This is the Sept. 30 video in which James Talarico announces he has the flu. https://t.co/787whXem2d

Does he look like someone about to have a mental breakdown? No.

Does he look like someone who has the flu? Well, he’s a bit red. And the host of the forum says “I spoke to him this morning. He sounded like hell.” But he doesn’t sniffle or cough or speak roughly anywhere in the hour-long video. There are one or two of what seemed to me uncomfortable swallows. You make the call!

Keep in mind there is precious little (e.g. zero) other public evidence, aside from Team Talarico’s say so, regarding the flu diagnosis. The New York Times claims to have proved through security cam footage that he was at home for the next week, not that he had the flu.

Let’s concede for argument’s sake that he was sick in some way.

The next 9 days are the crux of the issue–i.e. the real question is DOES TALARICO LOOK SO ILL IN THIS VIDEO THAT HE CREDIBLY SPENT THE NEXT 9 DAYS RECOVERING WITHOUT COMMUNICATING WITH THE PUBLIC? No tweets, no zoom videos, no photo ops? Seems strange for someone with such a strong online presence.

If you’re on the bubble about whether the 9/30 video shows a man with the flu, you have your answer: Even if he was ill he sure didn’t seem so ill that he had to drop off the grid for one of the final weeks of the campaign.

That’s my conclusion anyway, and Mark Penn’s, and others’. It’s “super odd”  and “doesn’t make sense.” https://t.co/MpFv4IHT5E There must have been something else going on during those 9 days.

I haven’t any knowledge of what it was—the Ohio hospital thing always seemed “too on the nose” to me. https://t.co/9JOFOw1sGI That was a logical story for some partisan to make up, or to believe after a Gere-and-gerbil game of telephone (see https://t.co/tK3UYkLjnQ). But there are other possibilities: 1) Maybe Talarico needed to focus on grand strategic decisions before the final three week sprint, including how to back off his earlier, seemingly extreme positions (eg “reinvest our limited [police] funding into…community-based solutions”) https://t.co/SlMUrJUHLW; 2) Now is about the time when campaigns usually get hit with the most vicious stories their rivals can gin up. Maybe he was trying to fend off a big scandalous expose–or a big false expose–or a true or false attempt at blackmail that required prolonged negotiation; 3) Maybe he was just tired and needed a rest.

None of these things are mutually exclusive. Aside from the dissembling involved, they don’t necessarily reflect badly on Talarico. But they might. Voters should be told what was up.

What do you think?

— Mickey Kaus (@kausmickey)
Oct 17, 2026

from Twitter https://twitter.com/kausmickey

October 16, 2026 at 10:11PM
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