Graham Cracked

Too many second-chances floating false hope

Photo by Jorge Campos on Unsplash

By now, unless you’ve had your phone off for the last few days and avoided audiovisual media of all kinds, you’ve learned that Graham Platner, the newly minted Democratic Senate candidate from Maine, has rape allegations. Maine has under a week for him to drop out and Democrats seat someone to run for the office whose bid isn’t beset by rape, sexting, unwanted sexual advances, a Nazi tattoo, stupid Reddit comments…the list seems to grow each time I look.

There’s a lot of finger-pointing going on. Is it his fault? Yeah, probably. He should have come clean about anything that compromised his run for office or even better, not run since his personal house is in disorder. Is it the Democratic Party’s fault? Yeah, they share blame too. They were busy pushing Mills on Maine and trying to undercut this guy, against what Maine voters said they wanted. Instead of burning money arguing with their own base, they could have taken a deeper dive into the man that appeared to be the presumptive nominee and ensure he didn’t have, I don’t know, a rape shaped skeleton waiting to jump out a week before they could replace him and scream, “Allegations!”

I think there’s more afoot here though. In a word, electability. Yeah, you’ve heard this tossed around a lot. “She has the credentials and the background, but is she electable?” “He’s popular with certain constituencies but will he resonate with working class voters to be truly electable?” What is electability? Oh, I can feel some of you pulling away from the screen right now in horror, because you know I’m gonna say it. Yup, like my man Kurupt, I’m calling out names. As patrician pronunciations of urban voters through tightly pursed lips usually means Black, electable means won’t scare white voters over to your opponent or right out of the voting booth altogether.

Yes, an electable candidate is basically one that soothes, calms and is seen relatable to poor and middle-class white voters, especially those imagined to live in the center of America speaking with an accent like Edie McClurg’s. She was in Ferris Bueller and an 80’s sitcom called Small Wonder. Look her up. It’s the trait that made Obama, dancing just enough on beat on an episode of Ellen, without moving his hips in any direction, an electable candidate. It’s also what made Rev. Jesse Jackson, unapologetically movement inclined and social justice oriented, a long shot as a Democratic candidate, even before reports of comments about NYC.

Some white readers just finished the paragraph above and are thinking, “Well, I would have no problem with a more justice oriented BIPOC or woman candidate!” That may well be true, and I’m glad that’s where you’re at. The fact remains that a whole lot more of the rest in your demo do have a problem with it. The proof is in the pudding. The current president pulled strong support from a majority of white voters in every election he ran in, including among those identifying as Christian (Hallelujah! Praise Jesus!). That remained despite assault allegations, adult film star payoffs, cheating on all his wives, felony convictions, grifting, COVID response failure, economic destruction, racism, sexism, crass behavior and any other thing that would’ve tanked other campaigns all on their own. None of that was a threat to his support because he has the two things that appear to be the most reliably electable qualities among white voters; he’s white and a man.

Other than the anomaly that was President Barack Hussein Obama, the majority of white voters in the US have a type. That type is white and male. The next attribute in importance isn’t what most would expect, like competence, excellence in a profession, demonstrated governing acumen or the like. No, it is as they referred to it during Dubya’s reign of buffoonish incompetence, “the guy you’d most like to have a beer with.” It’s not, academic achievement, negotiating prowess, deductive reasoning, IQ scores, savant-like mathematical calculation or beating the Kobayashi Maru. When it’s all on the line, economic headwinds, international threats, red phone ringing or nuclear arsenal usage in question, the thing that matters most is who you’d prefer to sit out in the yard on lawn chairs with, crack a cold one and shoot the shit.

I’ve seen this before, and no it wasn’t Beto. Take a walk with me through memory lane and we’ll stop the time machine during the 2008 election. Candidate Obama was on the campaign trail and made a stop in, where else, the mandatory electoral debutante to court, the state of Ohio. A man named Joe claimed to be poised to buy a plumbing company that had annual revenues around $250K or so. He asked Obama, with a question formed to confirm an already determined verdict, if his tax proposal touted during the campaign would cost him more in taxes. Candidate Obama explained that under his proposal that the rates for income above $250K would go up but everything below that would stay the same, while he also proposed a tax cut to support health care coverage for small businesses like the one mentioned.

