The GOP knew all along about the past sexual misbehavior of Kavanaugh and that is why they held back information from the Democrats and tried to rush his confirmation through. Worse still they have sidestepped the routine FBI investigation. This man has no right to be elected to the Supreme Court without proper vetting whether innocent or guilty. The fact that a basic examination of the candidate has been avoided makes the candidate look as guilty as the very devil. Confirmation should be postponed—better yet cancelled.
For AACNY: Routinely candidates for the Supreme Court are investigated by the FBI. Kavanaugh’s confirmation has been rushed through and since the GOP already knows the dirt on him they have covered it up. I too believe a man is innocent till proven guilty but this haste and this coverup stinks to high heaven. The man has not been properly vetted.
Shame on Senator Caine’s fake friend Lindsay Graham for his lying betrayal of his friend.
And for His patent dishonesty and present attack on womanhood.
@Grandma
Another core value is the requirement of "evidence." Every American also knows that an allegation not backed up by evidence is questionable; otherwise, anyone could claim anything.
I agree that republicans should delay the hearing if the democrats can produce credible evidence to support their allegations. As of today, the only credible evidence is overwhelmingly in support of Kavanaugh's confirmation.
1
Peter Baker tweeted that the second allegation could not be verified. By The Times' own standard, this allegation should be preceded by the word "unproven" whenever referenced.
Fortunately, innocent until proven guilty seems to be prevailing. It's an American core value. In our DNA. Only in politics can someone be declared guilty until proven innocent, which is exactly where these Kavanaugh allegations belong.
1
@AACNY: Read the New Yorker article. I find her very credible as do many of her classmates.
1
@Anne
The NYT did not consider the allegations sufficiently corroborated.
You are free to believe anything and to ignore the normal rules surrounding allegations -- ex., that they require corroboration to be taken seriously.
McConnell is a dishonorable power hungry old man whose words no longer carry any worth morally.
Supporting Kavanaugh is proof of his toxic pudding.
2
@Grandma: McConnell's rant to the "Values Voters" conference clearly indicates intent to turn the US into a theocracy with the Kavanaugh appointment.
1
"He (Kavanaugh) ... would be a potentially decisive vote on litigation over women’s rights — including the right to terminate a pregnancy."
Two questions which no one seems to be asking is, "termination when?" and "termination why?"
We are supposed to be a sophisticated rich nation and yet we discuss this issue at the level of yes versus no. Binary thinking is all we seem to understand.
But "when" is important. A fetus does not stand still during pregnancy. Starting as a freshly fertilized ovum, it develops a heart and a brain and other organs.
And "why" is also important. It is one thing to terminate a fetus who is so damaged that it could not have a decent life. Quite another to terminate a perfectly healthy fetus merely because "you broke up with your boyfriend." This last has been given as a reason by hundreds of thousands of women.
Do we accept THAT reason? Even late in pregnancy? Are we going to go ON killing more than 500 FEMALE fetuses every day because of something which Kavanaugh did or did not do 36 years ago?
@Ludwig -- you make a weird conflation of the issues surrounding abortion. Late term abortions are rare and actually hard to get, even in "liberal" states. In New York I believe it is still the case (from knowledge of a decade ago) that there are only two hospitals in the state that do abortions after 20 weeks, both in NYC, both requiring medical referral and having a committee process. They aren't doing late-term "I broke up with my boyfriend" abortions, and if you bother to read Roe v Wade you will see that state interest increases with viability.
And then what's your point about female fetuses as opposed to male fetuses?
And then bringing Kavanaugh into this -- why Kavanaugh? Are you claiming that it is necessary to have a sexual abuser on the Supreme Court to stop abortion? Really? Really?
You don't think Trump can find another anti-abortion nominee, one who isn't so accused?
How about Amy Barrett?
3
@Ludwig
The rarely mentioned fact is that Americans support limits on abortion. Usually, just "overall support" is mentioned. Like many things in the abortion debate, obfuscation of the grim details often remain buried.
2
@AACNY: The first amendment denies power to Congress to treat faith-based beliefs as real and substantial in legislation. Stop trying to cheat this extremely fundamental limitation of governmental power under the Constitution.
As I've said, I don't support either Kavanaugh or Trump. I and we must insist we uphold due process, including
1. the presumption of innocence
2. support for criminal accusations with credible evidence and corroborating sworn testimony
3. the accuser must testify first.
Partisans have thrown #1 out the window. #2 has yet to be provided, in any shape or form, by the accuser, whose own friend has blown a huge hole in her story. The accuser's partisan lawyer demanded, absurdly, that #3 be stood on its head, turning the whole process into a sick joke.
Now the partisan press brings yet another uncorroborated accusation of adolescent drunken behavior from 30 years ago.
At this point, all that matters is to restore integrity to an absurd, degrading process.
Those who accuse Kavanaugh of assault must do so under oath, with witnesses and corroborating evidence.
If they can do so then Kavanaugh must withdraw; if not, a vote must be held immediately.
Either way, we must fix this process.
If the accused is shown to be guilty of sexual assault, then something is wrong with our FBI, our legal profession and with Yale Law School.
Kavanaugh has passed 6 FBI background checks and was heartily endorsed by dozens of peers and colleagues at Yale. So either:
A) (if he's guilty of assault) Yale Law professors are corrupt liars and our FBI is incompetent, or
B) (if he's not guilty of assault) this man's accusers have faulty memories and are being manipulated for partisan ends.
3
@T-Bone: This process can only be fixed by removing religion from the stew, as the original originalists obviously intended by adding "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion" the very first clause in the Bill of Rights amending the Constitution. It was never intended that the Supreme Court should become an outpost of the Roman Catholic Church.
3
@T-Bone
BK is not on trial.
BK does not actually need to be convicted of a crime.
"Presumption of innocence" is a pretty low bar for someone about to get a lifetime appointment to the highest court in the land. We can do better than this (hint Merrick Garland).
1
@oldBassGuy
The man has been a federal judge - on the same court as Garland - for TWELVE YEARS.
