Platner's Cookie Continues to Crumble

In case you are writing a movie script about a U.S. Senate candidate's campaign collapsing, all you'll have to do is read this week's news to see what that looks like. Wannabe Democratic U.S. Senator from Maine Graham Platner has not withdrawn yet, but the writing on the wall continues to get bigger and bolder.

To start, the woman who previously accused Platner of violence against her sat for an interview yesterday and sharpened her claims, asserting that the candidate-for-now removed condoms during sexual intercourse without getting consent to do so. She (and again, we don't see a need to include names, and make these women slightly more google-able) also expressed unhappiness that her initial claims were taken less seriously because she is a Republican operative.

Meanwhile, Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-MI) also sat for an interview. The Representative is not known for making unfounded claims, and she has a history of working with victims of sexual violence. She says that, without getting into details because she does not want to pressure anyone before they are ready to share their stories, she has reason to believe that there are more stories of sexual violence that have yet to be revealed.

Platner also lost his last, and most important, endorsement from a sitting U.S. Senator, that of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT). Sanders fired up the old computing machine yesterday and, as expected, jumped ship: "I have spoken with Graham Platner about the best path forward for Maine. In light of these very serious allegations, I have recommended that he step aside."

Politico has counted noses among the 47 folks in the Senate Democratic Caucus, and has found that 39 of them have called on him to end his campaign. Nobody in the Caucus is urging him to continue; the seven Democrats and one independent who are not among the 39 have simply remained silent. Here's the list of non-commenters, in case it is of interest:

• Tammy Baldwin (D-WI)
• Dick Durbin (D-IL)
• John Hickenlooper (D-CO)
• Mazie Hirono (D-HI)
• Tim Kaine (D-VA)
• Angus King (I-ME)
• Mark Warner (D-VA)
• Ron Wyden (D-OR)

We are not sure what they are waiting for. Maybe they forgot to charge their cell phones, and so can't post to eX-Twitter until they get some juice.

The only people who are actively urging Platner to stay in the race are—and you surely didn't see this coming—Republicans. For example, Scott Jennings, who is paid by CNN to be their MAGA heel, decreed that it is imperative that Platner remain the candidate, because to do otherwise would "subvert" the will of the people. His concern for voters—in particular Democratic primary voters—is touching. The Republicans' desire to keep Platner on the ballot may be the loudest statement of all when it comes to judging his post-rape-accusation electability.

Platner's campaign has canceled a bunch of fundraisers scheduled for this week, and has also halted all advertising for the campaign. These are things that tend to happen pretty close to the end of the death spiral. In particular, you can't run a campaign without at least some money. The DNC and DSCC have already made clear that their wallets are closed, most of the ActBlue pages that were raising money for Platner have been shut down, and now the candidate is not holding fundraisers. That's pretty much all the potential money spigots, all shut down.

Oh, and the sharks in Maine are already circling. Former state Sen. Troy Jackson (D) has already filed paperwork with the FEC, establishing an exploratory committee for a potential Senate run. Nirav Shah, who finished slightly ahead of Jackson in this year's Maine gubernatorial primary, is considering getting back in the game. State Rep. Valli Geiger (D) may also be in the mix. Platner has said that if he drops out, it will only be in favor of someone who can carry his torch, and not an "establishment" candidate. Geiger has been a close ally of Platner's, and it's not impossible that he conditions his withdrawal on her being chosen as his replacement. Geiger is pretty lefty and populist, as you might imagine, though not as young as Platner. We can't find her date of birth anywhere on the Internet, but she graduated college in 1977, so she must be around 70.

Yesterday, we asked readers for their thoughts on the Platner meltdown; here are some of those:

• D.E. in Lancaster, PA: I really don't want to write this letter, but feel I must since I have weighed in on past accusations against Graham Platner. I will admit that when I heard the accusations on Monday, my feelings and opinions swung back and forth. I think all accusations of rape should be taken seriously, but I also know that an accusation is not always proof or even actual fact. Unlike (Z), I did not find Platner's accuser to be without concerns, but then (Z) is being way more impartial than I.
  
