Terrifying Moment GOP Staffer Is Struck By Lightning — And Survives

A guy walks out of the dentist, gets hit by lightning, and lives to tell the story. That's not a political story, that's just a New York Thursday. But we'll admit there's something almost cinematic about a congressional staffer getting struck down on Todt Avenue and walking away from it. Somewhere there's a screenwriter taking notes.

We bring it up because it's the kind of headline that reminds you how much of the news is just noise and how little of it is actually about anything. Thomas Fahmy works for Nicole Malliotakis, a member of Congress who spends her days on immigration and tax policy and district casework, and for one afternoon her staffer became the most interesting man in Staten Island for reasons that have nothing to do with any of that. No press release, no statement of solidarity required. Just a man, a sidewalk, and a bolt of electricity that decided not to finish the job.

There's a small mercy in stories like this one. Nobody's spinning it, nobody's fundraising off it, and the internet hasn't yet found a way to make it about tribal politics, though give it time. For now it's just a reminder that survival is often dumb luck dressed up as a miracle, and that the guy answering constituent emails on Capitol Hill staff directories has a better story than most of us will ever have. Glad he's okay. That's really the whole take.