Susan Collins, A Uniquely Bad Senator, Turns to the Dark Money

There are undoubtedly perks associated with growing up in Maine, but one of the sad truths is that at age 13, I was forced—along with the rest of my high school—to listen to Susan Collins. It was fall 2006, and Senator Collins spoke in our high school’s auditorium, which I note—to provide a sense of scale—doubled as our cafeteria. Collins has never been an engaging speaker, and this day was no exception; a Daily Kos post from around then suggests she discussed “ethics in public office.” I wonder whether she believed this would genuinely engage a crowd of sleep-deprived teenagers on a Tuesday morning; I doubt she cared. For Collins, bland has always played fine. Two years after that speech, she’d earn a third Senate term with more than sixty-one percent of the vote—in a state that was simultaneously lumbering to the polls for Barack Obama—and in 2014, she cruised to a fourth term with a whopping sixty-eight percent.