Hi!
1. Unethical in its simplicity. An esteemed commenter insists, “Any witnesses who allege that Kavanaugh assaulted them should be allowed to testify.” This is either naive (incompetent) or intellectually dishonest. The Democratic Party’s stated objective is to delay a confirmation vote until after the Fall election, in the Hail Mary hope that the Senate will flip to them. There should be no question that the party, now thoroughly corrupted by a mindset holding that anything—lies, character assassination, perjury, misrepresentation, defiling of due process—is justified if it will protect abortion rights and its own power, would manipulate such a rule for political benefit, would recruit an endless series of politically motivated accusers if it could accomplish the objective of running out the clock.
The “any witnesses” flaw was amply demonstrated by yesterday’s fiasco. “New Kavanaugh allegations!” my late TV news screamed. By this morning, the entire story had fallen apart, and yet that ridiculous account (an anonymous woman claimed she was assaulted on a boat in Newport by a drunken “Brett” and friend, so an anonymous man beat them up) added to the designed false impression that multiple, verified, credible witnesses were confirming that Brett Kavanaugh is, as that same esteemed commenter has suggested, a serial sexual predator.
A witness whose claims are raised in a timely manner (that is before hearings begin allowing time for investigation and a response from the accused), whose account meets minimum standards of plausibility, whose accusation involves conduct relevant to a nominee’s fitness to serve, and whose story did not occur so long ago that verification or rebuttal is impossible, should be allowed to testify.
Those qualifications eliminate all of Kavanaugh’s accusers, as well as Anita Hill.
2. Res Ipsa Loquitur* #1 : The rotten ethics of Diane Feinstein.
- In her opening statement, Senator Feinstein stated that it would be outrageous for anyone to question Blasey Ford’s credibility. She therefore assumed before the hearing that Judge Kavanaugh is lying, because he uncategorically denies her allegations. She claimed that Anita Hill was “treated badly” because it was suggested that she was lying. This assessement means that Feinstein assumed then and believes no that Clarence Thomas was lying, because he uncategorically denied Hill’s allegations.
Feinstein’s statement was bigoted, biased, unfair and intentionally divisive.
- Feinstein spent an interminable amount of time praising Blasey Ford’s CV. Her degrees and position are 100% irrelevant to her credibility regarding Kavanaugh. This was an appeal to bias by Feinstein, and, ironically, undercuts a legitimate #MeToo premise, one of the ethical ones. A woman’s credibility when she claims harassment or sexual abuse should not rest on her class, power, education, erudition or life achievements, as when, for example, Democrats like Feinstein “believed Anita Hill” but mocked Paula Jones.
3. Res Ipsa Loquitur #2 The even more rotten ethics of Kirsten Gillibrand.
Here is Senator Gillbrand—you remember her, don’t you? She’s the one who brought “Mattress Girl” to the State of the Union so she could continue falsely accusing an innocent Columbia student of rape. She’s the one who railroaded Al Franken out of the Senate. That Senator Gillbrand—regarding what she considers a a fair standard for Brett Kavanaugh:
“To those who I hear say, over and over, this isn’t fair to Judge Kavanaugh, he’s entitled to due process. What about the presumption of innocence until proven guilty? Dr. Blasey Ford has to prove her case beyond reasonable doubt. Those are the standards for a trial. Those are the standards in criminal justice. We are not having a trial. This is not a court. He’s not entitled to those because we’re not actually seeking to convict him or put him in jail. We are seeking the truth. We are seeking facts. We are seeking just what happened….Is he an honest person? Is he trustworthy? Can we trust him to do the right thing for decades? Rule on women’s live for decades to come? Can we trust him to do that right?…This is not whether or not he should be convicted. This is about whether he has the privilege, the privilege to serve on the highest court of the land for a lifetime.”
I have to say, if you read that unethical, dishonest collection of straw men and misleading statements and say, “Yeah!,” I can’t do much to help. “Due process” is an ethical requirement as much as a legal one. It means that a just system—in employment, in academia, in religion, in justice, anywhere—does not harm someone without a process that guarantees fairness and is devoid of bias and conflicts of interest. It is not relegated to the courts. Those who would discard due process are nascent totalitarians, who want to punish without standards, equality, proportion or good reason.
I have not heard or read anyone who claimed that a beyond a reasonable doubt standard should be used to assess Kanavaugh. Oh. I’m sure some idiot may have said that, but it’s a straw man, and dim-witted as Gillibrand seems to be, I suspect she knows it’s a straw man. The standard, as it is in civil trials and daily life, is whether Blasey Ford’s accusation is credible enough to raise legitimate doubts about Kavanaugh’s fitness to serve on the Court, in which case he should be rejected. Let’s be clear about what Gillibrand wants: a standard that holds that any accusation, substantiated or not, by any woman, is sufficient all by itself to raise such doubts.
She’s argued for this before. In an essay about all of the Democratic plots to impeach President Trump, I credited Gillibrand with Plan J:
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.
Gillibrand misleads the public when she says “this is not a court.” In hearings like this, the Senate is a tribunal, and lawyers are required to treat it as if it were a court. This is especially important in cases like this, where a decision that Blasey-Ford’s accusations are credible will destroy Judge Kavanaugh’s reputation and career. Gillibrand is pretending, for the naifs and fools in her fan club, that losing those are trivial, since he isn’t going to jail. Moreover, Gillibrand and every one of her Democratic collegaues are not seeking truth, or an accurate assessment of Kavanaugh’s character. They have already announced that they don’t trust him, and that they don’t want him on the Court. Blasey Ford’s accusation is irrelevant to their decision, which is already made. They seek an excuse to do what they were already going to do.
What systems work like that? Corrupt systems, Rigged systems. Unjust systems. Totalitarian systems.
