The leftist complaints about non-cheaters being a bunch of goody goodies who went to Harvard is bizarre. These same people a week ago would accuse elites of being out-of-touch freaks, but now they're all perfect little angels who get off on judging the working class for not living up to their lived standards. This entire moral framework is based around stereotyping the working class as our of control. There's something to be said for the fact that the Stoller/Piker types are heavily driven by cultural resentment against people who make good life choices.
"What unites these reactions isn’t so much the defense of Platner as the staunch denial that there’s anything wrong here at all."
Sure. And also what unites these reactions is hatred of people like me, highly educated competent women who think that candidates for office should at least know what the fucking job entails and show some ability to do it, people who were terribly unimpressed by Bernie Sanders screaming about "what the government should do" and accomplishing absolutely fucking nothing as part of "the government", people who enthusiastically voted for Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama not because they, like us, went to Ivy League schools but because they seemed like real people who actually know what the fuck they are supposed to be doing when elected.
And speaking of Clintons, Bill Clinton managed to get himself elected and re-elected, and enjoy a reasonably successful presidency despite his personal failings and indiscretions, because he was an accomplished politician who projected competence-and delivered-and because he could connect with and persuade the people that he needed to vote for him. But his personal failings and indiscretions were a constant problem for him, for his family, for the democrats, and for the fucking country. I'll take a lot of baggage (not everything, but a lot) if it comes with someone who takes leadership and governing seriously, especially if they don't waste a lot of words casting people who have generally followed rules and, you know, accomplished something as the real losers, but everything is better when there is not a lot of baggage we have to take. But I'm not super interested in rallying behind someone who is an actual real fucking loser from an affluent background who has accomplished very little and who seems to have so much baggage that one could conclude that this is all he has.
I don't live in Maine. If I did I would be torn about whether to cast a very unenthusiastic vote for this arrogant ignorant prick to get Collins out, or, like, move to another state. But damn, Democrats, do better. Just. Do. Better. This is a winnable state. It would have been great if the choices had not been between an octogenarian friend of Schumer (no matter how competently she governed) and this guy.
Amen. The defense of Platner here is that moral rule-followers are ninnies and losers. Where have we heard that before? It's just disgraceful BS from the Platner apologists right now.
I mean, it almost boils down to "real people are the people who ignorantly make unfortunate tattoo choices and drunk post and drunk sext and if you haven't done that you aren't real people so shut up"
I have to say, the gratuitous swipe at Bernie Sanders, who isn't part of the article and doesn't have any scandals, makes me think your comment is about something other than just Platner.
"Real people and manly men cheat on their wives, get over it, lib" is an astonishingly shitty retort. This is how the left is going to win back working class men? A bunch of pundits sitting around saying no guys you softhands don't understand, real men are shitheads?
I don’t understand why someone would expect a Texas Republican to vote for Talarico instead of Paxton yet not expect a Maine Democrat to vote for Collins instead of Platner. Isn’t the idea that being more/equally concerned with character vs policy is a *good* thing (especially when it comes to candidates who, despite being on the “wrong side of the aisle,” are still pretty moderate at the end of the day)? Isn’t “Ken Paxton is a scumbag Texans should vote for” the same perspective from the other ideological side?
The left cannot win in the United States by combining the right's "I'm a shameless asshole but I'm YOUR shameless asshole vibes again THEM" with left leaning politics and rhetoric. I think the reason it doesn't work is twofold:
a) The premise of the left is that "They are going to run things for the good of all," but then they often use rhetoric that demonizes a "Rich, Propertied, Selfish THEM" against the "Poor, Renting, Unselfish US." In a nation where a supermajority of adults are homeowners in the stock market with private health insurance, that kind of rhetoric is going to make a lot of middle class voters think they are THEM, and that makes people who might otherwise support sensible progressive policies feel viscerally threatened, both materially and morally.
b) When your premise is "we are going to run the government for the good of all" you have to actually be good, because you are asking people to vote for you so you can have legal authority over managing their lives. When your premise is "You let me do what I want and I'll let you do what you want," which is the inherent promise of MAGA, then you don't have to be good, you just can't let gas prices get too high.
Democrats and Progressives can complain to high heaven about the "unfairness" of it but, I'm sorry, your mother should have prepared you better for adult life.
Democrats and Progressives need to actually understand why so many Americans hate them enough to vote for Trump.
