AS ALWAYS, LIFE IMITATES MEL BROOKS: Bernie Sanders*-backed Senate hopeful backtracks on apology for ‘Nazi skull’ tattoo insisting it’s an ’eminently reasonable skull-and-crossbones.’

A Democrat running for Senate in Maine who previously apologized for a tattoo resembling a Nazi symbol is now defending the design as nothing more than a skull-and-crossbones.

Graham Platner, who hopes to run against incumbent Republican Senator Susan Collins, was mired in scandal last year when it was revealed he has a tattoo on his chest resembling the Nazi ‘Totenkopf’ or ‘death’s head’ symbol adopted by Hitler’s SS.

He has since had it altered to resemble some kind of animal.

At first Platner apologized, saying he didn’t realize the symbol was associated with Nazism, and promised he’d get it removed.

But in an interview this week with news blog Zeteo, Platner pushed back, defending the tattoo as merely a ‘skull-and-crossbones’ and ‘an eminently reasonable thing’.

At the beginning of the month, I wrote that perhaps Platner should deploy the Mel Brooks crisis PR handbook. The 1963 comedy album, Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks at the Canne Film Festival kicked off thusly (audio available at the Wayback Machine):

CARL REINER: Sir, sir, you’re wearing your bathing suit, I noticed.

BROOKS: Yes, yes.

REINER: And as you scratched your head, I noticed a little “SS” tattooed under your arm. What does that mean?

MEL BROOKS: Oh, oh, oh, well, wait! That’s the Simon Says!  Umm, umm, Simon Says, we played that on the beach. I’m the captain of the Simon Says team! And that’s where we get SS from! I’m serious about the game, I love it, and so I had myself tattooed, “Simon Says!”

I didn’t expect for Platner to do exactly that. 

* Bernie Sanders, you say? Kevin Williamson, call your office: Bernie’s Strange Brew of Nationalism and Socialism.

You too, Chris Matthews! Chris Matthews compares Bernie’s likely victory in Nevada to the Nazis conquering France in 1940.