ep. 225 - Graham Platner: Autopsy of a Failure

There was something unique I noticed about Platner’s campaign. Unlike Mamdani with his polished, quick and highly produced videos, Platner would speak into a front facing camera with no cuts to say he is sorry. Each time he had to address some past scandal, his drinking, his womanizing, his Nazi tattoo, he would look into his camera, apologize, and his poll numbers would go up. Why? I realized that it was this front facing confession of his sins that put us in the position of a priest. Platner, instead of denying or doing the corporate dem meaningless word salad, was saying he was wrong and was asking for forgiveness. And We were on the receiving end of his apology and we were given the power to grant him grace. But we are not priests. We are Americans. The blood is on our hands. Platner is just a mirror. He is the avatar of our guilt, of our sins. If a man who was a soldier in a criminal war, a man who was an abusive drunk toward women, a man who served the mercenary machine and fed it blood can be redeemed, then maybe there is hope for us all. Because deep down I believe that Americans know we are living wrong. To discuss this further, I am joined by journalist Jasper Craven who recently interviewed Graham Platner in the New Yorker. Craven has written extensively about the culture and psychology of American veterans, most notably in his excellent new book, God Forgives, Brothers Don't, which we will be doing a book club on the very near future, so if you haven’t got yourself a copy, make sure you do. As always, thank you thank you for your continued support. Send me messages of things you’d like me to talk about, criticisms of what I could do better, because I’m in it for the long haul. Enjoy the show.