General Discussion

Now that we've got that out of the way, Platner's candidacy - and the reaction to these revelations about his past - are pretty troubling to me. Because let's all be very real here: if this were anyone else, no one would be minimizing his whoops-didn't-know-it-was-a-Nazi-tattoo excuse and no one would be hand-waving away the reports about his past behavior towards women.

The sexting and drinking I don't care so much about as long as the former was between consenting adults. If we immediately nixed anyone with peccadillos and a drinking problem from public office the halls of Congress would be very, very quiet indeed.

What I find troubling is that a lot of people seem okay with jettisoning certain values out of convenience and/or a desire to capture the Senate. They're okay with a very flimsy "aw shucks, I didn't know" excuse about a literal Nazi tattoo and content to shrug off reports of borderline-violent behavior towards women that would draw immediate and visceral condemnation if the guy in question wasn't running for Senate in a hotly contested midterm election cycle.

The thing about values is that they can be very slippery. It's easy to subjectively shift them to fit the conveniences and needs of the moment. If a value is truly, deeply held one will remain true to it even (perhaps especially) when doing so carries a cost. And if that value shifts to allow for that moment of convenience, it comes across a lot like that value wasn't all that important to begin with.

I understand the importance of capturing the Senate in the midterms. I get that control of both houses of Congress is key to defanging Trump's agenda for the remainder of his term. I'm just not certain that abandoning certain values is a cost that's worth the price because once those values start slipping away it'll get easier and easier to compromise them when convenient or necessary.

Just my view from the outside looking in.