What advice would I give Graham Platner?

Somehow I unwittingly got roped into doing four separate podcast/TV appearances today, so that’s dominated my itinerary. I figured I would re-post to Substack the livestream I did earlier this evening on the Platner affair. You’ve likely heard that he announced he “intends” to withdraw his Senate candidacy — although as of this afternoon, he had not yet formally done so. And who knows, “intentions” can be fickle. But should the coerced withdrawal be finalized, this will go down as perhaps the most ruthless (and shameless) defenestration in recent US political history.

Why do I say the hit has been manufactured? Why use that particular word? Because literally, it’s been openly divulged that the “rape accusation” rollout was facilitated by a specific individual, Cheyenne Hunt, who had openly declared her mission to take out Platner, following what she boasts was her integral role in vaporizing Eric Swalwell several months before. After which, she had joined with Democratic House members, including Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Debbie Dingell, Rashida Tlaib, and Becca Balint, to announce the formation of a new pressure outfit, “Reckoning Action,” and likewise announce that the next target on her list was Graham Platner. She then made good on these threats, and was openly credited for engineering the POLITICO article that spurred the denunciatory mob this week, in concert with a CNN interview of the alleged victim. It would defy reason to not also suspect that she could have been “behind” the accuser’s accusations escalating so radically since June 4, when the accuser had merely told the New York Times that she perceived Platner’s behavior to be “reckless” and “unsettling.” Then by July 6, the allegation morphs into full-blown rape. Go figure. “Rape” — the magic word everyone knows would send the Democratic Party hurtling into a frantic tailspin. So there’s just no question Platner’s neutralization was manufactured. It’s not being hidden! It doesn’t require any wild speculation. It’s being openly bragged about!

“Manufactured” is also an apt word because the initial POLITICO article was clearly framed to convey to casual news consumers — the vast majority of whom will not forensically read it, of course, and only absorb the headline takeaway — that rock-solid corroboration had been uncovered that made the accusation supremely credible, and should be assumed unassailably true. But… there is no corroboration whatsoever presented in the article for the claim that Graham Platner raped Jenny Racicot in 2021. None. And yet, even news consumers whom you’d think might be a bit more sophisticated, like Nate Silver, falsely described the article as containing precisely the corroborative evidence it did not contain. The literal opening sentences of Nate’s post on the matter featured two egregious falsehoods. I wrote a Substack Note yesterday (tagging Nate) that explained these errors in detail, and never received a response, nor has there been any correction made to Nate’s post:

So if this “rape accusation” rollout could have succeeded at getting Nate Silver to falsely proclaim “corroborating materials” had been produced — and thus every right-minded citizen should agree it’s been proven that Platner committed rape — that’s a phenomenal PR masterstroke. Bravo. Even though Nate himself was already primed to believe any “accusation” that might be flung Platner’s way, since he’d already been arguing for weeks/months that Platner was a big political liability for Dems, and Maine primary voters were extremely un-savvy to support him. Sensing vindication for his thesis had arrived, Nate confirmation-biased his way to the most damning interpretation of a single POLITICO article — that’s all it took — and announced the rape claim was “well-supported,” because the accuser provided “corroborating materials” such as “communications about the assault with her therapist and with a friend.” Yet it