The Humiliation of Dr. Oz Is Nearly Complete

Fetterman has successfully, and hilariously, played up the fact that Oz is a carpetbagger with all kinds of eye-catching stunts: He’s flown a banner over the Jersey shore reading, “HEY DR. OZ, WELCOME HOME TO NJ! ♥ JOHN”; enlisted the help of Snooki and Bruce Springsteen guitarist Steven Van Zandt to roast the longtime Jersey resident; he’s even kick-started a campaign to get the doctor inducted into the Garden State’s Hall of Fame. Oz, repeatedly baited into responding in kind, constantly misses the mark. When Oz released a spooky black and white video accusing (a quite cool-looking) Fetterman of being a malevolent force in American politics, Fetterman made it his header image on Twitter.

Over the weekend, Oz once again humiliated himself, posting a video of himself shopping at “Wegners,” a grocery store that doesn’t exist. (He appears to have been in a Redner’s—and created a portmanteau with America’s finest grocery chain, Wegman’s.) In the video Oz is shown shopping for “crudités,” apparently in some attempt to draw attention to inflation—and the rising cost of said crudités—like a downcast version of Ina Garten. Aiming for the Barefoot Contessa’s trademark cinéma vérité, Oz awkwardly ambles down the produce aisle, half-heartedly picking up various vegetables. But rather than draw attention to prices, Oz instead makes it clear that he has no idea how grocery shopping works. The prices that he comes up with are wildly off the mark—for instance, he tells viewers that a head of broccoli costs $2, when that is the price per pound. Fetterman’s response to it all? “In PA we call this a … veggie tray.”

Dr. Oz’s social media posts and appearances have taken on the semblance of hostage videos—Fetterman is occupying acres of real estate in the celebrity doctor’s head. Try as they might to find a message that won’t result in Fetterman going viral with a savage riposte, they fail again and again. Fetterman’s overall message—that Dr. Oz is a fraud who doesn’t know anything about Pennsylvania or its voters—is reinforced every time. Authenticity campaigns rarely work, in large part because these battles often put one hyperpolished and micromanaged politician against another; but Fetterman is the perfect rival for Dr. Oz in this regard. He consistently field-dresses Oz, leaving him exposed.