This Graham Platner saga just keeps delivering. Every time I think we’ve hit the ceiling on oppo drops, the elevator dings and we’re in a whole new suite of controversy. It’s not that the content was entirely new in tone. We’ve already seen him refer to himself as an Antifa supersoldier and admit to having an SS tattoo (which, to his credit, he covered up). But the latest batch of Reddit posts that surfaced added a thick layer of ugly homophobia. Explicit posts. Graphic anecdotes. And not from his teenage years or during some misunderstood youthful rebellion. These posts span several years, even continuing into the Biden administration.

I’ve always said that if you’re running as an outsider candidate, having some skeletons in your closet isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It can actually help. Nobody expects a populist outsider to be perfect. The electorate doesn’t want a robot. They want someone who talks like them, even if it means sometimes saying the wrong thing. And even as Platner tests the outer limits of that rule, here’s the twist: the polling. A new University of New Hampshire poll of likely voters in Maine had Platner at 58 percent. That’s not just a lead. That’s a blowout. Janet Mills is at 24 percent. If those numbers hold up, then Chuck Schumer and company are right to be panicking.

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Still, Platner’s campaign has been running scared. Apology videos. Zoom interviews. Carefully worded statements about how he doesn’t think that way anymore. But from where I sit, this guy is doing everything but what he should. If I were advising his campaign, I’d be yelling: go on offense. The proper response to all of this should be simple — I deleted the posts before you ever knew my name. I deleted them because they didn’t reflect who I am anymore. That’s growth. That’s accountability. And that’s all anyone should expect. Instead, we get these soft, hedged statements. You’re not going to convince anyone that you’re the perfect candidate — stop trying.

What kills me is how obvious the pressure is from the Democratic establishment. You can feel Chuck Schumer’s fingerprints all over this. They’re running the classic drip-drip-drip strategy, hoping to humiliate Platner into dropping out. But if you’re Platner — and especially if you believe those polling numbers — why would you flinch? Schumer and Mills are the ones who should be sweating. They’ve failed to unseat Susan Collins time and time again. They trot out the same kind of “perfect” candidate every cycle and lose. And now, when someone is actually running strong in the polls, they’re scrambling to blow it all up.

I’m not defending what Platner posted. It was gross. And people are right to be upset. But this is a high-stakes game, and the voters of Maine seem willing to give him a shot. The question now is whether Platner will take the opportunity and run with it — or keep playing defense while the party machine steamrolls him. Personally, I’m tired of watching him take these hits and not swing back. I’ve been saying it all week. If you want to win, you have to punch. You can’t win a Senate seat on your heels. So please, for the love of political strategy — say their names, take their power, and act like you’re trying to win this damn thing.

Chapters

00:00:00 - Intro

00:03:19 - Graham Platner

00:17:55 - Update

00:18:57 - SNAP

00:21:40 - White House East Wing

00:28:36 - Beef Prices

00:31:08 - Interview with Juliegrace Brufke

00:59:39 - Wrap-up

It’s not every day that the most interesting story in American politics is a Senate primary in Maine, but here we are. This race, at least for now, has everything: a populist outsider, a messy internal fight, a supposedly safe Democrat, and a very unfortunate tattoo. If the Democrats blow a winnable seat in 2026, you can probably trace it back to this moment, and to one name: Graham Platner.

Platner launched his campaign with the kind of fire Democrats usually dream of and then quickly move to kill. He’s ex-military, tattooed, and came out swinging against the party establishment. Think Fetterman with a more overtly socialist bent — and the endorsements to match. Bernie Sanders, Ro Khanna, a digital team built for viral insurgency. His launch video was raw and effective, casting him as the only one who’d fight Collins like it meant something. But before he could define himself, the knives came out. Old Reddit comments. Unpolished statements. And most notably, a chest tattoo that bears an uncomfortable resemblance to an SS death’s head symbol.

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Now, he says the tattoo was a drunk decision made while serving overseas — something picked off the wall at a shop in Croatia. That tracks. Plenty of service members come home with something dumb etched into their skin. But politics isn’t fair. The second it surfaced, it became a narrative — a “secret Nazi” smear that, while ridiculous, is now baked into every conversation about the guy. And that’s not something most voters are willing to fact-check. The perception — not the reality — becomes the problem.