It's so frustrating to watch as an American that would like real progress and a real opposition to Trump.
I want more people to get their positions on the table pre-election, because the Platner and Talarico races are interesting to watch as a pair and could make a good test of DSA politics.
Maine has been consistently blue in presidential elections, and Collins does an impressive trick by overcoming party alignment through a moderate image. All Platner needs to do is recover the ticket-splitters who voted for Harris and Collins. I watched DSA Dems push Platner and if he loses they need to sincerely reflect on whether a moderate would have done better.
Texas is consistently red, and Talarico gets zero love from the DSA. But if he is the guy who finally flips Texas, that would be a really impressive accomplishment and really good for the party (& the country, IMHO - especially versus Paxton).
So as an unrepentant neoliberal, if November brings a Talarico win and a Platner loss, I want the Democrats to seriously get on the moderation bandwagon and tell the DSA to f*** off. I already think it's the right move, but this would seal the deal in my opinion.
Is Talarico actually practicing moderation? To me, he seems more or less like a generic Democrat who has the good fortune of running in a great cycle against a terrible opponent, and maybe he wins anyway for those reasons. He's made some moves to the middle (recent comments about oil and gas being important industries, trying to reach out to Cornyn supporters), but he doesn't break with the national party nearly as much as Jared Golden, MGP, or Joe Manchin.
I mean, fair question... I know that in the primary battle he was considered the moderate vs Crockett. He has a certain affective moderation, but I am not sure how much true policy moderation is in the mix.
But note my wording was a little subtle and tried to focus on the DSA and their role in the intraparty power struggle more than the Hard Truth of who is or isn't canonically moderate. That is also why I want people to put their markers down early, or this is going to be like the Harris debacle where after the fact everyone tries to link her to the other faction.
(For the record, there is a slight risk that my view of the DSA's candidate preferences is overly influenced by my one relative who is a noisy Leftie! But I definitely expect our Thanksgiving conversation to be about what these two races have meant for the struggle within the Democratic party.)
One of the things we've lost in the past decade or so us the ability to make the jerk/monster distinction. The evidence that Platner is a jerk keeps getting stronger and stronger. Platner winning will mean that Trump, who even if you limit it to what he did openly (January 6) and what he's been found legally liable for (E. Jean Carroll) is a monster, will have less power, Collins winning will mean that he'll have more. If that's not "moral clarity", so be it.
This was an excellent piece all around but perhaps my favorite observation involves the compulsion of commentators to define ‘realness’ in a certain way. I would vote for Platner in this election even though I like Collins, because I mean it when I advocate ‘Blue No Matter Who’ in all directions. But it just isn’t the case that he’s especially representative of the median American man. To take just one example, most men aren’t veterans! The whole exercise is a ritual of conflating authenticity with aspiration.
But Platner agreed it was wrong, he and his wife are in couples therapy and his wife defends him. That is about the furthest thing from various moral failings of others who deny, deflect and dispute all charges. Life is a process and Platner is on a particular journey as he would be the first to admit. As such, it is not that different from his tattoo that he has now covered up. (Compare that to Hesgeth's tattoo's which are much worse and he still has). That is the lesson here, not that he is a scumbag.
Except he still can't admit it. He was saying "it's not true" on Sunday night, a day after his campaign and his wife both said it is true. The man is the same knucklehead he's always been, no matter how many stans insist "but he's taken responsibility and grown and changed!" It's just wishful thinking. Over and over again, Platner blames the media, or the establishment, or Chuck Schumer, or AIPAC, rather than take responsibility for his shitty behavior. I agree with Demsas that he's better than any Republican in November, but what an incredible loss for the party that still claims to care about integrity.
I’m no Platner stan. I would prefer someone with an electoral record. And his policy choices are not mine. But those are actual political / policy concerns. The NYT article says “Ms. Gertner said on Saturday that her marriage was strong, and she denounced “negative stories on Graham.” Enough with the purity patrol.
Ideological purity tests have hamstrung the Dems for a few cycles now and that's bad. We need to be a big tent ideologically, to win nationwide. But upholding standards for integrity is different. It's good to demand integrity, actually. Crazy to me that this even needs to be said.
The left started bending the rules under Clinton. People coming of age after 2000 think it was only sex. It wasn't. There were a number of financial scandals, culminating in the Mark Rich pardon. We still don't know the story on the Clinton Foundation. And we probably never will.