  What changed my opinion is the reporting in The Washington Post—I still don't visit their site but read things from there second hand—that another ex-girlfriend accused Platner of sneakily taking off condoms while they were engaged in sex. That is a move of power and dominance and that made up my mind that Platner should quit ASAP.
  
  Let me explain why that was a deciding factor. When I started listening to Platner's speeches, one of the ideas that I became enamored of was his belief that the modern Democratic party has stopped using the tools of politics to get things done. He said repeatedly that our Democratic leaders have continued to cede ground to the Republican extremists. His main pitch was that if he was elected he would wield that political power to get things accomplished. Every one of his scandals has had power and dominance at its core. Even if all those events are things that he now regrets, they still make his being a spokesperson for brandishing said power completely wrong and highly ineffective. We need the power of authenticity and not power for power's sake.
  
  My biggest worry is that what Platner did in the past will negate what he has said in the present. He is right in his philosophy, but horribly wrong in his execution. I worry that the lessons taken from this that it is better to be a focus-group-to-death Democrat who has little in the way of original thought and who wants to make a career of ceding as little ground as possible to MAGA—our very own versions of Sen. Susan "I'm deeply concerned (but will do nothing about it)" Collins (R-ME). If that happens then we will just repeat our current cycle of the Republicans destroying our government and then when things go to hell, as they always do, the Democrats try to patch things up but unable or willing to live up to their rhetoric, disillusioned Americans go back to voting for the party that put them into their current predicament. And so it goes round and round.
  
  We need fighters and we need new ideas but what we don't need is fighters for their own dominance. I hope whoever becomes the substitute candidate at least listens to Platner's speeches, tries to absorb some of his ideas that made him so popular, adopts what they can and tries to speak to those they can't. What I fear is that instead we will get another Democrat too timid for their own shadow.
  
  
• B.W.S. in Livingston, NJ: I had supported Platner since the primary race was him against Gov. Janet Mills (D-ME), and defended him from all sorts of allegations, from the Nazi tattoo to the first set of allegations made by the ex-girlfriends. But this new allegation is too well-corroborated and too not from a "Lady for Kavanaugh" to dismiss in that way. It's over. He's not a good person, and if he doesn't drop out, he harms progressivism. I hope Troy Jackson can right the ship.
  
  
• P.S. in Portland, ME: Just last week my wife and I traveled down east to Sullivan, ME, and had a private dinner with Graham Platner and his wife Amy Gertner. It was a wonderful discussion with wonderful people. A school teacher and an ex-marine and now oysterman who found themselves in a totally surreal situation. I think they were totally unprepared for what lay ahead when they made the decision to run. Graham is intelligent, a Star Trek:TNG fan, and a woods/bump skier who loves Saddleback Mountain (my home mountain). We both agreed Bernie Sanders and Gene Roddenberry would have been best of friends. In fact, we were in violent agreement on everything.
  
  What has now happened to Graham is wrong from the standpoint of, as you pointed out, there never would be a rape conviction if prosecuted. The timing was planned by the opposition, no doubt. But the political bar is set differently and he will succumb to the forces and step aside. To those of us here in Maine that can almost touch and feel that new Progressive Era, this is a deep loss.
  
  On the other hand, thanks to Graham, significant progress been made and the message has been spread. We want and need that new Progressive Era and have Troy Jackson waiting in the wings. From what I hear, he will almost certainly, and appropriately, get the nod. He is simply the most like Platner politically, and the most likely to attract and excite Platner's voters. Jackson will have the progressive left and unions fully behind him. His campaign team is already back together and plotting the path forward. Troy was always the best of the Democratic gubernatorial candidates to help Graham win the Senate. As the actual candidate, he will beat Susan Collins. Also keep in mind that Janet Mills and Troy Jackson are not exactly the best of friends. Troy has the dubious honor of having the most bills vetoed of any Maine Senate president, by Mills and by former governor Paul LePage (R-ME). One thing to watch is whether and when Janet Mills endorses Troy Jackson. It will be significant, as that will represent the establishment Democrats yielding to the Progressive left here in Maine. And yeah—you know it is coming—as goes Maine, so goes the nation.
  
