Coffee Break: The Machine Gets Its Man in Maine

Graham Platner, the Democratic nominee for Senate — whose campaign received record vote totals in the June 9 primary — has suspended his campaign following a Politico article featuring “credible accusations” of sexual assault against him. UPDATED: July 8 5pm EDT: Drop Site has the text Platner’s accuser sent him that Politico left out of their story. That’s at the bottom of the post. UPDATED 2: JULY 8 8:30 PM EDT: The Hill reports Platner has dropped out of the race. There goes any leverage his campaign had to influence the choice of the nominee. UPDATED 3: The Maine Democratic Party has decided that a nominating convention of 600 people will decide on the nominee. Contrast with the 156,000 who voted for Platner in the primary. NEWS: the Maine Democratic State Committee overwhelming voted in favor of a 600+ person nominating convention to replace Graham Platner in #MESEN DSC had a long emergency meeting Wednesday then took a vote https://t.co/mDzHnOlKQR — Ally Mutnick (@allymutnick) July 8, 2026 The Usual Caveats Apply As always, I’m covering this in the hopes of providing a one-stop window into a race that has national (and thus international) implications and what it tells us about the American electorate and the forces attempting to sway it. This is not an endorsement of any candidate, regardless of my (obvious) personal sympathies, or even of the American electoral system, which is impossibly corrupt and has led to the bought-and-paid-for US Congress being functionally impotent. Americans won’t vote our way out of the polycrisis, so don’t get your hopes up. The Dangers of Parasocial Relationships With Politicians The Platner story perfectly illustrates many of the problems with representative democracy in the 21st century: cults of personality, trial by social media, media manipulation by monied players (both for and against Platner). Let’s start with “stan culture” — a problem I believe is inherent in modern American politics. The Discourse Blog podcast reps the anti-Platner from the left perspective perfectly (lightly edited machine transcript) with warnings against “stanning” but as far as I can see no suggested solutions: Jack Mirkinson: This shows you what happens when you decide to become part of a politician’s stan army rather than treating them like someone who’s asking for very significant power over your life and and acting accordingly.A lot of people got themselves into a big hole with Graham Platner where they had spent so much time lauding him as the best thing since sliced bread; where they were reveling in the fact that the party establishment — which as we all know is very rightfully hated by everybody — was unable to defeat him.When you do that like too uncritically things can calcify in very problematic and crazy ways. Aleks Chan: Graham Platner looks and behaves (how what) you think a Republican would and then as part of that is he is a traditionally masculine white guy who espouses democratic and progressive politics and so when you when you don’t have many of those; you have sort of clean-cut Mckenzie types you find people like (Ken Klippenstein) and his ilk salivating at the opportunity to be like ‘look traditional masculinity can be progressive.’That’s also part of ‘well we’re done with like being woke, we know where that got us, nobody wants that anymore. If you are (opposing) someone like Graham Platner then you are trying to sort of resurrect the ‘hashtag resistance’ ‘vote blue no matter who’ pussy hat blah blah blah. They also raise the valid concerns about Platner’s history as a combat military veteran in America’s colonial GWOT and later as a mercenary for Blackwater. Admittedly these are (likely valid) concerns I am personally guilty of overlooking in my coverage of Platner. Yasmin Nair raised many of these concerns at Current Affairs in October 2025 when his nazi Totenkopf tattoo was first revealed: Platner seems less a homophobe and more of an asshole who can’t keep his stories straight. He has tried to brush off his homophobic and other problematic posts by claiming they were from some distant past when he was just a wee and silly lad, but many of these were in fact from 2021: when he was 37. Four years ago. The posts don’t confirm that he is a raging homophobe, but they do indicate that he is an immature, juvenile straight man—in other words, a very typical straight man, the kind who never grow up and away from their high school bullying days when they called every kid they didn’t like a faggot. And they don’t grow up because they never have to. Platner is beloved amongst a certain lefty crowd, led by the likes of Sanders. Given the state of the world, literally, literally anything could happen between now and June 2026, when he may be up against Collins, so who knows. Have to give credit for Nair for pointing this out at the time, although she presented no political alternative to Janet Mills. There’s another important aspect about why this scandal is bringing Platner down and the specter of whatever war crimes he may have been involved with in West Asia did not: racist Americans don’t care about deaths of brown people “over there”, to wit: The Platner stuff makes me want to talk about this picture again and how the American left does not treat violence against people in the middle east as “real” violence. Not really. This picture should be disqualifying. Joe Biden had been sponsoring the genocide for a year. pic.twitter.com/Oq3iyxopVZ — Anthony Doyle🍉 (@Anthonysmdoyle) July 7, 2026 I’d also like to highlight the once-bitten-twice-shy words of Bhavik Lathia on The Left Hook with Wajahat Ali when asked “Why did you recommened Graham Platner and tell me he was a good candidate who was going to win?”: I met Graham last September or October. We were both speakers at a conference put on to do an audit and an autopsy of what happened in 2024 and why we lost. The thing that Graham and I connected on frankly was his experience in the military and how that radicalized him into pro-peace, anti-war politics.What he did and saw while he was deployed, the stories he shared with me deeply resonated with me. I believed that he cared about taking on the military industrial complex and I was (Kamala Harris’) battleground mobilization director.It was a big job. I had staff across the over 80 staff across every single battleground state and state And my firm analysis is two big reasons why we lost the 2024 election is because we failed to put enough distance between our Kamala Harris’s 2024 presidential campaign and the Biden record on Gaza and inflation maybe not in that order, maybe inflation was the number one, but Gaza played a significant role. I grew up in mid-Michigan. I have done tons of work in Michigan, Wisconsin across swing states I was hearing from all of my organizers and staff and contacts on the ground that Gaza and the Biden administration record on Gaza was killing us with voters. And so after the election, when I saw a candidate like Graham strongly speaking about the genocide in Gaza, and before knowing what I learned yesterday that there is a credible sexual assault allegation against him, and then the way that I saw main voters responding to him… There was a strong economic populist who was just speaking in clear language. I decided to throw my support you know support behind him and um yeah that’s kind of that’s kind of where I landed. I think we need to continue to seek out outsiders, shake up the system economic populist candidates. We can’t like let this experience scare us from that. Now we need to be very clear that just like arming a genocide is a red line in our party, that sexual assault — credible allegations of sexual assault are also a red line. So to all the men, progressive men moderate men, whatever (if you’re) contemplating running, unless you’ve done the work to make amends for and atone for any abuse that you have done in your life, don’t raise your hand to run for office. This is not the moment for it. We need strong progressives that are going to inspire the people.One of the things I know everyone’s feeling right now is heartbreak. I felt it when I read The Politico piece yesterday. I just felt a deep sense of sadness and grief. There was this moment with Graham that the narrative was supposed to be redemption: imperfect people can find themselves in this moment, redeem themselves and represent just regular people in the halls of power. And because I’ll just say it’s Graham’s lack of foresight maybe arrogance… I don’t know now, but there’s a lot of people who are just feeling really disappointed. The whole video is worth watching if you have the time. Adam Green also explains that there is time for Platner to drop out and for Maine Democrats to hold a statewide caucus and allow voters to select a new nominee in a democratic fashion. It’s important to remind people who supported