_________________
* “the thing speaks for itself”
Ethics Alarms 
“Feinstein spent an interminable amount of time praising Blasey Ford’s CV. Her degrees and position are 100% irrelevant to her credibility regarding Kavanaugh.”
You know, inevitably, someone will counter by saying that then Kavanaugh’s exemplary record since High School should be irrelevant to his defense against accusations from High School…
…and actually think that makes sense…
Aren’t they both ethics accounting?
Correct!
Then the dividing line is that ethics accounting is fair for the accused and not for the accuser. I’m fine with that standard, I just want to know if that’s the standard.
Actually, the argument against high school offenses being used to impugn adults is not just ethics accounting. It isn’t “he’s earned the right to have this discounted,” which is wrong, but also “high school conduct should have no presumed relevance to adult character.” The accuser is currently a credentialed professional, so the argument that she should be believed because of that is ethics accounting and nothing but. If fact, professional credentials tell us nothing about character—especially academics.
I’ve seen the defense that looks like that take 3 forms that are distinct:
1) So what if he did it, the rest of his life makes up for it.
2) So what if he did it, we make a distinction between juvenile conduct and adult conduct.
3) The overwhelming odds are he didn’t do it, and his exemplary life since that time period is solid evidence he didn’t.
Obviously #1 is unethical (and that’s the ethics accounting one).
I think #2 is valid (which is what you argue).
But to me, the real use of balancing his adult life with the accusation is in #3.
Else there is no grace, no forgiveness, and no one can be on SCOTUS.
We have all done things which, when brought out into the harsh glare of public scrutiny, could be made to sound terrible.
For Example: “Jesus facilitates public drunkenness” could be the headline for the wedding miracle. Walk on water? “Jesus cannot swim.”
For once, Graham found his balls and told it like it is.
We’ve also all NOT done things, when when brought into the harsh glare of public scrutiny as though we had done those things, ARE made to sound terrible.
Exactly. Thank you for clarifying my point. Being pissed hinders your writing, evidently.
For all her degrees she did not know what the word “exculpatory” means and that she appeared to be a naïve teenager that had no understanding of polygraphs. I learned in psy201(in 1983) about technology reliability relating to psychological research which included stress induced biological measurements.
Should not have been under this exchange.
I didnt get to see the whole thing, but it seems as though the Republicans spent their time asking questions about her lawyers, and the Democrats spent their time defining Ford as a Hero, and going on about how terrible Rape is. (Ignoring the fact that no one is accused of rape.)
Right now even CSPAN has phone call after phone call of people recounting their own sexual assault stories. That’s not predjudicial at all. Great reporting, guys.
She claimed that she was unaware of the offer by Grassley to come to California. Didn’t her attorneys owe her an obligation to communicate that offer?
I’m amazed by the number of things she is/was unaware of.
She was aware. She’s literally the epicenter of all this. There’s no way she’s completely closed off to all the discussions about this.
Every answer she gave was passive. “I dont know… someone told me… i dont know who…” likely geared to frame her as a helpless victim.
Who cannot be sued. All of these accusations are designed to keep the liars out of legal trouble while breaking the law.
Anyone wanna take 1 to 1000 odds that Coreytacus Booker pulls out the line “Have you no decency?”
I’m making them long odds because of course he wouldn’t, but let’s make this fun, because if anyone said something that made no sense nor was appropriate but sounded bold and appropriate, it would be him.
Thanks for the “esteemed” part I guess.
I think it’s possible to distinguish between political theater and principles here Jack. I’m not naive — I know that there are Democrats who would go to any means necessary to keep a Trump appointee off the bench. But, let’s put that aside for a moment and talk about principles. I, along with many Americans, feel that an appointment to SCOTUS is one of the highest privileges that this country has to give. This is a job interview, not a court of law. If there is credible evidence that a person may have committed sexual assault, then I don’t want that person to have that job. In fact, even the hint of such a scandal — whether it happened 30 minutes or 30 years ago — would cause an employer to look for a new candidate.
I’ve now listened to Ford’s testimony, and I think she came off as credible. (I also heard the grandstanding by Democrats and rolled my eyes at that.) Now, that doesn’t mean that Ford is right (anything’s possible), but if forced to bet on this, I would put my money on her.
I think President Trump should find a new nominee who doesn’t have these skeletons in his or her closet. And you’ll hear crickets from me on that appointment, the same crickets that you heard from me on Gorsuch.
And I am now listening to Justice Kavanaugh. His opening statement is not going well. I look forward to hearing the rest of his testimony.
Certainly Kavanaugh does not seem to believe his resume is irrelevant, given this testimony so far.
“His opening statement is not going well. I look forward to hearing the rest of his testimony”.
His emotion appears far more credible than the unsure accuser portrayed as a deer in the headlights. His emotion reflect a innocent man whose life has been destroyed by political opportunists and those who want to see a scalp. He is far more credible so far.
I’m curious to see if this falls along gender lines.
SS
The emotion in his voice and tone speak volumes. Only the tone deaf will dismiss his opening statement as an act.
Chris — he is a lawyer and a judge. Take it from me — we are all actors. That doesn’t mean that he’s lying, but just about everyone I know could do the same performance. This is rehearsed. (I know I would have rehearsed this for hours.)
I don’t have to take it from you. If this is a performance then it is Oscar award winning. Let’s be clear I do not doubt Ms. Ford has been abused by someone. I also believe that her attorneys have coached her and rehearsed her to appear as if she was a fragile little girl.
Oh, they could be real tears. But you know what happens in court every day? Guilty people cry. They cry because they have been caught. They cry because they might go to jail. They cry because their lives will be changed forever. Genuine tears do not necessarily mean innocent tears.
Pure BS. These are not tears of sorrow they are an emotional response to being unjustly accused, having nothing but his own denials to sway opinions that have been steeled by the desire to be seen as the great protectors of innocent women.
People falsely maligned and harassed also cry.
