What a twit-wit!!
By Crash Barry
You’d think that since the Angus King Senate campaign is heavily invested in social media – with 38,747 “likes” on Facebook and 1,675 followers on Twitter – they would have asked the candidate’s college-age son, Ben Herman, to stop making racist, homophobic, ageist and inane Tweets. Or at least get him to change his privacy settings so the whole world wouldn’t have access to his views on politics, history, old people and vaginas.
The lack of discretion seems especially odd since King’s spokesperson, Crystal Canney, routinely asks all interns and volunteers for their Twitter handles and frequently inquires about Facebook postings. And it wasn’t like I went searching for Herman’s Twitter feed. I accidentally discovered it while looking at his mom’s Twitter account. Even though Mary Herman “follows” her son’s Internet shenanigans, it’s highly unlikely she actually reads his musings. I’m sure she’d be disappointed to know her son was posting stuff like…
While the first two tweets above were posted before King entered the race to replace Olympia Snowe, it’s remarkable that none of the King campaign staffers discovered them and asked for them to be removed, especially since King has been courting the female vote.
In any case, Herman didn’t stop posting statements and photos that might alienate King supporters. On Oct. 6, for instance, both Ben Herman and his father were tweeting pictures and text from the Fryeburg Fair, Maine’s largest agricultural gathering…
Mocking people different than himself seems to be a theme with Ben Herman, even with his dad on the campaign trail…
And he finds senior citizens amusing…
There seems to be a recurring, mocking tone toward minorities…
(The Olympian in question, Paraskevi Papachristou, “has often taken to Twitter to express her support for the extreme right-wing party Golden Dawn,” ABC News reported; Papachristou was one of only 10 people Ben Herman followed on Twitter.)
Herman tweeted a whole bunch during the Olympics, then bemoaned the end of the events…
Luckily, the dilemma was soon resolved…
He often tweeted about his work as an intern for a sports marketing company…
Some of his tweets had homophobic overtones…
And there’s this joke about child-molestation scandals…
Like his father, the son has a rather unique perspective on history…
Many posts revealed insights into the lifestyle of the wealthy candidate’s son, whose Twitter description was simply “money.” For example, it appears the kid likes the booze…
A lot of his posts, though, are just the banal thoughts of a heavy-drinking, lacrosse-playing white dude from Maine…
And just in case there’s any question that this is the candidate’s son, he provided us with an inside look at the King household…
Of course, the Internet is chockfull of people posting stupid stuff. And if having a racist, sexist, elitist son was grounds for excluding parents from running for office, Washington D.C. would most likely be a ghost town.
But the lack of awareness of the liabilities of social media does seem like another indicator that King isn’t ready for modern politics. After all, his son’s online antics could potentially offend a huge chunk of Maine’s electorate.
If he’s elected, King better get used to being watched online and elsewhere. In addition to the media, he’ll be trailed by trackers, citizen journalists, wind warriors and anti-one-percenters who all have an interest in keeping an eye on this corporatist millionaire.
King might not like the “new politics,” but he willingly entered the fray. And if he doesn’t quickly learn that a 68-year-old crybaby can’t survive in the modern political world, then Maine will be stuck with a one-term, septuagenarian senator who can’t bring home the bacon.
Perhaps he should listen to his son…
Ben Herman’s Twitter account (twitter.com/bherm18) was removed minutes after word of his posts went public. The King campaign, according to one of the candidate’s closest pals, has a friend at Twitter headquarters. That’s why the Angus King parody account disappeared so quickly.
At least we have Ben Herman’s tweets for posterity.
Starting Oct. 20, Crash Barry’s publisher, Maine Misadventures, will be distributing 10,000 copies of a free, 12-page print edition of The Crash Report focused on the upcoming election. E-mail to receive a bundle to distribute in your ‘hood: info@mainemisadventures.com.