  
• M.K. in Wilmington, DE: While I completely agree that Platner's long-term prospects for this election are basically nonexistent, I also think it's prudent for him to stay the course for the next couple of days.
  
  Obviously, if these allegations are accurate, then bowing out is the right thing to do, but I think there are broader considerations in play. My concern is that an immediate withdrawal not only makes him look guilty, but also makes the next accusation of any less-than-total-consent behavior against the next candidate that much more effective.
  
  It's a difficult needle to thread, as I want victims to come forward and have their voices heard. But I also don't want us to reach the point where any suggestion of sexual misconduct whatsoever leads to rash, unthinking reaction. We saw this happen with Al Franken and I'd prefer it didn't happen again.
  
  
• C.J. in Lowell, MA: I have very mixed feelings about the developments in the Maine Senate race which are both strong and contradictory. On the one hand, I never got the appeal of Platner. Even without any baggage he never gave off the Senate-material vibe, certainly nowhere close to a sitting governor. To me ,it's quite obvious which one's résumé makes the most sense for the Senate. There was also another candidate, David Costello, who never got traction, but had both a progressive issue profile and some political experience.
  
  On the other hand, it bugs me no end that all it takes is an accusation, which the candidate swears is false, for the Democratic pooh-bahs to turn on him. Without any investigation or a chance to tell his side, endorsements are withdrawn like they have touched a hot stove. The lesson seems to be that if you want to ruin a Democratic man's political career all you have to do is make a sexual accusation and the Party will be happy to do your dirty work for you. Maybe not to the level required by a court, but to me "innocent until proven guilty" is an ethical maxim, not just a legal one.
  
  This brings me to my other source of cognitive dissonance, because part of me says if he's innocent he should fight for his reputation and stay in the race, but, as you note a deadline is coming up and with so much on the line he may need to fall on his sword for the party and maybe try again another time after he's had a chance to really clear himself.
  
  
• A.R. in Los Angeles, CA: I thought I'd offer my thoughts in case it's helpful to have a female perspective.
  
  When the New York Times story, quoting all the ex-girlfriends, first came out, I dismissed the Republican operative's account because it seemed like she was stretching the truth and reaching for a story that wasn't there. The only part of the article that gave me pause was a different woman's recounting of a drunk Platner showing up at her door uninvited. That was disturbing, but she didn't indicate at the time that there was any more to the story.
  
  Now, of course, we know there is and it's absolutely disqualifying. Not surprisingly, women's rights groups, including Planned Parenthood and Reproductive Rights for All, are pulling their endorsement of Platner. Reading the rape accusation published this week just sounds eerily familiar to me. I recognize that feeling of fear and helplessness in having a large, drunk man in your home whose mind is on one thing and who isn't interested in what you want. There's an awareness that things could get violent quickly, so you negotiate, change locations, change the subject, try to talk and talk until he either sobers up or falls asleep. It's about harm reduction because you know it will be bad—it's just a question of how bad. In a situation like this, suddenly you don't feel like an equal human but a weaker animal trying to survive. Women aren't really trained for this—date rape has so many more layers to it. At the heart of it is a fundamental betrayal of trust, which doesn't trigger the same fight-or-flight response as an attack by a stranger. This is someone you have a relationship with, so you think you there's a way to reach the person you thought you knew.
  
  The woman who came forward this week had dated this man off and on for 2 years and they'd probably exchanged many intimate texts that didn't result in this behavior. Reports are that Cheyenne Hunt facilitated the interview with Politico. She is with the group Reckoning Action, which also connected, to the media, women who credibly accused Eric Swalwell of sexual assault. The Platner accuser warned another woman about Platner before his Senate run and also told a boyfriend about it, including naming Platner when he declared his candidacy. And unlike the NYT accuser, this one is not involved in politics and is a registered Democrat.
  
