Count me as one lifelong Democrat who wanted Bill Clinton to resign. I found both his willingness to betray his wife, as well as his willingness to abuse his position of power, as disqualifying. As Stephen accurately describes, it was part of the long slide toward total partisanship in national politics, where character became subordinated to winning.
As much as I would like to see Susan Collins driven from office, and to see the Democrats resume control of the senate, Platner has shown himself for what he is, and I would find it impossible to vote for him. His errors of judgement portend even more to come.
I get the argument that Democrats holding their candidates to higher standards while Republicans ignore the personal failures of theirs is a losing proposition. But I hate hypocrisy more than I despise the current GOP. To be clear, I thought that driving Al Franken from office for some silly jokes was crazy, and it only reinforced the whole purity pony concept for Democrats. But some behavior is not acceptable, and Platner's behavior that indicates a lack of consistent character is the deal killer for me.
One irony is that Democrats largely internalized the lesson of the Clinton years: what a politician can accomplish for “your side” is often more important than what they do or say in their personal life. That's easy to forget because the Clinton scandals are now more than 30 years in the past, (even if many of the people who still dominate American politics in 2026 remember them vividly).
The bigger story IMO is that the rest of American politics moved in the same direction on both sides. Politics is coarser, partisanship is stronger, and voters are generally more willing to overlook personal flaws if they believe a politician is effective. What seemed like a controversial lesson in the 1990s now looks more like a test run.
Count me as one lifelong Democrat who wanted Bill Clinton to resign. I found both his willingness to betray his wife, as well as his willingness to abuse his position of power, as disqualifying. As Stephen accurately describes, it was part of the long slide toward total partisanship in national politics, where character became subordinated to winning.
As much as I would like to see Susan Collins driven from office, and to see the Democrats resume control of the senate, Platner has shown himself for what he is, and I would find it impossible to vote for him. His errors of judgement portend even more to come.
I get the argument that Democrats holding their candidates to higher standards while Republicans ignore the personal failures of theirs is a losing proposition. But I hate hypocrisy more than I despise the current GOP. To be clear, I thought that driving Al Franken from office for some silly jokes was crazy, and it only reinforced the whole purity pony concept for Democrats. But some behavior is not acceptable, and Platner's behavior that indicates a lack of consistent character is the deal killer for me.
One irony is that Democrats largely internalized the lesson of the Clinton years: what a politician can accomplish for “your side” is often more important than what they do or say in their personal life. That's easy to forget because the Clinton scandals are now more than 30 years in the past, (even if many of the people who still dominate American politics in 2026 remember them vividly).
The bigger story IMO is that the rest of American politics moved in the same direction on both sides. Politics is coarser, partisanship is stronger, and voters are generally more willing to overlook personal flaws if they believe a politician is effective. What seemed like a controversial lesson in the 1990s now looks more like a test run.