On Platner
“This world is the will to power - and nothing besides!” wrote Friedrich Nietzsche. Politics is, perhaps, the most basic expression of this will available to most humans at this point in our history. We have seen the toll taken on the country by the pursuit of power at the expense of all else by the Republican Party over the past decade and more, the only question is - shall Democrats also throw their souls onto the pyre in the hope of the remuneration being sufficient to buy control?
This is not the first time the Democratic Party has thrown convictions aside - let us recall how swiftly Bill Clinton was taken up and all principles discarded - but it is the most egregious given how they have spent years screeching that anyone to the right of Bernie Sanders is a Nazi. Making the “ok” symbol with your hand makes you a white supremacist, we were told. Now we are condescendingly informed that having an SS tattoo on your chest for 18 years is simply a childish mistake that any of us could make, and, by God, we should give people some grace.
It is possible that as a young Marine, on leave with other Marines, and being rather intoxicated, Platner did not know what the tattoo he was getting actually meant at the time, but the claim he was unaware of its meaning for years (conveniently right up until the time he launched a Senate campaign), is disingenuous at best. I may insist on being old-fashioned here, and simply call it a lie, which it most certainly is. In numerous interviews, Platner has referred to himself as a student of history. He is a poor student if he remained ignorant of what was indelibly inked beneath his skin. I also accuse him of being entirely deficient in intellectual curiosity if he never once investigated the matter, and that sin alone should render him unelectable.
A member of the United States Senate must be curious. Writing legislation to solve problems is difficult. The job requires one to become educated on topics of which you were previously ignorant, and become an expert in subjects in which you had some - or even extensive - education and experience. If you do not have the curiosity to meaningfully investigate problems, you will never solve them, and solving is problems is the heart of what being a Senator means. If you cannot do this, you will not represent your constituents well. However, now that all politics is national, there is less appetite for members who represent their constituents. Rather, the hunger is for those who only do what the Party desires, regardless of what it costs those whom the member supposedly serves.
While that sin is, and should be, enough, there are more that must be cataloged. He is, as are so many of the progressive movement, another bored, spoiled rich kid, cosplaying as a revolutionary. While one might think this would be disqualifying amongst the Marxists, it has a long and honorable tradition in the revolution, beginning, of course, with Marx himself. Platner had a privileged, wealthy upbringing that he does his best to obfuscate. He calls himself an oysterman, when his sole customer is his mother’s restaurant. (Terribly convenient to have a built-in customer. Not all are so fortunate.) His history of internet posts would result in any Republican being mercilessly flayed by the national press. His denigration of a Purple Heart recipient contains within it an odd echo of Trump’s statement that he likes people who weren’t captured.
The latest revelatory admission is that of texting numerous women while married, and not married for very long. Infidelity - physical or not - is not a good look for any candidate. If he is willing to deceive his wife, about what else, and to whom, is he willing to be deceptive? In an ideal world, President Trump’s numerous and well-documented infidelities alone would have sunk his candidacy. Alas, we do not live in such a world. But no one should make the mistake of assuming that what did not stick to Trump will not stick to others.
All of this is brushed aside. None of it matters since Platner might help Democrats take the majority in the Senate. Perhaps, as Nietzsche also put it, Democrats have stared too long into the abyss, and it has begun to stare back. And not only stare back, but infest the party in ways that should not be tolerable. Those who have long attempted to claim the moral high ground should not be so eager to abandon it in pursuit of power. The first party that manages to be normal and competent will rule the country for a generation. The normies are out there, but they are so dissatisfied with everyone, we very much find ourselves in a "plague o’ both your houses” situation. Let us hope it does not end in a tragic, and entirely unnecessary, double suicide. Though with the way both parties are behaving, it seems like it might.
