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The Find Out Podcast
Is Graham Platner's Campaign Toast?
00:51:45
Today on The Find Out Podcast, we dive into the growing controversy surrounding Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner — and ask the question: can his campaign survive, or is it already finished?
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- [00:00]
A
Foreign.
- [00:16]
B
Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the Find out podcast. After three episodes with some really, really great guests, you are now down to me, Tim, Chris and Richard. The other guys have prior engagements that they have to go to. So you. We went from having six people on our show to having three. We have a lot of topics to talk about today, and we're going to talk about the shutdown first. But I also want to tee up. We're going to talk about the, the, the controversy surrounding main Senate candidate Graham Platner and some comments that he has made and also a tattoo he's got. We're also going to talk about some, some pretty rough news out of the VA about restricting treatment to vets. But, but let's talk about the shutdown first because it, there seems to be a little bit of movement. You know, it was reported that John Thune is reportedly getting antsy, I think was the term or concerned that as the shutdown goes on, polling after polling shows that the American public are believing that the Republicans shut down the government, which is the right belief since they control all levers of government. And there's also been these crazy stories about the Trump administration spending money when they're not supposed to. And I think there's a couple big ones in particular. One we saw the other day that they are literally demolishing part of the White House. Like the irony in them actually physically, which they said they weren't going to do for this ballroom, by the way. They said, oh, no, no, no, no, it's an addition. But I think they have actually destroyed part of like the, the first office that the first, when the first, first lady had an office, I think they destroyed that and a few other things to the tune of $250 million. We've also heard that Christy Nome is getting two private luxury jets with the tune of $137 million. And also Donald Trump has asked or demanded that the Justice Department give him, I kid you not, $230 million, almost a quarter billion dollars to quote unquote, settle the criminal charges against him over the last few years.
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A
So it's, it's, it's, it's grievance money. Like he, he's, his feelings are hurt. And so a billionaire wants the taxpayers to pay him $230 million to, to what, fix his broken heart? I'm not, I'm not quite sure like the, the, the, the, the bookkeeping of it.
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C
But he wants, he saw no King's Day and he got some ideas from it. He was like, I Actually should be able to just personally enrich myself, like directly just take money from the treasury and put it in my personal accounts.
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A
I think the good news is that, you know, the Justice Department, traditionally independent, unbiased, really great judgment, like they're going to be the ones to decide if he's entitled to this $230 million. And so at least Americans can go to sleep tonight knowing that, that Pam Bondi is going to do what's best for the American people and not just cashier. A 230 million. Yeah, that's a quarter of a billion dollars. Like that's not an insignificant portion of his net worth. It's almost half of what he had to pay in those civil fees. So it's a pretty good amount of money.
- [03:33]
C
Yeah, I mean, I hope they give it to him. Like I, I, I hope that they give it to him because I want everybody to get indicted.
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A
Yeah.
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C
When next time that, that a reasonable person is in the White House, I want indictments to be flying and just to just hit absolutely everybody and giving, giving the sitting President of the United States, who doesn't collect a salary a quarter of a billion dollars because his feelings are hurt that that is a crime. And I want them to do it like go commit all the crimes because justice will come. Might take a few years, but it's going to, it's going to happen.
- [04:14]
A
What is the current salary for President? Right now it's 400,000. So let's just do a little bit of quick math. So that's $230 million is enough to pay him for 575 years as president. So like that's pretty fair, I think, you know, because he doesn't take a salary, it kind of nets out even Steven in the end. No, I, if we have any, if we have any lawyers or judges listening quietly under pseudonyms, I hope somebody's taking, just like keeping a list because it's really hard to keep track of. Like any given day there's like 300 things that somebody could be charged for. I hope somebody's just got a stack of like a thousand decided cases like Case Law Stack, Constitution Stack, Congressional Law Stack, and just like vetting every single thing that happens every single day against what is legal and what is.
- [05:13]
C
There's an organization called crew, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington that, you know, from the first Trump administration was, that was the group doing the research, providing lawyers fighting the legal cases to hold him accountable for the emoluments clause, which the SCOTUS was just like Corruption. What's that? It's not a real thing. So CREW is taking all the notes. Yeah. If people want to, you know, learn more about them and support them, I highly encourage. It's an organization I worked with before. They, they are, Are good people and they take notes.
- [05:50]
B
Yeah, they're a great organization. Highly, highly recommend going and checking them out and supporting them if you want. And I think they actually defended me, which in the, in the first Trump administration, when social accounts that I created at the Department Interior were actually used to go after me. And I think I was the first private citizen to be attacked by the US Government on social media. So yay to me. And I think they did not know that. Oh, you didn't know that? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That. That happened a month before the election in 2020. And they. The Department Interior, of which I, I worked for five years in the Obama administration, they put out a propaganda video touting how great Donald Trump was. And I found it, and I wrote, I was the digital director during President Obama's reelection in 2012 at the Department of Interior. And if I had done, if I had produced that video, because that video was produced by the team that I ran, I would have been fired. And I also confirmed by. To both, I hope I'm not ruining their confidence. But Sally Jewell and Ken Salzer, who were the two secretaries I worked for, both did confirm to me that, yes, they would have fired me if I had done that, because, of course, I sent it to them. But they responded with this wildly insane, like, the, we have removed the stench of your administration and this, like, crazy deranged thing. And then I, I, I DM'd a few reporters, and I was like, you might want to look at this. And then all of a sudden, an hour later, just exploded. Somebody sued them on my behalf. I don't think it was crew, but crew talked about it. It was this whole thing. So anyways, they do great work and they hold people accountable, so people should, should support that.