I don’t know Still – I read the opening statement that he had prepared that was released yesterday. This statement is nothing like that one, so it seems likely that he wrote this statement this morning during Dr. Ford’s testimony. I think the emotion is pretty real given the absolute destructive force these allegations have and will have on him and his family.
“If there is credible evidence that a person may have committed sexual assault, then I don’t want that person to have that job”
Well, in this case, we have no evidence. Just the two testimonies.
In fact, even the hint of such a scandal — whether it happened 30 minutes or 30 years ago — would cause an employer to look for a new candidate.
So you would be ok to step down if at your next interview, one of the bosses said someone had accused you of sexual assault?
testimony = evidence
I wouldn’t have to step down, I wouldn’t get the job. And I wouldn’t have a cause of action either.
I find that unbelievable. You’d just accept it and do nothing about it?
Of course she does. This is the American Spartan want us to live in. Smug limousine liberals will never get thrown under the bus, you see. Only we deplorables.
She is in for a very rude awakening, if this utter hatchet job works.
Payback will be a bitch.
So the word “credible” gets used a lot with regard to accusations, especially old ones, and what I have a hard time parsing is this- when you use it, what do you mean by it? I can genuinely see how it could mean a few different things:
– There is some corroborating evidence beyond the accusation that indicates it is likely to be true, and therefore is credible
– There is insufficient evidence against the accusation to indicate it is likely to be false, and therefore it is “credible” even if not firmly established as true
– It seems unlikely that the accuser is actively lying, and therefore credit should be given to her statements
When you say the accusation of his misdeeds is “credible,” do you mean something like one of the above? Or something else entirely? This isn’t a gotcha, either, I think the word is easy to mean one way and be interpreted another, leading to a misunderstanding.
Credible = believable
OK, but if someone says “I’m late because traffic was backed up for an accident at the US-127 exit” I could say that’s a believable story because I got a traffic alert about that exact accident, or because there are accidents there a lot so it’s not unlikely there was one this morning, or because everyone who comes that way is late today, or because this person is rarely late, or because they’re just honest in general.
Some people will believe any accusation of sexual misconduct even in the face of strong evidence to the contrary. Others probably wouldn’t believe it if a woman in bloody torn clothes ran up to their door being chased by a half-naked maniac. Who needs to find an accusation credible for it to be a cause of concern? And does there need to be any reasoning laid out, or just “I think that’s believable, that’s good enough?”
You’ve just hit the nail on the head for sexual assault cases. The prosecutor often will plea out to a lesser charge if there isn’t corroborating evidence. Sometimes all there is the victim’s testimony. But this is NOT a court of law, it is a job interview.
But here — without an investigation of the witnesses — all we have is her testimony and his testimony.
Which gets us back to the question of, whose credible counts? If we have two mutually exclusive testimonies and neither has any corroborating evidence… what now? You say that a credible accusation should disqualify a candidate, but what’s the standard? I’d say that the judgment of the Senate is our proxy for “credible enough,” but I also have a strong suspicion that nobody will accept that judgment if it disagrees with their own gut.
Ford’s case carries a lot of the traits of alien abduction syndrome…I don’t know where it happened…time was distorted…I don’t know how I got there…I was forced into a small space…I was restrained…I was handled…I don’t know how I got back here.
LoS — Completely consistent with sexual assault cases. Every prosecutor will tell you that.
So how do they build a case without those details?
If it goes to Court, then it is up to the jury to decide.
If it goes to Court without the details, the jury must find in favor of the defendant.
5 of the 7 prosecutors who have gotten back to me say you’re wrong. I’m still waiting for responses from 5,477 others.
Well, you know some shitty prosecutors.
“Well, you know some shitty prosecutors.”
FOUL: Ad hominem smear against a professional answer you don’t like.
SS is dead wrong. I was a prosecutor.
Well, it’s up to the Senate. They are the deciders.
Well, no, we have more than that. We have her testimony that people she specifically identified have specifically rejected as consistent with their recollection.
We have significant gaps in her memory about seemingly basic memories, such as year, place, method of transportation to and from. These are things that my experience cannot credit as reasonable. My memories of traumatic events contain no such gaps about so many fundamental facts as far back as my grammar school days, and I am surely not unique.
Judge Kavanaugh’s memory seems much more … complete. Does that mean he’s right and she’s lying? No, I don’t think that at all. I think something did happen to her, I just don’t think it was Judge Kavanaugh.
So as to credibility, I think her memory gaps compared with his relative lack of them are convincing evidence that whatever happened to her, and however sincerely held, her testimony is less credible than Judge Kavanaugh’s. I won’t rule out my bias’ influence, I freely admit it, but even looking at it from what I believe to be a skeptical viewpoint, I get to the same conclusion.
Those people should have been called in to testify. And there are new allegations as well.
The new allegations are clearly bunk. There is no investigation necessary, the statement itself is its own refutation.
As far as witnesses go, I wouldn’t mind calling them all in for testimony at all. Had these allegations been released contemporaneous with their receipt, I’d agree with that.
But nobody in their right mind would reward the behavior of the Democrats by giving in to their demands after this deliberate, political delay. Gamesmanship like that comes with a cost, and it’s a price we all must pay. You don’t get to delay the hearing by airing evidence you’ve sat on for months at the last minute. In a court of law, such evidence, however powerful, would be excluded. That rule has a purpose – ensuring fairness. Even though this isn’t a legal proceeding, it’s supposed to be fair, and fairness is impossible if you have a transparently political agenda to delay the vote past the election in hopes of nullifying the nomination. It’s unfair to Kavanaugh, to Ford, and to everyone else.
What we have here is the Republicans playing by the hardball rules the Democrats established in this proceeding. It’s bad for the country, and I regret seeing it happen, but I think it’s both necessary and the only available remedy for the Democrats’ misbehavior. What we saw yesterday was a sham, as Lindsey Graham called it, and he was, for once, right.
