I hesitate to say that maybe the first step in an effective recovery program for Trump voters is to confess, "I AM A VICTIM." I don't know how healthy this is, and I have a problem when people who belong to the "Party of Personal Responsibility" so readily embrace victimhood like this, but if this FIRST step leads to the SECOND step, then I am all for it.
And what is the second step? It is to realize that you are a victim, NOT of Democrats or even of "liberals," but of REPUBLICANS. Yes, Republicans.
I will start feeling more confident about this two-step recovery program when I start to see it WORKING. I really don't see it working yet.
“Trump Voters” - you’re speaking of them as THE OTHER
What Platner understands is that people aren’t wedded to TRUMP as their primary identity.
As a socialist who also moved back to my rural hometown, the “Trumpers” as you call them, are for the most part, just PISSED OFF POOR PEOPLE who’ve seen everything from their communities extracted and see their lives too expensive to live.
MANY VOTED OBAMA AND MANY MORE voted for Bernie in the Dem Primary.
Please quit treating poor people who in anger at a status quo that continually dismisses them as undeserving, voted for Trump as a fuck you to those who demean them, as some kind of sociological monolith whose primary identity revolves around Trump worship.
I truly believe that there are people who are doing their best to divide us and say that one side is extreme left or extreme right, when in fact there are many people on opposite sides of the spectrum who share the same values.
During Apartheid, the government did its best to create a divide between the ANC and the Inkatha, because divided they could not fight as strongly.
It is possible that Tea Party (I can't bring myself to embrace the MAGAt's yet) and Occupy Wall Street have more in common than one might realize at first.
So what's the overunder that the Dem Establishment tanks this by throwing all of their weight behind the 77 year old governor who they're all already friends with in the primary. This feels like AOC on oversight again and I don't like it.
Graham Platner's platform strikes me as a powerful blast of thoughtful, impassioned fresh air. Nothing in it seems like pandering, or shows any sign of being tweaked to death by brainless consultants. https://www.grahamforsenate.com/platform
Universal health care would be far cheaper than the for-profit system we have now. Medicare is a good example of how that works. It would probably be far more effective as well.
I don't know if I would use the term compash - not that I'm agin it.
I think the problem he is getting at is the erosion of our civil society, our communities, our neighborhoods and social contexts and groups and clubs and all that the interwebs have acted like a corrosive acid on all that. We need to try to return.
I was in Boulder last weekend for a buddhist meditation thingy and I noticed on the street everyone was fingering their phones, talking to them, loving them. They were walking into oncoming traffic without a care, because Phone was there. Everyone on the plane watched movies. THen back in Dallas everyone was on their phones on the streets - looking, watching, touching, fingering - the phones were there and nothing else.
I think you got that backwards, most of the erosion of civil society happened before smart phones. The streets were stolen by cars, so you can't meet people by going outside. The local watering hole was made off limits to a lot of people because you now need a car to get there which excludes a lot of disabled people, all young people, and everyone who wants a beer but doesn't have sober friends, and kids aren't allowed because apparently we just gave up on communal raising of kids. People were isolated by income in suburbs and other subdivisions, the stores were made massive and moved far away so instead of daily running into your neighbours, friends, and family because you forgot the milk again; you are forced into a massive building full of strangers once every week or two. Meanwhile, we've made absolutely sure that different generations don't have to interact at all, When was the last time you helped an old lady get her groceries? And that isn't because you're not nice, it is because you literally never interact with old ladies. (If this does not apply to you, then it still applies to a lot more people now than before.)
So people got lonely. And then after the popularisation of the internet we found we could find people with identical interests online, so we spent more and more time on devices because that's the only place where randomly running into friends is at least occasionally possible. And now you want to take that away from them?
First we should solve the underlying problem, reshape neighbourhoods around social interaction, which includes but is not limited to taking back the streets from cars: Almost everyone can walk five hundred steps to their car, so if you put all non-handicapped parking outside of the neighbourhood, then finally kids can play in the street again, getting to know real people and making friends. Allow shops and cafés near homes again so people run into each other. add lots of little public parks with benches, and little nooks and crannies just outside apartment blocks so the people there have social places to run into each other. This stuff isn't hard, it just means sacrificing the lawns by densifying towns and taking back space for real people in the streets.