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A
And if you have.
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B
Yeah, but it's a. It was a funny. It was a wild night, especially since I worked at the private sector at the time. So I was kind of like, whoops.
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A
I feel like I, I've heard of them, but I didn't know that much about them. It's citizens for ethics.org if people want to go check it out right on their homepage. Crew sues to block Trump's illegal plan to fire government workers. So, like, these are the people. These are the people doing the work. I Know, it always feels better. It's like aclu, you know, it's like, well, I, I feel paralyzed today. At least ACLU is out there suing people, like, doing some. And Planned Parenthood. Like, if, If. If you can't do anything, go give $5 to organizations like CREW and Planned Parenthood and ACLU and know that somebody there is awake and able to work that day, even if you're not.
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B
I mean, it's just wild, like, just. Just to step back because we've been 10 years in this bullshit with him.
- [08:19]
A
Yeah.
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B
Like, the President of the United States is demanding that a department that reports to him hands him almost a quarter billion dollars because he got investigated.
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C
Like, and it was investigated by his first administration. Right. It was. It was the Trump DOJ that investigated him.
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B
Right.
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A
But, like, so crazy. But just think about everything. Like, what?
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B
Well, just think about it. Like, does that mean that anybody who is investigated and not, well, he was convicted of a crime, but is not convicted of a crime, deserves damages from the government? Like, it's just. I mean, again, it is just this, this, this narrative that he. That is true, that, like, he is there to keep himself out of prison one and two, to enrich himself. And Chris, you. You scoffed at the no salary thing because it's absurd. Yes, he is not taking his $400,000 salary, but his net worth after having made nothing other than be president, has gone up several billion dollars. Eric Trump, because of all the crypto scams that he's doing, is on paper himself worth a billion dollars. The $2 billion deal that Jared Kushner negotiated after the Trump administration with the Saudis, like, why. Why did he get the 2 billion. The only reason he got those $2 billion is because Donald Trump was president. Like, the guy. That's quite an ROI to say, like, I'm not taking the 400 grand, but I'm getting billions on the backs of. Of Americans and screwing them every. Every step of the way.
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C
When did they announce that deal?
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B
Was that.
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C
Was that after the first Trump administration had had.
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B
I think it was in the first year after.
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C
I mean, I think. Doesn't, like, $2 billion from the Saudis feel quaint at this point? Like, I feel like it used to be, like, headlines for days. Well, well, what about. It's just like, they're like, oh, you know, Jared Kushner just. Just another $2 billion. Like, it doesn't feel like it used to.
- [10:21]
B
There was more outrage, and there should have been outrage for this. For those comedians that went over to that Saudi Comedy Festival. They were paid somewhere in the neighborhood, like depending on who they were. The low end was 300 grand for one set and the high end was like 1.5 or 2 million dollars. And they got rightly like dragged across the coals. Donald Trump's son in law negotiates a $2 billion deal. That of course is all wink, wink, nudge, nudge what it's for. And no one really said very much at all. And I think it just goes back to this. Like, Trump's ability to flood the zone with garbage has been really effective, let's be honest. And the media, corporate media has essentially let him get away with it.
- [11:07]
C
So yeah, law enforcement has too. Like, yeah, you know, the Biden, Biden DOJ under Merrick Garland kind of sat on their hands and were like, oh yeah, Congress has got this. Like they tried to impeach him twice. They clearly don't fucking have this. Like the executive branch should have, should have fucking protected the United States from the most dangerous criminal in American history.
- [11:31]
B
Well, Merrick Garland was the worst choice for Attorney General. Like, I think we can all be honest at this point. Like, I understand the pick in normal times, sure, like, I mean, certainly qualified to do it, but like we needed, we needed a, basically a, a rabid Attorney General who was going to move quickly, whether it was like a Sally Yates or a Doug Jones or other very capable people to go after these guys. And I, we've, we have not learned the lessons from the Wall street crash of 2008. We also did not go after anybody there. And this is now two times with two, one on the corporate side and one on the government side where we said we were going to do things and then we did absolutely nothing. And then we wonder why we lose, you know, so let's go. But let's, you know, this is a super uplifting talk. But the next one is even more uplifting, which is the, the controversy around Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner. And for full context, I am from Maine, so this is, this is extra special to me. But you know, he was riding high. You know, he had raised $3 million in his first month, which in Maine is insane. And Bernie endorsed by Bernie, like, and had big rallies. He was having rallies, four or five thousand people in Maine, which again, Maine politics a year before, more than a year before election is a big deal. I saw him speak a few weeks ago, which I talked about. I met him briefly. Like, he is really good on the stump.