Shams should not be rewarded. And in this case, they won’t be. Yes, it will make divisions worse, but the fault for that lays entirely at the feet of the Democrats. They have demonstrated that they cannot be trusted by their Republican peers, so they won’t be and frankly, shouldn’t be. They could’ve negotiated with Grassley for the attendance of witnesses by agreeing to a deadline the Republicans could live with, but they demanded all or nothing by insisting on an FBI investigation without any compromise to the political realities. So Grassley gave them their alternative, which is to say, nothing.
You keep insisting it isn’t a court of law. It’s a job interview. If that’s the case and this really wasn’t a pseudo-trial, then the other witnesses mere *statements* that nothing of what Ford described happened, is sufficient for the “interviewers” to go on. There is NO imperative then for the others to show up in person to testify.
But you need to decide, was this a sort of trial or was this just a job interview. You keep appealing to the standards of a trial and then defaulting to the so-called standards of a job interview.
Which is it?
The woman accusing Emmett Till was deemed credible too. We know ho2 that turned out
So if I say 30 years ago or even 10 years ago, you, Still Spartan tried to have your way with me at a party, forcing yourself on me with groping and kissing, then you should potentially lose your job or be inhibited from being hired?
After all it’s just a “hint” of a scandal for me to allege this.
Would it be fair? No. But if my company found your statement to be credible, they could fire me, yes. And it would not be illegal for them to do so.
Would it be ethical of them to fire you?
Good God, what kind of company do you work for? I have never had any relationship with a company that would fire me for an allegation relating to high school conduct, and I would quit any job where an issue was made of it, because I wouldn’t trust THEM.
It I were Kavanaugh at this point, I would give a thorough, careful speech excoriating the Democrats, his accusers, the media and the process, and their unjust, unfair, vicious and unethical conduct. Then I would say, “Take your job and shove it.” I might even sing it.
Lindsay Graham did that, believe it or not, and to a level that Kavanaugh is manifestly incapable of achieving. Kavanaugh is a thoughtful, sensitive man. Graham is a bulldog politician with a real bad attitude toward the committee Democrats.
If his tirade had been a weapon, it would’ve vaporized the lot of them to the subatomic level. There’d be nothing but quarks left.
Oh, hell, here you go:
The amazing thing is that Graham is no demagogue, and regarded as habitually non-partisan. Thus he is disliked by the hard Right as being a “RINO.” He is 100% correct. The Democrats don’t give a damn.
Worse. They actively want to destroy Kavanaugh and drag his battered corpse around the capital building by the tongue. What we are seeing is, in the only word I can come up with, evil.
Kinda like Blackhawk down in Mogudishu
I find the change in Graham intriguing. I wonder if this is a permanent change in him driven by these hearings? Did too much over the top politics of personal destruction drive him to no longer be willing to extend an olive branch to the Democrats?
He’s auditioning for Jeff Sessions’ job.
God help us if you are right and he gets it. Sessions is awful enough.
BTW, valkygrrl, read any good books lately?
Lindsey Graham = Joe Welch
Jack — I was chatting with a client the other day and he asked if I knew of any qualified candidates. They have 8 open slots in their division. This company is an amazing place to work, and I expressed surprise that they had this many openings.
He said that they can’t full these slots because none of the candidates are passing the social media check. Companies now (and I don’t necessarily agree with this) are doing thorough social media checks on candidates. If they see anything negative — pictures of drunkenness, and off-color comment, etc. — they aren’t being hired.
I have a question, one I’ve had on my mind for a while, every time i read about things like Mattress Girl, the many Title IX cases I’ve read about, and this case…
If women are absolved of all responsibility when drunk (as we’ve seen time after time after time in Title IX college sex allegations where both parties are blotto, and rape claimed the next day) why are men prosecuted in these situations as if they were 100% sober and were making sober judgments, even when more impaired than the female was?
My father would have said, simply: Because they were taught better.
Because no one has a legal responsibility to make sure that they don’t get raped.
Except he can’t back down now, just like Ford’s abuse at the hands of the DNC, Kavanaugh, despite being imminently qualified on his own account, is now just a soldier in defense of the Constitution against the unprecedented assault by the Left. And he’s in the breach. If he doesn’t move forward and the Democrats win this with the vicious and dishonest tactics they’ve employed, then you may as well quit fighting, because that’s how it is going to be from here on out. Republicans will keep playing by the rules and Democrats will keep burning the house down when they don’t get their way.
If Kavanaugh is not confirmed because of this treacherous fiasco, Republicans may as well just run a docket of the most Leftwing activist judges they can find, because the Left WILL NEVER CEDE POWER AGAIN the way American culture demands in order for American culture to work.
It may not be illegal, but depending on the situation and state you’re in, it could open them up to tort liability.
Only against the person making the statement against me — not the potential or actual employer. You can get fired for any reason as long as that reason is not illegal (e.g., race, religion, political association, etc.).
Well, even at will employers have to follow their policies and procedures manuals, so while you’re generally right, strictly speaking tort liability would still likely attach if they didn’t.
So essentially, what this statement boils down to is that if the left doesn”t like an appointee, all they should have to do is try to paint him as someone with “skeletons”, no actual proof needed, and he should be made to step aside? That’s like letting one of your children eat an ice cream that he stole, figuring “well, it’s already been stolen; might as well let him have it”.
I’m a dude and find her more credible. Kavanaugh’s position seems to be that of defending something to which he is entitled, rather than considering the esteem of the court or the nation. I saw no sign of another agenda from Ford, no matter the agendas to which her testimony can be put to use.
He is entitled to his good name as is anyone.
It is not the purpose of these hearings to investigate his good name but to see if he is the right person for a job for which quite a few people are qualified.
Sensed gets it. This is a job interview — nothing more.
Sensed has no clue. It is a smear campaign to prevent someone who has been positioned as an existential threat to ensuring a progressive activist judicial branch.