I don't support his views but he is obviously extremely qualified. His peers - liberals and conservatives alike - give enthusiastic praise for him, his record as a judge, and his character.
Either the entire east coast elite legal establishment are lying, or his accusers' memories (and their partisan handlers) are playing tricks.
We will - assuming there is, finally, some actual examination of whatever real evidence and witnesses and corroborating testimony exist - soon find out who's not telling the truth.
After now a second and possible third accuser, I think that Judge Kavanaugh should remove himself from being considered. Any decent man would, and if Kavanaugh were truly innocent he would be asking for an FBI investigation. Especially if he has nothing to hide
This whole nomination is fatally flawed and is a true debacle for the deranged man in the White House and the GOP.
4
While republicans have been guilty of sexism, dishonesty and gross hypocrisy in their efforts to "plow right through" Dr. Ford's accusations against Judge Kavanaugh, their most self-destructive sin, when all is said and done, will be their own hubris.
1
It's incredibly discouraging that the Republicans would foist a nominee like Kavanaugh on the citizens of this nation. Is this the best they could do?
@Cherie -- The Republicans knew Kavanaugh had issues that might blow up on them. Matt Judge's book about the Georgetown prep scene, "Bart O'Kavanaugh" included, was well known.
Trump chose Kavanaugh because he was a privileged bad-boy with a history AND he has the most wildly-expansive views of presidential prerogatives and immunities of any of the potential nominees.
Trump picked him expecting to get a wingman on the Supreme Court.
Trump also picked him as a show of power to al the angry white men out there, in Trump's base. Trump was expecting considerable opposition to Kavanaugh (duh!), and was expecting Kavanaugh's "youthful indiscretions" to be in play. Trump expected that the "boys will be boys and we're all white men here" narrative would prevail, reinforcing his and their power and immunity.
He didn't expect a Blasey to come forward, even though anyone looking at Kavanaugh's known antics, would guess "where there's that much smoke, there's some kind of fire."
All the outrage you see in these comments from guys who vicariously identify with Trump and Kavanaugh is so sadly telling: they need gropers and abusers to have license ... it is part of their identity.
3
@Lee Harrison
The "outrage" is for a process that has yielded unsubstantiated charges full of holes and contradicted by witnesses, including the accuser's own friend, brought forth 30 years after the fact and after 6 FBI background checks, dozens of enthusiastic recommendations from across the spectrum, and a sterling 12-year judicial career.
This is not how our democracy works.
The process is broken.
Would you tolerate it if the shoe were on the other foot?
Anyone else think we should start a company producing paper calendars from the 1980s and 1999s for privileged white men to support their lies? I think ironically enough this is the beginning of the end
11
The Kavanaugh Kult....fully exposed. Good stuff.
3
Kavanaugh is basically done, as the Me Too Movement has decided that any male who was drunk while in high school, and tried to forcefully have sex with, exposed himself to females, or tried to have sex with them, etc. is toast. That said, the Me Too Movement better hope that Bill Cosby, who drugged, and or raped 58 women, receives at least 20 years in prison. If not, then it really is a man's world, and 58 women who told their stories of real rape and being drugged won't matter, and if they don't matter, then it really won't matter, at all women, will it? And if women don't care about those 58 women, then women will be no better than men, will they?
2
The smart choice would have been to nominate a woman. That was not even a consideration for Trump and the GOP. What a bunch of clueless white men being led around on a leash by Trump trying to make sure he is not impeached.
16
To all the nay sayers, I'd like to remind you that Weinstein's collapse was the result of a single unsubstantiated claim.
The same to be said for Cosby.
It hasn't worked out terribly well for either of those pillars of society.
9
@Uncle Fester: Yes. And in each of those cases, it took one incredibly brave woman to come forward before others felt safe coming forward to share their stories, too.
#MeToo is not going away. It's the new normal. Women (and men) are done with silence around sexual assault. And until our court systems take sexual assault seriously, survivors will use whatever means necessary to tell their stories.
9
@Anne, Concur. And as long as the denial is fostered from the top, things will never change.
Hope then, that when the house of cards falls, it collapses completely.
1
@ Joseph Puentes and Sam Katz. Everybody is entitled to their own interpretations. As a home care nurse I. saw a number of clients that would fit the bill of having 'obsessive-compulsive, collecting genes', and meticulous 'sentimental ' savers. We called them hoarders. As patients they were one of the most difficult types to take care of because of their super controlling behaviors. Usually they were demanding , require far more attention then others, and are self absorbed. Some had insight into their behaviors, most did not.
In inpatient settings these kind of clients have to be managed in order to have time for the workload of taking care of 5-10 ( 20 in nursing homes). When a nurse went into the room of such a patient , a certain amount of time was set as a maximum and then another nurse was designated to come to the door and call that nurse out for whatever reason.
Wealthy clients of this stripe can afford to hire 24/7 private duty nurses at home or in an inpatient setting to cater to their every whim.
Woe to poor hoarders. They usually don't have the space or servants to keep their 'meticulous collections ' secret'.
3
@Gwen Vilen
There are also mothers who save everything. This is not a stretch if a mother wanted to save a record of his high school life.
My mother saved all my report cards going back to kindergarten. My kids got a good laugh at the nun's comments in first grade. I wasn't studious enough, evidently.
Time to pull the plug on this sorry excuse of a man.
Although matters related to sexual assault are important, at this point we don't even need Dr Ford's testimony. There is overwhelming reason to can this guy.
He was a serious drunk and lousy losing gambler (can we name the guy who paid off his gambling debts?).
He was nominated by a sexual predator who is also an un-indicted co-conspirator to a felony, and proven sexual predator (no need to rehash the obvious here).
His (BK) signature achievement in life appears to be being joined at the hip with Ken Starr (fired president Baylor for mishandling sexual assault issues), yet another old guy with a perverted view on the mystery of womanhood.
Is there not single other balanced, well adjusted qualified person in the land who does not have trouble with the mystery of womanhood in this country? How about Merrick Garland.
