I disagree with the concept of politicians only being acceptable if they have never said or done an objectionable thing. I think we need to be nominating people who've actually experienced struggle, pain, and growth.

There are a lot of people online who would say they've never held prejudice toward a person for who they are or their views, never made a big decision without all the information, never faced a point where they realized they made a bad choice, or were misled or misinformed. Even if that's true for them, it's certainly not true for the average US citizen. And when you cannot see yourself in a system, it's much harder to identify or feel represented by that system.

I understand the concerns some have of dishonesty in cases of large shifts in perspective. But that discounts our own ability to tell the difference between a shift in perspective and parroted statements for the purpose of tactical maneuvering.

This is personal perception but genuine shifts in perspective are usually broadly distrubuted in the persons mental model, affecting their perceptions in multiple areas. The person should be able to speak comfortably on the perspective they held before and where they feel it was flawed, either logically, ethically, morally, etc and their experience of undergoing the shift in perspective, and the outcome of their actions should follow-through on the spirit, not just the word, of that shift.

I'm not from Maine so I don't keep up closely on Platner, but the things I have seen indicate to me he is a human who has undergone a genuine change in perspective as he gained new understandings.