Clinton got a pass across the board.
Biden was clearly a corner cutter and made Hunter millions while declining mentally from before Day One--remember the Basement Campaign? That wasn't because Joe love hanging out underground. He couldn't withstand public scrutiny from the beginning.
Trump is all that passed before times a million. The left's complaints about norms and rules and whatnot are BS articles of convenience. Trump is the end product of the left excusing rule breaking for short term gains.
Before Clinton, everyone was pure and innocent, but especially Republicans. Then Clinton pardoned a Democratic donor. And then 20 years later Hunter made money. Therefore the left is to blame for Trump. Is that the chain of logic?
Either you are smarter than you let on, or you're a partisan shill. Clinton was much less corrupt than Trump, clearly. But he was a liar. HRC was a money grabber. They were financially and ethically corrupt and the mainstream media and the Democratic Party gave them cover. Sorry if you don't agree. I don't care.
Hunter Biden's corruption and Joe’s complicity are easily seen. Again, if you're a partisan shill, the view is different.
The massive cover up of Biden's incapacity is a story yet to be fully written.
Enter Trump: worse than all before him but, perversely, more open about it.
Trump does openly and orders of magnitude more in volume than Clinton/Biden but the difference is in degree, for the most part, not in kind.
It is interesting that as you plot this graph, the only points on the line before Trump are Democrats. But I'm the partisan shill?
Do I think that people give politicians a pass due to partisan reasons? Absolutely! I think that's a human tendency that's universal. It's something that ideally those of us in our respective political coalitions fight against, rather than pointing fingers and saying "they started it".
Feel free to put in the Republican corruption data points pre-Trump. Watergate? Nixon was booted from office. What else on the personal corruption ledger can you identify?
So, yes, the left prior to Trump was much more norm-bending/breaking than the right. Not to say the right didn't have its share of moral cretins, but they were booted, not enable/rationalized/contextualized.
The leftist complaints about non-cheaters being a bunch of goody goodies who went to Harvard is bizarre. These same people a week ago would accuse elites of being out-of-touch freaks, but now they're all perfect little angels who get off on judging the working class for not living up to their lived standards. This entire moral framework is based around stereotyping the working class as our of control. There's something to be said for the fact that the Stoller/Piker types are heavily driven by cultural resentment against people who make good life choices.
"What unites these reactions isn’t so much the defense of Platner as the staunch denial that there’s anything wrong here at all."
Sure. And also what unites these reactions is hatred of people like me, highly educated competent women who think that candidates for office should at least know what the fucking job entails and show some ability to do it, people who were terribly unimpressed by Bernie Sanders screaming about "what the government should do" and accomplishing absolutely fucking nothing as part of "the government", people who enthusiastically voted for Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama not because they, like us, went to Ivy League schools but because they seemed like real people who actually know what the fuck they are supposed to be doing when elected.
And speaking of Clintons, Bill Clinton managed to get himself elected and re-elected, and enjoy a reasonably successful presidency despite his personal failings and indiscretions, because he was an accomplished politician who projected competence-and delivered-and because he could connect with and persuade the people that he needed to vote for him. But his personal failings and indiscretions were a constant problem for him, for his family, for the democrats, and for the fucking country. I'll take a lot of baggage (not everything, but a lot) if it comes with someone who takes leadership and governing seriously, especially if they don't waste a lot of words casting people who have generally followed rules and, you know, accomplished something as the real losers, but everything is better when there is not a lot of baggage we have to take. But I'm not super interested in rallying behind someone who is an actual real fucking loser from an affluent background who has accomplished very little and who seems to have so much baggage that one could conclude that this is all he has.
I don't live in Maine. If I did I would be torn about whether to cast a very unenthusiastic vote for this arrogant ignorant prick to get Collins out, or, like, move to another state. But damn, Democrats, do better. Just. Do. Better. This is a winnable state. It would have been great if the choices had not been between an octogenarian friend of Schumer (no matter how competently she governed) and this guy.
Amen. The defense of Platner here is that moral rule-followers are ninnies and losers. Where have we heard that before? It's just disgraceful BS from the Platner apologists right now.
I mean, it almost boils down to "real people are the people who ignorantly make unfortunate tattoo choices and drunk post and drunk sext and if you haven't done that you aren't real people so shut up"
I have to say, the gratuitous swipe at Bernie Sanders, who isn't part of the article and doesn't have any scandals, makes me think your comment is about something other than just Platner.
