I had pretty much concluded that Christine Blasey Ford was contemptible based on her willingness to impugn a public servant’s integrity, derail what should be an orderly and fair political process, and manipulate the U.S. Supreme Court’s membership using a three decades old allegation that involved, at worst, teenage misconduct. She did this with full knowledge of how #MeToo has unjustly harmed other men simply by raising unprovable rumors and characterizations. In fact, it seems clear that she chose her course of action knowing that she could harm Brett Kavanaugh the same way. If the allegation was politically motivated, as I strongly suspect it was, she is unethical and despicable. If the motive was late vengeance for a teenager’s indiscretion, she is unethical and despicable.
Imagine someone you may have harmed when you were an immature teen. That individual never calls you to account, privately or officially. She never urges you to apologize, accept responsibility, or make amends, or gives you an opportunity to do so. No, she maintains the grievance in escrow, to bring it out years or decades later when the accusation will not only do the most damage, but will also be impossible to defend against. What a cruel, horrible, inhuman way to treat anyone.
First Ford attempted to harm Kavanaugh anonymously. Then, when that wasn’t going to work, she announced her accusation in the news media.
What is being ignored by all those rationalizing Ford’s actions is that that the harm to alleged wrongdoers is magnified and multiplied the longer a victim delays calling for accountability. If Kavanaugh did what he is alleged to have done, he should still have the right to deal with the consequences, accept punishment if any, and be able to get on with his life, set a straight course, and prove his character and values as an adult. Wouldn’t anyone want that opportunity? Shouldn’t any 17-year-old miscreant have that opportunity? As I have already noted, Ford’s conduct is an anti-Golden Rule monstrosity.
It also creates the equivalent of ethics toxic waste. In a just society, nobody is pronounced guilty until guilt is proven, and nobody is publicly accused unless the offense is provable. A prosecutor who knows that there isn’t evidence to convict someone of an offense is violating prosecutoral ethics to bring charges. Ethically, the principles follow. If you cannot prove an accusation, if all you have is your word and nothing else, if there is no chance that any evidence will arise that supports your version of events, you must be, at very least, absolutely certain that you are correct. Ford cannot be 100% certain. Not after more than 30 years, and especially after a long period in which she says she had forgotten about the alleged episode. There are many, many memorable episodes in my life, and I have always had a remarkable memory for events I witnessed or took part in. Such memories, however, shift and blur over time. No 30 year-old memory is 100% reliable, and because we, well, those of us who are fair and honest, know that is true, no 30-year memory should be employed as a weapon or personal destruction. Ford’s memory is both destructive and impossible to defend against exactly because it is so old.
Now, however, whatever doubts I had been erased by Ford’s “demand” that the FBI investigate her claims before she will testify before the Committee. So even the also-unethical precedent created by Anita Hill isn’t sufficient for Ford. Now she is attempting to dictate to the U.S. Senate and the President of the United States, using her own testimony, and the chance for Kavanaugh to face his accuser, to extort the Judiciary Committee. There is a rebuttable presumption that she has no intention of testifying, and that her real objective is to assist Democrats in achieving their partisan goal of delaying Kavanaugh’s confirmation vote until after the Fall elections. There is no downside for her: she is a professor at a Left-dominated institution, and will doubtlessly be lionized as a hero, much as Hill has been. Progressives don’t care whether the alleged incident really happened, or happened as she claims. What matters is stopping the judge’s confirmation.
Progressives, Democrats and women who deny this forfeit any credibility or presumptions of integrity. The FBI investigates crimes, and none is alleged. The facts of 30 year-old cases usually cannot be settled after so many years; that’s why there are statutes of limitations. It’s also why we aren’t completely certain who shot Kennedy, or who the Zodiac killer is. That’s OK though: Ford probably knows this very well. If the hearings are delayed, it’s mission accomplished for her, and probably a book deal.
Ford’s lawyers signaled their client’s game by having the gall to attack the committee for scheduling a hearing on her accusation. “While Dr. Ford’s life was being turned upside down, you and your staff scheduled a public hearing for her to testify at the same table as Judge Kavanaugh in front of two dozen U.S. senators on national television to relive this traumatic and harrowing incident,” they said a letter to Sen. Charles Grassley, the committee chairman.