- [13:08]
C
He.
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B
But the investigations have started and it has come out that he said some racist things on Reddit. One in particular was he was asking the community why black people don't tip, which, as a white guy from Bain, is not a thing that you really should be talking about. And there was some other things in there. And then yesterday, which we're recording on Wednesday, yesterday, it came out that he has a tattoo that apparently. And Chris, I'm gonna turn this to you in a second because you're. Yeah. Toten cup, which is a. An SS tattoo that some people in. Or some SS officers in Nazi Germany had in the 1940s. And he gave an answer to crooked yesterday. That was really not much of an answer. So, Chris, you are the expert here. What is this tattoo? And is this. Is he toast or is there room for him to explain his way out of this?
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C
Yeah, so the Totenkopf, for people who've never heard of it before, is a pretty distinct looking skull and crossbones that SS officers from Nazi Germany used to wear. And in. In more recent years, as, like, the swastika flying Nazis that my organizations track have grown in their ability to attract attention, it's become a more recognizable symbol. I don't think that the majority of Americans, by any stretch of the imagination in 2015, when this tattoo was allegedly inked into his skin, would recognize it as a Nazi symbol. But with the rise of the alt right, with the rise of, you know, organizations like NSC131 or Blood Tribe or any of these other extremist organizations, bringing back the popularity of these. Of these Nazi symbols, like, it's. It's inexcusable to have a Totenkov tattooed on your chest and to not understand how not just deeply offending it can be to people, but how threatening it can be to people. And that is what's most important, I think. We're not talking about people being offended by something. We're. If. If he had a swastika on his chest, that isn't offending people, that's threatening people. Those symbols are symbols of violence. They are not symbols simply of ideology. So I am. I am particularly invested in what's going on right now. Because he's a vet, that's like part of. He. He doesn't talk about it all the time on his platform, which I do appreciate, but he is someone who is. Who I, I was excited about. And then to see this when my, My, you know, background is hunting Nazis is extraordinarily disappointing to. To put it really mildly.
- [16:13]
B
Yeah, I mean, it's a. It. It's Deeply concerning, you know, and I. There is something to be said on those Reddit things, which I think are. Go back even further, 2012, 2013. Like, know, if he had said sort of like a. A little bit of a version of like your. What I guess I'll call redemption arc of moving from the right to the left. Like, and especially on this show, that is some of what we are trying to do is, is encourage men and show them that there's a place for them on the left which will event. Which will mean, you know, sort of like forgiving some past. Some past mistakes, which is fair because we are all human. But he's had this for 10 years. He has been running. He has been thinking about running for Senate for at least this year. Right. It's concerning to me that it is still there. And it is concerning to me that there was some reporting yesterday that also said he had told a friend of his that he knew exactly what it was. And that is concerning to me. And that is where, when I talk about redemption arcs, I kind of stop the arc halfway because I am all for, you know, you know, accepting and moving past, past mistakes that you recognize. But I'm not seeing that right now. And that's my concern.
- [17:32]
A
We don't give a redemption arc to somebody. You complete your own redemption arc and then you. And then you present the new version of yourself to the world and ask for forgiveness. And. And I think that's where, you know, like, I. This is really tough because, like, Pete Hegseth has, like, the whatever weird tattoo on his arm, right? That's like Christian militants need to take over the world. Like, that's basically Pete Hexeth's. Yeah, whatever.
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B
I think it's on his chest. That's on his chest, too. Right?
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A
Right.
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B
He's got a bunch, but he's got.
- [18:03]
C
It on his chest. He's got a slogan on his. On his arm. He's. He's covered in them.
- [18:10]
A
Right? So, like, contextually, this is about the 400th thing on my list that I'm concerned with right now. So, like, in the world. And so there's that part where it's like, seriously, like, so. And Democrats also do this. Like, we are the ones who are going to come after ourselves because we hold ourselves to a higher standard. And so, like, there are these. There are these frustrations within me in how we are responding to what. What's going on with Platner. When I read him say stuff like, I made dumb jokes and I picked fights. I'm a small Business owner, a Marine. Marine Corps veteran and a retired shitposter. That's all fine. All of these things are fine. Getting a dump. Like, I genuinely believe that he was a bro who got a bro tattoo in a different country with his bros when he was drunk. Like, I mean, whether he was drunk or not, I didn't know what that tattoo was. Of course, I'm not in that world and he is. I didn't know what that tattoo meant when I saw that he had a sketchy tattoo or a racist Nazi tattoo on his chest. Let's be clear. I would not have gone into a tattoo. I don't have any tattoos because, like, it's because of stuff like this. You go in and you make a dumb decision and you don't, like, know exactly what it is. You pick it off the wall.
- [19:27]
B
Like, you have a lower back tattoo.