  Platner has since said he's taking time off from his campaign to "reflect" but otherwise denied the allegation. More disturbingly is his campaign's response that this is the work of "establishment" operatives. That is not the way to address this most recent revelation. If he really wanted to refute the accusation, then he needs to explain whether any of it is true. Does he deny dating the accuser? Does he deny showing up at her house uninvited and drunk? When the NYT piece came out, he said he wasn't always a great boyfriend. What exactly did that mean? Does he, or does he not, consider forcing himself on his girlfriend not being a "great boyfriend"?
  
  Electoral-Vote.com wrote a few times that if no other shoes dropped, perhaps Platner could survive. And we do need to allow some room for redemption and contrition. But sadly, there was more to the story after all. This was the one we thought could drop, and now that it has, he needs to be dropped as well. Also, note again the hypocrisy of the Republican outrage, all while the man found liable in court for sexual assault remains in the Oval Office with their full support. Democrats are still the only major party that takes these allegations seriously and will withdraw support from candidates credibly accused of sex crimes.
  
  
• A.G. in Scranton, PA: I knew this guy was an a**hole a long time ago, but I genuinely did not believe he was whatever this makes him... I guess an attempted rapist?
  
  Yay. Governor Mills. The status quo for the Democratic Party it is.
  
  I want my money (and faith) back.

Thanks to all of you. We also have a bunch of reader thoughts on who should replace Platner if and when he drops out; we'll run those later this week. (Z)

The Mitch-stery Deepens

People close to Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY), including his campaign staffers, have confirmed he was admitted to the hospital on June 14, and that he is still there. In addition, they have not denied that he suffered a cardiac arrest while at home, and had to be revived. As we noted, if that is true, and if there was no immediate CPR, the odds of survival without serious brain damage are very low.

There has also been some behavior from people in McConnell's orbit that is at least mildly suspicious. Most obviously, McConnell's wife, former Cabinet secretary Elaine Chao, was spotted in China just a few days after her husband was admitted to the hospital. This it not the usual behavior of someone whose spouse is, or may be, on death's door. On the other hand, the typical spouse of a heart attack victim is not worth $30 million with extensive business interests in China.

It also does not help that we now live in a post-truth world, particularly when it comes to politicians' health. Dianne Feinstein's staff clearly covered up for her serious decline. Joe Biden's staff covered for him. Tom Kean Jr. (R-NJ), Frederica Wilson (D-FL), Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), etc. And, of course, Donald Trump has made lying about his health into an art form, starting with that ridiculous "healthiest president in history" letter that was signed (but not written) by Dr. Harold Bornstein in 2015. We don't know what the truth is when it comes to the current president's health, but we are confident it's not what the American public has been told.

It comes as no surprise, then, that things reached something of an obvious climax yesterday when the conspiratorially minded Laura Loomer got on eX-Twitter to share this:

Mitch McConnell is being kept "alive" by life support machines, but my White House source told me McConnell is in organ failure, and as I reported, source told me he has allegedly been declared a vegetable (brain dead) by doctors and the White House has been told "McConnell isn't ever coming back."

Officially brain dead, organ failure is accelerating, life support machine is keeping him "alive" but his brain is officially dead and his wife @ElaineChao has fled the country to China.

I wonder if she brought any of his documents or briefings with her to China.

Loomer is as nutty as a fruitcake, but she's also dialed into this White House (which, it should be noted, has a generous supply of nutty-as-a-fruitcake staffers). So, she could be telling the truth.

In response to Loomer (presumably), Senate leadership sprang into action. Spokespeople for both Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) and John Barrasso (R-WY) told reporters that the two senators had both spoken to McConnell at length over the phone. The Thune call was described as a "lengthy and substantive conversation that covered a variety of topics, including national security." The Barrasso call was described as being about 20 minutes in length, during which the two colleagues "caught up about the latest news impacting Senate races, the Graham Platner scandal, and the recent Supreme Court ruling on coordinated spending limits."

