Goood Morning, Wonder Woman!

(You might want to skip item #3…)

1  How the NFL defines good leadership..The news today that the most recent result of  examinations of deceased former football players’ brains shows 99% of them with CTE puts an especially harsh light on the NFL’s new contract with Commissioner Roger Goodell, who was promised hundreds of millions of dollars  to serve in the same role he has botched for another seven years. Well, botched is a relative term, I suppose. True, Goodell has made it clear that his league is the least ethical, most venal, and most brutal sports organization on earth. Over his 11 year tenure so far, he proved that the league only regards its star behemoths beating up women after there is a public outcry, then tosses away due process to levy illegal punishments for show. Goodell first denied that the science showing that his game’s routine and unavoidable concussions were deadly, then had his lawyers negotiate an unconscionable low-ball settlement with the desperate families of former players his modern day gladiatorial combat had crippled (it was declared so by a judge, and thrown out), and now says the league is addressing the problem, which it isn’t. Meanwhile, every game, play by play as fans cheer, more young men are  sent on their way to a premature, drooling death by brain damage.

Goodell’s biggest star, Tom Brady, and most successful coach, Bill Belichick, are smug cheaters. For the last year, fans paying three figures a game for their seats have had to watch their National Anthem marred by various player protests about..something. Ratings and attendance have fallen; polls show that the NFL is the most disliked sport in America, which it should be, since it kills people,  promotes felons and cheaters as heroes, and abuses its fans. But this isn’t considered a botch by the Commissioner, says the New York Times, because “during his tenure as commissioner…Goodell has helped team values skyrocket, and the owners are betting that will continue under his leadership.”

That sentence explains everything, doesn’t it?

2. Welcome to “the resistance” Plan J.  Review: Plan A was to reverse the election by hijacking the Electoral College. Plan B was pre-emptive impeachment. Plan C was the Emoluments Clause. Plan D was “collusion with Russia” (The New York Times, to give credit where it is due, actually created a chart to explain this one, and if it isn’t obvious to you how pathetically weak the case is, you played NFL football…), Plan E is”Trump is disabled because he’s a narcissist and a Republican, so this should trigger the 25th Amendment.”, Plan F, the Maxine Waters plan, is to just impeach the President because she really, really doesn’t like him, Plan G is “The President obstructs justice by firing incompetent subordinates,” Plan H is “tweeting stupid stuff is impeachable,” Plan I is “Let’s relentlessly harass him and insult him and obstruct his efforts to do his job so he snaps (see E) and does something really impeachable.”

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand unveiled Plan J, since the others are absurd, when she demanded that the President should resign now for unproven allegations of non-crimes, when none of the misconduct occurred during his tenure as Presidency.  This is impressive, because it is just as ridiculous and desperate as the other plans, and I thought they had exhausted the possibilities. At a Congressional hearing examining Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein  Texas Democratic Rep Sheila Jackson Lee insisted that women who accused non-President Trump of sexual harassment can report it to the FBI.  That’s right: now the FBI should be investigating illicit kisses, “groping,’ and my personal favorite, walking into a Miss USA dressing room where the contestants might be in various states of undress.

These aren’t crimes, they aren’t prosecutable, and they aren’t even close to the FBI’s mission and duties.

3. Meanwhile...Plan J, and the fact that Democrats are taking it seriously (after all, they sacrificed Al Franken to try to justify it), is one more indication that the Harvey Weinstein Ethics Train Wreck has jumped the rails.

It looks like the rate of carnage is accelerating, not slowing down. Dustin Hoffman appears to be toast, as more women have accused him of past misconduct, and though he denies all of the new accounts, they are very detailed and disturbing. 

And that’s not all…

The Interior Dept. fired four managers for harassment

Clerks Resigned  to put pressure on  9th Circuit Judge Alex Kozinski, accused of sexual harassment

Fashion PR guru Kelly Cutrone claims music mogul Russell Simmons, already facing other rape accusations,  tried to rape her at his apartment

Walmart is cutting ties with celebrity chef Mario Batali in the wake of sexual misconduct and groping allegations.

I’m sure I missed a few, and it’s been a while since I checked. But these are the meat-and-potatoes, standard harassment allegations. Now progressive women are in the cross-hairs:

• Andrea Ramsey, a Democratic candidate for Congress in Missouri, will drop out of the race after the Kansas City Star asked her about accusations in a 2005 lawsuit that she sexually harassed and retaliated against a male subordinate who said he had rejected her advances. She was running with the endorsement of Emily’s List, the liberal women’s group that has raised more than a half-million dollars to help female candidates who support abortion rights.

“In its rush to claim the high ground in our roiling national conversation about harassment, the Democratic Party has implemented a zero tolerance standard,” Ramsey said in a statement Friday. “For me, that means a vindictive, terminated employee’s false allegations are enough for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) to decide not to support our promising campaign. We are in a national moment where rough justice stands in place of careful analysis, nuance and due process.”

Ya think?

• Wonder Woman is in trouble too. On November 14, a woman calling herself “Ima Survivor” published post on Medium  claiming that actress Gail Gadot bullied and shamed her for being raped by a friend of theirs thirteen years ago. The first-person account is graphic, and describes both the rape and the victim’s subsequent mental and emotional abuse by Gadot, at least as she claims.

Now a feminist writer is demanding that Gadot convincingly rebut these claims, writing,

“If these events did not happen then it is very easy for Gadot or a member of her team to come forward and discredit them by providing history for her whereabouts or an account of what actually took place during that time. Instead there is radio silence, as if these allegations do not matter.”

No, it is NOT “easy” to prove a negative, that something did  NOT occur thirteen years ago. As with The Terror during the blood frenzy of the French Revolution, the seductive power to destroy is turning the #MeToo warriors into indiscriminate vigilantes. Careers, reputations and lives are going to be destroyed. But it will all be worth it, right? After all..

“If some innocent men’s reputations have to take a hit in the process of undoing the patriarchy, that is a price I am absolutely willing to pay.”

—Feminist writer Emily Linden