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A
I do have a stamp, actually. Yeah. I, I have a whale tail tattooed onto my lower back so that I wouldn't have to wear thongs anymore. And so, you know, all of that stuff. Like, I can understand all of those. Like, whether you call them excuses or reasons or, like, things that he could move on from even the tattoo if he genuinely didn't know what it was. Like, there is a scenario where that is not a lie, but it's like it's the product of having somebody like him come up from nowhere. When you do, when you have somebody vet you, when you have the Democratic Party vet you, they find those things and they find people who you knew in your past that you didn't know still knew you. And like, and they, they, they wiggle that all out. They iron it out. Republicans don't do that. I mean, Donald Trump says 17 things a day that are worse than anything that Graham Platner's ever said in his life. And, and, and so this double standard is very, very frustrating, but it's still something we have to deal with. And so, like, do I think he's going to make it out of the primary at this point? Like, it's, it's probably a no, but, you know, it's up to Maine Democrats. Right.
- [20:38]
C
I'm, I'm just looking at news as we're recording this on Wednesday. I'm looking at news breaking from Vanity Fair 30 minutes ago. Graham Platner says that he's already gotten rid of his Nazi. Nazi tattoo. So, yeah, that is great. Also want to correct some, something that we said. We said that he got it 10 years ago in 2015. He actually got it in 2007. He was born in 84. He's 41 years old. So he's a year older than me. He probably joined the Army a year before I did. Excuse me. He probably joined the Marines a year before I got out of the army in 2007 after a deployment to Iraq. I was a very, very different person back then, and the things that I was doing and saying would absolutely get me fucking canceled today. Now I have. I have, in a way, had the benefit of making my transformation extraordinarily fucking publicly. In 2008, I testified before the out of Iraq Caucus. It looked like a committee hearing, but it wasn't. It was on C Span, right? And I talked about how I had joined the army as a New Yorker In 2003, I signed my contract the year I graduated high school. I was in basic training. In 2004, I joined the army to kill terrorists. And by the time that I made it to testifying before Congress, four years after I set foot in basic training, I didn't have the lexicon to intelligently describe how I had come to recognize the things that I used to do and say and tolerate. I then, in 2008, recognized war. Racist, right? I said before Congress on C Span I was a racist. And that's part of what drove me to join the Army. That is a very oversimplified way of saying that I joined the army to. To go, you know, get bad guys who were Al Qaeda, who happened to be Brown, who happened to be Muslim. Right. I didn't say it in the best way.
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A
And.
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C
And that is a video that haunts me still. You know, the Daily Caller wrote about it a few years ago to come after me for being a veteran advocate who was not a fan of Trump during the first Trump presidency. It's something that, you know, current members of. Of the State Department. You know, a conspiracy theorist who now runs communications for the State Department, he wrote about, you know, me and that video. So I know what it feels like to have that. To have that kind of thing dug up. And Tim and I talked about this earlier today. Like, in my culture, in the. In the military and veteran culture, it seems crazy to me that Graham Platner had this tattoo and he didn't get together with. And he talks about, you know, his struggle with drinking, that he didn't get together with a bunch of his friends and heat up a K bar with a lighter, a knife that we have in the military and put it over his chest and wipe away that tattoo. I mean, I have friends who've gotten rid of tattoos that way like that would be an appropriate end to a tattoo that happened to, you know, he happened to discover was a Nazi symbol. The fact that he carried it for 20 years, that. That makes me really concerned about his, his decision making at best.
- [24:19]
A
Right.
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B
Yeah. Because we've got kind of a couple of things going on here. That one, the horrible, horrible tattoo, a horribly anti Semitic and just hate, hateful thing. But, you know, let's say he, he admits that that was the way that was, but didn't do anything about it. That's a judgment problem. So you've got both the, like the horrible anti Semitic image, but also the judgment. And as a United States Senator and as somebody that Democrats, some Democrats are pointing to as the quote, unquote, like, new path forward. It's. It's deeply concerning. And I can give some context about Maine, which is where I think other than being in the military, he spent most of his life. He is from a rural area in the northern part of the state. I am from the southern part of the state. I'm from a town called Bath, which is about 30 minutes north of Portland, right on the coast, which is the first district, which is what. Which is very socially progressive. This guy, probably outside of the Marines, probably has only associated with white Christian people his entire life. This is not an excuse, by the way. I want to be very clear. I'm just giving context, just what happens. And I know people from my, my part of the state that are afraid to go to other towns because there are Haitian immigrants there now. They are not doing anything bad. They just know they're there and they're scared because they don't understand. So there may be some of this, but I think that the, the thing that I really struggle with is he's 41 years old. Like, he has had this for like 18 to 20 years. And you know, if you have a, you know, a smart bone in your body, you know that like, no matter what, like, that thing should not be there and you should get rid of it and then never talk about it again. And he didn't do that. And that's the thing I want to ask. Right? Like, and I'm not sure that we are going to extend an invitation for him to be on because I, I don't know if he, if he is deserving of it yet. But I. That's the first question I would ask is like, what the hell were you thinking not doing this? I mean, Luke, I think I could say this because it's.
- [26:33]
A
It.
