“Few politicians are taking a harder hit” for aligning with the “rising star” — now falling star — than the California congressman.
U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna hustled to endorse Graham “P-Hustle” Platner, the Nazi tattoo guy, presumably to pander to the so-called Democratic Socialists and other far-left activists who seems to be on the electoral ascendancy, but it appears to have backfired.
The politically ambitious California Democrat has withdrawn his Platner endorsement, as have many of his previously fawning colleagues, after the latest revelations which the “oysterman” has denied.
Initially, Khanna “dismissed the complaints about [Platner] by claiming he just said some ‘dumb’ things,” the New York Post editorial board recalled.
The situation is still developing as of this writing, so it remains to be seen if Platner will exit his campaign for U.S. Senate from Maine so that the Democrat establishment can replace him on the November general election ballot pursuant to upcoming state legal deadlines.
As an aside, Graham Platner — a Democrat who at one point reportedly described himself as a communist — was previously deemed the fakest of fake populists on the left. But Ro Khanna perhaps can give Platner a run for his money, as it were.
The socialists and progressives, and other advocates of confiscatory tax policies, may have yet to realize that Khanna is someone who allegedly hides his family’s massive wealth through the kind of elaborate tax shelters that he routinely condemns.
And as another digression, is there anything more cringe than when politicians who barely know each other, and may not even like each other, hold hands? Hugging may be a close second.
Apart from all that, even the liberal Politico news outlet has concluded that Khanna made a big mistake in campaigning for and with Platner:
“In the blast radius from the sexual assault allegations against Graham Platner, few politicians are taking a harder hit than Silicon Valley Rep. Ro Khanna. Khanna, arguably more than any other national Democrat, provided political cover for the renegade Maine Senate candidate. He stood by Platner as he was buffeted by a series of controversies and physically stood with him onstage at a campaign rally in Maine, one day after the New York Times reported on the oysterman’s toxic behavior toward former girlfriends…
“Khanna’s speed [in withdrawing his endorsement] did not spare him the backlash for being such a steadfast supporter of Platner until this point, despite the Senate candidate’s tattoo resembling a Nazi symbol or old offensive online posts…
“Khanna bet big on Platner as a rising star among progressives, the wing of the party he has assertively courted in the run-up to a potential 2028 presidential run. For months, he basked in the attention that came with being a prominent surrogate for a buzzy Democrat in a top-tier Senate race. Now, that wager has proven to be a bust.
“’Ro Khanna will always and forever be the Graham Platner defender’ said one California Democratic strategist…’I don’t think damage control is going to fix the damage he’s created by getting himself in the middle of this.’”
[emphasis added]
It’s worth noting that office-holders or office-seekers like Platner, Andrew Cuomo, Eric Swalwell, Joe Biden, and many others, seem to be slow learners:
It should be obvious by now that when a politician’s electoral usefulness ends, the Democrat machine — along with the compliant corporate media which amplifies negative stores on command rather than otherwise conveniently ignoring them — will immediately banish them.
Common sense suggests that Democrat insiders had already concluded that Platner would lose to incumbent Sen. Susan Collins, a moderate Republican.
As pundit Larry O’Connor observed on X (formerly Twitter), “Let’s be clear: If Dems force Platner to drop out, it will not be because they find him and his behavior repulsive. It’ll be because they’re convinced he can’t win. That’s the entirety of their calculations right now.”
On Substack, author and NewsNation host Batya Ungar-Sargon wrote on Monday that hypocritical Democrats like Ro Khanna should have turned on “scandal-ridden” Platner a long time ago, rather than just when the latest allegations surfaced:
“…The New York Times reported the story of another ex-girlfriend who accused Platner of roughing her up and leaving bruises, even locking her in a bedroom. That ex-girlfriend was dismissed because she’s a Republican. The new accuser, though, ‘was torn over coming forward in part because she agrees with Platner politically.’ Thanks to these Left-wing bonafides, some Democrats have begun rescinding their endorsements of Platner…”
“Obviously, it’s better for the Democrats to drop an alleged rapist than stand by him. But it also only underscores just how long they were willing to defend him, just how much they were willing to forgive…”
“The Nazi tattoo really should have been a dealbreaker. There is just no coming back from defending a Nazi tattoo. And yet, for the country’s top Democrats, it just wasn’t…a party that will defend a man with a Nazi tattoo—after spending a decade calling its political opposition Nazis—has no standards.”
According to the aforementioned New York Post editorial board, Democrats have let Trump derangement syndrome get the best of them, with Platner as one of the political symptoms of same:
“…the only reason they’re deserting [Platner] now is not that they’ve finally grown a moral spine; it’s that they fear his grotesque character won’t fly with normal voters. Not only would a continued Platner campaign for Maine’s US Senate seat almost certainly fail; voters nationwide may now realize that Democrats are morally bankrupt — that they stand for nothing, except the acquisition of raw political power by any means…
“Even mainstream Dems tolerated [Platner’s] candidacy, seeing it as part of a path to Democratic control of the Senate — while overlooking his disqualifying traits or taking the coward’s approach and remaining silent. Yet his appalling flaws were beyond glaring…The fact is, Democrats have been so wrapped up in their Trump hate, they totally failed to develop any realistic political agenda likely to improve the lives of voters…
Original article“Fact is, Democrats have a problem. They need an agenda that’s not Orange Man Bad. They need to focus on what Americans want. They need to purge the radicals and sleazebags among them. Until they do all that, none of them deserves anyone’s vote.”
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