From this point on, the legend of Joe the Plumber, aka Joe Wurzelbacher was born. You couldn’t get away from this guy afterwards. He was getting interviewed on every channel. They made sure to include him in a town hall style debate between candidates McCain and Obama and ask his opinion specifically on their performances. He became a darling of the right-wing because he epitomized the small business guy that was gonna take it in the shorts from all of that leftie, pinko, commie tax-raising that pays for the stuff both parties stuff into budgets, instead of deficit spending and taking on more debt. Obama’s impromptu explanation of how the progressive income tax system that’s been in place for decades works, notwithstanding, Joe was unmoved and continued to view and call this rate hike proposal on incomes above $250K a tax hike on the little guy.

He became the stand-in for the average working guy just trying to get ahead. A bellwether of the mood of the country. Need the average guy’s take on what’s happening? Check in with Joe the Plumber. The truth is that Joe didn’t make more than $50K in preceding years, probably couldn’t have afforded to buy that plumbing business he mentioned and didn’t have a plumbing license, a prerequisite for just such a purchase in his state. He would eventually go on to endorse McCain. That’s right, a guy referred to as a plumber, who had no plumbing license, and embellished claims of buying a business was a sought-after endorsement for the McCain camp. Why? He was gruff, unpolished, folksy and a white guy.

His newfound fame decrying Candidate Obama’s proposals as socialism, endorsement of McCain and constant bitching about taxes, set up his progression to Republican candidate four years later. He had no governing experience, and apparently no prior aspirations for office until a group of enthused supporters coaxed him to run. Run he did, securing the Republican nomination and then getting drubbed in the general by his Democratic opponent.

His inexperience wasn’t his only impediment. He backed his loose gun regulation stances, using the Holocaust and Armenian genocide as proof of what happens when people can’t buy guns with the ease of getting a soda out of a vending machine. However, his stance that old 2A is to prevent the nation from being overrun by a tyrannical government stands disproved, as this nation with over 400M guns in circulation whimpers meekly, overrun by billionaires and their pet politicians. He also went a bridge too far in declaring that the US should build a big fence at its southern border and start shooting. This seems almost quaint now that the country elected a president for the second time who, along with his cabinet, says virtually the same thing on a near daily basis.

All of the above brings me back to our latest great white withering hope. Like Plum…uhm, I mean Wurzelbacher, Platner is gruff, unpolished but an “oystuhmin” out of Maine. His beard, flannel, work boot credentials and working guy persona ticked, he left Mainers fanning themselves as they fainted dead away, completely overcome with how enamored they were. His everyday white guy vibes, looking, acting and tahhking like the guy other average white guys would love to have a beer with, skyrocketed him into the conversation. Unlike Joe, though, Platner would embrace the progressive stances similar to AOC, Bernie Sanders, and the REAL America’s mayor, Mayor Zohran Mamdani. This, actually, seemed like a rare bit of lightning caught in a bottle to bring an energized challenge to longtime Senator Susan “this really concerns me but I’m gonna vote for it anyway” Collins.

As is their wont, the Democratic establishment was already in the bag for the candidate they chose for their voters, looooooooooooooooooooong before the primary ever took place; sitting Governor Janet Mills. As they did on a national stage with HRC versus Barack Obama for president, they backed themselves into a corner with a known and tenured candidate that voters weren’t blown away by, and tried to beat back an upstart who seemed to have all the momentum in the world.

It’s at this critical juncture that I think that two major mistakes were made. First, the Democratic Party lately, much like the disgraced former governor they would continue to endorse for NYC mayor, AFTER he got his clock cleaned in the primary by Mamdani, can’t accept no for an answer. Instead of feeling Maine’s temperature, realizing that Platner had momentum and was the likely candidate, they worked feverishly to tell Maine that the party knew better than voters who they wanted. That was wasted energy that could have avoided their second mistake.