Platner that they are not responsible for what he may or may not have done. Responding to his message is not the same as giving a blank check or excusing any personal behavior. We’ll come back to Ken Klippenstein and others who make a case that Platner represents the overwhelming will of the Maine Democratic party primary electorate, but first I want to remind readers of the money and talent behind Platner. Campaigns like his don’t “just happen.” The Monied Leftists Who Groomed Graham I blogged about some of this last fall, citing a key piece from the New Yorker: It was three days before a video titled “Platner for U.S. Senate” would drop, catapulting this local oyster farmer, harbormaster, and former marine onto the national stage. The video was produced by Morris Katz, a top political strategist for New York City’s Democratic mayoral candidate, Zohran Mamdani. … The campaign rollout, which was orchestrated by Platner’s senior adviser, Joe Calvello (John Fetterman’s former director of communications), raised half a million dollars in its first four days; volunteer sign-ups for the campaign averaged three hundred a day. “No one was expecting this,” Calvello told me. The Times, ABC, NBC, and Fox News covered the launch, focussing on Platner as a political novice who represented a new approach for the Party. The Rupert-Murdoch-owned New York Post had a near slanderous and salacious piece titled Meet the champagne socialist duo who groomed rich kid Graham Platner into a ‘working-class’ candidate — since they were just caught lying about Morris Katz advising Platner to stay in the race, take with lots of salt, nonetheless I’m including factual claims that I presume to be true: The truth is he was discovered and coached by a pair of Ivy League-educated radical Democratic socialists, replicating a playbook they’ve used in Nebraska and Iowa. … That under-the-radar team are a couple, Yale Law School grad Daniel Moraff and his fiancée, Leanne Fan, an academic with stints at Harvard and the proudly radical University of California-Berkeley.The pair had originally met while working for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) in 2020 and are hardcore members of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). They have previously been behind candidates Dan Osborn, running for Senate in Nebraska, and Rep. Summer Lee (D-Pa.), a member of the Keystone State congressional delegation since 2023 and part of the DSA “Squad,” alongside Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.). The point being, that Platner didn’t organically rise up from the Maine oyster beds, he was recruited and groomed by some of the most effective DSA operatives in the country. Nothing wrong with that, but let’s not be naive about how this game is played. Now let’s look into the specific charges that seem to have crippled Platner’s campaign. The Times’ Opening Salvo The MSM has been coming at Platner hard since it became clear he would win the nomination. First the NY Times dropped “Several Women Who Dated Graham Platner Recall ‘Unsettling’ Behavior” on June 4. The Times detailed their sourcing: This article is based on interviews with more than two dozen people, including six women who had been romantically involved with Mr. Platner. The Times spoke with friends or acquaintances of several of the women, reviewed contemporaneous text and social media messages and saw some of Ms. Fifield’s diary entries. Mr. Platner declined to be interviewed for this article. The worst allegations in that story came from Lyndsey Fifield. Long time New York Post readers might remember Fifield from a previous sexual assault accusation kerfluffle: Inez Stepman and Lindsey Fifield are two millennial women who co-founded the group Ladies for Kavanaugh to show their support for the nominee when they felt that view was being left out of the public discourse. Their day jobs are in conservative politics, Stepman at Independent Women’s Forum and Fifield at the Heritage Foundation. (Their pro-Kavanaugh group was formed on their own time.) Fifeld and her pro-Kavanaugh friends had stayed quiet during the original hearings while liberal women raged in the streets and on social media. “But in the wake of the baseless, 11th-hour accusations orchestrated to stop Kavanaugh’s confirmation, we couldn’t stay silent anymore,” Fifield said. Supreme Court denies NFL’s bid to keep former Dolphins coach Brian Flores’ discrimination lawsuit from heading to court Stepman told me, “Our husbands, brothers, fathers and sons deserve fairness, too.” The Times June 4 story also quoted Jenny Racicot who said “she dated him casually off and on between 2019 and 2021, said the posts deepened her belief that he did not respect women. “When I saw the old comments that he made online,” she said, “I recognized a version of him that I had experiences with.” While that story did not force Platner out of the race, it had a dramatic effect on his polling. Before: — Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) July 8, 2026 After — Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) July 8, 2026 These polling numbers have allowed journalists and pollsters like G. Elliott Morris to proclaim “Graham Platner is a bad dude — and data shows he’s a bad candidate, too.” But to Morris’ credit, he isn’t trying to push for a centrist to be the new nominee: (Platner) tapped a genuine populist, anti-establishment current that is currently animating a lot of American politics. Democrats might pick former state Senate President Troy Jackson — a fifth-generation logger with deep working-class roots — and, if he polls well, Democrats flip from underdogs to win the Senate to slight favorites. But back to the MSM campaign against Platner. Politico Goes for the Kill Shot Politico’s Monday piece got quite a bit more from Jenny Racicot — including an accusation of full-on sexual assualt while Platner was allegedly “black out drunk” — than the Times had gotten. Politico detailed their sourcing: The woman, a 41-year-old Maine resident named Jenny Racicot, detailed the alleged incident to POLITICO in three interviews over the past two weeks. POLITICO also spoke with a man Racicot dated and confided in the years after the alleged incident, and reviewed documents, including emails between Racicot and her therapist and messages between Racicot and an acquaintance whom she warned against getting involved with Platner years before he ran for office. Adam Wren, co-author of the Politico piece went on MS Now’s Morning Joe where (per DropSite) “Mika Brzezinski pressed him on what evidence pushed the outlet to publish rape allegations against Graham Platner, asking what made the story more than a “he said, she said” case and what evidence directly tied Platner to the alleged crime.” Key exchange: Mika Brzezinski: So my question to you, given the very high standards political has before they write something like this and publish it, what aspects of this story brought it to the level of publishable? Adam Wren: Yeah, you’re correct here, Mika. There is no police report in this case. We spent a lot of time talking to Jenny asking her for corroborating evidence. She shared that she had confided into a number of people, including her therapist, in almost real time and we reviewed e-mail exchanges between she and her therapist, referring to what she called the sexual assault and her therapist sort of acknowledging that this had happened to her. We talked to people who she confided in, in the months after this happened. We asked her why she didn’t file a police report and she described sort of the insular nature of (the part of Maine) she shares with Graham Platner and she debated sort of how to handle this. We found ultimately the number of coloborating pieces of evidence. I want to take a look at this to support her story in a way that we could report it. Brzezinski: What are some of those corroborating pieces of evidence. So you’ve got conversations with her therapist and people who she confided in. Any conversations with Graham Platner at the time of it where she said, because apparently as part of this she said she even confirmed to him that this was not consent. Do you have that? What do you have that actually connects …Graham Platner to raping this victim? Wren: She reached out to him the day after via Instagram and essentially told him that she didn’t want to hear from again. She told him that morning as well. We looked at messages that she had sent to others in the months after this happened through social media. Brzezinski: But were you able to see those? Wren: She tried to recover those dms. We did not, we were not able to review those dms, but she described them to us. We also, long before he was a political candidate we saw, her essentially explain to others that he was in her words ‘consensually careless.’ Brzezinski: Were you able to see the interactions between Graham platner and this alleged victim? Did you actually physically see them? Did she produce them for you? Wren: She attempted to uncover them, but was unable to. At one time that would have been considered a very thin reed upon which to overturn the will of 150,000 primary voters — a record breaking total that has not been matched since record-keeping began in 1918. Platner Paused His Campaign and His Supporters Fled Platner quickly released a video denying the allegations but also pausing his campaign. After that it was all over. Chuck Schumer, Kirsten Gillibrand and the DSCC were among the first to announce they would not support Platner. I’m sure it hurt worse when Bernie Sanders, Zohran Mamdani, Ro Khanna, and Ruben Gallego withdrew their endorsements. The Sierra Club and veterans groups like Veterans for Responsible Leadership (VFRL) were just the cherry on top. Of course the real kick in the nads came when VFRL called forAIPAC-owned Congressional Rep. Jared Golden to take Platner’s place. This Jared Golden: “The House just failed to pass a resolution to end Trump’s war with Iran by one vote. The count was 213-214. Just one Democrat, Jared Golden, voted to let Trump keep waging the war.” There was also some mysterious influencing going on. Who’s Influencing This Influencer? Cheyenne Hunt, he social media influencer who claimed the clout for the fall of California Congressman and Gubernatorial candidate Eric Swalwell was quick to notch her belt: If you are a Platner staffer and would like to resign in solidarity with survivors but are worried about financial repercussions, send us your resume and we’ll help you find your next gig. We did the same thing for Swalwell staff. This offer does not extend to his highly paid… pic.twitter.com/ZNB2ktTiv1 — Cheyenne Hunt (@CheyenneHuntCA) July 8, 2026 Matt Stoller described Hunt thusly: “This person runs a dark money political group and is offering to pay accusers of Platner. Who are her funders?” This post has more on Hunt’s group Reckoning Action: EXCLUSIVE: Dark money conduit behind hit job on Graham Platner campaign, preserves congressional status quo Reckoning Action, the group that connected Jenny Racicot to Politico, is a 501(c)(4) — a Delaware nonprofit that discloses none of its donors. Its executive director,… pic.twitter.com/LUDb7M43yQ — DannyKPolitics (@DannyKPolitics) July 8, 2026 Key quotes: Reckoning Action, the group that connected Jenny Racicot to Politico, is a 501(c)(4) — a Delaware nonprofit that discloses none of its donors. Its executive director, Cheyenne Hunt, was instrumental in ending Eric Swalwell’s career. It was launched May 20 on Capitol Hill alongside the Democratic Women’s Caucus, whose chair, Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández, personally announced the expulsion resolutions that forced two congressmen out in April. Reckoning Action’s reach is real and demonstrated. It helped force Swalwell’s resignation, and it can claim a Republican scalp too: Rep. Tony Gonzales of Texas resigned within hours of Swalwell in April. But the mechanics matter more than the box score. Reporting from the Texas Tribune and PBS shows the two removals were paired to preserve the balance of a narrowly divided House — expelling one member from each party cost neither side a net seat. Gonzales was already finished, having lost his primary runoff with GOP leadership pushing him out. The bipartisan-looking action was structured around partisan seat math. The Platner case strips that cover away. There is no cross-party pairing here — the target is the party’s own Senate nominee, who won Maine’s primary by more than seventy points. Within hours of the Politico story, Schumer and Gillibrand demanded he “immediately withdraw,” the DSCC pledged zero spending, and Khanna, Gallego, and Heinrich pulled endorsements. The mechanism they are racing toward is Maine’s July 13 ballot-substitution deadline, after which the party — not voters — selects the replacement. The accusation at the center would not survive the standard the party pretends to apply. That won’t be the end of the reactionary push to undo the will of the Maine Democratic electorate. The Maine Democratic Party Has Ideas of Its Own Maine Democratic Party Executive Director Devon Murphy-Anderson took to the webs with a short form video arguing that Platner should not have any influence over the party’s ultimate nominee: Update from Maine Democratic Party Executive Director Devon Murphy-Anderson on the Maine Senate race. pic.twitter.com/Jzj9ofinU8 — Maine Democrats (@MaineDems) July 8, 2026 “Unfortunately Graham Platner’s team has repeatedly reached out to us in an attempt to put their thumb on the scale of what this process looks like. We have repeatedly reiterated to GP’s team that they have no role in determining our next Democratic nominee for the US Senate” The Platner campaign fired back via NBC News: The Platner campaign has reached out to the party to try and understand what this process would look like. At no point has the campaign tried to ‘put its finger on the scale.’ Over 150,000 Mainers voted for this movement, and over 15,000 Mainers volunteered their time and energy to it. While Graham wouldn’t want to be a part of the process, he would want to make sure the voters and volunteers make this decision — not the political establishment. Stoller and Klippenstien Still Fighting the Centrists Matt Stoller did a lot of tweeting and deleting yesterday before boiling down his thoughts into one essay. Some key quotes (although the whole thing is a must read): …there’s a big difference between ‘normal people in bad relationships who hate each other’ and ‘crime.’ So let’s be adults. This is a political attack. Top Maine Democratic Party donors in recent years are Reid Hoffman, Haim Saban, and David Ellison. David Ellison! As in the Trump ally who fired Stephen Colbert and is taking over TikTok, CBS News, and CNN. These names should mean something. Saban may be the single most important AIPAC donor in the Democratic Party. Another big donor to the Maine Democratic Party is the founder of Zynga, Marc Pincus, who said in 2024 that “an attack on Amazon is an attack on America.” It goes beyond big tech and Wall Street. Crypto fraudster Sam Bankman-Fried’s partner Nishad Singh at FTX gave $100k to the Maine Democratic Party in 2022. The insiders running the party are the people funded through these streams of revenue, they are the ones dealing with the donors and currying favor with them. And while I will not speak out of school, the Maine Democratic establishment simply cannot be trusted and that is well-known. …the goal of pushing Platner aside is to destroy the agenda on which he was elected, which is about taming oligarchy and reorienting us from endless war. That is why the Maine Democrats aren’t saying ‘let’s respect Platner voters and transition to someone else,’ they are taking a sanctimonious ‘he gets NO say in ANYTHING.’ Those are not the actions of people who want to win a Senate seat, those are the actions of nasty insiders claiming factional power for themselves. Ken Klippenstein was unrepentant: To give you a sense of how nasty this is getting, here’s a fairly representative example from legal commentator Ken White, who said of me: “Anyway just waiting to hear what new hilarious insult [Ken Klippenstein] comes up with next to sneer at people who don’t like rape.” Never having sneered “at people who don’t like rape,” I have no idea what he’s talking about. But I get the maneuver here. He and other commentators are trying to bully anyone who defended Platner against the earlier scandals into issuing self-abasing public apologies, by implying that anyone who doesn’t is pro-rape. The campaign to get people to self-flagellate over things they never said is working, with virtually every high-profile figure who defended Platner in the past issuing weepy apologies about how sorry they are. He then includes apologies from Naomi Klein, Adam Carlson, and Michelle Goldberg and added “it’s unclear to me what exactly they’re apologizing for other than not being clairvoyants able to foresee this week’s accusation before it happened.” He continued: I stand by my previous defense of Platner. Offensive tattoos and sexting-out-of-wedlock struck me as the most Marine shit ever. I literally know Marines who’ve done both but later grew up and became decent guys. (Hi if you’re reading this!) I still believe in my bones that people like that deserve to have a shot at public office and that our country would be better for it. But the Marines I’m describing were never accused of more serious things like sexual assault. People were right to give him a chance before; and they’re right to drop him now. As I wrote, people are done with the fake, plasticy candidates who’ve dominated politics in the past. I’m certain that’s still the case, regardless of how hard the media commentators try to gaslight you into thinking willingness to look past lesser flaws is the same as defending rape, misogyny, and so on. Giving people a chance means that sometimes they won’t live up to it. No one should apologize for that. I’m not. More from Stoller who brings it back to the main point: If Platner steps down, he will be characterized as a deviant, and that’s just how it’ll be forever. True or not. And everyone will be tarred as supportive of immoral behavior. It doesn’t matter if you are a liberal, centrist, young, old, whatever. People are saying the Bulwark, a centrist outlet started by ex-Republicans who were skeptical of Platner, are tarred by this. Punchbowl is reporting that Senate progressives will never have credibility going forward. The ploy here is obvious. That is, even though the actual immoral behavior at issue here is the genocide in Gaza, the corruption of DOGE and Musk, and the neoliberal turn in American politics for 40 years that has destroyed our faith in society and each other. Platner has been consistent about his platform, and there’s no reason to assume that will change. 