You are correct. Not a big leap.
"Real people and manly men cheat on their wives, get over it, lib" is an astonishingly shitty retort. This is how the left is going to win back working class men? A bunch of pundits sitting around saying no guys you softhands don't understand, real men are shitheads?
I don’t understand why someone would expect a Texas Republican to vote for Talarico instead of Paxton yet not expect a Maine Democrat to vote for Collins instead of Platner. Isn’t the idea that being more/equally concerned with character vs policy is a *good* thing (especially when it comes to candidates who, despite being on the “wrong side of the aisle,” are still pretty moderate at the end of the day)? Isn’t “Ken Paxton is a scumbag Texans should vote for” the same perspective from the other ideological side?
The left cannot win in the United States by combining the right's "I'm a shameless asshole but I'm YOUR shameless asshole vibes again THEM" with left leaning politics and rhetoric. I think the reason it doesn't work is twofold:
a) The premise of the left is that "They are going to run things for the good of all," but then they often use rhetoric that demonizes a "Rich, Propertied, Selfish THEM" against the "Poor, Renting, Unselfish US." In a nation where a supermajority of adults are homeowners in the stock market with private health insurance, that kind of rhetoric is going to make a lot of middle class voters think they are THEM, and that makes people who might otherwise support sensible progressive policies feel viscerally threatened, both materially and morally.
b) When your premise is "we are going to run the government for the good of all" you have to actually be good, because you are asking people to vote for you so you can have legal authority over managing their lives. When your premise is "You let me do what I want and I'll let you do what you want," which is the inherent promise of MAGA, then you don't have to be good, you just can't let gas prices get too high.
Democrats and Progressives can complain to high heaven about the "unfairness" of it but, I'm sorry, your mother should have prepared you better for adult life.
Democrats and Progressives need to actually understand why so many Americans hate them enough to vote for Trump.
It's so frustrating to watch as an American that would like real progress and a real opposition to Trump.
"France, duh" is some perfect writing. Legit snorted into my coffee
I want more people to get their positions on the table pre-election, because the Platner and Talarico races are interesting to watch as a pair and could make a good test of DSA politics.
Maine has been consistently blue in presidential elections, and Collins does an impressive trick by overcoming party alignment through a moderate image. All Platner needs to do is recover the ticket-splitters who voted for Harris and Collins. I watched DSA Dems push Platner and if he loses they need to sincerely reflect on whether a moderate would have done better.
Texas is consistently red, and Talarico gets zero love from the DSA. But if he is the guy who finally flips Texas, that would be a really impressive accomplishment and really good for the party (& the country, IMHO - especially versus Paxton).
So as an unrepentant neoliberal, if November brings a Talarico win and a Platner loss, I want the Democrats to seriously get on the moderation bandwagon and tell the DSA to f*** off. I already think it's the right move, but this would seal the deal in my opinion.
Is Talarico actually practicing moderation? To me, he seems more or less like a generic Democrat who has the good fortune of running in a great cycle against a terrible opponent, and maybe he wins anyway for those reasons. He's made some moves to the middle (recent comments about oil and gas being important industries, trying to reach out to Cornyn supporters), but he doesn't break with the national party nearly as much as Jared Golden, MGP, or Joe Manchin.
I mean, fair question... I know that in the primary battle he was considered the moderate vs Crockett. He has a certain affective moderation, but I am not sure how much true policy moderation is in the mix.
But note my wording was a little subtle and tried to focus on the DSA and their role in the intraparty power struggle more than the Hard Truth of who is or isn't canonically moderate. That is also why I want people to put their markers down early, or this is going to be like the Harris debacle where after the fact everyone tries to link her to the other faction.
(For the record, there is a slight risk that my view of the DSA's candidate preferences is overly influenced by my one relative who is a noisy Leftie! But I definitely expect our Thanksgiving conversation to be about what these two races have meant for the struggle within the Democratic party.)
One of the things we've lost in the past decade or so us the ability to make the jerk/monster distinction. The evidence that Platner is a jerk keeps getting stronger and stronger. Platner winning will mean that Trump, who even if you limit it to what he did openly (January 6) and what he's been found legally liable for (E. Jean Carroll) is a monster, will have less power, Collins winning will mean that he'll have more. If that's not "moral clarity", so be it.