According to Lindsay Graham… This is not a job interview.
SS, it is not just a simple job interview. How many job interviews involve sitting on the highest court in law for a life time appearance. This is a disgrace, Sparty. It is apparent from the questioning that the Democrat side wants to delay the appointment until after the elections. How many of the Democrat senators have asked Kavanaugh if he would ask Pres. Trump to open an FBI investigation?
Finally, Lindsey Graham got his spine in place and yelled at the Democrat side of the podium.
jvb
Is sitting on the Supreme Court a right or a privilege? Now, I think you’re a lawyer John, so no need to answer the obvious question. It is, in fact, a job interview. It doesn’t matter if Graham says otherwise.
It is neither. It is a part of our constitutional republic to nominate people to the position. The recipients of the nomination may be honored, but it isn’t a privilege, but a job – a very hard one to do well. A nomination is a combination of hard, high-quality work and good timing.
Thinking of it as a privilege is misguided and wrong. Very few are qualified, and even fewer ever have the combination of qualifications and timing to be nominated, and that nomination is even more of a political question than a qualification one. In fact, the Constitution puts forth no qualifications for the position, only requiring good behavior to keep it.
Many lawyers think of it as the pinnacle of a career, and that’s probably as it should be for their profession, but it’s not something you can go out and earn. You can only earn a spot on the list.
I would very much consider it a privilege. And it is a job — it comes with a W2.
Well, people thank me for my service all the time, and I tell them no thanks are due – it was an honor.
But my perception does not change what it was – essentially, it was a job. I got paid for it, free training which serves me even today, free medical care, free dental, free food and housing, free transportation (though not always where I wanted to go).
Perception is one thing. Reality is another.
But it does affect his good name, regardless of whether he gets the job or not.
Sensed:
What do you think is going on here? They are doing everything that they can to destroy his character. His character is his name. His qualifications are beyond reproach.
Lots of people have these qualifications.
No, very few do. A good number meet the minimum qualifications, but very few are as or more qualified than Kavanaugh.
Nobody’s qualifications are beyond reproach. Reasonable accusations should be investigated before anyone is handed a very powerful job. In politics there will always be grandstanding, but grandstanding does not have any bearing on the truth of such accusations. Ford seems very credible, Kavanugh less so, at least so far.
Why is she credible?
Well, obviously such a judgement is subjective, but her manner seems consistent with someone reluctantly testifying to something tramatic, and I see no personal agenda on her part to put herself in such a spotlight.
She will become the Rosa Parks of the MeToo movement. She will be lionized by feminists for al time. She will be the woman that saved progressive judicial activism. The book deals will be hers to be had. She will be set for life.
That’s pretty thin broth. She’ll be hated by a good portion of the populace for life, and a nice advance from Simon & Schuster–which Kavanaugh could also get, of course–is unlikely to be of such enormous value as to wreck one’s professional and personal life for it. But if you think people are likely to lie in order to retain a position for life, well, that would apply to Kavanaugh as well.
I don’t think anyone should hate her. She looked sincere to me, and I don’t believe she was telling a tale, although I did before she showed up to testify. But her memory gaps make her story incredible and unlikely, especially given that nobody she named can support it in the least.
I am convinced something happened. I just don’t believe it is what she says it is.
I disagree
We shall see.
I rather doubt it. She will become a tragic anti-Anita Hill, a person who, unlike Hill, thought she was telling the truth. I just don’t believe she was.
The Left has been known to give Anti-American Left wing terrorists professorships at prestigious Universities.
A left wing activist bringing down a Constitutionalist Jurist that would potentially halt Leftist judicial activism (one of the Pillars of Leftwing governance) for a decade or so?
Yeah, there is plenty in this to pad her resume for advancement.
Sensed,
The Ford allegations have a ring of credibility, except that 4 people who were alleged to have been present have denied the incident happened as Ford alleges.
The request to delay the vote for a “reasonable, non-partisan” investigation by the FBI (who had been provided with the allegation by Sen. Feinstein and declined to investigate) is obtuse at best. Feinstein had this information since July and chose to sit on it until the initial hearings had been adjourned. This is purely a partisan ploy to delay a vote. Shame on them. If these allegations were credible and serious, then why did Feinstein sit on them?
jvb
As I said, there is grandstanding, but that is irrelevant to the truth. Feinstein sat on them for political reasons. It doesn’t mean they’re not true.
Grandstanding is not irrelevant to this process. It is the entire point of this process. Feinstein should be ashamed of herself.
jvb
The process is to determine whether someone is qualified for a very powerful political position. Obviously there’s politics involved. To pretend that one party is waving the banner of truth is reveal of bias and nothing more.
There is no question he is qualified. The only question is, did he commit a crime as a minor, namely sexual assault, which might disqualify him.
The answer to that question is no, and not just because he says so, but because there is no evidence at all other than the 36-year old testimony of a woman with significant gaps in her recollection – little things like “How did I get there? How did I get home? Where was it? What year was it?” She can provide none of the answers to these basic questions. She can’t even accurately provide “Who was there?”
There is no case of a significant event in my life, regardless of age, where I don’t remember where I was, how I got there, or how I returned from where I was. I don’t always remember everyone who was there, so she gets a pass on that one. But that lack of recollection of the rest makes me instantly suspicious of her testimony. She did nothing at all today to make me more confident that she is remembering events accurately.
Your perception is skewed. Kavanaugh is every bit as credible.
Perception in such a situation is inevitably skewed. That’s subjectivity for you.
Indeed.
Reasonable accusations should be investigated
Quite so. Unfortunately, there is nothing tangible to investigate. I say “unfortunately,” because in cases like this, the damage is done by the vagueness (and other questions regarding the veracity) of the accusations alone, unless they are proven one way or another.
