"The Characteristics that ruin a man in one class make him eminent in another."
--George Bernard Shaw
For MAGAs, i.e. for Republicans, the only requirement is you love Donald Trump, or at least obey him and nod yes to every wackadoodle action he takes.
 |
| She Gives Him What He Wants |
For Democrats, it's not enough to be for vaccines, to believe people of all races enrich our nation, to think that before making war on a culture we do not understand, in a part of the world we have never comprehended is stupid, to believe we can afford a well designed national healthcare system and to agree if that health care system extends to caring for people who don't look like us or sound like us that's okay, to believe that the government ought to stay out of the bedroom, that contraception is just fine and to believe that abortion, while regrettable should not be denied--all of that is not enough.
 |
| Didn't Go to Yale |
For Democrats, a man who leers at women at a bar, a man who gets drunk and disorderly who bullies or brags is disqualified from holding public office. For Democrats, every candidate must be virtuous, having learned morals at the feet of approved philosophers. He must choose his pronouns carefully.
To question whether people who went through puberty as boys ought to be able to play on a field hockey team against girls who went through puberty as girls, or to be able to swim on women's swimming team--that is a litmus test for the truly deserving, the sincerely moral.
Only paragons of virtue need apply.
What the scandalized, sanctimonious cannot abide is the Jimmy McNulty's of the world. (Mad Dog understands that most people have not watched "The Wire," and so they do not get that allusion,) but what the reaction to Graham Platner's rough edges is all about is not morals, nor character but it is all about class.
David Brooks looks at Platner and sees a tattoo, a brute, a guy who drinks at the bar, not in a corner booth.
 |
| Not Reality |
So David Brooks calls Platner a "moral degenerate."
But, fact is, there is are vast herds of Platners out there who look at Brooks and see an example of a privileged snotty class of would be aristocrats. The lobstermen, truck drivers, HVAC guys will never vote Democratic because they know their class is no longer welcomed in the Democratic Party. They know they are seen as moral degenerates.
And the women, oh, the women! Who could vote for a man who would twist the wrist of a woman, or who would get so angry he would lock her in a room until they both calm down? So much better to vote for a Woman who looks so sweet in her Ann Taylor suits, who wears lapel pins with the American flag (and sometimes with an added Ukrainian flag) while she quietly votes for a man who betrays an actual hero in his fight against a real autocrat trying to rape Ukraine.
 |
| Collins Betrays Her |
Remember, it was the women who were so taken with Der Furher, who voted for him.
Better to have that nice grandmother voting to install Robert F. Kennedy Jr into office so he can cancel vaccines and unleash epidemics, better to choose a woman who votes for Kristie Noem and her storm trooper brigades and better to vote for a woman who reacts to the murders of Alex Pretti and Renee Good by suggesting perhaps next time we can ask ICE agents to wear body cameras. Or perhaps counseling and better training for the goons.
 |
| So Sweet |
The fact is, the choice is not between voting for a nice old lady and a moral degenerate, who, out of a population of 1.4 million Mainers is the best the Democratic Party can offer. We are not being asked to scold the Democratic Party for its temerity in running a tattooed soldier who snarls at his lovers. Our choice is between a guy with dirty hands and a woman who has blood on her hands.
This is the woman who would wash and iron her husband's Ku Klu Klan robe and hang it in the closet for him and then hold a tea for the wives and daughters of their murderous husbands and fathers.
Susan Collins' middle name is, officially, Margaret.
Susan Collins's middle name in truth is "Complicity."
