Whenever I hear some shrunken-soul member of the supposed left-wing pundit class opine about how Democrats need to "appeal to white working class voters," I think, "What the fuck are Democrats doing that shouldn't appeal to them?" Of course, the answer is that they need to be a little more racist, a little more homo/transphobic, a little less "woke" (whatever the fuck they think that means), a little more, well, Republican. Oh, and Democrats need to find "authentic" voices, candidates who speak like voters do, who come from their background, who "understand" them.
That's where I call "bullshit" on the whole thing. Because what white working class voters have shown us in the past decade is that they don't give a damn where a candidate or a leader comes from. They don't fucking care if someone is, say, a pampered, inarticulate billionaire. They don't fucking care if it's some elite-educated, privileged prickmite. You can't look at Donald Trump's wins and think, "Well, obviously, we need to get some farmers or steel mill workers to run for office because that's what voters want." Or, if you do, you're fucking weird. That's like seeing some dude fuck a pig and decide he really would prefer a human so you decide to set him up on a date and he leaves the date early and go fuck another pig because he's a pig fucker and you're an idiot for thinking otherwise.
See, Democrats already elected a working class hero. You know who that is? It's Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Yeah, AOC comes from a background that should make consultants drool. Not only did she work as a bartender to survive after college, her father died when she was young and her mother worked as a house cleaner and school bus driver to avoid the bank from foreclosing on the small house they had been able to afford in the Bronx. How has she been received by the gatekeepers of the white working class on the Republican side? With nonstop mocking for having been a bartender, with endless vitriol about her legitimacy and devotion to workers, with, you know, the usual gleefully cruel racism and sexism that any non-white woman is going to get in this cursed age.
When everyone was rushing to anoint former Maine Democratic senate candidate Graham Platner as a new avatar of working class authenticity, it was a joke (not least because, unlike AOC, Platner was not from a working class background). It showed that racism and sexism bled over to the left, too, because, apparently, the only way to get white working class voters is with a white man. The Democratic Party is filthy with working class politicians, like Aaron Ford, the AG of Nevada who is running for governor. A single dad who needed food stamps and housing assistance, Ford is the real deal. However, he is Black. The consultants who gave us Platner have made their disdain for non-white voters plain, which maybe works for Maine, I guess.
My own opinion of Platner until the rape allegations was "Fine, whatever, if this is who Maine wants, I don't care, just beat Susan Collins and get back the Senate, vote blue no matter who." Sure, I liked his platform; it was great to hear someone say all the right things about wealth disparity, health care, corruption, and more. But the defense of his Nazi tattoo and the old sexist and violent Reddit comments was dumb. The dude fucked up repeatedly, but, again, sure, Maine's gotta do what Maine's gotta do. But once it became clear that he went from creepy to criminal, then fuck your precious politics. And still, he was defended. The idea that credible rape allegations might not be a deal breaker for some is pathetic.
Stop defending Platner. It wasn't an AIPAC plot or Deep State attack or whatever other conspiracy bullshit his remaining supporters are clinging to. You just look like a perverse moron. There are plenty of potential candidates who haven't been accused of rape (or don't have a Nazi tattoo). You know how fucking hard it was for Jenny Racicot to speak out? You know the shit she's likely being dragged through by Platner stans and followers of the media whores who love him. You think she's putting herself through that for kicks?
The point here, though, is not just about Platner. It's not even about the real working class candidates and elected officials out there. It's that the whole idea that somehow there is some innate need to run those candidates in order for Democrats to succeed. That's a fucking lie. We are told all the time that pampered pricks are men of the people. We heard that about George W. Bush. We heard it about Donald Trump. The truth about them couldn't be further from the image. Jesus, Platner wasn't even winning the voters he was engineered to win.
What Democratic consultants with any brains should do is deal in reality and not try to . Sure, Democrats, no matter what class they come from, give more of a shit about the poor and working class than Republicans, who couldn't give a fuck less but sure love to pretend. But if white working class voters think it's more important suck billionaire cock, then fuck 'em. Get the candidate who is going to unify everyone else (and some of those precious white working class people will jump on board because they're not all stupid). Jesus, look at Jon Ossoff. Privileged upbringing, man of the people. It's not that fucking hard.