Someone here is clearly lying. Either Loomer's White House "source" lied to her, or Loomer lied about what she heard, or Thune/Barrasso's spokespeople lied about their phone calls. It is true that you can, for example, go to a cemetery and have a "conversation" with anyone there. However, the tone and tenor and content of the spokepeople's statements overwhelmingly suggest a two-way exchange of information between Thune-McConnell and between Barrasso-McConnell.

The problem with the conspiratorial case is that it's not clear exactly why the Senator's alleged demise would be covered up (or why the physicians and other professionals at the hospital would play along). True, Loomer does have an answer for that (warning, uncensored content ahead): "The cover up of Senator Mitch McConnell being brain dead is because the Senators want to Fuck Trump and not pass the Save America Act." This makes absolutely no sense, however. First, the SAVE Act isn't going to pass, McConnell or no. Second, McConnell is probably a "no" on the bill, and he's definitely a "no" on killing the filibuster. So, if Thune, et al., really want to stop the SAVE Act from passing, they want McConnell alive and kicking and casting votes.

On the other hand, the problem with the "McConnell is alive" story is similar to the problem with the "Tom McKean is just fine" story. If you are speaking the truth, why not prove it, and nip the story in the bud? McConnell is allegedly functional and able to talk on the phone. Why doesn't he make a quick call to Fox, or CNN? Indeed, after Scott Jennings claimed he had personally had a phone conversation with the Senator, he was asked to get McConnell on the phone, and refused to do so.

In short, who knows what is happening? And if McConnell does vacate his seat, whether of his own volition or that of the Grim Reaper, things will likely remain... messy. That is because Kentucky has made quite a mess of the process of choosing replacement senators, basically to try to keep Democrats (like current governor Andy Beshear) from having influence over the process. To wit:

1. The Kentucky constitution, as amended in 1891, says that Senate vacancies must be temporarily filled by gubernatorial appointment, but that a special election must be held if there are more than 90 days remaining in the vacated term.
   
   
2. The Seventeenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, adopted in 1913, says that states must hold elections to fill vacant Senate seats, but that legislature can empower governors to appoint temporary replacements.
   
   
3. In 2021, the state legislature changed the rules to make it so that the governor could only choose a replacement from a list of three candidates chosen by the legislature.
   
   
4. In 2024, the state legislature changed the rules again to say that the governor cannot pick a temporary replacement; their only role is to decide when the special election is held.

The legislation from 2021 and 2024 has not been tested in court, and may not be compatible with the state Constitution or the U.S. Constitution. Meanwhile, the 2024 legislation, which is theoretically controlling right now, doesn't specify how quickly an election needs to be held. Beshear could well decree that there's no point in spending the money to elect a senator for a few months, and that the seat can just remain vacant until the regular election scheduled for November.

Now here is where it gets interesting. It is hardly a secret that Beshear will run for president in 2028. He probably has pictures of Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter all over his office. He is also a smart politician and is undoubtedly aware that the primary will be tough and Democrats want a fighter. Suppose he appoints some Democratic state senator to fill McConnell's seat based on the state Constitution, which the legislature cannot override. Will Thune swear him in? Would that cause a huge fight between Beshear and Thune? Boy oh boy, would appointing a Democrat put Beshear in the news and raise his standing among Democrats. Being that aggressive is not Beshear's native style, but he knows he will be up against fighters like Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA). Just calling a special election in September would be seen by Democrats as bowing to the Republicans. Definitely not what Candidate Beshear needs. God may give Beshear an opening this week, but will he use it?

What it amounts to is that any attempt to pick a new senator would likely end up tied up in court, either to settle the question of whether the 2024, and possibly 2021, laws are legal, or to establish whether or not Beshear is allowed to forego a special election this close to Election Day. Way to go, Kentucky! (Z)

Mo Money Mo Problems

Earlier this week, we had an item about the disastrous Great American State Fair. Trump does a lot of odd things, but he's always been very image-conscious. So, we just do not understand why the administration keeps making choices that are so obviously going to lead to embarrassing conclusions.

Today is something that's been kicking around for several weeks, and that is in the same vein, namely the proposed Trump $250 bill. There are a bunch of mockups that have been prepared on the orders of Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent; this is the one that seems to be favored by him:

Can't they find one decent graphic artist in Washington, DC? We could slap something together that looks considerably more professional than this in 10 minutes in Photoshop. Maybe in 5 minutes.