- [26:34]
B
This isn't Portraying his trust. We were talking about it earlier and he was like, I would have taken a cheese grater to my chest the second if I couldn't get it removed to get that thing off of me. And he did not do that.
- [26:45]
A
Everyone should go read the Vanity Fair article. It's a, it's just an interview. It's not, I mean, there's a little bit of preface, but he talks about it. I mean, they, they asked him, you know, where did you realize, when did you realize what this means? And he said, oh, when it all came out. What, like yesterday when this came out. Like, this is, it's. So he covered it up with a Celtic knot and a dog. He, like, just immediately had it erased. But, you know, like, see, this is the thing. Like Democrats are, I think, are introspective, academic, research oriented people. And, and we think like that and we also project that onto other people. And so when we look at like Donald Trump and all the stuff he does and the things that MAGA voters made their decisions on, the, the number one question, the comments I see everywhere, all of the time are, how the did we get here? I don't understand it. I, you know, I feel like I'm in a nightmare, that we are just genuinely confused as to how other people's brains work. And so if I remember that, that is true. And I look at a guy like Graham Platner, who I did not serve in the Iraq war. I didn't have ptsd. I have never been drunk in Croatia. There are a lot of things that he's done that I don't understand and that I'll never understand. And so the main voters are going to have to figure this out for themselves. Just reading a couple of his responses, I'm like, yeah, it sounds like a guy who made stupid. I mean, he just says that I made stupid decisions. I didn't know what I was doing. But he also pointed out, like, I wouldn't take my shirt off and dance if I knew that I had a Nazi tattoo on my chest. Like, that would be a stupid thing for a person to do. So if, like, if he knew and was embarrassed about it. So, you know, I, I don't know what to do with it. It's an, it's, it's at best an annoying distraction. At worst, it's, you know, an implosion of one of the brightest young or one of the brightest new voices on the Democratic scene in a long time.
- [28:52]
C
So in, in 2008, and I've been googling while, while Rich has been talking. So in 2008, I. Let me back up. So Graham Platner and I graduated in the same year from high school. In 2003. He joined the Marines. I joined the Army. We were in Iraq at the same time and the same time as Vice President J.D. vance. That that was. That nobody had a good time in Iraq at that point doesn't create any excuses. But when I got out of the military and joined an anti war Veterans organization in 2008, so a year after he got that tattoo, I got, you know, what is commonly referred to as a soldier's cross. I also got some Arabic. I don't read Arabic, but it felt right. It says salam on my arm, which means peace, which also happened to be the name of my interpreter from Iraq who I lost touch with. And I don't know if he's alive or dead. In this soldier's cross, I, I have three phrases that you cannot read. Because I didn't have a lot of money. I didn't understand how tattoos age, but it used to say, never alone, not in my name, and never again, symbolizing my relationship with, with war. I didn't know until years later, many years later, that never again is very commonly associated with, like, never again are we going to let the Holocaust happen. Right. I think most people from my community growing up in Long island, where, where, you know, half my friends growing up were Jewish, like, maybe they would recognize that, but I don't know that many Americans would recognize that. That slogan, that phrase is so meaningful, ironically, in the very opposite way of Graham Platner's tattoo. But I, I carried that on my body for probably a decade and a half before I understood what it meant to other people. This is, this is not a long way of making an excuse for, for Graham Platner, but it is. I can, I can understand the idea of going so long with something so meaningful tattooed into your skin without anyone ever telling you what it means.
- [31:20]
B
So do we to sort of wrap this. And I, and I want the audience, like, I want you guys to chime in on this in comments, because this is really important. But, like, as it stands right now, do you think from what you know, and obviously there are a lot of unknowns, so I'm, I'm not going to hold anybody to this. Is this it? Can he survive this? Like, can he get through this? Based on what we're reading in the Vanity Fair piece, and just generally speaking, a Democratic candidate with a SS tattoo is not. We don't have a real clear, like, Path of like anybody else who has done been in this situation, you know, I guess Chris, from you at first, like from your, your, your background, do you think that this can be explained a way, in a way that will satisfy Democratic primary voters who tend to be more left than, than the general public?
- [32:17]
C
I, honestly, I, I think that you as a Mainer would know better than I, you know, I, I can I take him at his word that he's not a Nazi and never was. I, I don't think there's any evidence other than a dumb tattoo that, that he has like Nazi affiliations. And when I use the word Nazi, I'm being like hyper literal. Right. My job is to hunt right Nazis, like actual Nazis. People who are not just racist but who have genocidal fantasies that sometimes result in mass shootings. Like, that is why I do what I do. Graham Platner is not one of those guys and I seriously doubt that he ever was. But I, it, I remain extraordinarily concerned that he made it this far in life without and, and his friend apparently said that he called it a Totenkoff, which is a very specific name that is German. Yeah, he knew what it was like. He has to be honest. And I, I am glad that he got it covered up within 24 hours of, of him very stupidly giving it to the podcast. Podcast bros, our technical competitors, even though they don't know we exist. The God Save America, Pod Save America guys.
- [33:39]
B
Yeah, whatever.