The Democratic Party doesn’t appear to have done any decent opposition research on Platner to make sure he didn’t have any major issues that would make him go from hero to goat in the space of a news report. Given that the guy was looking like he had the primary in the bag, the Dems should have asked Mills in back channels to shut it down. Then, they should have used the party funds they spent trying to push Mills across the finish line to fund good Platner oppo instead. Anything they found that was irreparable, they could bring to Platner and get him to shut his own race down for Mills and David Costello, the other Democratic primary contestant, to battle it out. If anything found was potentially manageable, the Platner campaign and Democratic Party could work up strategy ahead of any news releases, and make sure he didn’t break one of his legs as he was galloping towards the finish.

As we see now, neither of these things happened. For anyone reading who’s thinking, “Yeah, ok Monday morning quarterback”, I can see how you’d feel that way but I honestly thought they’d already done some oppo. Let’s consider what happened. He had momentum, he was drawing support from all around the state, and he was looking more and more like a lock. He already faced two scandals early on in his primary: the tattoo most popularly known as a Nazi Totenkopf, then some Reddit posts that insulted people in rural areas. The Nazi tattoo alone should have been cause to make sure the guy wasn’t a closeted Uncle Atomwaffen or something. Had they done that, not only would they have known about the sexting, they’d have learned about the other allegations too and prevented the disaster materializing around a winnable Senate seat like a sulfurous phantasm.

Nope. No one wanted to hear anything once it looked like the Platner train was at full chug. The DNC’s lifeless marionette of a chairman waived off the Reddit comments. No inkling to see if smoke meant fire. Other Senators rushed to defend him, one claiming he was just someone who made mistakes. All coalesced behind the brash, gruff white guy who’d show the Senate a thing or two, without a lick of curiosity to make sure the guy wasn’t too good to be true as tremors of scandal began triggering the seismograph.

Is this a pitch for what I imagine is the 99.9996% white population of Maine to seek diversity and choose a person of color as a candidate? Uhhmm, no. The state’s makeup is what it is, and it shouldn’t be made to forage for POC to run for public office. However, two other candidates were running as progressives when Platner threw his hat in the ring. The aforementioned David Costello, ran unsuccessfully against Angus King before and ran again in the primary this year. Unlike Platner, he doesn’t boast the rugged outdoors credentials that win you the white guy vote. So, his experience working at USAID, as aide to a governor and his environmental focus and international experience don’t have that same delicious feeling of danger it seems white voters are drawn to, similar to nice girls swooning for a brooding guy on a motorcycle in a leather jacket.

The other was a write-in candidate named Andrea LaFlamme, an adjunct professor whose website I checked out. She held progressive positions and was pretty much running a campaign on a shoestring and gumption, so no danger of any PAC’s buying her vote, at least in her first term anyway. She’s not a maverick of a white man, though, is she. While Uncle Bernie Sanders was crowing over Platner, I didn’t see anything about him even looking into LaFlamme. You’d think a man obsessed with telling you about how you’re being ravaged by millyunayuhhs and billyunayuhhs, would have been intrigued by a plucky professor unbeholden to special interests who holds strong progressive stands. Apparently not.

I hear talk of coaxing venerated Substack writer Heather Cox Richardson to fill the Senate seat in a pinch, and I guess that’s an option if she’s up for it. We know she knows her history, and as a subscriber to her Substack, I can tell you she has no confusion about how government works, separation of powers and the check and balance Congress is supposed to be on the other branches. If anyone has a chance to beat the essential tremor out of Collins to take that seat right now, it could well be HCR, once Platner realizes he’s dead and lets them take his political body to the morgue.

However, that is addressing a symptom, not curing the disease. I’ve written the following already in a couple of notes. Until US voters, and the Democratic Party especially, abandons the love affair with the mythical gruff, white, straight-talkin’, beer-drinkin’, “workin’ man” ideal as their dream candidate, this kind of spontaneous electoral combustion will keep happening. I’m not saying that all average white men are unqualified. I’m saying that there are more attributes to consider for election, than just the guy be white and considered relatable to other average white people. Maybe it’s time for voters and parties to stop voting for an archetype, and start voting for credentials, platforms and proposals instead. I mean, could it be worse than scrambling to replace an accused rapist with the clock about to strike twelve? Think about it.