"I Am Not a Secret Nazi"
Candidate for the Democrat nomination for US Senator from Maine Graham Platner's Nazi SS tattoo has stirred up some controversy. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt), who has endorsed Platner, urged voters "to not fall victim to those who would unfairly judge this solid fighter for socialism. Remember, Nazi is short for National Socialist German Workers' Party. While Hitler took a wrong turn when he reneged on his deal with Stalin to carve up the smaller nations of eastern Europe between them during World War II, his previous program of socialist investment in German factories helped rescue the country from the Great Depression by providing the working class with jobs."
Platner himself asserted "I am not a secret Nazi. If I were a secret Nazi I wouldn't have a Nazi tattoo. I would have studiously avoided such a telltale symbol used by Nazi concentration camp guards. I got the Totenkopf skull and crossbones tattoo because I thought it was cool artwork that would make me appear tough. I never bothered to consider what sort of symbolism it might represent."
Genevieve McDonald, Platner's political director before she resigned after learning of his Nazi tattoo, said she "doubted Platner's claim to be an innocent admirer of the artwork. He is a big history buff and cannot credibly maintain he was ignorant of the Totenkopf's significance to the Nazi perpetrators of the Holocaust."
Desperate to dilute the impact of his tattoo, Platner pointed out that "I went to the same elite Hotchkiss School that was attended by such great Americans as former Supreme Court justice Potter Stewart, former CIA director Porter Goss, Clinton family adviser Strobe Talbott, and veteran newsman Chris Wallace. My mother even hired a seamstress to sew me a uniform so I could participate in Civil War reenactments while I was in high school. The Nazis were street-brawling homosexuals before they became mass murderers. I am nothing like them."
In a bid to quell criticism, Platner announced that he has had the tattoo redone to show wolves devouring sheep, saying "this should finally show folks that I'm not really a Nazi. It's the Republicans who are the real Nazis tearing down our democracy. If I am elected to the Senate I pledge to use every weapon available to defeat them."
Dems Edge Closer to Civil War
In California, US Rep. Robert Garcia announced that "the House Democrats on the Oversight Committee are establishing a 'Master ICE Tracker' that will help our Antifa street fighters locate where immigrants are being arrested and allow them to intervene and prevent the deportation of the folks invited into our country by former President Biden." Apple and Facebook have removed similar ICE trackers from their platforms lest they be held liable for damages in any violent confrontations enabled by their ICE trackers.
Garcia explained his strategy, saying "with the government shutdown there is no money to pay the ICE agents that are harassing our Party's voters. It's one thing to face down a crowd that is ramming your vehicles, throwing stuff, cursing and spitting on you when you are being paid. When paychecks aren't coming the risk of bodily injury or death could reach intolerable levels and provoke the ICE officers go on strike."
Former House Speaker Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif) and Rep. Kevin Mullin (D-Calif) warned that "ICE officers who carry out raids in our sanctuary state will be arrested and tried under California's sanctuary laws. Trump will be unable to pardon them for violating these state laws. The convicted ICE officers will rot in state prisons for 'just following orders' to enforce Trump's fascist policies."
US Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche responded with a letter warning them to "stand down or face prosecution. We urge you and other California officials to publicly abandon this criminal conspiracy, to stop threatening law enforcement, and to prioritize the safety of your citizens. No one threatens our agents. No one will stop us from Making America Safe Again."
In Illinois, State Representative Margaret Croke sent out an email listing detailed descriptions of vehicles belonging to ICE agents operating in Chicago neighborhoods. This includes make, model, color, and partial license plate info for cars believed to belong to ICE agents working in the area. Former Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot says she "is heading up a similar effort to identify federal immigration agents so it will be easier for residents to know who and where their enemies are and attack them."
In Washington, DC, Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-NY) gloated over his Party's recent success in "repelling the Republicans' attempt to get funding to pay essential government employees during the shutdown. The attempt to pay the so-called essential workers is a ploy to deny paying the non-essential workers. These folks are a core constituency of the Democratic Party. Ninety percent of them vote Democrat. We consider keeping them on the federal payroll essential. As long as we Democrats hang together the Republicans will run out of options and have to give in to our demands."
In Louisiana, James Carville, the brains behind former President Bill Clinton's 1992 winning campaign slogan "it's the economy, stupid," told Al Hunt on his "Politics War Room" podcast that he "fantasizes about having Trump's collaborators having their heads shaved. Being put in orange pajamas, and marched down Pennsylvania Avenue while people are invited to spit on them. That's what they did to the Nazi collaborators in France after World War II. Later some of them went to prison and were hanged. Others were permanently barred from ever serving in government again. That's what Democrats should do to Republicans after we win the 2028 presidential election."
In related news, an anonymous person has given the Department of War $130 million to help pay for some military salaries during the government shutdown. Schumer scoffed at the donation calling it "far short of what is needed to fully compensate the troops. It shows that we have Trump by the short hairs. When Democrats retake the majority in Congress in the 2026 elections we will find out who made this donation along with any others who may dare to emulate him and punish all of them just like we punished the January 6 insurrectionists."
Dems Doctor Crime Stats
Gov. JB Pritzker's (D-Ill) claim that crime is down in his state and the City of Chicago is based largely on reclassifying felonies to misdemeanors. The Governor boasted "this essentially cost-free method of improving our safety record is something we should have thought of doing a long time ago. Prosecutors have always had the authority to decide whether to reduce the cost of prosecuting offenders by offering them a deal to plead to a misdemeanor and get a lesser sentence or probation rather than being tried for a felony. We also save on incarceration expenses with the lighter sentences."
US Attorney General Pam Bondi asserted that "jiggering the statistics to make crime rates appear to decline isn't making citizens safer. It's letting dangerous criminals go free with just a slap on the wrist, leaving them free to prey upon people who may be lulled into a false sense of security by the data that Gov Pritzker cites as proof that his easy-on-crime approaches aren't risky. Individuals with dozens of arrests show a disregard for civilized behavior that argues for them being kept away from potential victims."
Pritzker called Bondi's view of public safety "out-dated. A lot of the folks we arrest had deprived childhoods. They lacked virtuous role models. The so-called 'slap on the wrist' complaint under estimates the potential positive effects of a 'second chance' for the offender. It tells that offender that he is worth saving. This has to get him thinking about being a better person."
Bondi said, "when individuals are given dozens of 'second chances' I think it immunizes them against doing the right thing. Their behavior tends to get worse over time, often producing horrific and brutal crimes. Take the case of the senseless murder of a young Ukrainian immigrant by a habitual criminal in Charlotte, North Carolina. All the 'second chances' this offender got cost another person her life. Crime without punishment undermines civilization and replaces it with primordial savagery--the most out-dated form of human interaction."