- [33:42]
C
I, I think he maybe can get past it. Like, I, I think you know Mainers.
- [33:46]
B
Better than I do, so it's, yeah, it's really tricky. I, like I said, I know a lot of people who would probably say all the things that he said and not think, think another second about it and that there is a fear of people that they do not understand. And I think that, you know, I think he can. I, I've talked to, I, I specifically DM'd a bunch of people in Maine last night. Not, not political people, just people that I know. And I was just like, what do you think? That was it. And I, I didn't get any. He's done. I didn't get any. He's amazing either, but I got a lot of, I don't know, you know, it really depends on the next few days. I think he has to own it. I, I, I haven't read this Vanity Fair article, so maybe he is owning it, but, but like, you know, great that he got it covered up in the last 24 hours, but like, what was he thinking? About it two weeks ago or like six months ago. Like, but, like, like, but you're right, but like you're running for the Senate and like, you know, there's a vetting thing and usually you do, you know. And actually I had a friend that, that DM'd me and he, he literally said, you know, that there is a reason why, you know, the Democratic establishment picks candidates that they do because they are vetted. And the sort of. These, these guys who come out of nowhere generally don't get the same. Now, they may be better. They may be better, but they generally don't have the same vet. And so, you know, I think Mainers in particular are a. Especially among their own, open to hearing about this. I think. And I, I think that it is good that it came out now. I mean, it doesn't take a genius to figure out who dropped all this. And I think it's, you know, either will end him or he will be stronger afterwards if he can. If he could explain it. But like, I, I am not satisfied right now. I, I am not. Like, I am. I was very pro platner. I met him a few weeks ago. He was great, but I didn't know any of this stuff. But I think we also have to ask how much of, like you said, like, Rich, you made a good point. Like, the redemption arc is on him. And like, he has started that arc, I think. But he is nowhere near a place where I would say I support him over Janet Mills, who I really like as governor, but I think is too old. But, like, that's the struggle that I have. And I think there are a lot of Democrats that are. Are struggling. Her knock is her age. Yeah. And this, like, I'm only going to serve one term, which basically just means that we're going to deal with this six years from now. It doesn't really solve anything.
- [36:30]
A
Yeah.
- [36:32]
B
So. But Rich, I'm curious your perspective as a, As a sort of outsider, not a military person, not from Maine. What do you.
- [36:38]
A
I mean, like I said, like, I had to look up the skull and I was like, okay, I believe it's true. I had to go look it up. And like, I had no idea. If I saw that tattoo, if I saw that on the wall of a tattoo shop, I'd be like, it's. I would imagine it would probably be with 15 or 30 or 50 other skull and crossbone configurations. It's a poss. I think in Austria. Right. Or Croatia, I think they probably knew what they were tattooing on his body and they probably should have said like, hey, this is a Nazi tattoo. Are you sure? Like, maybe he doesn't even, he was.
- [37:13]
C
An active duty service member in a foreign country. Like this kind of happens.
- [37:17]
A
They're just like, whatever.
- [37:19]
C
No, they're, they're like laughing as they're doing it.
- [37:21]
B
That is. Oh, it's like, yeah, he's not the.
- [37:24]
C
First Marine to get a, that the artist knew what it meant. And like, every Marine who goes to Asia is gonna get a very regrettable tattoo and the artist is gonna know.
- [37:37]
A
What they're doing when the artist is going to be laughing. Well, and maybe they, maybe they hated American soldiers back then. Who knows?
- [37:44]
B
Well, we didn't have a Great rep in 2007.
- [37:46]
A
Exactly. So it's like, well, these guys. No, I think we, the question is, do, do we allow people to recover from mistakes? And so then the question which has to be, yes, I think Democrats have typically been more on the no side of like, if you've ever done anything controversial ever, you should have known. And we hold you to an impossible standard and you have to be perfect if you want to be our candidate. And where that's led us is these highly vettable candidates who since they were 14, have been in debate in middle school prepping for the day that they would run for president one day or run for Senate one day. And so they, they come out of prep schools and Ivy Leagues and they're polished the whole way. And, and they then become wildly unrelatable to regular humans, right? Because you've just got a thousand, I don't know, you look at like Mitt Romney on the right and you look at Paul Ryan like these, these polished people with perfect hair and they're made in a lab. They, they're grown in a lab. They speak like politicians, they speak like news anchors, they speak like somebody you would have to get obliterated drunk in order to get, like, to get them to say, you know, like to get anything out of them that is real and that has worked against us. So, you know, I'm like, I'm, I'm trying to stay in a, in an open minded place. Obviously this is like a, a pretty brutal test for the party. Right out of the gate is like, hey, how about a oyster farmer with fucking. Or a lobster farmer? How about a oyster, Oyster farm?
- [39:20]
B
You don't farm lobsters, you farm oysters.