Her life is being turned upside down? That was her choice.
Today competition arose for Ford in the “Most Unethical Non-Senator To Board The Brett Kavanaugh Nomination Ethics Train Wreck” pageant. Cristina Miranda King, a former classmate of Ford’s, decided to grab 15 minutes of undeserved fame by recalling that she “heard” about the incident. Then she issued this Unethical Quote of the Week:
“Christine Blasey Ford was a year or so behind me,” wrote King, who works as a performing arts curator in Mexico City. “I did not know her personally but I remember her. This incident did happen. Many of us heard a buzz about it indirectly with few specific details. However Christine’s vivid recollection should be more than enough for us to truly, deeply know that the accusation is true.”
Stuff you hear about in high school when you don’t know the participants or details is called gossip. It isn’t even hearsay. Do you remember any 30 year old gossip sufficiently vividly that you could state with certainty now that it was true? Why was King’s idiotic statement treated as news? A woman who didn’t know Ford says that she remembered hearing about the incident without details three decades ago, and the fact that Ford has a “vivid recollection”—though she can’t name the year, date or location of the party, who held it, or any party guests who can confirm her story—means that the accusation must be true.
Ah, that good ol’ fair, professional, unbiased news media!
Now 900 more unethical women, all alumnae of the Holton-Arms School, the private school for girls in Bethesda, Maryland Where Christine Met Brett, signed an open letter, voicing their support for Ford even though they don’t know her. She’s a woman, you see, and of course one who is impugning a man 30 years late, so she must be telling the truth. “Dr. Blasey Ford’s experience is all too consistent with stories we heard and lived while attending Holton,” they write. This convinces me that Holton Arms graduates a lot of bigoted idiots incapable of critical thought. These women have no valid reason to believe or disbelieve Ford with such certainty. Because they know that students have been assaulted at Holton Arms, this means that Ford must have been assaulted by Brett Kavanaugh? I dare anyone to support this “reasoning.” X must be guilty of conduct Y, because other people like X have been guilty of the same conduct.
Unethical women, as far as the eye can see…
Ethics Alarms 
Spot on, Jack, but I want to add more to this:
I think what we are seeing here actually happened, but she knows it wasn’t Bret Kavanaugh who pawed her. I think she has deliberately altered the story for political effect. I suspect her polygraph was non-specific about the perpetrator but specific about the incident. She’s not lying about being pawed, but about who did the pawing in hopes of derailing Kavanaugh.
This is pretty clearly a put-up job, and the reason she doesn’t want to testify absent an FBI investigation is purely defensive – she knows she is lying, and doesn’t want to get caught later perjuring herself. She could always claim a faulty memory, but if she doesn’t testify, there is no risk of her testimony being characterized as perjury. I was willing to believe her to the extent that something happened involving Kavanaugh, but now, I don’t. I believe him when he says he wasn’t at such an event.
Her attorney also knows she’s lying, I suspect. I hope this leaks, and both of them get prosecuted and the attorney disbarred. Then again, the California bar would probably find an excuse to let her go. After all, she hasn’t tried to deceive an actual court, but just a bunch of politicians and the American public.
There is criminal activity to be investigated, but I want to suggest it isn’t on the part of judge Kavanaugh.
Your takes on this discussion over the past week have been well thought out and well communicated.
Thanks. Nice of you to say.
Glenn Logan wrote, “she hasn’t tried to deceive an actual court, but just a bunch of politicians and the American public.”
If she knows it wasn’t Kavanaugh that pawed her as you wrote then she is intentionally providing false witness, in the form of the accusation letter, to the FBI to get them to investigate under false premises, isn’t that illegal?
In answer to your question, the most useful federal law in this case would be 18 USC 1341, the good old mail fraud statute. It forbids defrauding another of either property or honest services.
The particulars of this case have never been tried under the statute as far as I know, so it would probably make new law, but she transmitted a letter to DiFi, which (if we are charging the case) was corruptly intended to disrupt an official proceeding, and deprive Bret Kavanaugh of a thing of value, or perhaps deprive the Senate of the honest services it is due under their advice and consent role. Each intentional transmission of that letter by her or her authorized agents would constitute a separate offense.