Most of the democrats will all line themselves up behind Platner because power is important. Control of the senate might be on the line
Meanwhile, most republicans will do the same behind ken paxton. For the exact same reason
" We can't let democrats have control over the senate do you know what they will do"
BOTH parties have sold their soul in the hopes of temporary power.
And you see what type of politicians we get. Worse, you see what type of voters we get
You should invite Dilan Esper to do a Mad Libs.
This was an excellent piece all around but perhaps my favorite observation involves the compulsion of commentators to define ‘realness’ in a certain way. I would vote for Platner in this election even though I like Collins, because I mean it when I advocate ‘Blue No Matter Who’ in all directions. But it just isn’t the case that he’s especially representative of the median American man. To take just one example, most men aren’t veterans! The whole exercise is a ritual of conflating authenticity with aspiration.
This is such a wise essay. The last paragraph in particular is a masterclass of political analysis and words I will think about for a long time.
But Platner agreed it was wrong, he and his wife are in couples therapy and his wife defends him. That is about the furthest thing from various moral failings of others who deny, deflect and dispute all charges. Life is a process and Platner is on a particular journey as he would be the first to admit. As such, it is not that different from his tattoo that he has now covered up. (Compare that to Hesgeth's tattoo's which are much worse and he still has). That is the lesson here, not that he is a scumbag.
Except he still can't admit it. He was saying "it's not true" on Sunday night, a day after his campaign and his wife both said it is true. The man is the same knucklehead he's always been, no matter how many stans insist "but he's taken responsibility and grown and changed!" It's just wishful thinking. Over and over again, Platner blames the media, or the establishment, or Chuck Schumer, or AIPAC, rather than take responsibility for his shitty behavior. I agree with Demsas that he's better than any Republican in November, but what an incredible loss for the party that still claims to care about integrity.
I’m no Platner stan. I would prefer someone with an electoral record. And his policy choices are not mine. But those are actual political / policy concerns. The NYT article says “Ms. Gertner said on Saturday that her marriage was strong, and she denounced “negative stories on Graham.” Enough with the purity patrol.
Ideological purity tests have hamstrung the Dems for a few cycles now and that's bad. We need to be a big tent ideologically, to win nationwide. But upholding standards for integrity is different. It's good to demand integrity, actually. Crazy to me that this even needs to be said.
The left started bending the rules under Clinton. People coming of age after 2000 think it was only sex. It wasn't. There were a number of financial scandals, culminating in the Mark Rich pardon. We still don't know the story on the Clinton Foundation. And we probably never will.
Clinton got a pass across the board.
Biden was clearly a corner cutter and made Hunter millions while declining mentally from before Day One--remember the Basement Campaign? That wasn't because Joe love hanging out underground. He couldn't withstand public scrutiny from the beginning.
Trump is all that passed before times a million. The left's complaints about norms and rules and whatnot are BS articles of convenience. Trump is the end product of the left excusing rule breaking for short term gains.
Before Clinton, everyone was pure and innocent, but especially Republicans. Then Clinton pardoned a Democratic donor. And then 20 years later Hunter made money. Therefore the left is to blame for Trump. Is that the chain of logic?
Either you are smarter than you let on, or you're a partisan shill. Clinton was much less corrupt than Trump, clearly. But he was a liar. HRC was a money grabber. They were financially and ethically corrupt and the mainstream media and the Democratic Party gave them cover. Sorry if you don't agree. I don't care.
Hunter Biden's corruption and Joe’s complicity are easily seen. Again, if you're a partisan shill, the view is different.
The massive cover up of Biden's incapacity is a story yet to be fully written.
Enter Trump: worse than all before him but, perversely, more open about it.
Trump does openly and orders of magnitude more in volume than Clinton/Biden but the difference is in degree, for the most part, not in kind.
It is interesting that as you plot this graph, the only points on the line before Trump are Democrats. But I'm the partisan shill?
Do I think that people give politicians a pass due to partisan reasons? Absolutely! I think that's a human tendency that's universal. It's something that ideally those of us in our respective political coalitions fight against, rather than pointing fingers and saying "they started it".
Feel free to put in the Republican corruption data points pre-Trump. Watergate? Nixon was booted from office. What else on the personal corruption ledger can you identify?
So, yes, the left prior to Trump was much more norm-bending/breaking than the right. Not to say the right didn't have its share of moral cretins, but they were booted, not enable/rationalized/contextualized.