"Men and women both have the right to vote, [name a few other rights here that suit the listener], so what does it matter? If some guy starts wearing a dress that doesn't change what rights this person has does it? Because both men and women have equal rights. So why do you care? Let people be weird, everyone is weird in one way or another."
Finally, a Democrat who can talk about empathy without sounding like a TED Talk in yoga pants.
Graham Platner rolls into rural Maine with tattoos, VA scars, and Circle K coffee, telling people that compassion isn’t weakness, it’s strategy. Meanwhile Susan Collins is still somewhere clutching her pearls and whispering, “I’m concerned.”
Platner’s out here proving you can be tough, tattooed, and still believe healthcare is a human right. That’s not woke. That’s just what happens when you’ve seen war and decided peace deserves funding too.
If she was concerned she would've run as a Democrat. She's just playing at hearing "both sides" while voting with the bad guys every time, and she knows it.
I hope to hell she is VERY FUCKING CONCERNED. I despise her namby-pamby bullshit. She may have started out as a Mainer but she sure as hell is not a Mainer any more. Her over-stay (she said--PROMISED--she'd leave after two terms--she's now on her FIFTH TERM) in Washington, D.C. has made her a mealy-mouthed hypocrite in modified MAGAt clothing. Sure, she votes against her party occasionally--but ONLY when it doesn't count. She pretends to be a moderate but her "moderate stance" is about as phony as it gets.
I love Maine, and I’m really hoping Graham and beat that hideous lying twat.
I hesitate to say that maybe the first step in an effective recovery program for Trump voters is to confess, "I AM A VICTIM." I don't know how healthy this is, and I have a problem when people who belong to the "Party of Personal Responsibility" so readily embrace victimhood like this, but if this FIRST step leads to the SECOND step, then I am all for it.
And what is the second step? It is to realize that you are a victim, NOT of Democrats or even of "liberals," but of REPUBLICANS. Yes, Republicans.
I will start feeling more confident about this two-step recovery program when I start to see it WORKING. I really don't see it working yet.
“Trump Voters” - you’re speaking of them as THE OTHER
What Platner understands is that people aren’t wedded to TRUMP as their primary identity.
As a socialist who also moved back to my rural hometown, the “Trumpers” as you call them, are for the most part, just PISSED OFF POOR PEOPLE who’ve seen everything from their communities extracted and see their lives too expensive to live.
MANY VOTED OBAMA AND MANY MORE voted for Bernie in the Dem Primary.
Please quit treating poor people who in anger at a status quo that continually dismisses them as undeserving, voted for Trump as a fuck you to those who demean them, as some kind of sociological monolith whose primary identity revolves around Trump worship.
Do Better
I truly believe that there are people who are doing their best to divide us and say that one side is extreme left or extreme right, when in fact there are many people on opposite sides of the spectrum who share the same values.
During Apartheid, the government did its best to create a divide between the ANC and the Inkatha, because divided they could not fight as strongly.
It is possible that Tea Party (I can't bring myself to embrace the MAGAt's yet) and Occupy Wall Street have more in common than one might realize at first.
I feel Graham Platner may understand that
Thank you. This was so well written.
So what's the overunder that the Dem Establishment tanks this by throwing all of their weight behind the 77 year old governor who they're all already friends with in the primary. This feels like AOC on oversight again and I don't like it.
I… might have a tiny crush on Graham Platner now.
I like the positive vibe even though it’s a bit of the same “when they go low we go high”
Graham Platner's platform strikes me as a powerful blast of thoughtful, impassioned fresh air. Nothing in it seems like pandering, or shows any sign of being tweaked to death by brainless consultants. https://www.grahamforsenate.com/platform
Ta, Dok. This entire maladministration is nothing but rot. Platner's a breath of fresh air.
Universal health care would be far cheaper than the for-profit system we have now. Medicare is a good example of how that works. It would probably be far more effective as well.
I don't know if I would use the term compash - not that I'm agin it.
I think the problem he is getting at is the erosion of our civil society, our communities, our neighborhoods and social contexts and groups and clubs and all that the interwebs have acted like a corrosive acid on all that. We need to try to return.