18
Let it all hang out? WP reports by name that another accuser has come forth that BK exposed himself at another Frat Boy (?) party since 1982.
9
It's time for another women's march, folks. Right before the election would be perfect timing. Women have had enough. Control over women and their bodies by old white men is over.
14
A million woman march on Washington. Way more people than the inauguration. We need a million man march too. Then a million teenagers who will live with SCOTUS and are endangered by lack of gun control.
Who retains a calendar from 1992 when you were in high school?
11
if you dont hold yourself to the highest standards of honesty and integrity then you dont deserve the privilege of representing the interest of us all. your qualifications alone dont give you the right to hold this office
you should step aside and let a more neutral person take that responsibility
this is not to say that you are a bad person. you just aren't the right person for this place at this time.
please do the righteous thing for all of us.
11
Did anyone out there stop to think that another Catholic, privileged white male on the Supreme Court and especially a man who has barely been out of the elite, Washington, political area is not in our best interest, Roe v. Wade notwithstanding.
Dr. Blasey's history suggests strongly that she is telling the truth and Judge Kavanaugh was either so drunk he doesn't remember (not a good sign, but forgivable, I suppose) or he is lying. I believe the latter. He doth protest too much. She has a huge downside from coming forward. So why would she do this for a lie. (except to right a wrong.). He has a huge incentive to lie. Huge. He should have declined the nomination, but then, the system right now IS rigged.
Dr. Blasey Ford is a hero, a survivor in the most real sense. Kavanaugh is just another privileged rich guy. One we will probably be stuck with for the rest of his life. Conned again.
12
Journalist Ronan Farrow just reported the story of a second accuser, this one from Yale.
It also seems that Senator Grassley and others may have known about the second accuser's existence for several days.
Why did Senator Grassley attempt to bully Dr. Ford into testifying immediately? Why no other witnesses? Why no FBI investigation?
Because they don't want us to know what kind of man Justice Kavanaugh is.
27
Shame on the Republican Senators who are afraid to face her, and feel they need to hide behind a hired gun.
11
This entire episode disgusts me! People claiming that Kavanaugh is guilty even before we hear from them both.
Women will be sorry for the day Dr Ford ever started this charade, for when her lies are out in the open and her feeble attempt at trying to ruin a noble mans life- women will not believed any more and fewer And fewer women will
Come forward with TRUE ACCUSATIONS of abuse.
4
From the New Yorker article just published about the second accuser:
Kavanaugh was also a member of an all-male secret society, Truth and Courage, which was popularly known by the nickname “Tit and Clit.”
Goodbye, Brett.
28
That’s terrible. Really a question of character and revealing a kinship with a secret society which reflects pattern of deceit in its existence. He said in a speech “what happens here stays here” when speaking of drunken behavior.
2
As a teen who was raped wtih a knife held to my throat at age 17 (1968), and never told anyone - not my parents - not even my friends, I find president Trump's comment about bringing forward the police report as incredibly insensitive,and telling especially from a person who called for the death penalty of youths accused of rape who were later exonerated. What if she was not supposed to be at that party - does that make Kavanaugh's actions OK?
I realize that makinga judgement of a man from his youth is problematic, but there are other things that have surfaced in his background that might suggest a moral charater not suitable for the highest court in the land. He has not been an ivory tower jurist for decades, but a Republican political insider being rewarded with this nomination.
I wish Dr. Blasey all the best in her testimony, and expect her insensitive Republican inquisitors will provide her with inadvertant political support when she testifies this week.
18
As we all knew, a second woman has come forward to claim that Kavanaugh molested her as reported by the New Yorker. Once a molester, always a molester. We also have the spectacle of Kavanaugh ogling his female law clerks. There will be more, I am certain.
Kavanaugh is dragging the Republicans down. They can't get out of the deep hole that they are digging for themselves. It is hurting them now, and they will feel the effects in November. There are already anti-Kavanaugh demonstrations, and his approval is the lowest for any SCOTUS nominee ever.
If Kavanaugh is rammed through, as Mitch McConnell wants, he will have a huge asterisk over his head. Moreover, if his perjury and lies are exposed, he will be impeached.
Kavanaugh should withdraw now, and save his party the embarrassment that is to follow. If Republicans keep the Senate (now not so certain), they can nominate someone just as conservative as Kavanaugh who actually has a distinguished record that we can actually examine--as opposed to Kavanaugh whose documents have been totally hidden from the public.
16
@William O. Beeman
Once an uncorroborated allegation, always an uncorroborated allegation.
Evidence, please.
That the congress critters just out right turned a vocal blind eye toward the Lady. It pains me to see this happening, But gender and class and skin color and $ amount, is all bad for our leaders to engage in, being mean toward the different layers.
I did not vote for Fear mongers, War mongers, Or people that want more discord than they want Peace.
We are a failing Empire. This is one more nail in the coffin
7
Perhaps what bothers me most, apart from the specifics of the case, is the idea that someone who's served as a political appointee in the White House would never, ever be a political actor on the Supreme Court. And that we have no right to see just what he did in that post. We want to keep pretending the Supreme Court and nominees to it are non-political despite their actions, and when the current President ran on an explicit platform of shoving it hard to the right. Of course, it'd be a bit inconvenient if the stealth candidate to overturn abortion rights was shown to have had that agenda all along.
4
And we now have a second woman coming forward- where there is smoke there is fire!
11
That’s because they’ve been in pain for so many years and they’re fed up but encouraged by one woman standing up!
2
“This just in”. Attorney Michael Avenatti is representing a female client who was at Yale purportedly with knowledge of Kavanaugh behavior. Ronan Farrow is about to reveal more as well. This is probably the tip of the iceberg. Let’s hear it all.
12
A tsunami of women from this earthquake is possible.
2
Past behavior is not the primary issue in this case. Behavior as a teenager is excusable, if a person's character has developed since then. The question is, did Mr. Kavanaugh lie about his past behavior and choose to blame the victim instead of apologizing? If he lied, then he is disqualified. I saw a video in which Mr. Kavanaugh says something like "The tradition at my high school is that what happened at high school stays at high school. That might be best for everyone." which disqualifies him, regardless of whether he actually committed the act, in my mind. A supreme court justice should not condone hiding of facts so that anyone (such as him and his buddies) can get away with harming other people.