If my theory is right and could be proven, she clearly intended to wrong Kavanaugh and, by extension, the United States Senate by interfering with their constitutional duty. The fraud statutes seem broad enough to encompass this conduct. Whether or not they should be that broad is another matter, but I think they are.
Unless there is a smoking gun, though, I doubt she would be charged.
The polygraph was only 2 questions.
TOTAL.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2018/09/26/christine-blasey-fords-polygraph-test-brett-kavanaugh-sexual-assault-allegations/1434270002/
They didn’t even use warm-up questions to establish a baseline on the polygraph. Even by the pseudo science of polygraphs this fails.
This whole thing has been like a bad joke.
Unethical Quote of the Week… Hold my beer
Now she has been quoted as saying
But wait… it gets so much better…
That’s right… She is saying that indeed she did make this claim, but had no idea that she would have to back it up in any way, and now that this is expected of her, she is suddenly has no knowledge of whether or not this happened.
This is truly the strangest timeline.
Sorry, should have source that:
https://www.npr.org/2018/09/20/649787076/kavanaugh-accuser-classmate-that-it-happened-or-not-i-have-no-idea
She is apparently an idiot as well as a bigot. I have lost all respect for Holton-Arms.
https://ethicsalarms.com/2013/08/18/ethics-hero-millikin-university/
This is interesting. https://qz.com/980766/the-truth-about-false-rape-accusations/
In the article you cite, “What’s equally important to know, however, is that false rape accusations almost never have serious consequences.””
In my case, I was falsely accused of rape, sodomy, kidnapping, battery, and probably other things I don’t remember by a woman I helped with a broken down car. A few of the non-serious consequences I suffered were about $10,000 in legal fees, going through an Article 32 hearing, having my medical privileges suspended, providing detailed information on every subsequent job application to explain why I answered yes to the question of whether my privileges were ever suspended, and thinking about spending the rest of my life at Ft. Leavenworth. And those were the less serious consequences. I also had the constant gut wrenching fear about how my wife and two young children were going to survive and then I had to deal with my wife developing such a deep depression she had to be hospitalized. The thing that changed the most for me though was that I went from being a guy who would stop and help a woman change a tire or things like that to one who totally distrusts women I don’t know well and will never again stop to help one. I don’t like this change but the cost my family and I paid for what was truly just a random act of kindness were just too high. To this day I do not know why the woman made the accusations though I do have some guesses. The final outcome was that after my family and I went through six months of hell she just dropped it without any consequences to her and I was never given any explanations. Still, I got off lightly compared to these guys. 26 Years Later, Justice for Men Imprisoned for a Bogus Rape
The statement that being falsely accused of rape doesn’t have “serious consequences” is nonsense on its face. Being accused of rape is itself a serious consequence.
I wonder why false rape accusations never result in tghe retaliatory murder of the false accuser.
John, that’s terrible. There are always exceptions to the rule, you got a raw deal.
What rule?
“women never make false accusations, and all men are predators”
/snark
Still Spartan wrote, “There are always exceptions to the rule”
Even though it’s not likely what you intended to project, you’re subtly projecting misandry again. This “rule” you speak of when looking through industrial-strength weapons-grade thickened misandry blinders (#Cornelius Gotchberg) is…
Rule: When a female accuses a man, the man is guilty.
This “rule” you speak of sure does have a lot of exceptions.
That “rule” is also how my alcoholic x-wife thought many years ago when she wanted out of our marriage. She tried to shift blame away from her own immoral, unethical, and some illegal actions and started making lots of false accusations about me to friends. When she started repeating those false accusations to the police, it didn’t bode well for her. You know the phrase “you can’t fix stupid”, well a photo of her face should accompany both that definition and one for liar. Yes even those accusations that she eventually admitted to the police and our families were lies remained on file about me with the local police department and I lost some friends because of the accusations.
Here’s the point Still Spartan; there are no rules to have exceptions to. There are some really vindictive people out there and some of them are women. The only “rule” you should be using in ethical observations about accusations is “innocent until proven guilty”.
“…there are no rules to have exceptions to.”
That statement was too broad; I’m sure that readers understand what it was referring to in relation to this conversation.