70% of Maine Democrats picked him as their candidate, and he has the right to represent their views. So he should stay in the race or, if he feels he cannot win, leave on terms that will ensure his platform, and not that of Maine Dem Party oligarch donors, is the one on the ballot in November. The Maine Dem establishment cannot be trusted. And frankly, this kind of ugly scenario is how power works. They make ordinary people pick among ugly scenarios, and then they make it seem like the obvious path is the one that accords more power and wealth to oligarchs. And if you don’t choose that one, you’re a bad person who deserves approbation and scorn. I’ve never denied being a bad person who deserves approbation and scorn so there. But let’s get back to the future. If Not Platner, Then Who? WGBH has the basics: Those names include several former Democratic candidates for governor, such as former Maine Senate President Troy Jackson, Secretary of State Shenna Bellows and former Maine CDC director Nirav Shah. One of Platner’s Democratic primary opponents, David Costello, also said he would seek the nomination. Another potential candidate is Jordan Wood, who ran for the Senate seat before switching to the primary contest for Maine’s 2nd Congressional District. Wood finished third in that race after a ranked-choice runoff. Dan Kleban, owner for Maine Beer Co., has also expressed interest. Kleban was briefly a senatorial candidate last year, but dropped out and endorsed Gov. Janet Mills when she entered the race in mid-October. Jackson, a logger from Allagash and a Sanders-style populist, campaign with Platner and has spent years pushing some of the same ideas: Medicare for All, workers’ rights, higher taxes on billionaires. Jackson filed initial paperwork with the Federal Election Commission to potentially run. “There’s a movement out there right now of people that want a progressive person, they want some change, they want Medicare for All, they want worker’s rights,” Jackson said in an interview. “They want everything that I care about.” As for Shah, he was just the subject of a NY Times op-ed called “The Covid Czar People Still Trust” by Dr. Rachael Bedard. I got cooties just reading this: Nirav Shah, who narrowly lost the Maine Democratic primary for governor last week, didn’t run his campaign as a populist, a celebrity or a self-funded business owner. Rather, the first-time candidate is something that would seem anathema in contemporary politics: a public health technocrat who became a household name during the Covid-19 pandemic. Dr. Shah has some of the highest favorability numbers of any public figure in Maine, despite having been a state resident for less than a decade. He entered the race months later than his four opponents, spent less money than most of them and received few significant endorsements. … Dr. Shah got the most first-choice votes of any candidate on the ballot but was beat out in the final ranked-choice tabulation by Hannah Pingree, a former Maine House speaker. His was an impressive and surprising showing.Less than half of Americans feel their state leadership managed the pandemic well. More than 70 percent believe the pandemic did more to drive the country apart than to bring it together. The rise of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the Make America Healthy Again movement was largely fueled by Covid backlash. Yet Dr. Shah managed to build durable trust, during a time when others in his field were losing it. … Beginning on March 9, 2020, Dr. Shah, then director of Maine’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention, conducted hundreds of televised news conferences. He took questions on a public radio call-in show a few times a month and posted on social media constantly. He became a mini-celebrity, introducing Mainers to his hobbies (cooking) and his dog. A local company named a chocolate bar after him. … Maine did relatively well during the pandemic: Death rates were low and vaccination rates high, largely because state decision makers made good choices, compared with some of their peers. But those decisions came with trade-offs and consequences anyway: There were protests against closures, economic stress, learning loss and preventable deaths from other causes.The real distinguishing factor of Maine’s response was Dr. Shah’s steady presence in the public eye. Former Democratic gubernatorial candidate Nirav Shah said he is preparing to enter Maine’s open U.S. Senate race should Platner withdraw. Shah said he is consulting with his family, advisers and voters before making a final decision, but called for the Democratic nomination to be decided through an “open and transparent” process, including at least one televised debate and multiple town halls across the state. He also outlined the platform he would run on, emphasizing Medicare for All, higher taxes on the wealthy, protecting abortion rights, rebuilding the economy for working people, and holding President Donald Trump and Republicans accountable. He did not mention Palestine, Israel’s genocide in Gaza, or broader foreign policy and anti-war issues, key positions in Platner’s campaign. Notably, Shah’s 2026 gubernatorial bid was backed by more than $630,000 in TV spending from the AIPAC-affiliated 314 Action Fund, as he declined to sign a pledge rejecting outside Super PAC spending. So yea, my spidey sense was right. Establishmentarian former state rep., two time congressional campaign loser and former Emily’s List executive director Emily Cain is also reported to be putting her hat in the ring. CBS News quoted a number of progressive groups have weighed in: “To the Democratic establishment: this is not your opening,” Our Revolution Executive Director Joseph Geevarghese wrote Monday evening. The group, which has its roots in Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign, specifically warned against picking a “status-quo candidate” like Mills. Adam Green, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, said in a statement Monday the Maine Democratic Party should nominate a “shake-up-the-system economic fighter who challenges powerful interests.” He added that the decision shouldn’t be left to a “small caucus of party insiders.” Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna of California, who was one of Platner’s best-known backers before this week, argued Jackson should get the nomination, calling the former state Senate president “someone who has spent his life standing up for these progressive values.” Platner’s campaign manager says the state party and DSCC are icing them out of any part in the process of picking a new nominee: Latest from Platner camp pic.twitter.com/2BNxPg8LLe — Eoin Higgins (@EoinHiggins_) July 8, 2026 The WaPo featured the empire striking back: “People who got us into this mess — who vouched for this candidate after 3 different scandals and kept telling us there were going to be no more — may want to take a break from Maine strategizing,” Neera Tanden, the head of the Center for American Progress, a more establishment liberal think tank, said in a social media post. “The Democratic nominee, if there is a new one, has to be someone who is independent minded from Platner, otherwise they will be viewed by voters as a protege,” state Sen. Joe Baldacci, who lost his congressional bid this year, wrote on X. “Any connections to Platner will doom that person’s campaign from the very beginning.” Meanwhile, things are going great at the Maine Dem Party: The Platner campaign’s organizing director has resigned from the Maine Democratic Party over their lack of engagement with grassroots organizers and volunteers in determining the nominee replacement process. pic.twitter.com/CMs0A8tVuB — Nathan Bernard (@nathanTbernard) July 8, 2026 But wait, it gets worse. Confirmation that