13
If you are a woman who was molested previously , you probably feel that Kavanaugh is guilty.
If you are one of those"all white" senators, you probably feel that Kavanaugh is innocent.
If you are from a southern state, the chances are you feel that Kavanaugh is innocent.
If you are from Oregon, the chances are that you feel that Kavanaugh is guilty. California and New York, the same.
Those of us who are so upset because of profiling, are probably profilers themselves.
The chances are that those who are so angry about prejudice in America are themselves--prejudice in some way.
This means that if you think that i'm not so hot, the chances are that you are not so hot, yourself.
Everybody profiles and the chances are, they have little prejudices here and there.
That's the way it is in America-- and the world.
Also , people who think they are so perfect, get on my nerves.
M.W. Endres
1
Oh, my. Another allegation of sexual harassment. And another set of "witnesses" who cannot confirm Kavanaugh was there.
Only in politics could someone be indicted without any corroborating evidence, which is a dead giveaway that democrats' behavior is purely political. These allegations would never fly outside the political realm.
7
I actually have a hard time grasping the sexual fever Kavanaugh was in when he kept reiterating his curiosity of the details of the explicit sexual acts Clinton and Lewinsky engaged in. Just for the record the Clinton hit team that was about to be unleashed against Lewinsky rivals the vileness of Trump and his misogynist chorus. His good buddy Mark Justice talks about pursuing women to have sex and then works his whole whole life to prevent access to abortion. I have my own thoughts and analysis about why and how that works. But in truth I still don't grasp it. And I think there is something very important there to understand.
9
“If the nomination goes through, it will be a victory for anybody who has ever been falsely charged with some sexual abuse accusation.” An epidemic, no doubt, of about six or seven people.
11
Ten thousand comments later, this particular skirmish in the Great American Culture War shows no signs of abatement. Personally, I'm looking forward to the day when this circus pulls down its poles, folds its tents and moves on. It's been a week. Come on, Senate. America has shopping to do.
1
Hmmm....I wonder if all those women who support him have read the 90% of the transcripts that have not been made public or even shown to the Senate. I'm not too worried about who's lying here, but I am worried about ANYONE the proven lying psychopathic Trump picks for SCOTUS...especially one who has extreme views on presidential powers. Also it appears that Brett has also not been exactly truthful in his testimony. Fact is, the GOP is pushing this extremist no matter what his history, as long as he supports Trump and votes down Roe....very simple, and sick.
4
The New Yorker just broke a story that a new allegation against Kavanaugh has been made by a former Yale classmate.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/senate-democrats-investigate-a-...
8
@L
OMG well this settles it! We must delay the confirmation at least another week! What's the hurry? Supreme Court justices serve A LIFETIME!*
*Except when they don't. Like Justice Kennedy, who just retired. And who is still alive. You know, the guy Kavanaugh is replacing.
4
@L
I just read the New Yorker article. I found it to be very credible, including the role of alcohol. I suggest Kavanaugh immediately find a bottle and fall on his sword.
9
@L And no reporting to any authority?
3
Trump and the GOP are really tone deaf when it comes to sexual allegations and discrimination.
For instance, why in the world would Trump just recently hire the Foxnews executive Bill Shine, as the current White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Communications, after Shine was JUST named in at least four lawsuits against Foxnews for alleging sexual harassment or racial discrimination by the company and fired from Fox because of it all?
7
Every person who has, or has had a mother, a sister or a daughter, and anyone who has ever has known any woman in any way, should be thankful to Dr. Blasey if what she says is true and her amazing fortitude to be interrogated as if guilty of ruing anther party. She has not ran away this time while some hands have tried to intentionally drown her in pain.
Should the Senate ignore the allegations, if true, then my hope is that Dr. Blasey follows up with her state's right in MD to yet file a complaint and force an investigation. Even 40 years ago humans understood that such an act, like murder, can't have a status of limitations.
She has suggests that she recalls some parts of the house in questions, such as its interior and its vicinities.
Perhaps the house is still there. Not many houses have the same narrow stairs going to a bathroom, with a bedroom situated as she recalls. My hope is that she can overcome the trauma of visiting the scene and pointing it out. Lots of truth can be discovered in baby steps.
4
There’s still no deal. Anybody taking bets?
1
@Ed
Democrats don't want a hearing. They want to damage Kavanaugh's credibility. The minute they hold a hearing, they've lost their leverage.
5
The conservative right wants to "to advance religious liberty laws and define the rights of gay and transgender Americans." By which they mean the right of evangelicals to dictate what is considered "religious liberty", not the rights of all religions that was a founding principle of this country. The rights of gay and transgenders Americans would be curtailed under that same banner. They are concerned only with their own narrow views, not equal treat for all.
My question for the Kavanaughs is this: If a 17-year old boy tried to rape one of your daughters at any age, would you chuckle and say "Boys will be boys" or excuse it because he was drunk? Just wondering.
18
Hillary supposedly galvanized them too. Except she didn't. Perhaps inside the bubble things are different.
7
"The president selected him over several contenders including Amy Coney Barrett, an appellate judge who is seen as a ferocious opponent of abortion"
But most important to this president is Kavanaugh's expressed sentiment not to place a sitting judge on trial, again proving the only interest 45 has is in saving his own skin.
6
Grassley and his ilk have no interest in the truth. They are interested in discrediting Dr. Ford and inserting their man. At all costs. This won't be testimony; this will be an inquisition. She is a brave woman.
And someday, when they are a bit older, his daughters are going to ask their dad why he'd want to be appointed by a man who speaks so causally himself about sexually assaulting women.
8
Anne, why did she try to keep her identity secret?
2
@Bobo: Because she knew she'd be smeared and would get the threats that she is indeed getting. She has little to gain.
4
"He boasted that most of his clerks had been women".