- [39:22]
A
Yeah, how about. Exactly. How about a, how about an oyster farmer with a Nazi tattoo? And we're like, well, that's a, that's, that's Ripping off the band aid real quick, you know, to go from, like, you know, Joe Biden mom, Donnie to grandfather, it's a. It's a little bit of whiplash. But, like, I do think it's a healthy conversation whether he makes it through or not. I. I think. I think he has. It has to be recoverable. If we know that if we somehow prove that it was a genuine mistake and that he was never lying about it. If there's any question, like, that's, like, that's just a judgment call that. I mean, fortunately, it's on main Democrats and. And not on me, but. Well, I'm glad we're having a really.
- [40:05]
C
Difficult about this before. And, you know, I. And when I said, like, my friends and I would take a K bar, heat it up, and rub it across the chest to get rid of the tattoo, like, I am not joking. I am genuinely upset that he did not burn that tattoo off of his skin. I. I think coming from my, you know, from the military and veterans culture, it's the reason why I fucking like this guy. He's probably the only candidate. Even though I couldn't remember his name for the first couple times I mentioned him, he's the only candidate that I've been excited about at all. Like, I really haven't given about anybody else. I. I am really upset that he didn't burn that off his skin. No. Knowing what it meant.
- [40:49]
B
Yeah.
- [40:50]
C
The fact that he got it covered up after it came out, like, this really feels like a cop out to me.
- [40:58]
B
Yeah, well, I. I mean, I think we're gonna see. I mean, again, like, I, you know, I don't know if we're gonna have him on the show, but, you know, I think I want to hear. We want to hear from the listeners. Like, what. What do you think? Would you like to hear his side? Would you? Like. I. And by the way, you know, our interviews to date have been pretty, you know, mild, let's say, but, like, if he comes on, it will not be. I think we are upset. I was also. I mean, everybody's been, like, kind of laughing at me because I've been like, the biggest, like, Platner fanboy before this, because I'm like, he is a real Mainer. This is exactly. Like, he talks the right way. Like, he's. He's doing the right things, he's saying the right things. But this is a real problem for me. So, guys, let us know. Like, what do you think? Like, should we. Should we just say, forget it? Like, let's hear It, So just reply in the comments wherever you are, and we'll take a look at them and we'll, we'll see. And he, if he's, if someone on his team is listening, like, we're willing to listen. I'm not guaranteeing coming on, but we're willing to listen, so we'll, we'll leave this at that.
- [41:58]
C
The evolution that we've all had on, on Gavin Newsom over, you know, over the last few months, like, shows, you know, we're like, I was pissed at Gavin Newsom, who was platforming the fucking. All right, like Charlie Kirk, not a fucking good dude. Steve Bannon, not a fucking good dude. And, and the. One of the most popular, like, apparent frontrunners to become the next Democratic nominee for, for president. Like, we were shitting on him for weeks or months. I don't know if it fucking made a difference, but, like, the episode that he had here, I think was pretty constructive and.
- [42:34]
B
Yeah.
- [42:34]
C
And, you know, he's been doing some good since. He's not a perfect candidate. Nobody is, but it seemed like the, the listeners really, really liked hearing from Gavin Newsom even after we were pissed at him for months. So, you know me like, well, yeah. Knows it's what's gonna happen.
- [42:52]
A
It's funny you. You bring that up because the contrast, like, I think, you know, Gavin Newsom is one of those people I referenced earlier. It feels like he's probably been prepping for president for the last 40 years, whether that's the case or not. Whereas Graham Platner is brand new on the scene. And yet in both cases, I'm looking at them thinking, I, I have to care about what you are doing now, not what you believed or what you said or what you did 10 or 15 or 20 or 50 years ago. The Grant Platner situation is more unique. Obviously, this is not a matter of political differences, but I care. I like Gavin Newsom because he's the one who is doing the stuff now and he is taking action. And in the future, I have more confidence that he will take more action and do more things that need to be done than the people who, you know, nominate Merrick Garland, like, and, and, and we end up in this position where everybody's saying all the right things and writing all the strongly worded letters, but nobody is taking the action that needs to happen. So if, if Platner, if, if he can move on from this, he's still, I feel like a person who's gonna have a stronger bias for sharper, more decisive action. Than if we put somebody who's been in politics for, you know, most of their life in, in the seat. But like, is that enough? Yeah, I mean, it, it's, it's, yeah.
- [44:13]
B
I mean, it's interesting because like, I, if he was before all this happened, if he was to knock off Susan Collins, I actually think that Platner would have been on, on the list for VP choices for whoever is the, because of his authenticity and frankly, ability to win a very difficult race. But now I, I don't know. So we have to see and I think like, you know, let us know what you think. We've obviously got a few opinions here and, you know, maybe, maybe we'll have him on, maybe not, but let us know. But we also have another thing before we wrap that's important and somewhat related that is that this news that CNN dropped today that it appears that the VA is limiting health care for veterans. And this is something that, Chris, you were talking about back in, in, excuse me, in June. Tell us a little bit about what this is and why that, why people should be concerned about it.
