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'The Establishment Is Spooked': Poll Shows Platner With Big Lead Over Mills in Maine Democratic Primary
(www.commondreams.org)
this post was submitted on 23 Oct 2025
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Discussion point: Graham Platner has some very questionable aspects to their backstory.
I say this as both an unabashed leftist, and a veteran. I was downloading MP3's of Democracy Now! and discussing Zinn with my section chief in 2003.
I propose the following material for review:
Don Lemon and Wajahat on the matter of Portner
Humanist report on Portner
TYT on Platner
Breaking points on Platner
I say this as someone who has met with Platner and as part of an organization I volunteer with, we endorsed Platner about 5 days before this came out. I've been on the endorsements committee, and we've never previously had to rescind an endorsement.
I'm interested in what you, Lemmy, have to say on this matter.
From someone with absolutely no horse in this race I feel this is looking a gift horse in the mouth. No matter how bad he turns out to be (which, yeah, I don't think I'm convinced he'll be a principled anti-imperialist in office), he's not going to outdo establishment democrats by much. The way American democracy is going it's worth the bet, I think.
For this race, I agree. The worst he can be is a Fetterman... Who sucks but is still better than fucking Dr. Oz.
But be careful with this line of thinking. It's very similar to how the right ended up voting for Trump. It's actually how a lot of really awful governments gained power. "Anything different" than the current catastrophe does not inherently mean better.
My point was more that you lose if you get anything to the right of an outspoken progressive, and given the speed of Trump's consolidation of power the amount of loss is essentially unchanged. Therefore, better on someone who might realistically be an outspoken progressive is the optimal move. It's kind of like "you can get bitch slapped, or you can toss a coin and you either get bitch slapped extra hard or get a cookie." The damage is being done either way, so you might as well bet on the cookie.
I dunno. I feel like a few countries made a similar bet (but to a higher extreme) during the Arab spring and it went extra bad. It's important to be careful about who and what you're trying to replace an authoritarian system with.