Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine is 73 years old. She has held her seat for 29 years. Graham Platner, her Democratic challenger this year is 41. She’s old enough to be his mother. Not likely, though, given their ideological, political, and moral differences. And, as far as anyone knows, she has no children.

Nevertheless, the case can be made that she created him. Intentional injustice spawns the agents of its own downfall. Certainly not an immaculate, but let’s call it payback, conception. And now she’s trying to destroy him. Let’s call that an attempted very-late-term abortion by smear campaign.

Back in 2002, Susan Collins voted for the Iraq and Afghan wars. Platner, intent on serving his country, served four combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, He came home suffering from PTSD—Post Traumatic Stress Disorder—and exhibited many of the symptoms that are being exposed currently in the media: anger, substance abuse, dysfunctional relationships, etc. Like the current Iran War, the Iraq War was a war of choice (war of choice is a euphemism for a crime against humanity) promoted by the George W. Bush administration. They were lying about the reasons for the war. Senator Collins knew that. For political and economic—or what we might call military-industrial complex—reasons, she supported the war, betrayed the soldiers’ sense of duty, and sent young men like Platner into the cauldron of atrocious violence for a cynical lie. The violence and hypocrisy really screwed him up. Thank you for your service.

So, in effect, she gave birth to Platner. But the delivery pains were all his, not hers. No war, no Platner.

Politicians hate consequences; an exposed lie interrupts the flow of corporate donations. Politicians get by on a daily dose of political mifepristone so mistakes don’t come back to haunt them. Platner is the baby that’s come home to haunt her, the baby that comes in with the bath water. She will deny him and attack him for all her billionaire backers are worth, but the connective tissue of historical DNA can’t be fudged.

An ethical law is at work in this maternity case. It’s called Sacred Trust. The idea is the sacred trust that must exist between soldiers and their government in a democratic society. Soldiers agree to sacrifice their bodies and lives, and agree to take onto their souls the stark responsibility of ending other’s lives to protect the state’s Constitution, that is, committing murder with a government blessing. In turn, the state agrees to require such sacrifice only when absolutely necessary. If the state breaks that trust for imperialist or frivolous reasons, where does that leave the soldier? Then nothing can morally justify the atrocities committed or witnessed. The soldier is mired in a morass of anger and guilt, in the grip of what’s called moral injury. Graham Platner is one such soldier. The chicken has come home to roost.

If Susan Collins had the courage to look Graham Platner in the eye, she’d know; a mother always does. And she’d beware the wrath of her betrayed child.