Would that sentence be significantly changed if the verb "boasted" were changed to (say) "revealed", or "disclosed", or "let slip" or simply "said"? It is in such small details that journalistic prejudices betray themselves. Would a NYT article use the verb "boasted" if the nominee were a Democrat?
7
@John
Spot on. He has a great reputation as a mentor of women. Those identity lenses keep distorting their vision.
3
He did mentor women -- if they exuded a model-like femininity.
7
@DaveSJ711
Discredited by the source.
Re: "Judge Kavanaugh...boasted that most of his clerks had been women." Sure, and this is what we know about THAT:
[from TheGuardian]:
"A top professor at Yale Law School who strongly endorsed supreme court nominee Brett Kavanaugh as a 'mentor to women' privately told a group of law students last year that it was 'not an accident' that Kavanaugh’s female law clerks all 'looked like models' and would provide advice to students about their physical appearance if they wanted to work for him, the Guardian has learned.
"Amy Chua, a Yale professor who wrote a bestselling book on parenting called Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, was known for instructing female law students who were preparing for interviews with Kavanaugh on ways they could dress to exude a “model-like” femininity to help them win a post in Kavanaugh’s chambers, according to sources."
18
I am not sure that there can be a "pivot point". Talking to a woman friend she did tell me that sexual harassment and attempts to rape are quite common, especially to young women.
On the other hand it is clear that charges of sexual misbehavior made against men can be used in a political way. That is a dangerous path to go down.
So since there are to legitimate issues in opposite directions, we cannot talk about a pivot. A pivot implies moving from A to B but what we need here is an acknowledgement of BOTH A and B.
Also, America needs to work more on prevention and put "punishment" on the back burner. We wage far too many wars and imprison far too many people because we refuse to take precautions.
Freedom to drink and freedom to party need to be restricted, especially for teenagers. And I am afraid women do need to accept more responsibility for their own safety. The attitude that only men are responsible is simply not going to work.
1
@Ludwig: Women are supposed to accept responsibility for their safety FROM men's behaviors? How? By staying home and only leaving home with a male escort protector?
Do you blame men who are sexually assaulted by other men?
The person responsible for the assault is the person who chose to do it. Elderly women and toddlers are sexually assaulted, too. Should we lock them away and blame them as well for having been wherever they were?
12
@Anne, Here are some suggestions don't go out late in an area that you do not know, don't go at night into a room with a man whom you do not know well or whom you have no reason to trust, don't get drunk with a stranger, don't dress provocatively. None of these things require you to stay home and hide in the kitchen. You can have a perfectly good active life. You just can't have it while walking down the street at 2 a.m. in the morning with your belly full of alcohol.
2
@Ludwig: And would you, as a man, take these precautions to ensure a man doesn't rape you? Or is it just women who have to self-monitor everything they do to avoid men's predatory behavior?
Also, women are most likely to be sexually assaulted by someone they know and trust. Our 'protectors' are often the perpetrators.
3
@ Joseph Puentes. When I first read that bit about the calendars, I thought how seriously weird that is. A 17 year old kid is making daily entries about where, with whom, and what he was doing every day of the month, and then saving these calendars for 36 years! He must have quite a stack of calendars. I want to see that stack of calendars on his table at the hearing. Good for a laugh if nothing else.
7
@Gwen Vilen I keep calendars, too. They don't have everything I ever did on them, but they're a start. Some of us have the obsessive-compulsive gene, along with the collecting gene. I don't like Kavanaugh's politics or his personality, but I can't fault him for being meticulous or a sentimental saver.
3
Well, Joseph, I guess keeping punctilious records of one's drunkenness and sexcapades as a teen boy, such that one posits one must be innocent of attempted rape since one did not journal the act really does show an unusual character. No one I have ever known or heard of would do it. As to his superior nature, frankly, I am not aware of any stunning superiority in this coddled fellow of privilege, whose repeated joke has been that what happens where he has been "stays" where he has been. The view that his special nature makes his bizarre claims credible seems to me, well, naive. Or something.
3
This is easy. Let Judge Kavanagh agree to allow whatever he did to his accuser to be done to each of his daughters. Of course, that would never happen -- we don't punish a man's children for the sins of their father. But millions of men and women, by voting for p-grabbing Donald Trump, supporting child-molester Roy Moore, and making excuses for every filthy abuser who happens to belong to their political tribe, are enabling the sexual abuse of more of our American children.
2
Blasey Ford is making all this up for what she thinks of is the good of the country. And the left is okay weigh this. Feinstein staged this all. And the left knows that it never happened. But they have learned from the Russia election propaganda that propaganda is very much alive.
The media has people knowing who Kavanaugh is and that he abused woman. Yet these same people can’t name another Supreme Court justice.
The media in this country is pure propaganda.
5
@Jim, no, I don't know that Dr. Ford is lying. I don't know that this attack never happened. How are you so certain, given that there's been no FBI investigation and you've yet to hear from either Ford or Kavanaugh?
I think we can all agree that Kavanaugh was a self-professed heavy drinker in high school, and that Georgetown Prep had an atmosphere of serious partying where girls were sometimes abused. Why not have the FBI investigate other potential witnesses? Why not have the FBI question the woman from Yale who claims that Kavanaugh exposed himself to her the following year during a drunken party game?
Your assumption is that Kavanaugh has an impeccable reputation. My suspicion is that he doesn't.
6
Now that trump has refused to order the clearly justified FBI investigation, Kavanaugh will set off for the supreme court owing the colluding president big time, which will come in handy once trump requires that "above the law" SC ruling. God this stinks.
12
Plus they had the same organization that has no record of donors (dark money) ,45committee, pay for both of their media ads, Trump in 2016, and Kavanaugh's recent media blitz of commercials on TV nationwide.
7
Lindsey Graham has a penchant for alleged abusers.
10
Of Kavanaugh:
"He boasted that most of his clerks had been women."
I once worked for a man who owned a small company and hired mostly women. He constantly made inappropriate comments and even admitted to me that if he didn't watch it he'd be sued for sexual harassment.
10
@L
I was once [fill-in-the-blank] by a man so Kavanaugh is guilty.