the email to the therapist that Politico used to justify publishing Racicot's allegations against Platner didn't exist prior to June 2026. https://t.co/xuAskGaLLR pic.twitter.com/tbC6DjS3AM — gato fumante (@KweenInYellow) July 8, 2026 Life’s ugly and so is politics. Either way, it looks like Susan Collins might be getting re-elected again. UPDATE: JULY 8, 2026 5PM EDT Drop Site has new information that makes Politico’s reporting look even worse: NEW: Politico knew at the time of publication precisely what Jenny Racicot texted to Graham Platner but deliberately omitted it from their article. Racicot, according to the lead Politico reporter on the story, told Platner she “needed her glute massaged.” He told her he was… https://t.co/3b9sMZ0N2d — Ryan Grim (@ryangrim) July 8, 2026 Ugly, ugly story. Flawed candidate. Vicious, dirty counter-attacks from the establishment and MSM. The electorate will have no say in the outcome. End result — more of the same in the US Senate. Related Posts: Hey Nat, it’s Totenkopf not Totenkampf. I was ok to overlook the Nazi tattoo since he got it in Croatia and the neos in the Metal scene there are mostly irredentist Ustashe admirers (without mostly understanding even what that means, but they hate Serbs). But the merc history was worse. But then, is there even any due process anymore for sexual assault allegations of politicians aiming for high office? I hate to sound procedural but, why not file charges or a suit against the guy instead of going to the press when he’s running for office? That’s just oppo. thanks for the correction, fixed. I agree about the due process thing. It is far too easy to cook up something like this. Just ask Julian Assange. The moment I learned that Platner ran as a Democrat I stopped paying attention. Thanks for the detailed report, Nat. Nat Platner was not indicted by the grand jury nor was he found guilty by a jury He was tried and found guilty by the media Did he commit crime/crimes? I do not know But he deserves his day in court doesn’t he? I am not a supporter of Platner and I was not before but his antiwar antigenocide in Palestine positions are good as are raising the minimum wage and socialized medicine Thee epstein class seems to have taken Platner out I have to agree. A functioning republic would not allow the will of 150,000 voters to be overridden by one day of extremely sloppy news reporting. I don’t know why he didn’t sue politico for a billion dollars, deny the accusations and run. The establishment is going to get there favored candidate since he dropped out. He should have stayed in regardless of whether Collins wins or not. He could have easily tarred her as a war criminal supporting the illegal Iraq war, supporting telecom immunity and finish it off with giving the iDF billions of dollars. If he gamed it out he would have realized that was the only way he was going to get his voters voice out. Anyone with half a brain would see the obvious ratf$cling that the establishment is doing. Heck they supported Trump even after a video of him telling the reporter about grabbing them in the you know what. That’s how desperate the electorate wants change, and Collins is definitely not change. Simple, he got a call from someone who told him, drop out or else the next time it’ll be child p*rn found on your computer. And you’ll go to jail. And you’ll be murdered within a few months. And everyone will say good riddance. Ustashe were the Croatian Nazi state paramilitaries who were responsible for war crimes and ethnic clensing against Serbs, Jews and left-wing Croats during World War II. They operated military formations separate from the Croatian Nazi state regular army, so called Domobrani, and were in charge of concentration camps on Croatian territory. Some of their insignia and memorabilia was similar to that of the SS, their Black Legion units used similar Totenkopf emblem. Split has a heavy neonazi presence due to resettlement of Bosnian Croats (who a very pro-Ustashe) in the 90’s, so I am not surprised that a local tattoo shop would have these. And remember, it was Platner himself who pointed out the tattoo and then got it covered up, once he realized how vicious the smear campaign against him was was going to be. Speaking of which, I don’t know the timeline of Fifeld’s relationship with Platner, but my guess is it was while he was bartending in DC several years ago, before moving back to Maine. Perhaps while she was busy defending Kavanuagh. Funny how she had no problem with the allegations against Kavanaugh but years later she’s screwing Plater (figuratively, of course) over very similar allegations. This is all about Israel. The whole thing reeks. Just when you think you can’t get any more disgusted with the state of things in the US. Neera Tanden might want to take her own advice. After all, she was one of Bill Clinton’s advisors during his Administration, which led to the GWB Administration, and one of Hillary’s primary advisors prior to their losing to Trump. She was also an advisor to the Biden Administration, with identical results ensuing. With a track record like that, her advice is surplus to requirements. Knowing that history, it might be a good idea for some enterprising journalist to find out if she is getting a stipend from the RNC sent to one of her offshore bank accounts. No, she gets paid by a secret coterie of “Democratic” billionaires. Four letter words! Another comment eaten by hungry Internet Dragons. “Politics ain’t beanbag,” as the political sage Dunne wrote lo these many years ago. If the top slots are now stolen by the ‘Forces of Evil,’ then the down-card races must suffice for now. Given the thought that playing spoiler might be a bit of fun, the thought occurred to me to gin up a write in campaign for a Maine resident who ticks all the boxes that enrage and frighten the Powers That Be: Lambert Strether. I believe he could be inveigled to run on the Skunk Party banner. He could also have the cachet of having “mysterious donors” from the Far East. Stay safe. Avoid Imperial entanglements. Maine write in candidate rules: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/21-A/title21-Asec338.html HELL YEAH LAMBERT FOR SENATE YOU GO WITH THE BADASS POLITICAL BLOGGERS IN MAINE THAT YOU HAVE, NOT THE ONES YOU WANT LAMBERT WAS BALLS DEEP IN ALL AMERICAN POLITICS, AND I MISS HIS EVERYDAY IN DEPTH COMMENTARY VIA NC 😢 W(ho)TF does that blonde a**h** think she is? (I try to use the same pejoratives for men and women, even if most people think man when they hear a**h***.) That would be reaction if I were a Maine. You have to do what we say, even though even though we’ve shown ourselves to be completely out of touch! Coming on the heels of the hissy fit over the success of DSA candidates, it’s really showing how much the iron law of institutions applies to the Dem Party. Stoller hit the nail on the head with that last paragraph. This is basically another casualty of identity politics. Gender equality and “believe women” are incompatible ideas. If men and women are equal one doesn’t get to always be right. Among id pol types they always start out by defending a marginalized community but then always morphs into putting that group on a pedestal where they can do no wrong. In reality women can lie cheat and steal just as much as men, in the past we could reserve judgement until a trial or compelling evidence, now its just ” believe women” unless its an establishment politician then its all swept under the rug. It bums me out how so few on the left can see this and how its cynically used against them. Exhibit 1: Hillary Clinton Ok, ugh… So I’d go with the anti-genocidaire unless maybe there is something much more substantial. The dude may have been a bit of a creep (hmm, a novelty in the US Senate?), but there things that are vastly worst, like abetting genocide. While the accusations do seem credible, the timing and promoters are definitely suspect. This information has likely been sat on for a while and is being brought up at the last minute so they can force a more mainstream-friendly candidate on the voters. I hate to use whataboutism, but I will when pointing out hypocrisy. To use the biggest examples, both Joe Biden and Bill Clinton had credible accusations of similar behavior against them and the Dem establishment couldn’t have cared less. ‘Whataboutism’ is always fallacious. “What if we punish our rich sponsors, will that the do anything for the coloured?” as H Clinton the trouser wear said (paraphrased). Comparison on equal terms retains power. That one israeli is suggested worth a thousand Palestinians is a valid critical comparison. That one israeli is suggested worth a thousand US voters is a valid critical comparison. However, I realise saying things like this might be realised as a 14 year worthy crime in the UK. I think the Democratic Party establishment will always destroy the career of any