The author of the link you provided wrote, “But the truth is that false rape accusations aren’t salvos in any political struggle. They’re crimes, mostly perpetrated by the same men and women who commit other categories of crime, and for similar reasons.”
I can tell you straight up that the “mostly perpetrated by” claim is quite likely false, I don’t believe it includes the young high school aged girls that accuse their “boyfriends” of raping them when in fact it’s found out later in interviews with parents, teachers, social workers, and sometimes police, that it was consensual sex and they didn’t want to be branded with a label like “easy lay” or “slut”. Since most of these kind of accusations don’t get reported to police or perused by law enforcement and most of these young people don’t end up being criminals as the author suggested I think they’ve probably left them out of their “mostly perpetrated by” claim.
I went to a number of different high schools in a couple of different states and these kind of false rape accusations happened all the time and the damage of being falsely labeled a rapist is devastating in a tight knit community like a high school and it caused some students to switch schools. Those accused of rape or being a slut (whether male or female) in high school are never, ever treated the same by classmates or teachers after the accusations or rumors set in; high school can be quite viscous. I remember a couple of instances where some over zealous parents got in some rather brutal fist fights due to false rape accusations from their daughters.
There was lots of teenage sex happening in the 60’s an 70’s and to be honest I don’t think parents were ready for it. Free sex was all the rage back then but being negatively labeled in high school can be terrible for adolescents and some of them would do anything not to be branded with those labels.
What of the latest claim of Kavanaugh’s clearly nefarious conduct vis-a-vis Whelan’s theory?
Well, Yikes. Ed really went overboard.
Indeed, I am reluctantly forced to agree. I guess from a purely logical standpoint it’s … well, no, it just looks a little nuts to me.
Plausible, yes. Likely? Hardly. It’s so circumstantial it makes the definition of “circumstantial” look peaked. I doubt many minds will be changed, if any.
Then again, what happens if that look-alike guy claims to have been in the room with her, but not remembering touching her? Wouldn’t that be funny? I know I’d laugh.
It would also be a perverse from of justice for bringing up this charge 36 years removed from the actual events.
Seriously though, guys. The people increasingly don’t believe the DNC’s narrative on this accusation. Don’t muck things up by looking like you have to invent a defense.
Always count on conservatives to step on their own toes.
Whelan’s no wacko. I am beginning to think that he has the “lookalike” ready to admit that it was him at the party. And it could well be another lie.
I agree with you: its overkill. I think Democrats make more anti-Democractic votes the longer this goes on.
Even if it was the truth…its definitely overkill. This is something that’s wrecking too many individuals and worse its wrecking the Constitutional system and our system of deliberative processes.
Unfortunately, those processes have been largely wrecked since Anita Hill’s attempted sabotage of the Clarence Thomas nomination.
Just to show how pervasive something like this has been, almost unnoticed, I watched “Jerry Maguire,” again last night, which was made five years after the Thomas nomination fiasco. After Jerry kissed and pawed his then-employee Dorothy Boyd while drunk, there was this exchange (from memory):
Maguire: Now I feel like Clarence Thomas.
Boyd: Don’t feel like Clarence Thomas!
Maguire: I do. I’m harassing you right now.
Boyd: [jokingly] I may not sue.
The high-tech attempted lynching of Thomas has become a pop-culture iconic moment, and not for the right reasons. Anita Hill has been feted on the Left as a hero. “Borking,” the disastrous, unethical attack by deceased senator Ted Kennedy, has been a verb for years.
This is the continuation of that process. I linked a very good article before that I’m too lazy to look up now over at NRO that describes this descent into madness in gory, disgusting detail.
The confirmation process is irretrievably broken. The Republicans will not sit still after this. The next time the Democrats are trying to confirm a court pick, it will doubtless be them seeking payback, it’s just human nature. You can’t play by Marquis of Queensbury rules while the other guy dons brass knuckles and bladed weapons.
Escalation is inevitable.
As the Whelan angle isn’t gaining any traction in the media for smear ammo, I am increasingly convinced that the People aren’t phased by any of the DNC’s Ford strategy, which at this point is only hurting Ford.
Tragically, you’re probably right.