Well, there is Jordan Wood, Katie Porter's former chief of staff. I don't know a damn thing about him, except he doesn't seem to be a vanity candidate. But Mills likes the filibuster, and Platner seems to rhyme with Fetterman.
Hey Max, I know several folks who’ve known Platner for 20 years. He’s the real deal … the oppo research is taking things completely out of context.
Jordan Wood’s husband is the scammy founder/principal in Mothership Strategies. He raises millions for Dems but distributes less than 5cents on the dollar back to candidates.
I know about Collins. About Platner & Mills, I only know what you've written here. My main concern is, what Democrat can beat Collins? She cleaned up in 2020.
If both Platner & Mills can beat Collins, I agree that Platner is the obvious choice. But what's most important is to bring a Democratic majority to the Senate, with or without Shumer as leader.
I am not one of those who currently prefer to lose with the wave of change to winning with a superannuated figure who will give us a majority. Losing with the better message can presage future wins, but with the Felon President having more than three years left in his term, I can't wait for the future wins. I need a win now.
I wrote somewhere else about this and wanted to repost it here, but I'll be damned if I can find it.
Basically, I've seen, and lived this movie before. In 2018, fresh out of retirement from a career that concluded with 29 years in IT, preceded by 12 or so years as a labor activist/factory worker, I was thrilled to see the emergence of one Randy Bryce, the "IronStasche", an Ironworker, who decided to challenge the odious Paul Ryan in Wisconsin's 1st Congressional District.
Just the ticket, I thought, I can combine my two careers and do something I really believe in. It was catnip to me. About two weeks after retirement, I made the short drive from the Chicago area to a Kenosha, Wisconsin, UAW hall, where I offered my services as someone with IT skills if they could use such help. They could, indeed and soon I was involved in merging two incompatible lists they had and such work.
Pretty soon, I realized, that though the Bernie-loving kids who were running the campaign continually told me they loved what I was providing them, they didn't have the slightest idea how to use it and they weren't actually using it. I began making frequent drives to the district to canvass and such, and left the IT work behind.
No matter, Randy won the Democratic primary easily and the campaign began. Either before or after the primary, I can't remember which, Paul Ryan dropped out of the race. I doubt he was scared of Randy Bryce, I think he just didn't want to be in Congress anymore. He was replaced by an anodyne Republican no one had ever heard of. This deprived Randy of his #1 attack target.
And then Randy's negative shit hit the fan. A 20 year old DUI. Maybe some dispute about child support. Etc. Etc. These are the echoes I hear with Platner. Randy lost by about 55-45.
However, these echoes have only limited value, IMHO.
I don't think Randy lost because of the negative stuff. For sure, it didn't help him. But the campaign had not really analyzed the district or understood it. The district was two small industrial cities along Lake Michigan, Racine and Kenosha, and a third industrial city, Janesville, where Ryan was from, about 80 miles to the West. In between, miles and miles of farmland.
I attended a meeting shortly before the election at which Randy laid out the campaign strategy: work like hell to get out the working class vote in the three cities. I knew then we were doomed. The campaign had NOTHING going on in the agricultural areas of the district. Did they count the numbers of voters? It was flawed from the start. Hope and hype.
I don't know anything about the Platner campaign's strategy for this, but I doubt it's based on nostalgia for the working class community that used to be there. In WI-1 all those union halls were serving retirees. The plants had mostly closed. And I don't know enough about Maine.
And so, let the primary voters decide between Platner and Mills. They either will or won't be deterred by Platner's youthful snafus. It is actually good that this shit comes out now, rather than after the primary. And we should never forget all the crap that the R's allow THEIR bad boys. Sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander I say. This will require fiercer messaging, not centrist ducking, not "when they go low, we go high" bs. I'd like to see Platner make a big issue out of Mills' opposition to abolishing the filibuster. Getting rid of it is essential to rebuilding the mess that Trump and the Republicans have made, and there's nothing to be gained by hiding from that issue.
But we'll see. As Michelle Goldberg points out, things on the ground look different from what some of our professional pundits imagine.
Well, there is Jordan Wood, Katie Porter's former chief of staff. I don't know a damn thing about him, except he doesn't seem to be a vanity candidate. But Mills likes the filibuster, and Platner seems to rhyme with Fetterman.