Jack has suggested that if worst comes to what it looks like it will, there is someone perhaps more, say, conservative than the man who is being deliberately eviscerated alive here, someone who may be waiting in the wings, in which case there is a good chance of rebound.
If the Establishment GOP had the balls to push through such a candidate, Kavanaugh would already have been confirmed.
Exactly, Chris.
jvb
You know, If I and my family were wrongly subjected to this kind of disgusting abuse, I’d hold onto that seat for dear life, just to SPITE the Goddamned left!
Kavanaugh testified today that he was a virgin in high school. I thought that was unnecessary, but he went there and put it on the record. When asked about his yearbook, he also testified as to what boofing and “devil’s triangle” meant — and I’m pretty certain that he is lying. (I knew the former term, but not the latter.) Google will instruct you if you do not know. Kavanaugh was no saint.
Either that, or in 1982 they didn’t mean to them what the common understanding is now in the circle in which he traveled. I remember many of us in high school using the profane slang for male genitalia for female, ignorant that we had the word wrong.
That’s called being in high school.
As I said to a friend earlier today, either he is the unluckiest man in the world for using these terms for innocent and/or juvenile events — or he was a player of the first order who keeps score.
I think such binary propositions are generally unethical. It’s remarkable how liberals are always talking about shades of grey, then happily propose binary choices like this when it suits them.
He was in high school. He didn’t have to be a saint, and it doesn’t matter if he was or wasn’t. I was juts about a saint in high school, to my undying regret, and I could see everything that has happened to Kavanaugh happen to me.
Really? Did you talk about boofing and devil’s triangles in your yearbook? I highly doubt it.
I was a high schooler in the same grade eight years before Kavanaugh, and today is the first time in my life I have heard of “boofing.” “Devil’s triangle” has only one meaning to me – the Bermuda Triangle.
This bizarre parsing of high school terminology in hopes of finding something incriminating, even if they meant exactly what you suggest, is tragic and weak, indicative of “ends justify the means” thinking.
When I was in high school boofing was making a swish in basketball or stuffing the basketball with a loud swishing sound. The Devil’s Triangle could mean so many different things.
At least Kavanaugh has contemporaneous evidence of his activities on a calendar. His accuser has exactly nothing.
If Kavanaugh attempted rape, bring the lawsuit. Let’s see her case against him SPECIFICALLY made. Montgomery County has no statute of limitations on this crime.
I think they did at the time, particularly in the case of juveniles. I’m not 100% on that, but I do know you can’t change the statute of limitations and still prosecute or sue for an event that was covered by an earlier version. It would be an ex post facto law.
“Kavanaugh testified today that he was a virgin in high school. I thought that was unnecessary, but he went there and put it on the record.”
You are correct it was unnecessary, so was everything else that happened today. These allegations absent any evidence other than the accusers testimony should never had a hearing.
This should terrify everyone, no one should have to answer allegations like this without any evidence or even a relatively recent accusation. Even if I believed that these accusations were true, based on what has been presented thus far I couldn’t in good conscience vote against him because the actual evidence is far more exculpatory. I believe in the ideals of this country and this is a crossroad, do we abandon our ideals for political expediency, that applies to both sides, or do we do the right thing?
Remember when everyone made fun of Pence for not meeting alone with women? Not so silly sounding anymore is it?
I wonder if other men have a strong opinion because they see themselves in his shoes. In my 40-some-odd years I have never mistreated women, never been buzzed let alone drunk, and never attended a party with alcohol when I was in H.S. or college. All it now takes to ruin my life is someone to mis-remember or incorrectly blame me for something I never did. That thought frightens me.
I work in higher ed, and just the other day I was in a break room (used by faculty, staff, and students) and I was blissfully alone. A female student came in, sat down, and read a book. Even though people were in offices nearby and down the hall, I picked up my stuff and left. This is the environment that MeToo zealots and IBelieveHer nazis have cultivated.
I’m honestly really very sorry that you were afraid today. I personally don’t go around thinking every man is going to sexually assault me, because that is no way to live. But the chances of you facing an unfounded allegation are infinitesimally small compared to the actual assaults that happen every day. And, absent a woman who has serious mental problems, very few of us are willing to risk our reputations by making a report — whether or not an assault happened.
Ford is not risking her reputation. She will now always be a hero to the Left, just as Anita Hill is. Don’t forget that this includes her peer group, as an academic in California. There is no possibility that her claims, given she cannot or will not give the time or place where they were supposed to have occurred, will ever be disproven. Her account, even if totally fabricated, is as immune to falsification as the Virgin Birth, which is precisely why it cannot be deemed credible.
Hero to some and fucking liar to others.
And pawn to a few others, the same as Cindy Sheehan, the same as Anita Hill, and the same as a few others who ceased to be useful to the pain pimps and the grief pimps and the outrage pimps who feed the lefties who make their decisions based on feelings, not thoughts.
Never having to interact with those who will disdain her for life because she’ll never have to leave her leftist bubble pretty much mitigates the negative aspects of her “coming out” like this.
There is no scenario where this doesn’t benefit her.
She’s sacrificed nothing. To believe in political hit job. Nike approves.
Hero to those in her social circle and her professional peers, liar to people she cares nothing about. Some risk.
Bingo.
Listening to Ford’s testimony I have to say, I can’t totally dismiss her claims. As far as gaps in memory of such an incident, that I believe, based on my own unfortunate experience. However the fact that her alleged attack wasn’t corroborated weighs heavily against her. Also I can’t understand why she didn’t go to the police instead of Feinstein & WaPo if she believes a crime happened and the statute of limitations made her able to report it properly. That being said, her testimony gave me pause.
Personally I appreciate Kavanaugh’s passion. He didn’t testify just as a judge or potential employee, but as a man with a family & his honor at stake in the midst of a sea of clearly biased Trump hate. His emotional response was moving but I could see certain women asserting he was mean faced and was sexist for interrupting some of the women. What what most compelling was his calendars and record employing women. Most important, he had many more people corroborate his testimony than Ford.