4
AACNY,
My point is that some men who claim to hire mostly women because they're such great guys often have ulterior motives.
4
@L --the prototype is Charlie Wilson, he did it on the public nickel too. At least he wasn't married. He was blatantly, cheerfully obvious about it, and his constituents kept reelecting him.
The women he hired knew all about it -- he wasn't assaulting teenagers at drunken parties.
To me, it is disqualifying if these sexual assault allegations are true (it certainly sounds like they are). But I wish it’d never come to this. It shouldn’t have come to this. The issue with Kavanaugh in the beginning was his lies under oath about possessing stolen emails. As with Roy Moore and Joe Arpaio, mere failure to do your job with honor isn’t disqualifying, you have to be a sexual assaulter of children or a convicted criminal for the GOP to even think twice about supporting one of their entitlement-class elites.
16
Fine example of unbiased man. Lindsey Graham! He like his buddies already has mailed in his vote. Lindsey November can't come soon enough!
6
Conservatives don't want the government telling them what to do. They want the government to tell everyone else what to do. Particularly in regards to things that are neither theirs, nor the governments, business.
They want to criminalize your behavior, not theirs. Otherwise, they wouldn't be the morally degenerate hypocrites the rest of us all know them to be.
A serial sexual assaulter for President? You bet!
A pedophile for the Senate? You bet!
A failed rapist for the Supreme Court? You bet!
All backed by "Life is precious" (until you're born) Evangelicals.
And for the record, these people are not "Pro-Life" they are "Pro-Birth". They couldn't care less about those who are actually living. In fact, they spend the majority of their time and effort making sure most peoples lives are as miserable as possible. Their end goal is an ecologically destroyed planet of slave wage workers ruled by the 1%.
28
It's past time. Women just want to have THE say about their health including their uterus. Women want to be in control of their bodies. We want affordable health care, good and reliable information and access to procedures, medications and family planning. Women want to be responsible for themselves.
We do not exist in isolation. We have partners and families and community and faith.
And in America, we want to practice our own faith or not. We do not wish to be told to do or allowed by law to do by a religion that is not ours. We believe in the separation of church and state.
There is no law in America that dictates what a man can NOT due with his body. We wish the same freedom of autonomy over our own bodies.
Women have a very long way to go to attain that freedom.
19
@Elizabeth I see the freedom to smear is missing from your list.
3
Alabama Democrat Doug Jones offered some tough words for McConnell and any Republicans who follow him lock-step. On Saturday, Jones tweeted: "I'm a former US Attorney. If a judge/juror made a public statement that their mind was made up before all testimony is in, the trial would be prejudiced & I'd move for mistrial & have the judge removed. Mr. Leader, is this the message we want to send to victims of sexual assault? The last time I read the Constitution, it said our role was to advise and consent, not to 'plow right through' the confirmation process."
33
This is the second time Kavanaugh is ruining Dr. Blasey Ford’s life.
17
Republicans: “Pyrrhic victory” - look it up. You’re about to have one.
A handful of Republican men are going to humiliate this woman in front of a national audience. Aside from the ghastly moral turpitude Republicans are displaying, surely they must appreciate the optics and how badly this is going to play to all the women in this country going to the polls this fall. Or are they assuming that this kerfuffle is just a blip that Americans will forget by Election Day? Republicans are on the precipice of a political catastrophe.
You know what, I’ll do you a favor and just tell you how to fix this. Tell Kavanaugh to withdraw from consideration and go on TV and start groveling.
9
@Chris C: Not to mention there are a lot of male survivors of sexual trauma who also 'get' why this treatment of Dr. Ford is so horrific.
5
Let’s see what unfolds. Will other women come forth and another question given his own stated drinking history is what impact that has. Alcoholism is a big deal. Then there are his gambling issues. It’s the SCOTUS and Americans deserve to be protected from any progressive illnesses with a clear view. Sex abuse, alcohol, gambling should be a concern to the holier than this GOP. Except for Trump of course.
8
@Neil, a Yale woman has come forward with an allegation that Kavanaugh exposed himself to her in a drunken party game the following year.
I think an FBI investigation would uncover that Kavanaugh does not have an impeccable history with women.
6
Kavanaugh should withdraw. If he had any sense he would never have gotten involved with the President’s sickening cabal.
11
It might reflect the state mind of an alcoholic abuser. Every alcoholic is self centered to the max.
7
An accuser who names 4 people who were supposedly present at the supposed sexual assault. All four have publicly stated that they did not attend this party, or that they have no recollection of the participants. Case closed. Meanwhile 75 women have come forward to validate the reputation of Judge Kavanaugh. Where is the validation of the accuser's claims? In matter of fact, there is no validation by any single person. This non-event is a manifestation of a woman who is a strident leftist Democrat and who has repeatedly issued anti-Trump and anti-Republican comments in the past. Her agenda is clear. She is a liar.
5
Kavanaugh is already tainted and that, sadly, will always hang over him. Sorry, Mr. Kavanaugh, truth or not you are already toast. Your seat on the court has slipped beyond your grasp.
Going head-to-head in the Senate Judicial committee hearing really makes Republicans losers either way. It is best for everybody for Kavanaugh to withdraw himself from this circus and for the Senate to start the process over...slowly and deliberately.
Bullying Ford will result in tolling Republican's death knell.
The women of America are already planning to vote in large numbers this time (as opposed to sitting out the 2016 election) in what has become a referendum on Donald Trump and his presidency. And unless Senators treat Professor Ford with dignity and respect, women's rage will become a crushing blow to all Republican candidates on November 6th.
If Mitch McConnell thinks that ramming through any candidate for the Supreme Court will work for him, I think he is about to learn a lesson. And I think the women of America will be doing the teaching.
15
Looks like Mrs. Ford has a history causing problems with men.
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/sep/20/christine-blasey-ford-r...
"She once got caught in a romantic triangle that culminated with the two men getting into a fistfight over her, "
3
@MPA
Haha. We take it there were never any fistfights over you, huh?
