"Platner’s statements, not to mention his covered-over tattoo, disqualify him from serving in the senate. Mainers should let him go back to his unsuccessful oyster farm and leave governing to more rational people." Jed Babbin
"Platner has been condemned by various Jewish groups because of that statement and because of his praise for a Hamas raid in 2014 in which five Israeli soldiers were killed. At the time, Platner wrote that it, “Looks like an all-around well executed and successful small unit raid to me.”
"He hasn’t commented on the war Hamas started with its genocidal attack on Israel in 2023. But he has said that Israel committed “genocide” in Gaza." . . .
"The Totenkopf — a symbol closely associated with the Nazi SS — was tattooed on the chest of Maine senate candidate Graham Platner in 2007. He alleges that he did not know of the Nazi association with the symbol — Platner wore it proudly — until he began his candidacy at which point he had it allegedly covered up by another tattoo.
"The plausibility of Platner’s story is questionable at best.
"The Totenkopf — German for “death’s head” or skull — image is not one of the “Jolly Roger,” the skull and cross bones one sees on a pirate flag. It is a skull that has broken bones on either side of it. It was adopted by the Nazi Schutstaffel (SS) as its symbol and was later adopted as the symbol of the Totenkopfverbande, the German soldiers who guarded the concentration camps where millions of Jews and many others died." . . .
"The Totenkopf, German for “death’s head,” is a skull-and-crossbones insignia most widely recognized as the emblem of the Nazi SS. Germany bans its public display under Section 86a of its criminal code, with violators facing up to three years in prison. More than a dozen other European nations enforce similar prohibitions. In the United States, the symbol receives First Amendment protection, though displaying it carries serious professional and social consequences" . . .You Don’t Hate the Media Enough, ‘Pouncing’ On Der Oysterführer Edition "Imagine, if you will, that Republicans had run a candidate with a Nazi SS Totenkopf on his chest, who posted in public forums that women should take some responsibility for being sexually assaulted, called them "hatchet wounds" in reference to their genitalia, and had a credible record of actual domestic violence on a partner. Would the media consider a focus on those scandals by his Democrat opponents to be "pouncing," especially in the first days of the general-election campaign? "Absolutely not. The Protection Racket Media would go into full Kavanaugh Lynching Mode at the merest hint of any of the above. When a liberal Republican draws attention to a Democrat with this record, however, it's suddenly a Republicans Pounce™ story, and the Totenkopf gets transformed into a "resembl[ance] of a Nazi symbol" at ABC News:". . .
"The Journ-O-List bat signal has gone out. The story will no longer be Graham Platner's Nazi tattoo, domestic violence allegations, weird Kik account trolling up until last week, or Der Oysterführer's sexting with a half-dozen women not his wife over the last couple of years. The story will now be meanie Republicans and conservatives pointing out all of these peccadilloes, not to mention Platner's victims." . . .