I was in Boulder last weekend for a buddhist meditation thingy and I noticed on the street everyone was fingering their phones, talking to them, loving them. They were walking into oncoming traffic without a care, because Phone was there. Everyone on the plane watched movies. THen back in Dallas everyone was on their phones on the streets - looking, watching, touching, fingering - the phones were there and nothing else.
I think you got that backwards, most of the erosion of civil society happened before smart phones. The streets were stolen by cars, so you can't meet people by going outside. The local watering hole was made off limits to a lot of people because you now need a car to get there which excludes a lot of disabled people, all young people, and everyone who wants a beer but doesn't have sober friends, and kids aren't allowed because apparently we just gave up on communal raising of kids. People were isolated by income in suburbs and other subdivisions, the stores were made massive and moved far away so instead of daily running into your neighbours, friends, and family because you forgot the milk again; you are forced into a massive building full of strangers once every week or two. Meanwhile, we've made absolutely sure that different generations don't have to interact at all, When was the last time you helped an old lady get her groceries? And that isn't because you're not nice, it is because you literally never interact with old ladies. (If this does not apply to you, then it still applies to a lot more people now than before.)
So people got lonely. And then after the popularisation of the internet we found we could find people with identical interests online, so we spent more and more time on devices because that's the only place where randomly running into friends is at least occasionally possible. And now you want to take that away from them?
First we should solve the underlying problem, reshape neighbourhoods around social interaction, which includes but is not limited to taking back the streets from cars: Almost everyone can walk five hundred steps to their car, so if you put all non-handicapped parking outside of the neighbourhood, then finally kids can play in the street again, getting to know real people and making friends. Allow shops and cafés near homes again so people run into each other. add lots of little public parks with benches, and little nooks and crannies just outside apartment blocks so the people there have social places to run into each other. This stuff isn't hard, it just means sacrificing the lawns by densifying towns and taking back space for real people in the streets.
I'm closing in on 70, and I want Graham Platner to be my dad.
Don't get me wront, my real dad was great.
I just want Mr. Platner to take me under his wing until I see my real dad again.
Like Tim Walz, he strikes me as the kind of dad who won't lose his shit when you back into his car.
That and other hypothetical anecdotes may apply.
The “what is a woman” line was barely a clever zinger four years ago. Now it’s just tired. Get new material, MAGAts.
I think it was tired four years ago. I think the best answer is "whatever she wants to be."
"Men and women both have the right to vote, [name a few other rights here that suit the listener], so what does it matter? If some guy starts wearing a dress that doesn't change what rights this person has does it? Because both men and women have equal rights. So why do you care? Let people be weird, everyone is weird in one way or another."
So sick of this "what is a woman" crap.
It's such a simple question to answer.
A woman is any individual who identifies as a woman.
No wonder no one wants to fk these MAGAts.
Finally, a Democrat who can talk about empathy without sounding like a TED Talk in yoga pants.
Graham Platner rolls into rural Maine with tattoos, VA scars, and Circle K coffee, telling people that compassion isn’t weakness, it’s strategy. Meanwhile Susan Collins is still somewhere clutching her pearls and whispering, “I’m concerned.”
Platner’s out here proving you can be tough, tattooed, and still believe healthcare is a human right. That’s not woke. That’s just what happens when you’ve seen war and decided peace deserves funding too.
If she was concerned she would've run as a Democrat. She's just playing at hearing "both sides" while voting with the bad guys every time, and she knows it.
Not sure she’s concerned. She knows the second district and BIW will keep her.
I hope to hell she is VERY FUCKING CONCERNED. I despise her namby-pamby bullshit. She may have started out as a Mainer but she sure as hell is not a Mainer any more. Her over-stay (she said--PROMISED--she'd leave after two terms--she's now on her FIFTH TERM) in Washington, D.C. has made her a mealy-mouthed hypocrite in modified MAGAt clothing. Sure, she votes against her party occasionally--but ONLY when it doesn't count. She pretends to be a moderate but her "moderate stance" is about as phony as it gets.
Lots of truth. Apparently Maine doesn’t care about her promises.