Still, the bigger issue isn’t the ink. It’s how Platner handled it. His entire appeal is built on strength and authenticity — and he responded like a nervous staffer trying to keep his job. The apology video was soft. It was long. It was careful. None of that fits the image he’s built. If you’re running on being the guy who doesn’t back down, you can’t fold the first time someone calls you a name. He needed to come out swinging — not just at the press, but at the party that clearly doesn’t want him there.

Because make no mistake, they don’t. Janet Mills is the Schumer pick. She’s the “safe” one — a proven fundraiser, a party loyalist, and the kind of candidate who rarely wins a general in a state like Maine but always gets through the primary. That’s why the long knives came out for Platner. And if he doesn’t wake up and fight them like they’re already trying to end his campaign — which they are — then he doesn’t deserve the spot. Not because he’s a bad guy, or because he’s unelectable. But because he misunderstood the moment.

This is a fight. Not a conversation. Not a listening tour. A fight. And if he doesn’t start treating it like one, he’s already lost.

Chapters

00:00:00 - Intro

00:02:26 - Graham Platner

00:16:10 - Interview with Josh Jennings and Andrew Heaton

00:45:58 - Update

00:46:13 - Trump-Putin

00:49:03 - Israel-Hamas

00:52:30 - Shutdown

00:56:30 - Interview with Josh Jennings and Andrew Heaton, con’t

01:23:09 - Wrap-up

Trump is once again talking about Vladimir Putin — this time setting up a meeting in Budapest to discuss ending the war in Ukraine. That’s according to Trump himself, who said the two agreed on a phone call to meet, and that Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other U.S. officials would begin prep meetings with their Russian counterparts. No date has been set, but Trump described the call as productive.

He also mentioned they’d loop in Zelensky during his upcoming White House visit, which adds another layer of complexity. Earlier in the week, Trump floated sending Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine as leverage. Whether that was serious or just bluster is up for debate, but the message was clear — he’s still playing both sides. One thing he did emphasize on Truth Social was how eager Putin seemed to be about post-war trade. According to Trump, that was the real focus — not the war itself, but what comes next.

This is the kind of move that makes sense if you assume Putin is trying to preempt whatever message Zelensky hopes to deliver later this week. It’s also a reminder that Trump sees all of this through the lens of dealmaking, not diplomacy. He’s playing to his base — the voters who see “getting a deal” as a win, regardless of what’s actually in it. But as past attempts have shown, any momentum gained by just talking with Putin tends to evaporate as soon as the bombs keep falling.

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The Shutdown Math

Senate Majority Leader John Thune hinted that the White House might walk back some of its shutdown-related moves if Democrats agree to vote for a continuing resolution. He didn’t lay out specifics, but the implication was that things like furloughs or aggressive reduction-in-force orders could be reconsidered. Thune said passing a full-year appropriations package would make more clawbacks unnecessary — but until then, it’s unclear what Democrats would get in return.

The rumor mill is working overtime — and the story making the rounds is that Democrats will vote for the CR, then hold a vote on Obamacare subsidies separately. Chuck Schumer says that’s not the plan, but let’s be real: it sounds like a deal in the making. Everyone knows the play here. The question is how quickly the Democrats can make it look like they won.

At the end of the day, this is all about messaging. Democrats want to go back to their base and say they got something out of this. And if a CR plus a later vote on subsidies is the path to that — well, they’ll probably take it. Everything else is just noise.

John Bolton Indicted

John Bolton’s been indicted. Eight counts of transmitting and ten counts of retaining national defense information. This case centers around his handling of classified documents tied to his book, which he apparently shared through personal email and notes. The FBI raided his home, and now it’s up to the courts.

The Biden administration says politics aren’t involved, but Bolton’s been a vocal Trump critic, which puts this in awkward territory. It comes on the heels of indictments for James Comey and Letitia James — all of them known Trump opponents. In those cases, the Comey case seems flimsy, while the one against Letitia James has more substance. Meanwhile, the Bolton charges had been floating around since before Trump left office in 2021.

Here’s where I land: this whole mess reflects the same double standard we’ve seen for years. People working with classified material always say the same thing — if they did what these folks are accused of, they’d be in jail. There has to be a better way to handle these documents. Until then, we’ll keep getting stories like this.

Chapters

00:00:00 - Intro

00:03:04 - Interview with Tom Joseph

00:22:23 - Russia-Ukraine

00:24:43 - Shutdown

00:26:21 - John Bolton

00:28:26 - Interview with Ryan McBeth

01:13:29 - Wrap-up