candidate who threatens their control over which candidate gets offered up as an antidote to neoliberal/AIPAC controlled/whatever you want to name strategy or politics. If it wasn’t rape accusations, it would be something else, every time. I do not believe the Dems want anything ever to change that would upset their position. They do not want any group beneath them socioeconomically ever to advance in any way. And I agree with the commenter who said these rape allegations needed to be reported and investigated at the time the events happened, both to help other rape survivors and to avoid situations like this. Too many shady figures were involved in this whole drama – who didn’t assault anyone but do not want any progressive change in the U.S. And doesn’t Politico have a German billionaire owner who’s best buds with Peter Thiel? Sorry, but the whole thing stinks, and not just Graham Platner. Yeah, I guess you really can’t get there from here… That’s the plan! Same, although decent guys of all backgrounds have their scumbag moments. My read, in a broad uniformed way, is that a lot of most Marine shit ever is men feeling that they are owed, after the meat grinder of active duty. Owed a chance to prove yourself, among other things. I’m amazed that the analogous situation unfolding in the WNBA hasn’t been mentioned as relates to both this thread and the Hypersociality Hypothesis post from yesterday. In short, it appears the WNBA eco-system, owners, coaches, players union, and players have been executing a plan to destroy the career of Caitlin Clark because she upsets the status quo. This is Caitlin Clark, the most exciting player in the WNBA, responsible for massive increases in ticket sales, televised viewership, merchandise sales, player salary increases, and private charter flights. Knowledgable sports journalists have been commenting for at least a year about the collective push-back aimed at any in the media who criticize the way Caitlin Clark has been treated. Don’t react to the fact that it’s Megyn Kelly’s show, skip forward to ~6:40 to hear one of her guests description of the massive effort being expended to control the story in every possible way including smearing Christine Brennan one of, if not most respected journalists following the WNBA. Media is afraid of disturbing the explosively rising AD revenue, journalists don’t want to loose access, even the player’s union gets in on the act branding Brennan a racist, homo-phobic who doesn’t deserve her credentials. I’m not going to go any farther in describing the situation, I wouldn’t even bring it up if it weren’t for the fact that it appears WNBA fans HAVE HAD ENOUGH. Ticket sales have plummeted, secondary market ticket prices have dropped massively, seats are empty, a massive boycott is coming into focus and the entire ownership of the WNBA (NBA owners) is panicking as all the usual tricks are failing to stop the bleeding. Now consider that a huge amount of the anger is coming from very young fans and their families, and it’s looking more and more like that anger is being channeled into effective action. Here’s my point; The American electorate should be ashamed of accepting it’s learned hopelessness. It looks to me as if a campaign by hundreds of thousands of young women, aided by dozens of young Black internet basketball video-casters are going to successfully thwart the evil plans of the clique that currently makes the rules in the WNBA. They’re going to it them where it hurts, in the pocket book. There’s no real reason that the American electorate couldn’t pull off a similar campaign. We could start by encouraging the voters in Maine to refuse the replacement of their chosen candidate. Great update. I haven’t been following that story. Thanks If voters in the US do not engage in reciprocal lawfare in situations like this, they can expect routinely to have their candidates rolled by spurious accusations of financial, sexual and legal malfeasance – allegations which seem never to hold up after the election. Platner should refuse to step aside and immediately countersue for slander and defamation. It would be messy and ugly but I doubt that the allegations would stand up in a court of law. Standing tall throughout this auto de fe by the press, political parties and others would signal an ability to fight fiercely for his constituents against all comers. Move to litigation allows him to subpoena the records, which would be important since both accusers by going to the press, revealing their names, have waved privilege, Or if he withdraws, he and his supporters should still immediately move to significant litigation against any and all of his accusers, as well as Politico, which if the underlying documentation doesn’t hold up have considerable exposure. The problem for grass roots candidates is they don’t have the funds to fight back. And, often, they have not had the advantage of “background scouring by professionals,” so they accede to the allegations. But there are avenues of support, not the least, of all Maine voters, who should get off the bandwagon regarding “rape” and ask for immediate adjudication in a legal venue and documentation that will hold up in a court of law. Otherwise, it’s simply inflammatory allegations writ large. Again, this is consistently happening to grass roots candidates … Remember that the bleeding hearts of Reckoning Now have had nothing to say for the two months of their existence regarding the many victims in the Epstein emails, a more worthy direction for their efforts. Also readers should remember that the Democratic Women’s Caucus has not at this time supported these allegations. Maybe some wise head is asking Cui Bono? I agree 100%! Drag these Family-Bloggers into court and let’s see where the cards fall. Maybe a grassroots campaign to fund a legal team sufficient to the task. What would Maine’s democratic machine say to a boycott by Maine voters leaving them with nothing but billionaire and AIPAC support? Let’s saw one the legs off their credibility chair and see how they like it. Didn’t file a police report because “Maine is insular”… Is his father the police chief? If not, your credibility is thin. If you are willing to make the issue this public. Going to the police wouldn’t have been a major issue. Very bizarre. No evidence that you sent him messages saying “this was totally not okay and you dont ever want to see him again”. Also bizarre. Emails showing that the therapist “sort of acknowledged that what happened was sexual assault”… Therapists are paid to take your side on all matters. Yet the therapist only “sort of acknowledged” that the purported sexual assault happened… It sounds like the therapist heard a story that does not align with what they would define as sexual assault and therapists are biased to be on her side. It sounds like she didn’t like who Platner turned out to be. Its sounds like she just expected him to be different than who he was without saying anything about her expectations. If she clearly said no and he ignored it or said who cares the therapist would adamantly acknowledge that she was raped… She was the one telling the therapist what happened. So she could have just lied to the therapist for approval if she wanted it. But she didn’t… This isn’t a valid accusation. I don’t know how old he was when he got the death’s head tattoo. But being pro-Nazi even when trolling at a young age is one thing. Getting a permanent tattoo on your body is another. I also didn’t know his Reddit posts were from 4 years ago. Seems like Platner is certainly a loose cannon and would do well in the lower house. But people probably should have known that he wouldn’t make it in the senate. I worked with Jerry Irwin, a fairly well-known photographer, on a project years ago. He was also a free-spirited non-conformst who enjoyed getting a rise out of people, and at one event he wore a tee-shirt with a Totenkopf on it… Jerry was a jew. The bikers he rode with in the 60s often displayed swasticas for the same reason– just to F with the straights. Yes, you’re being too harsh. [Side note: Dennis Morgan, Jerry’s “promoter”, was a con man who indeed stole the work of Teenie Harris (semi-famous photographer), and continued to sell his work even after a court compelled him to return the negatives to Teenie’s estate… they got some of the negatives back. Morgan pretty much ran the same scam on Jerry, which is why I mention this. Jerry was not a bad guy and didn’t deserve that, but scumbags like Morgan will screw-over grandmas for a nickle.] Side note on the donor class and Maine politics. Mamdani is a Bowdoin College graduate. The college, located in Brunswick, Maine, issued a very tepid acknowledgment of Mamdani’s win in NYC. Based on knowledge of Bowdoin’s fundraising emails and their frequency, one would think the college would have been shouting from the rooftops that a recent graduate was already mayor