Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner says his six months in Afghanistan in 2018 as a State Department security contractor revealed how America’s wars had become “a corporate money-grab.” He clarified he never worked for Erik Prince’s Blackwater but for a hedge-fund-owned successor that inherited its State Department contracts. “They used guys like me with these backgrounds to meet the contract requirements so they could pay us bare minimum and walk away with the balance.”

Platner said his job mostly involved driving for the U.S. ambassador’s security team. “We were barely leaving the Green Zone… All I did was lift weights and play video games. I got huge and I played a lot of Far Cry,” he said.

He quit after six months and went home to farm oysters.

    • BussyGyatt@feddit.org
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      4 days ago

      His own claim is that he got the tattoo while drunk, which is idiotic. I decline to pretend with you that the tattoo is not its own evidence of cryptofascism.

        • BussyGyatt@feddit.org
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          4 days ago

          i dont think ‘lots of other people are drunken idiots too’ is quite the argument you were looking for

        • wheezy@lemmy.ml
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          3 days ago

          I’ve been drunk as fuck for most weekends of my life. Never once did I find myself getting a Nazi tattoo to celebrate my service killing brown people in Iraq. Idk. Maybe have a higher standard for a representative than you would some random reddit comment?

          Like, this isn’t a personal friend you’re trying to help explain the personal struggles of to another friend. This is a representative that will influence the lives of thousands to potentially millions of people. Maybe have a higher standard for them to reach than you would a drunk idiot in a bar.

          That’s why he’s a “pass” for me. I don’t live in Maine. I don’t have any interest in helping or promoting him. Maybe if I was in Maine I’d have a bit more patience.

          But I am not gonna waste my time defending or promoting a dude with a Nazi tattoo just because he said “fight the oligarchs” like it’s a copy pasta from Sanders to get voters.

          • yonderbarn@lazysoci.alOP
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            3 days ago

            He said he had no idea it was Nazi symbolism. No one in his family or friends made him aware of it either. I was also unaware of it.

            • wheezy@lemmy.ml
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              3 days ago

              You being stupid is ok with me. You’re not running as a politician.

              Edit: I’m sorry. Maybe the average person is just really stupid. But it’s literally the second symbol listed on the Nazi Symbolism Wikipedia. First is the Swastika. Is the average person really that ignorant of history?

                • wheezy@lemmy.ml
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                  3 days ago

                  Like, you’re telling me if you saw a guy with that tattoo in the gym the first thing that comes to mind is not “damn, that looks like some Nazi shit”?

                  Like, I’m not saying people need to know the exact symbol and name. But, come on, you watch one WW2 documentary and you should be able to put that together. That shit was all over.