It was sad that he was quasi-accused of being a drunk & the little AA 12 step cult mention was utter BS. Also the yearbook issue stuck me as grasping at Animal House style straws.
More than anything my takeaway is this: Our country is in great peril if this style of government continues. My wife often asks “how would you feel if…” and usually I find it annoying. But in this case I’d ask “how would you feel if you were treated the way Kavanaugh has been and were innocent?” Yes I know Ford had been treated in an undignified way (by other Democrats especially – for being used as a pawn), but seriously…how would you feel? Because the truth is if they can do this to him, guilty or not, they could do this to anyone for any mistake or alleged but uncorroborated crime in youth. No one will be free to live as a fully human being who gets to make mistakes and learn from them, especially in youth. That’s the most disturbing thing the hearing conveyed.
Mrs. Q — I am very sorry for the unfortunate experience that you referenced. Sadly, there are too many of us who fall in that category.
She didn’t go to the police because she didn’t want to press charges — she just wanted them to choose another nominee. She STILL hasn’t pressed charges, even though there is no SOL in MD for this alleged crime.
Also, if I were her (and thank God I am not), the very first thing I would do is hire an attorney.
Even the Jesuits agree with me: https://www.americamagazine.org/politics-society/2018/09/27/editors-it-time-kavanaugh-nomination-be-withdrawn
Their reasoning is that it’s become too divisive. That is complete and utter garbage. To that reasoning, anyone who attracts a political hit can never be confirmed, all the other side needs to do is make enough noise to get them declared too divisive. That is ridiculous, and a wrong standard.
Too few people are stopping to consider the integrity of the process. If we set the precedent that any nomination may be derailed on the strength of an easily manufactured, utterly unverifiable allegation, then any nomination may be derailed at the whim of under opposition, period.
Progressives are fine with that, as they control the press and thus think they control the narrative. In their minds, this would never happen to one of their nominations.
Which is probably what Feinstein hoped would happen: enough noise is made that he withdraws or is forced to do so. They don’t care about the experiences of women that can’t be used as political pawns. This is an ends-justifies-the-means scorched earth policy.
Kavanaugh just voted out of committee. We will see if the GOPe will stand by their man.
“Even the Jesuits agree with me”
So does the American Bar Association. So does CNN. So what?
Progressive all agree with each other and that makes them right?
I think some of you need stop and evaluate the criteria you are using to establish credibility. #metoo and feminist have been successful in getting a great deal of the population to instinctively evaluate credibility of accusers based nothing more than repeated bad statistics and a completely useless profile of how a “victim” may act: the current profile is anything that may actually be negative to the accusers credibility, such as corroborated timelines, witness testimony, or how you got somewhere is explained away just part of an accusers actual profile. So while I am currently completely unsympathetic to Dr Ford I will also throw out there the way this was brought forward is also contrary to her being credible.
She is completely unreliable and her demeanor does not speak to her being the professional her CV would lead one to expect. It was an act.
I thought I was done but not just yet. There is next to nothing to in this judges history that cast any doubt on his credibility. This judge and nearly every single aspect of this judges life speaks to his credibility. He has been a public figure for a long time there has been countless opportunities for even for even a low life opportunist to try to cast shadows on his character and it has never happened until just now when the democratic party needs a win before midterms.
You are right that there WAS nothing in his history that cast doubt on his credibility, but there is now. I suggst he has been trapped into lying, or at least into making statements that can easily be disputed (like never having had sex until whenever.). So sadly he just reveals himself not only as having been a standard, entitled, arrogant youth, typical of his class and generation ( amongst very many others) but also as being somewhat dim and incompetent. So he should have failed the job interview on ‘competence’ rather than ‘character’. Sad …. he seems to have matured into quite a nice guy.
(PS When will the adults be back?)
You’re post ensures you will not be considered one. Incredibly biased and one sided.
Your thought process is what is sad.
Your
“PS When will the adults be back?”
Never, if progressives get their way.
Your comments show such a lack of self awareness that it answers your own question.
What would that be? An accusation refuted by all known contemporaneous witnesses, and called into doubt by his own contemporaneous notes, something which his accuser could not produce at all?
I’m afraid I can’t agree.
Really? Well, I suppose some woman he dated should come up and gainsay him, then. After all, we know that lying to the committee is a felony.
What, that hasn’t happened, you say? No woman has claimed she had sex with Kavanaugh during high school or early college? How do you adjudge him to be a liar? Even in the promiscuous 1970’s, I didn’t have sex until well into my college years. I know numerous other men with similar experiences.
Your conclusions are biased, illogical, and almost certainly wrong. He has a long history of incisive jurisprudence, and your comments regarding competence are refuted by a mountain of evidence, documentary and testimonial, to the contrary. That fact alone is sufficient to relegate your comment to obviously biased irrelevancy.
Andrew, Now I know that you’re a smart guy. Why would you put in print something as dumb as your first sentence? An uncorroborated, politically motivated accusation adds nothing to Kavanaugh’s history at all.
Have you read a single Kavanaugh judicial opinion? If he’s dim, you’re a drooling moron. Does it occur to you that the the SECOND Kavanaugh said two days ago that he didn’t have sex until after law school, the Democratic character assassination team was out in force trolling for women who would contradict him? They couldn’t find a thing, because he was telling the truth.
You can apologize for the obnoxious “adult” snark at your convenience. It just made you look infantile.
Gosh just look at civic minded Ford raising her right hand to swear to uphold the truth after her long trek to stand before her elected representatives as an empowered citizen! The power! The Dignity! What honesty she must possess!
Look at the ranting and raving Kavanaugh! He looks ready to rape again!
Well done NY Times. Such a beacon of journalism.