- [45:04]
C
Yeah, so I had a, a VA psychiatrist who, or a psychologist who worked at Northport va. That's the VA that saved my life through my horrible dark transition period after I left the military. And she reached out. She had seen me as an anti war activist in around 2008, coming and speaking before her classroom, like sharing my horror stories that motivated her to become a doctor at the va. She now works at the va. And she came to me all these years later and said, hey, my VA is enforcing a new policy or enforcing a policy that had been around for a little while but was getting more strictly enforced as time goes on that is limiting her ability to see patients as they need, instead throwing out kind of an arbitrary number, whether it's 6 or 8 or 12 or 16. After those number of meetings, they want to try and push these vets into like cheaper and less successful, especially for people with certain needs, therapies that are not individualized, that are not personalized, that are not focused on the patient. So I wrote about this in June right before the Unite for Vets rally that Tim, Zach and I went to. And since I wrote that piece on, on my substack, I, I have had many more doctors from around the country reaching out and saying we're seeing the same thing. This is a policy that started under Trump or, or Biden but is now getting much more strictly enforced and it's gone across the entire country. Hospitals are, are threatening to Fire and otherwise discipline mental health providers who refuse to stop seeing their patients, who need it the most. This is literally going to kill people. This is a terrible fucking policy. And the VA is trying to. The Trump VA is trying to gaslight us after. You know, I could not release these documents because they're all marked by what hospitals they come from. So it would make it very easy to find the whistleblowers, and I'm not about to put these people at risk. So I couldn't release those documents, but I did give them the cnn. And after four months of chasing down this story, CNN finally published this, found even more sources, even more documentation, including email threats from managers. Right, the. Like a stack of evidence. And I'm. I'm just glad the story's finally getting out there. I mean, we only have so much reach, you know, through this podcast through substack or whatever. But it getting to CNN is. Is huge. And I'm. I'm glad that I had the opportunity to play a small role in this and listeners of this podcast in boosting this story, in connecting with VA physicians, connecting them with us, help make this happen. And I, I think that this story will ultimately force this policy to be reversed. Might take some time, but Congress will act on. On this type of thing, and they will force the Trump administration to stop doing this.
- [48:13]
B
Well, I think it's. It's incredible work that you did, and thank you to everybody who paid attention and lifted this story up, and obviously also the whistleblowers within the va, you know, taking a risk to. To try to better people's lives or save them from losing effective treatments. And, you know, I think it's just another reason why we are doing what we're doing and that our motto, as we've told people in the past, is, is impact first, revenue second. And this is a great example of helping. Helping to amplify a big story like that. So thank you for doing that and also thank you to everybody who did that. And it leads perfectly into mihawking all our shit for you to do. And I see Rich has a lovely. The same lovely one from before, which he was lamenting. He wasn't wearing the Five Faces hoodie, but he has our OG Find out podcast Hoodie on. Looks great.
- [49:09]
A
It's so comfortable. I always put on something else. And then I'm like, I'm gonna put on a hoodie. It's a little chilly.
- [49:15]
B
And.
- [49:15]
A
And then I pull this on and.
- [49:17]
B
I'm like, I've got everybody's favorite. The Five Faces which everyone laughs at my face. So you can just like, just do it this way. We've sold so much. It's been great. But. Oh, go ahead, Chris.
- [49:29]
C
So my, my wife keeps stealing these hoodies and it, it upsets me because for some reason this is like a lifelong thing. In high school, if a girl liked you, she took your hoodie and you never got it back. And I like had favorite hoodies that I never get to wear again because someone took it. And for some reason in high school and I remember this, I was thinking like, man, one day I'm going to be married and I'm not going to have to worry about those hoodies getting stolen. No, now the hoodies get stolen faster because I can't protect them. The thief lives with me and I know hoodie is safe from inside the house.
- [50:12]
B
So if, so if you're a guy and you're buying a hoodie then like really, you got to hit that quantity button at least one time to get, get two and then everybody can enjoy them.
- [50:21]
C
So don't, don't buy her size by your size.
- [50:24]
A
Yes.
- [50:25]
C
Right. Because she's going to want to wear your hoodie.
- [50:27]
A
Yeah.
- [50:28]
B
And they are run a little small. A little small. So just a little heads up on that. They're also made in America union printed. You know, live in our values and when you wear it. We saw some great photos of people out at the no Kings protest this weekend, which we didn't even. There's so other bunch other news. We barely touched on that. Which is like the largest protest. Yeah, the largest protest in U. S. History. But, but we saw lots of photos of people like showing us that they were wearing them out. And I, you know, just thank you for doing that and you know, you know, if you haven't picked up any like you can get it@findoutpodcast.com and you know, if you want to help support like the, the work like Chris did in uncovering this VA story, you can become a member of our substack which is@findoutpodcast.substack.com and we have lots of other things we'll be announcing in the next couple weeks or maybe months of other ways you can get involved too. So. But I think with that we are going to wrap today. I want to thank Rich and Chris for joining me and you know the other guys will be back. They're fine. They're just not here today. They'll be back next week. So we hope everybody has a wonderful weekend shopping the find out store or you know, just enjoying your life. And we will talk to you on Tuesday. So have a great weekend, everybody. We'll talk soon.