doctor, announced that he is running for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania as a Republican on Tuesday. Oz is running for the seat Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA) is vacating at the end of this term in January 2023.

The former frontrunner in the GOP primary, Sean Parnell, suspended his campaign last month after losing a custody battle to his estranged wife, who accused him of spousal and child abuse. Toomey’s seat must be held by Republicans in the battleground state as the GOP pushes to win control of Congress in 2022.

Oz, apparently sensing opportunity with Parnell’s exit, is making his Senate bid as a Republican after decades of contributing to notable Democrats such as John Kerry. Logan Ratick, Newsmax’s national correspondent, listed some of Oz’s past political donations in a Twitter thread Thursday. Oz donated to Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) in 2011, former White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles’ losing 2004 campaign for U.S. Senate in North Carolina, former New York Rep. Charlie Rangel in 2001, and to U.S. Climate Czar John Kerry’s 2001 U.S. Senate campaign in Massachusetts.

[Thoughtful Monk]

Dr. Oz, Running For U.S. Senate As A Republican, Has A History Of Donating To Democrats

Dr. Mehmet Oz, who announced his GOP candidacy for U.S. Senate last week, has a long history of donating to Democratic campaigns.

Oz, a celebrity TV doctor, announced that he is running for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania as a Republican on Tuesday. Oz is running for the seat Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA) is vacating at the end of this term in January 2023.

The former frontrunner in the GOP primary, Sean Parnell, suspended his campaign last month after losing a custody battle to his estranged wife, who accused him of spousal and child abuse. Toomey’s seat must be held by Republicans in the battleground state as the GOP pushes to win control of Congress in 2022.

Oz, apparently sensing opportunity with Parnell’s exit, is making his Senate bid as a Republican after decades of contributing to notable Democrats such as John Kerry. Logan Ratick, Newsmax’s national correspondent, listed some of Oz’s past political donations in a Twitter thread Thursday. Oz donated to Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) in 2011, former White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles’ losing 2004 campaign for U.S. Senate in North Carolina, former New York Rep. Charlie Rangel in 2001, and to U.S. Climate Czar John Kerry’s 2001 U.S. Senate campaign in Massachusetts.

I see the point. It does buttress the argument that he's a Democrat in Rhino clothes. However, those donations are over 10 years ago and maybe he's learned something since then.

[rogue06]

I see the point. It does buttress the argument that he's a Democrat in Rhino clothes. However, those donations are over 10 years ago and maybe he's learned something since then.

Trump was, until shortly before converting to a Republican, a bigtime backer of Democrats including Hillary and Obama.

[Cow Poke]

I see the point. It does buttress the argument that he's a Democrat in Rhino clothes. However, those donations are over 10 years ago and maybe he's learned something since then.

That's possible - Reagan was a Democrat, and a bunch of folks in Texas who were Democrats are realizing their party has left them.

[NorrinRadd]

That's possible - Reagan was a Democrat, and a bunch of folks in Texas who were Democrats are realizing their party has left them.

Right. It's always possible that the Lefto-Fascist abuse of the medical profession has jolted him into realignment.

Still want to hear his views on abortion.

[Cow Poke]

Right. It's always possible that the Lefto-Fascist abuse of the medical profession has jolted him into realignment.

Still want to hear his views on abortion.

You need only ask!

Inside Dr. Oz’s Shameless Flip-Flop on Abortion

Dr. Oz claims to have seen up close what happens when women are forced to get unsafe abortions. But now that's he's running for Senate, he's fine with overturning Roe v. Wade.

When the Supreme Court heard arguments last week for a case that could upend abortion rights nationwide, Mehmet Oz—the TV doctor and accused “quack” turned Republican candidate for Senate in Pennsylvania—suggested he was at peace that the Supreme Court could overturn Roe v. Wade.

But only two years earlier, Oz characterized efforts to overturn Roe as a misleading and possibly conspiratorial crusade. Not only was Oz supportive of abortion rights, he seemed puzzled that people would spend time fighting abortion rights—going so far as to say that, as a physician, he was “really worried” about the anti-abortion movement and that eliminating Roe would have negative effects on women’s health.

“It’s, as a doctor—just putting my doctor hat on—it’s a big-time concern,” Oz said in the 2019 interview, which aired on the Breakfast Club radio show. “Because I went to medical school in Philadelphia, and I saw women who had coat-hanger events. And I mean really traumatic events that happened when they were younger, before Roe v. Wade. And many of them were harmed for life.”

Oz conceded that abortion “is a hard issue for everybody,” and he said that, on “a personal level,” he disliked abortion and would not want anyone in his family to have one. But he took a common pro-choice position in 2019 that his belief should not be forced onto others. He would not want to “interfere with everyone else’s stuff,” he said, “because it’s hard enough to get into life as it is.”

Oz’s defense of abortion wasn’t just a passing question. He held forth for seven minutes in this 2019 interview about the practice and was highly critical of anti-abortion advocates who argue that life begins at conception. His tone throughout the entire segment on abortion was one of concern that legislators might be passing abortion restrictions, and he seemed to endorse viability—generally thought of as about 24 weeks—as a popular limit for abortion.

“Just being logical about it,” he said, “if you think that the moment of conception you’ve got a life, then why would you even wait six weeks? Right, then an in vitro fertilized egg is still a life.”

Oz also questioned why restricting abortion access was so important to some people.

“There’s so much we gotta do already to take care of each other. To start picking fights on this—I always wonder about it,” he said. “It happens periodically. There are these moral issues that almost on purpose are inflamed.”

And yet, despite his full-throated support for abortion access in 2019, Oz said last week during an interview on WGAL in Lancaster that he was “OK with the Supreme Court making the right decision” on Roe, “based on what they think the Constitution says.”

[rogue06]

It's Trump 2.0. He's all over the map on his positions.

[NorrinRadd]

Per his appearance on Hannity the other night, he's "Pro-Life" of the sort that think it's ok to execute a baby because its father was a rapist, or because its father and mother were close relatives.

IOW, he's a "typical" Pro-Life candidate.

[Terraceth]

wow. They are definitely a cult.

https://www.gotquestions.org/Swedenborgianism.html

Having looked at that article, I am not sure how they qualify as a cult--at least in the typical popular sense of the word. The article's argument for it being a cult seems to boil down to "it rejects Christian doctrine" by which logic every non-Christian religion is a cult. Which, to be fair, is how some use the term, but it isn't a very useful definition. And since Dr. Oz is, by his own statement, not a Christian to begin with but rather a Muslim, one would not expect him to join a religious organization that was Christian.

Maybe the argument is that it's misleading to have the word "Church" in their name if they reject so many Christian doctrines. I still wouldn't classify that as a cult.

My bigger question is, if the beliefs listed on that page are accurate, how someone could be a Muslim and be a member. After all, it says the beliefs are "God has many names, depending on the beliefs/religion of the individual; the Holy Spirit is not God; the Trinity does not exist; Jesus Christ’s death did not atone for our sin; salvation comes by practicing what you believe, whatever religion it might be; the afterlife is spiritual, but dependent on how well you lived in your physical body." While some (most?) of those are perfectly in accord with Islam, the claim of "God has many names, depending on the beliefs/religion of the individual" seems decidedly against what I understand to be the doctrines of Islam. Additionally, the idea that Swedenborg "had a vision in which he believed God came to him and declared him to be God’s personal messenger of new revelation" seems contrary to Islam, as such a big part of the religion (as I understand it) is that Mohammed was the final prophet, with none to come after.