of NYC, using it as a recruiting and fundraising opportunity. But there is another more influential Bowdoin alum, Reed Hastings, who was one of the founders of Netflix. Hastings had recently given an extremely large donation to the school. And apparently Hastings is a Cuomo guy. And I just found this from the student newspaper, where the editors call out the college for its lukewarm reaction and point out the Hastings connection – https://bowdoinorient.com/2025/11/07/congratulations-mayor-elect-mamdani-14/ The establishment just can’t stop with the hippy punching. Susanna Gibson, anyone? It’s ironic that the main Platner bashers were so supportive and determined to get Kavanaugh on the court. Biden accused of worse (and consistently downright creepy) behaviour than Platner, had a literally lifelong career in politics. Trump, proud of his ‘grab em by the kitty’ pickup style, convicted of assault and accused of actual rape, still gets elected – twice. Paxton, right wing fascist extraordinaire, accused of impropriety, fraud, bribery, extortion probably will win TX. Oldie but still a goodie – Gingrich divorcing his hospitalized wife to marry his mistress then becomes house speaker. It does seem that this type of attack politics only works on one side of the isle, but the US is so mentally unstable when it comes to sex, it’s obscene. This discussion reminded me of the phrase “Politics of Personal Destruction.” When I looked it up, I was referred to Hillary Clinton. Not that this is anything new, remember what Nixon’s CREEP did to Ed Muskie and his wife in the 1972 campaign. The upshot was that Nixon got to run against his chosen opponent, George McGovern. Granted, CREEP made up the whole attack back then, unlike Platner’s situation. Still, Clinton had a reason to talk about the politics of personal destruction, because Linda Tripp broke laws to secretly record Monica Lewinsky and to get the tapes to Ken Starr’s investigation of Bill Clinton. At the end of her Grand Jury testimony, Lewinsky volunteered, “I hate Linda Tripp.” Decades after Bill skated free, Lewinsky is still paying for Tripp’s unpunished crime and violation of Lewinsky’s privacy. Which gets back to Platner. No charges were ever filed against him in 2021. Only after his nomination did these reports come out. Did these women do so out of actual political concern about his candidacy, or did some latter-day Linda Tripp force them out into the spotlight? We may never know, unless some latter-day Lee Atwater has a future deathbed confession. Remember old Lee? He apparently engineered the Donna Rice on the Monkey Business boat that shot down Gary Hart‘s presidential bid. Then there is former Senator and former comedian Al Franken. Wobbly evidence and quick pressure forced his resignation, that later led to other Senators regretting the action. Plus, Roger Stone was involved, and AIPAC was not happy with his politics. Put it all together, and is it any wonder that the world is run by shameless sociopaths? Oh boy. My best wishes to the voters of Maine. Well, at least Maine Democratic Party now knows what voters want. So all the need to do is figure out how to not give it to them but win the election anyway. You know, like Obama. What a coup for the Democrat Establishment and the oligarchy class, and Collins, lol. They were all possibly dead to rights. Solved! I remember reading a thing, years ago, in the London Review of Books about Rosa Parks. Seems the local civil rights people spent a lot of time and effort finding the exact person with a spotless record, personal, criminal or professional, to be the one to refuse to sit in the back of that bus. Rejecting at least the first couple of candidates before Rosa Parks entered the picture. Because they knew, understood and expected the segregationists in the room to try and find any conceivable or inconceivable fault with this individual so as to derail the entire protest. In some circles, this is also called vetting. There is also the more recent practice of Internet debates where a misplaced comma or, more realistically, a couple of stray words in the middle of a 3-page thesis, will often give the opponent a valid reason to ignore the entire argument and focus just on that detail. I am not suggesting that whoever it was that pushed Platner in the first place – some of the individuals are noted in the post above – could 100% have known, even with the strongest possible vetting, about Platner’s record with women. But shouldn’t these “pushers” be ultra-paranoid, like the civil rights people back when, about selecting absolutely pristine candidates? Instead of, you know, the first guy they run into who happens to say “Medicare for All” and used to be a Marine? I mean, just reading the guy’s Wiki page – kid from affluent family is expelled from boarding school A, completes prep school B, but instead of going to Uni goes “backpacking in Europe and Africa” for a year, then enlists in the Marines. Does this by itself not send up any signal flares for anyone, that there just might be some psychological or self-discipline issue at play, which just might have a teensy chance of continuing to play out for the rest of his adult life? Anybody? Bueller?..[To be sure, sometimes kids like this end up growing up to be Mark Twain, the new Chernow biography of whom I am reading at present. Nevertheless.] Eh. At least the DSA finally redid its political platform into something palatable and election-ready. Though it took Mamdani becoming the Democratic candidate for them to move off their duff and to it. Maybe this little episode will also prove to be a learning experience for them… And with this single act, James Carville’s faith in the Democrat party is fully restored Genuine laugh out loud off this comment. I was never a real Platner fan – principally for the reasons in your caveat at the top, Nat, which I believe should be stapled to all election coverage by anyone left of Hillary Clinton from now until the end of time – and so can’t hardly be accused of stanning or defending MY sonofafamilyblog, as it were. Nonetheless this stinks to the moon. I don’t think it’s an accident we’re getting the full push on Platner just after the Mamdani set (nearly? I think he got them all) ran the table in NY. This is the corrosive work of a power struggle playing out in real time, nothing more, and I suspect everyone involved has plenty of reason to feel ashamed of themselves, if they have the character to feel shame. By the way, Stoller at the end there summed up the reason I only vote under exceptional circumstances: Leaving the smearing aside, few things corrode your soul more thoroughly than affirmatively selecting and supporting someone you know to be vile, and that is the electoral process. Ole boy got himself nuked. And people wonder why young men these days are reluctant to enter the dating-pool: an accusation alone is often enough to destroy lives, and this is well-known by the crocodiles in the water. On a campaign in 2015, the candidate I was working with found himself smeared by the accusation of “beating/abusing his wife.” I’d known his wife since the mid-90s, and I will swear on my life that if he ever lay a hand on her the wrong way, he would not wake to see the following day… she’s a hard-ass and found the accusation quite humorous. That false witness thing, that just goes to show we’re not nearly as principled as we claim. Tough couple of days for this Platner-supporting, Platner-contributing Maine voter. One of the most annoying aspects of the media coverage of Platner’s campaign (before this latest disaster) has been the tendency of many, including many Leftie-ish Sanders Dem Soc types, to attribute Platner’s success to his macho, gruff, tatted-up persona (reflected in Nat’s quote from the Discourse Blog above). It is so patronizing to have pundits constantly speaking of Maine’s voting population as if we’re a bunch of idiots, mesmerized by anyone in a Dropkick Murphys t-shirt. I can summarize my own support of Platner thusly: He had good policy positions, and he spoke about those positions with passion and intelligence. He said good things, and he sure seemed to believe in the things he said. The media NEVER spoke of Platner’s positions, only his scandals, but the positions were why people here supported him. Platner’s popularity cut across several demographics, and in spite of my respect for the people here, I feel sick at the thought of the state Democratic Party picking the nominee. The state is basically split between coastal voters who went for Harris by 85% and a deep red interior that mostly went for Trump. There are a ton of toothless ‘No Kings’ rather-be-having-brunch types, many older, but also many young professionals. It’s not uncommon to see Cory Booker bumper stickers here. Platner was successful because he picked up an unruly cross-section of voters from both parties who are going to be