(Note: Z doesn't actually use Photoshop, because he hates subscription-model software. He actually uses Affinity Photo, but nobody knows what it means when you say "they did a bad job of Affinity Photoing that.")

Anyhow, it is all good and well to talk about issuing Trump-branded currency. But there are several rather serious problems with this plan. First, it is ostensibly meant to be in honor of the nation's 250th birthday, which has arrived. Even if it was "all systems go" today, it is no small thing to do the necessary engravings, get the plates made, get the testing done, get the currency produced, and get it into circulation. We seriously doubt it could be done by the end of the year, much less anytime sooner.

The second problem is that it's not legal to put living people on U.S. currency. It's been illegal since the passage of what is known as the Thayer Amendment, in 1866. Some readers will know the backstory here, especially since we've mentioned it before, but what happened, in brief, is that Congress intended to order currency honoring William Clark, of Lewis and Clark fame. However, the enabling legislation was vague enough that any "Clark" fit its terms. And so, Superintendent of the National Currency Bureau Spencer Clark decided that it would be even better if the bill honored... Superintendent of the National Currency Bureau Spencer Clark. This did not please the Congress, hence the law to stop such a thing from happening again.

Of course, Congress can change laws if it so desires. However, a bill revising the Thayer Act would have to get through the Senate, which is now home to at least 51 people who aren't too keen on finding ways to honor Trump. And even if most or all of the Republicans (plus Sen. John Fetterman, "D"-PA) were OK with the plan, such a measure would be filibusterable. There is absolutely no way that Senate Democrats would allow currency with Trump's portrait on it; their base would be after them with pitchforks and torches. There's also no way that such a measure survives a Byrd Bath, and so gets tucked into the reconciliation bill that might or might not happen.

A third problem, related to the second, is that Trump owns the rights to his image, and would be entitled to payment for every Trump $250 produced. Oh, he might say he'll forego such payments, but we saw how long that promise held up with, say, Trump Airport. We cannot imagine that Republican budget hawks, like Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), would ever agree to a scenario where the U.S. Treasury is paying royalties to Trump, especially since there are plenty of perfectly good and royalty-free dead people to put on the $250, if it's really necessary to produce such a denomination.

A fourth problem is money laundering. Many people who are trying to combat money laundering, especially relating to drugs, hate the $100 bill since that is the currency of choice for many money launderers. Forcing them to use $20 bills would increase the size of weight of their suitcases 5x and put a real crimp in their ability to move large sums of cash around. Having a banknote with a higher denomination than $100 in circulation would make stopping money laundering even harder. Could that be a feature rather than a bug for Trump? Donald Trump Jr. once said: "In terms of high-end product influx into the US, Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets."

So, there's no way this happens, and it's entirely foreseeable that it's eventually going to go belly up, the way that the Great American State Fair went belly up. While we can accept that the a**-kissers in the administration just seize every opportunity they see to brown nose, and don't worry about how it's going to turn out, the fact is that when failure and embarrassment come, Trump is invariably furious (see, for example, his angry tweets about Freedom 250, or about the Kennedy Center re-naming). Is someone like Scott Bessent simultaneously hoping that Trump will remember who was responsible for the $250 when the project is announced, but will forget who was responsible once it flops? We guess that must be it, but it's not a very satisfying explanation.

And wait, there's more. While much energy is apparently being put into the Trump $250, Bessent announced yesterday that he has canceled the longstanding plan to put Harriet Tubman on the $20 bill. Not too surprising, since Trump is not much a fan of Black people, is definitely not a fan of Black history, and positively hates to be reminded of slavery. However, the Democrats almost couldn't write a better script here, particularly when it comes to Black voters. Something along the lines of: "It's pretty clear what Trump's priorities are, when he's pushing the Trump $250 at the same time he's canceling the Tubman $20." (Z)

Lies Across America, Part I: Christopher Columbus

We're going to start this series with a bit of a lay-up, just to make sure we get off on the right foot. And we're going to start this entry with a pop quiz. Which of these pictures most accurately captures what Christopher Columbus actually looked like?