“Causing problems with men.” So you’re saying she should have what; joined the nunnery? We’re talking possible assault here by a candidate for the Supreme Court, not romantic triangles.
10
MPA,
You're blaming the woman for the men's bad behavior.
This is exactly the attitude that keeps victims of sexual abuse from coming forward.
9
@MPA When men get in a fistfight over a woman, that means the woman is worthy of getting into a fist fight over. Ya dig?
Let the SOAP opera TV show Kavanagh vs Ford begin. The viewers are being programmed by RATSH (Radio Talk Show Hosts who programmed the minds of public over past decade), Trump, Democrats, and Republicans through conflicting stories. Whoever produces better show wins those minds and election. Reprogram then starts depending on which party wins the election. Serious issues of budget deficit, expensive college education and health care, Science vs Religion, , Global warming , Russia annexing border areas and using nerve agents, China gobbling up South China sea etc. are all on side lines and unattended year after year. Economy is measured in terms of tax break and stock market growth irrespective of widening income gap. Our president seems to enjoy using “divide and rule “technique whenever he is in trouble and enjoy governing the Divided States of America. I am yet to find a leader from either party who can speak for solving the real problems of United States of America.
2
Really, how much time is he spending with Bill Shine plotting the next US reality show drama playing it out on Fox TV while no one is minding the ship. God, Bob Woodward was right on.
People who are argue that Kavanaugh can't be "proven guilty" are missing the point. This isn't a criminal trial. It's a character test.
We know he had a history in high school of drinking, and he now has one accusation of attempted rape (including literally holding his hand over the victim's mouth to stifle her screams.)
In response to the accusation, he called as his "character witness" Mark Judge, another self-reported drinker whose high school yearbook included the quote, "Women should be hit regularly, like gongs." That was Kavanaugh's choice of character witness.
He said, "What happens at Georgetown Prep, stays at Georgetown prep."
In college, he joined a fraternity with a reputation for date rape (and I can vouch for that as a Yale student from the 1990s.) The fraternity was banned for 5 years in the 2000s for their "No means yes!" chant.
Then he hounded Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky over a consensual affair.
He received illegal opposition research for the GWB team and then lied about receiving it, under oath, committing perjury.
He racked up 200K in debt buying baseball tickets and can't explain how he paid them off.
He's a consummate party insider whose morals change with the prevailing winds of his frat-boy, prep-school buddies. He has no character. The Ford accusation isn't the only mark against him; it's just further evidence that he has the mentality of a spoiled rich kid who serves the wealthy and himself, at the expense of everyone else.
31
@RVC
OK. Let's conduct that "character test":
One woman's accusation against dozens of women who have publicly expressed their support for him based on their professional relationships with him.
He passes that test with flying colors.
4
@AACNY: You realize she has a lot of professional peers and students attesting to her good character, too?
1
@AACNY, a second woman has come forward with an allegation that Kavanaugh exposed himself to her in a drunken party game the following year at Yale.
I think it's entirely possible that both versions of Kavanaugh are true--he has women who think very highly of him, and women who have experienced a darker side.
1
“Some of my best friends are women.”
8
"There are any number of issues that the Democratic Party could have focused on in opposing the nomination of Kavanaugh—his participation in drafting the torture policies of the Bush administration, his role in the Clinton impeachment campaign, his extreme right-wing positions on abortion rights and business regulations. There was a conscious and deliberate decision to instead focus entirely on charges related to what Kavanaugh may have done when he was still a juvenile.
It is a practiced act of political manipulation. Over the past 25 years, sex scandals have become central mechanisms for working out political conflicts in a system dominated by oligarchs incapable of making any direct appeal to the social or economic interests of the broad masses of working people." is a poition of the wsws and one i entirely agree with http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/09/22/pers-s22.html
4
@michael roloff, you seem to be assuming that Dr. Ford's allegation is false. I think all those issues you mention are important, but I think Dr. Ford's decision deserves more respect than to be dismissed as political manipulation.
If the allegation is true, it can't be dismissed as a youthful indiscretion. It doesn't matter when he did it.
1
When I was 17 I always put a reminder on the calendar for an upcoming drunken unsupervised pool party. Didn’t you?
20
@Cruzin, yep, me, too, and --let me read from my notes of May 5, 1972, "Sexually assaulted Sue Jackson tonight--what a hoot! Hope nobody ever finds out!"
3
Now, this "family man" (the photo with groper #45) looks from TV shows of the 1950s! Not a good era for us, women. But , yes, my point: it just appeared in the NYT that this family man, Kavanaugh, willingly and promptly turned over calendars from the summer of 1982 to the SJC but he refused to turn over to the SJC his judicial past, which unlike the former are of any substance. Interesting.
8
This country is full to the brim of 17-yr.-old boys who a) never got drunk at a house party (or anywhere else). Let's start there. Is Kavanaugh denying that too? If he doesn't deny his social drinking (underage and against the law), then it raises the possibility that alcohol impaired HIS memory and his blanket denial 30 years later is just as suspect as the recollections of his accuser. He could use the defense, "I was sometimes drunk when I partied with friends. While I don't remember the scenario she is describing or even encountering her at any party, it is possible I did something like it as a result of intoxication and miscommunication. I can't be sure of everything I did under the influence of alcohol." The old "I'm not responsible because I was drunk" defense is a little better than, "This woman is a liar out to ruin my career."
8
I take it you are not acquainted with teenage boys.
2
@abigail49, thank you. Not every teenager adopts a frat boy mentality.
1
@Margo -- I am thoroughly acquainted with teenage boys -- I was one.
You don't get the free-pass smear of every male being the privileged bad-boys in Matt Judge's "wasted."
The plain (and unfortunate) facts are that while roughly one-in-six women have experienced a sexual assault by a man, the men that do this commonly repeat ... the obvious conclusion is that much less than 1 in six men has committed a sexual assault. Further, many of the men who do start later than their teenage years, so sexual assault by teenage boys is uncommon ... Hardly unheard of, but uncommon.