tough to mobilize to vote for a milquetoast Zionist liberal spat out by the party machine. If anyone is interested in the politics in Maine, I highly recommend Andy O’Brien’s Substack, he’s a Platner supporter and labor organizer with an insider’s knowledge of the politics here. He hasn’t written on the Politico story yet, but when he does, that one is going to be a doozy. I just subscribed to O’Brien’s substack. thanks From across the country, so disappointed this has blown up. Is there no hope the Maine Ds can coalesce around someone decent? I am told Troy Jackson was one of the few who refused to knife Bernie in the back, is he disliked by rural types? For me, Platner’s stint as a merc was all but disqualifying, well before the tattoo and first reports of sexual misbehavior, but his anti-imperialist take on things was refreshing and worthy of support. By US-ian standards, the man is very well-read on these matters, as well as labor relations and labor history. In my book, that counts for a lot. It’s been clear for months that #McResistance media and D’s have had a hard-on (not the best description, but whatever) for him, and that also made me more sympathetic, but the recent allegations do seem credible, despite the ideological and interest-based piling on. Credible or not, he’s finished, and the Chuck Schumers and Hakeem Jeffries of the world are jubilant. We’ve seen since at least 2016 that they hate the Left far more than they do Trump and the Republicans, who are their only vehicle for whatever legitimacy they maintain, as well as being their caviar-and-steak meal ticket. As Nat rightly says, ugly times, ugly politics, ugly people, and dispiriting any way you cut it. I have to differ about these latest allegations seeming credible. Drop Site’s reporting makes them look cooked like a thanksgiving turkey. There’s a reason the NYT didn’t run with these accusations, but after JR hooked up with a PR firm who could apparently spell corroboration if not produce it, Politico was all-in. Perhaps I should have said “seem credible enough to do Platner in,” though I also have to say that Ryan Grim’s reporting, while adding nuance, is not exculpatory. Inherently unverifiable, therefore I don’t care. Were I a Maine voter I’d vote for him in a heartbeat. Doubt anyone will get the chance now though. Anyone surprised by this outcome has been living under a rock. Mamdani embarassed a lot of powerful people by winning and our beloved reptilian overlords and their minions in the Democratic Party will do whatever it takes to make sure that doesn’t happen again. By “Whatever it takes” I mean exactly that, you do not embarass the people that matter without suffering the consequences, and as our Benevolent reptilian overlords feel increasingly threatened ” Whatever it takes” will become increasingly explicit, and violent. Ahso, and yes. We under rock dwelling have increased access to correctly informed commentary. I for one find little joy. Nat said accurately: “The point being that Platner didn’t organically rise-up from the Maine oyster beds, he was recruited and groomed by some of the most effective DSA operatives in the country.” “Nothing wrong with that, let’s not be naive about how this game is played.” I would argue, in contrast, that everything is wrong with how this game is played. The DSA is using the same political logic as their supposed rivals (Dems and Repubs)–proper grooming to be acceptable to the groomers and then to be viewed by the voters as a man of the people, when he primarily is a man of the DSA. When a spontaneous citizens uprising occurs please let me know. Aristotle’s theory of spontaneous generation got debunked a long long time ago. “On August 14, 1980, democratic space in Poland was occupied by about 8,000 shipyard workers, united both in their tentativeness and their fragile resolve. On August 17, the space contained 50,000 workers in 20 enterprises in Gdansk; on August 18, by some 200,000 workers in 156 factories in the tri-cities; and by August 31, by 500,000 to 750,00 from many parts of Poland. The space had a name, Solidarnosc, which within two more weeks had some three million inexperienced members; within two months, seven million; and by Christmas, almost 10 million. These were impressive numbers, assuredly; but the real change was that Poles everywhere had entered into self-activity wherein they could be ‘born’ and ‘come alive’ and through which, in the end, different people came out.” For more info on this spontaneous eruption, see “Breaking the Barrier: The Rise of Solidarity in Poland,” Lawrence Goodwin, Oxford University Press (1991) pg. 271. Well now, it took The Party long enough, but they got him. Does he deserve to be “got?” I don’t know. The evidence presented looks damning. Is it as damning as it looks on first presentation? That’s the question isn’t it. But The Party does not care one way or the other. They have removed a cancerous growth. That is all that matters to Chuck and the rest of the mealy-mouthed so-called moderate Democrats who operate on the premise that it is far better to have an issue to run on that actually do the job as Senators and Congress critters… at least that is what it looks like to me. Didn’t John Nance Garner Garner say of the Vice Presidency that it was not worth a pitcher of warm spit or some other bodily fluid. I would say the same of the present day democratic party. Well aside from all the lefty intellectual like for Platner, most of his voters are mainstream Mainers. I have family there that have voted both centrist Democrat or Republican and were all in for him including ex-Collins voters. He seems likely guilty of the sexual assault or “consensually careless.” But also this was not likely to come out without a massive effort to find. The NY Times for some unknown reason thought it would be a good story to go interview all his past girlfriends. They did come up fairly empty in the sense that nothing was uncovered that had an effect on voters…and “missed” the full story from the victim. Also don’t underestimate the massive campaign against Platner. I know for a fact there have been Senate offices in other states that have had the phones ringing off the hook for their Senator to do something to stop him. Person: “This political candidate / public figured assaulted/raped me many years ago” Journalist: “Did you file a police report?” Person: “No” Journalist: “Go file a report. I don’t try crimes in public. The police can help you with what constitutes evidence and help you. We can talk after that.” Why isn’t this the norm? Also comment from my wife: “Who paid her to come forward?” Because that is how it seems. Disagree that the ‘evidence’ is damning. Its pretty thin. He may have. He may not have. Couldn’t recover the DMs from ‘real time’. Just some many years after the fact email to a therapist. With no names. That’s a ‘pretty slim reed’ to quote Nat. And Fifield defended Kavanaugh? But not Platner? Hypocrisy much? It’s the same old game: Don’t talk about the issues (Medical Access/Cost, Economy, Structure of our Society, Inequality and its consequences that generate unfairness, Proper use of Military, Genocide, etc.) Just tar and feather any candidate/official with unproven accusations, especially if they represent contrary attitudes. I always thought that Maine voters were a self-reliant people possessing common sense and good judgement. I can’t imagine them being as chickenshit as all the out of state “woke” political hacks who will react positively to any old bollocks which erupts steaming from the backside of humanity, the Zionist mainstream media and websites of strange provenance. To me, this sounds like just another setup and/or the cry of a willing, possibly used and then spurned sexual partner who made the blindingly obvious not-a-sexual-come-on but simply a serious request for a buttock rub from a guy who was blind drunk enough to be able to drive (or stagger on his hands and knees) to her place as she desired and still get a hard on. Maybe ex-Marines do not suffer from brewer’s droop as do us mere mortals. Platner would be a fool to walk away from this race now. And he can build place his case publicly to his electorate and the good people of Maine can make a judgement based on considered argument and based on such “evidence” that has been and will be placed before the public. He’s a fool or a broken man. He done walked away. Mirkinson and Chan are out to lunch. In the real world culture matters in politics. Count me on Team Klippenstein/Stoller. We need Platners to win the working class at large. Period. The AOCs will crash and burn. And yeah sometimes they’ll have had messy lives because they weren’t scheming to run for office since they were 14. If your candidacy depends on the duopoly, then you don’t have a candidacy. TIME TO THIRD PARTY THE DUOPOLY USING ECONOMIC POPULISM FOR AMERICAS 250TH. #AMERICANREVOLUTION2