Hey Max, I know several folks who’ve known Platner for 20 years. He’s the real deal … the oppo research is taking things completely out of context.
Jordan Wood’s husband is the scammy founder/principal in Mothership Strategies. He raises millions for Dems but distributes less than 5cents on the dollar back to candidates.
I know about Collins. About Platner & Mills, I only know what you've written here. My main concern is, what Democrat can beat Collins? She cleaned up in 2020.
If both Platner & Mills can beat Collins, I agree that Platner is the obvious choice. But what's most important is to bring a Democratic majority to the Senate, with or without Shumer as leader.
I am not one of those who currently prefer to lose with the wave of change to winning with a superannuated figure who will give us a majority. Losing with the better message can presage future wins, but with the Felon President having more than three years left in his term, I can't wait for the future wins. I need a win now.
Why the hell don’t we have our own Platner here in Va?
Abort, abort, abort… https://bsky.app/profile/aaronhuertas.bsky.social/post/3m4p2c7c6l22n
no no no
Fetterman 2.0
I wrote somewhere else about this and wanted to repost it here, but I'll be damned if I can find it.
Basically, I've seen, and lived this movie before. In 2018, fresh out of retirement from a career that concluded with 29 years in IT, preceded by 12 or so years as a labor activist/factory worker, I was thrilled to see the emergence of one Randy Bryce, the "IronStasche", an Ironworker, who decided to challenge the odious Paul Ryan in Wisconsin's 1st Congressional District.
Just the ticket, I thought, I can combine my two careers and do something I really believe in. It was catnip to me. About two weeks after retirement, I made the short drive from the Chicago area to a Kenosha, Wisconsin, UAW hall, where I offered my services as someone with IT skills if they could use such help. They could, indeed and soon I was involved in merging two incompatible lists they had and such work.
Pretty soon, I realized, that though the Bernie-loving kids who were running the campaign continually told me they loved what I was providing them, they didn't have the slightest idea how to use it and they weren't actually using it. I began making frequent drives to the district to canvass and such, and left the IT work behind.
No matter, Randy won the Democratic primary easily and the campaign began. Either before or after the primary, I can't remember which, Paul Ryan dropped out of the race. I doubt he was scared of Randy Bryce, I think he just didn't want to be in Congress anymore. He was replaced by an anodyne Republican no one had ever heard of. This deprived Randy of his #1 attack target.
And then Randy's negative shit hit the fan. A 20 year old DUI. Maybe some dispute about child support. Etc. Etc. These are the echoes I hear with Platner. Randy lost by about 55-45.
However, these echoes have only limited value, IMHO.
I don't think Randy lost because of the negative stuff. For sure, it didn't help him. But the campaign had not really analyzed the district or understood it. The district was two small industrial cities along Lake Michigan, Racine and Kenosha, and a third industrial city, Janesville, where Ryan was from, about 80 miles to the West. In between, miles and miles of farmland.
I attended a meeting shortly before the election at which Randy laid out the campaign strategy: work like hell to get out the working class vote in the three cities. I knew then we were doomed. The campaign had NOTHING going on in the agricultural areas of the district. Did they count the numbers of voters? It was flawed from the start. Hope and hype.
I don't know anything about the Platner campaign's strategy for this, but I doubt it's based on nostalgia for the working class community that used to be there. In WI-1 all those union halls were serving retirees. The plants had mostly closed. And I don't know enough about Maine.
And so, let the primary voters decide between Platner and Mills. They either will or won't be deterred by Platner's youthful snafus. It is actually good that this shit comes out now, rather than after the primary. And we should never forget all the crap that the R's allow THEIR bad boys. Sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander I say. This will require fiercer messaging, not centrist ducking, not "when they go low, we go high" bs. I'd like to see Platner make a big issue out of Mills' opposition to abolishing the filibuster. Getting rid of it is essential to rebuilding the mess that Trump and the Republicans have made, and there's nothing to be gained by hiding from that issue.
But we'll see. As Michelle Goldberg points out, things on the ground look different from what some of our professional pundits imagine.
The voters will decide.