We will get to the answer in short order.

For now, however, we will observe that Columbus is such an obvious entry for this series, it's almost a cliché. For at least 50 or 60 years, people with even a modicum of historical knowledge have been pointing out two well-known falsehoods about the Columbus myth. The first is that he did not, of course, "discover" the New World. The tens of millions of people who were living here when he arrived could tell you that (well, if they were still alive). He was not even the first European to visit what became known as North America. Leif Erikson beat him to it by nearly 500 years, and there's also the possibility that other Europeans paid a pre-Columbus visit, as well.

Second, Columbus did not "prove" the world was round. This was known thousands of years before Columbus was born. Both the ancient Greeks and the ancient Indians (and probably others, too), using pretty basic trigonometric principles, had inferred that Earth must be globe-shaped. This notion was broadly accepted by educated people of Columbus' time, such that a flat-Earther back then would have been regarded much like a flat-Earther is regarded today: ignorant, anti-scientific, superstitious, conspiratorial, etc.

The significance of Columbus, such as it is, is that in his efforts to "prove" that Asia was relatively easy to reach by traveling due west, he bumped into a landmass that had largely escaped European attention, and had not previously inspired European interest. After Columbus, followed by several others, demonstrated that there was something pretty big and pretty resource-rich in that direction, Europeans became very interested, indeed. And so, he was effectively the starting point for the Age of Exploration.

Now, it should be noted that Columbus was—to use the professional historian's term—an evil bastard. He was unbelievably cruel to the people he governed, both European and Native American, and indiscriminately used harsh corporal punishment and summary execution against both groups, while also being more than happy to enslave and rape Natives when that served his purposes. It is not true, mind you, that Columbus deliberately handed out smallpox-infected blankets to the native peoples. That's not because Columbus was above such a thing, however, but because people in his time were not aware of that sort of biological warfare. The smallpox-infected blankets thing actually originated with the British, during Pontiac's War, nearly 300 years after Columbus.

It should also be noted that Columbus was—again to use a technical term—a moron. He was pretty much wrong about everything. We still have copies of his journals, where he scribble notes and thoughts in the margins, and nearly everything he wrote was wrong. He guessed that it was about 4,000 miles due West to get to Asia; he was off by about 8,000 miles. Bumping into North America saved Columbus' bacon, not that he ever figured that out. To his dying day, he believed that each of the three visits he made to the New World were actually visits to Asia, which is why he called the area in and around the Caribbean Sea the "West Indies."

And that brings us to the opening question, about what Columbus looked like. The correct answer is... it's a trick question. We don't have any real idea what he looked like; the images of him (including the most famous one, which is the one in the center) were artists working generations or centuries after Columbus lived, and basically picturing a somewhat generic Italian male in the garb of a Spanish admiral. They are, in essence, fantasy pieces.

There's actually much more about Columbus that is not known. Although he's long been portrayed as a native of Genoa, Italy, his DNA is consistent with someone born in or near Valencia, Spain. Similarly, although he's generally assumed to be Catholic, since he was employed by the fanatically Catholic Ferdinand and Isabella, the DNA evidence points to his having been a Sephardic Jew (if that is true, he undoubtedly did NOT clue his bosses in on the truth). Another thing we don't know is... exactly what Columbus' name really was. Spellings were not only not standardized back then, but it was also customary to translate names into the local language, such that a person might be Columbus in one place, Colón in another, and Corombo in a third. We do have Columbus' (or is it Corombo's?) signature on some documents, but it's not much help in solving the mystery:

Most of that is actually braggadocio about how he's an admiral and is blessed by God.

The lack of information about Columbus, not to mention the lack of any sort of formal portrait made during his lifetime, pretty overwhelmingly demonstrates that he was not seen as a man of great importance while he was alive. Certainly, not a man worth commemorating and celebrating. And he remained a relatively obscure figure for at least a couple of centuries after his death. While it is true that he initiated the Age of Exploration, or at least one key chapter of it, the general sense was that others (Prince Henry the Navigator, Ferdinand Magellan, etc.) were equally or more important, and that things would largely have unfolded as they did whether or not Columbus did what he did.