I thought she was highly credible in the sense that she was describing what she honestly believes happened. And I imagine there probably was a real incident with boys that disturbed her, although Im skeptical that Kavanaugh was one of them. She probably was lying about some of the details. Most witnesses do. (Raise your hand if you believe she had only one beer.) But overall I think she was being truthful.
But to me, the credibility of her judgements and memory is highly questionable. Begin with the fact that she’s a kook. Did you catch the part about how she insisted on having two front doors in her house because of the claustrophobia allegedly caused by the trauma of this incident? That’s just nuts. Lots of people have suffered trauma and lots of people are claustrophobic, but who else besides her wants two front doors? And her demeanor while testifying was far more tense and brittle than is normal, even for witnesses in highly charged cases Kooks have diminished credibility, because they tend to misunderstand things, to misremember them and to overdramatize them. (She said she was “terrified” of testifying and in fear for her life.)
Also, the event that she described just wouldn’t be so traumatic to a woman of normal resilience. She thought she was going to be raped but she wasn’t. Most women would move on. It certainly wouldn’t shape the rest of their lives. That she claims it as the central event of her life indicates a particularly weak psyche or, more likely, a woman seeking easy explanations for her generalized lifelong unhappiness and dysfunction.
And finally, although she’s convinced that she was the victim of an attempted gang rape, it’s clear that’s not what it was. (1) Nowhere in her testimony do the boys drop their pants or even unzip. That’s not consistent with an attempt to rape. (2) Though she’s convinced Kavanaugh (I’ll pretend she’s gotten her identification right) was trying to remove her clothes, that can’t be true. No matter how drunk he was, if he had been trying, he would have succeeded. Also inconsistent with attempted rape. (3). She testified that Judge kept jumping on top of Kavanaugh while the two of them laughed uproariously. You can’t commit a rape that way. (4) She says the incident ended when Judge jumped on Kavanaugh, sending the three of them tumbling to the ground, the boys laughing, and she left the room, neither of them trying to stop or chase her. Also not consistent with attempted rape.
I still think it’s most likely that the boys, whoever they were, thought they were all wrestling around, while the supposed Brett copped a feel, and that she was a willing participant in the horseplay. A lot of girls would be, especially drunk girls. Given the apparent fragility of her psyche and the fact that she doesn’t recognize the essential nature of what was going on (I.e., not a rape), it’s hard for me to trust any of her other recollections or perceptions, including her recollection of who the boys were.
Pissed. Beyond. Belief.
I watched the entire Ford hearing yesterday and here is my honest opinion of Ford. There are some things about her that I recognize and not in a good way.
I suspect that Ford has more psychological problems than she is willing to open up about which likely led her to pursuing psychology. After listening to her it’s my belief that something likely happened between her and one boy and the second boy was added to the story later for dramatic victimizing effect. I think this story has been becoming more elaborate over the years, started off with one simple truth and then she’s added a couple enhancement lies on that simple truth carefully crafting them so no one can absolutely disprove them. If it were possible to accurately look back at her life I think you would find that she has used exaggerated victim claims to manipulate others including her therapist and her husband. She likely had psychological problems well before this seed event ever happened. Ford appears to me to be a master manipulator seeking personal attention and she might be on the verge of being a narcissist.
Now back to why I recognize some things about her; I grew up with a master manipulator I’m a victim family member (yes a narcissist) that is just like her right down building up false stories based on a simple truths and even the pursuit of psychology. I’ve seen this before.
Something more: I just talked to someone I know that’s actually claustrophobic and has been since they were a youngster and it’s now my opinion that Ford is lying through her damn teeth about being claustrophobic. No one so claustrophobic that they would actually need two front doors on their house because of their condition would ever step foot on an airplane without being very heavily sedated for the entire flight. According to Ford, she has flown all over the world and all over the United States.
I rewatched the Ford testimony over the course of yesterday and today and I repeated some portions multiple times. My conclusion is that Ford is a liar and a very accomplished one, she’s been doing this sort of thing for a long, long time. I no longer believe a word of her testimony.
P.S. I think that Feinstein was behind the Ford leak, I think she inspired it.
Fuck!…
I confess, I didn’t watch any of the sleazy shit that was on the air yesterday. Oh, yeah, I didn’t watch or listen to anything about the Kavanaugh Family Execution by Kavanaugh’s Political Enemies, either.
No, I just pondered how the next SCOTUS nomination will go down, when there is a Democrat Party member who is President and a Democrat Party-controlled (note I did NOT say “Democrat Party-majority“) Senate…
That nominee initially will benefit from a nonstop media orgy of glorification for firing on all progressive cylinders for his or her entire life – including some sign he or she printed and brought to his or her preschool class to protest…maybe something like, say, cruelty to cockroaches (“When You Step On One, You Step On ME!”), or similar…
But wait: I used “him or her.” Oops. The nominee might not wish to be referred to by use of either of those old, white, male, evil pronouns. But I digress…
…followed by no hearings (that’s right: the Judiciary Committee will waive hearings entirely), and a committee vote for confirmation within one day of nomination, and a full Senate vote for confirmation the next day. With only Democrats, plus wimpy go-along senators of other parties, plus scattered, token opposition (who will lose their re-election bids – the fascist monsters!) in attendance for the voting – it’ll still be a quorum. And all will be done, but for the swearing in, at which point the new Justice will place erz hand on…a copy of Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals. Or a Koran. Or a photo of Ms. Ford.
I watched most of Kavanaugh’s opening statements but I was pulled away and only got to watch a few minutes here and there after that.
I though Kavanaugh’s opening statements were completely appropriate. When your family and livelihood are at stake because the Democrats and their henchmen are attacking everything in your life, you come out forcefully.
I saw some of Feinstein’s if you’re not guilty why don’t you want an investigation bull shit innuendo and I nearly puked.
I saw just a little bit of the discussion about words in the High School year book and I shook my head in utter disgust at what the Democrats were doing.
Democrats have lost their damn minds.