Jon Reisman
Several friends and acquaintances have sent me missives suggesting that my tone in recent weeks has become increasingly partisan and confrontational, and that I am suffering from Platner Derangement Syndrome (PDS). I think that’s a misdiagnosis, and that I actually have Platner Traumatic Socialism Disorder (PTSD), which is a highly infectious virus spread by the Maine People’s Alliance out of a Chinese Triad grow house in Hallowell, with the aid and assistance of Janet Mills and climate czarina/Democratic (socialist) gubernatorial nominee Hannah Pingree. Preliminary indications suggest that conservative Jewish economists are particularly vulnerable to this pinko plague, and that infected and infectious Jews should be quarantined and gagged/masked to protect public health. It seems likely that Janet will issue a Fauci-like pardon to Hannah for her great work protecting Maine from the climate-threatening Hebrews.
Rural Health care being what it is, I don’t expect to secure a social justice therapy appointment any time soon, although it’s possible that an emergency red flag intervention request from Shenna Bellows and the legacy media will protect the woke liberal order and public health from the conservative threat of transparency and accountability. It seems unlikely that Maine’s Democrat dominated Supreme Court will reverse Shenna’s decision to keep the issue of biological males in girls’ sports off the November ballot. Shenna knows you’ve got to gag and quarantine dangerous ideas to prevent their spread and damaging electoral spillover. Freedom of speech can’t be allowed to damage the socialist project.
It is true that the left’s growing antisemitism and socialist delusions have deeply disturbed me. If you wanted to upset a retired Jewish freedom-loving economist, Graham Platner is the perfect choice. I believe the Collins/Platner race will be very close, extremely expensive, and dangerously divisive, with voters splitting along geographic, gender, and generational fault lines. Southern Coastal Maine (the 1st CD), women (however defined), and voters under 40 will break sharply for Platner. Rural western, eastern, and northern Maine (the 2nd CD), men, and older voters will break for Collins. The cacophony of political ads won’t change many minds, and the final result, regardless of victor, will be an exhausted, divided, demoralized, and angry electorate. Good luck uniting the state after the upcoming bruising battle. Whether we send Susan or the Oyster Fuhrer to D.C., Governor Charles, Pingree or Bennett will have their hands full.
The escalation of partisan preference is a consequence of our media information siloes. Whether you get your news from the legacy or social media, the silo effect means that Mainers do not share a common vision or understanding of reality. If you follow the legacy media, Mainecare/Somali fraud, Lewiston gun violence, Chinese Triad marijuana grow houses, and creeping socialism are not major concerns. If you’re a troglodyte 2nd CD rural Republican following the Maine Wire, you are living in a completely different and very threatening world. Potentially irreconcilable partisan division is the result. Our public health masters should probably order mandatory medical interventions, starting with sedatives and Prozac for every right-of-center voter in the state.
Jon Reisman is an economist and policy analyst who retired from the University of Maine at Machias after 38 years. He resides on Cathance Lake in Cooper, where he is a Statler and Waldorf intern. Mr. Reisman’s views are his own, and he welcomes comments as letters to the editor here or to him directly via email at jreisman@maine.edu.