So, why is Columbus so well-known today? Well, he can mostly thank a king for that, and it's not Ferdinand. No, the key monarch is actually a fellow from a different country, namely George III. George, and his Parliament, made their American colonists cranky. And, as you may have heard, those colonists decided to rebel in 1776.

Now, a nation needs to have inspirational figures to look up to, to serve as a model of that nation's values, and an inspiration to aspire to. If you were an Englishman or Englishwoman in New York on, say, July 1, 1776, then most of your heroic figures would be Englishmen and women—select monarchs, generals, philosophers, academics, etc. But when England becomes the enemy overnight, well, those heroic figures aren't going to get it done anymore. And if there's ever a time that inspirational figures are needed, it's in the middle of a war.

So, there was a sudden need for new heroic figures. Given the culture of tha time, those figures had to have some meaningful role in American culture and/or history. They had to be white and male. And they could not be English. George Washington checked all those boxes, and so he was elevated to demigod status, even while he was alive. Some of the other founders, most obviously Benjamin Franklin, as well. But it couldn't all be people who were alive in 1776.

Under these circumstances, Columbus was one of the main figures that Americans seized upon for their new pantheon of civic heroes. He did have a role in American history, and he was white and male, and he was definitely not British. They thought he was Italian back then, of course, rather than Spanish. But either way, definitely not an Englishman.

The importance of Columbus in that era is indicated by the sudden prominence of his name in American culture circa 1780 or so. King's College was re-christened as Columbia University. The nation's new capital district, once it was established, was named Washington, District of Columbia. The ship commanded by Capt. Robert Gray was named Columbia Rediviva. Most people have not heard of that ship, but they have heard of the river its crew visited, becoming the first Americans to do so. That river was, of course, the Columbia River, which was named after the ship. Most of the original 13 colonies also had a city named in the explorer's honor; Columbia in some cases, and Columbus in others. Indeed, he's the only person to be the namesake of two state capitals—South Carolina's and Ohio's (and yes, we know Ohio wasn't one of the original 13 colonies).

Of course, it helps one's reputation if a skilled mythmaker comes along to help lionize you. In Washington's case, of course, the mythmaker was Parson Weems (of cherry-tree story fame). In Columbus' case, it was Washington Irving. Irving's A History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (1828), like Weems' Life of Washington, was not meant to be a biography so much as it was a heroic epic loosely based on real events. Still, it was THE work on Columbus for well over a century, and was generally treated as the unvarnished truth. The bit about Columbus proving the world was not flat, incidentally, came from Irving's book.

The apex for Columbus' reputation came in the late 19th century. By the final decade of that century, not only were (white) Americans eager to celebrate their country's general prosperity and success, they were also eager to celebrate the fact that they had finished the "job" that Columbus started, namely conquering the North American continent. Sitting Bull was killed in 1890, and shortly thereafter, the Indian Wars concluded, with the massacre at Wounded Knee.

All of this laid the groundwork for the massively successful World's Columbian Exposition of 1893, a celebration of American culture and technology that drew nearly 30 million visitors. It was at the Exposition that the country and the world were introduced to, among other things, A/C power, the Pledge of Allegiance, the Ferris Wheel, the escalator, Braille type, Quaker Oats, Shredded Wheat and Vienna Sausage. It was also at that event that the historian Frederick Jackson Turner announced that the frontier existed no more, and that the process that had created a uniquely American culture (i.e., "taming" the West) was over.

These days, of course, Columbus is mostly back to where he was when he died all those years ago—a second-tier jerk. Sure, Donald Trump put up a statue of him outside the White House, but the hero worship has otherwise largely ended, most of the other statues are gone, and his once-important holiday is usually either ignored or is co-opted as Indigenous Peoples' Day.

And that is the REAL story of Christopher Columbus. (Z)

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