And now that another woman has come forward to say that Kavanaugh exposed himself at a party at Yale ... Kavanaugh is done.
Get over it and move on.
How poignant? Mark Judge is the key man. Yet, the "Judge" is not stepping forward. Says a lot about what needs "to go". Just wait NYT......minds are a changin'
5
If you were lying about an assault, why would you want the FBI to validate your lying? QED
10
And why would you put the assaulter's good buddy in the room with you as a witness?
5
@jwgibbs
Because she knows the FBI won't be able to prove things one way or another with regard to a 36 year-old alleged crime. On the other hand, if you weren't lying, you would submit a written affidavit under penalty of perjury, to show that you are serious. You would also submit for review the lie detector test you claim to have taken and passed. Yet she has done none of these things.
1
And how will Kavanaugh protect his daughters from people just like himself?
23
I"m not buying this as being "appropriate".
36 years later, accusations that cannot be proven are far too dangerous for any society to rely on.
The man has led an exemplary life, so has the woman. Both are very educated professionals, neither can be said as being unprofessional in their careers or adult lives.
Whether they were ever at any party at the same time is not something that can be proven. Nothing can be proven, other than if this is the "new sabotage morality" all our daughters and sons are at a huge risk, and a huge disadvantage.
9
@common sense, I think you're overreacting. No one accused Neil Gorsuch, John Roberts, or Samuel Alito of sexual assault. Kavanaugh is the first SCOTUS nominee ever to be accused of assault.
Without an FBI investigation, you can dismiss this hearing as he said/she said. But what if Kavanaugh hasn't led an exemplary life, especially in prep school and college? There is a Yale woman who just came forward with the allegation that Kavanaugh exposed himself to her in a drunken party game. He was a Deke--the fraternity that marched through campus chanting "No means yes, and yes means anal."
2
I took part in the Canadian Women's March in Vancouver the day after Trump's inauguration and was proud to support the women in the US who cannot abide this president nor his enablers. What many Americans may not realize is that this affront is felt all over the world by women and men alike. To imagine a man of Trump's ilk as your president is not only repugnant but it feels danergous. He has brought everything down to one thing, and that is money. He believes a soaring stock market and a booming economy is all he needs to stand for, the rest is just blurred out. What he has erased is the face of your nation, it's moral code, it's sense of decency and fairness, it's still there, it must be, but we only see him now, his numbers, and his “winning”. You are disappearing behind him and that is frightening.
So, next Thursday, what will we see? It will be Trump's old, white, male minions doing their work to minimize, undermine and discredit a women brave enough to speak up about an incident that traumatized her as a teenager. But, we are familiar with the tactics that have been played out in countless scenarios against the female voices for years, but it's 2018 now and not the 1950's. Women are fed up and whatever the outcome of this hearing is it will further galvanize women to stand up and be counted.
26
Yeah, this nomination IS ABOUT MONEY.
Money for the top 1% who have made out like bandits with the flawed Citizens United ruling, which BK will surely protect. The committee should ask him point blank what his view is on that ruling and "dark money", especially since 45committee, funded by "non disclosed donors" paid for Kavanaugh's recent media blitz, and also Trumps media ads in 2016.
3
The title of this article is irresponsible. That last part: "Kavenaugh is testing it." What possible good is it to cast any doubt over the feminist movement? Why qualify it with any single event? True positivity: nothing can stop an idea whose time has come.
9
1. There is no right to become a Supreme Court Justice.Through this process Kavanaugh has proven himself to be deeply flawed. Pick a Republican who isn't. There are lots to choose from.
2. Let's say he's not guilty. Where is his humanity? Where is his acknowledgement that something happened to Dr. Blasey, that must have been extremely traumatic for her. Why is it so hard for him to say to her "That must have been so difficult for you. I'm sorry that happened to you and I'm not the person who assaulted you." Which again brings us to item 1. He is deeply flawed and should be asked to withdraw his name or not confirmed.
19
Our senators would do well to stand up and say "no" and stand in favor of our time tested values of fundamental fairness, due process, and the presumption of innocence. These rights are enshrined in our constitution for good reason because our founders knew that these rights would be attacked from to time to time at the whim of an angry mob.
The #metoo movement represents an assault on these values. the movement seeks to destroy lives and reputations without due process, have college students expelled from schools without any due process, and ruin careers. While at the same time, the movement looks the other way when it comes to members of the media, Hollywood, and others who give large sums to the Democratic party. Money, that's what this is all about.
Senators need to stand up and rediscover their spines.
5
Ford took a lie detector test. Why hasn't Kavanaugh too committed to take a polygraph? It seems appropriate given that otherwise we have only a he said/she said scenario. If Kavanaugh isn''t willing to take a polygraph test, that would certainly speak volumes to most of us. If he had the polygraph and passed, THEN we might be left with he said/she said. But if he declines, no contest.
Just make sure the person administering the test is as credible as a former FBI agent.
Don't tell me this method of determining truth is inaccurate. It's surprisingly accurate. Just make sure the person administering the test is beyond reproach. Or use the same guy Ford used.
12
That makes sense. I’ll bet those Democrat operatives have at a secret location brainwashed scores of women to make false sexual as assault claims against any of the dozens of innocent, qualified conservative male jurists the Republicans May nominate in the years to come.
4
“Are we respected? Are we believed? Are we equal?”
Yes, you are respected and equal. No, you dont get special female privileges of being believed automatically.
6
Yes indeed!
2
The Kavanaugh backlash is not about victims and survivors, rather it is about American women deciding that they are not going to be treated like second class citizens by the Republican Party who are running the country without regard to any semblance of civil or human rights.
17
@Alabama
Looks more to this woman like women blaming someone for the wrongs that have occurred in their lives and condemning that person without a shred of evidence.
These alone are creating a backlash. You just don't realize it.
2
@AACNY In other words, you're blaming the victims. Memory is evidence, whether you like it or not. Most women have no evidence of assault except their testimony. It's been that way since the beginning of time. Or are you thinking she should have kept the DNA 25 years before the common use of DNA?Guess this is what happens when we have a reality TV show host in the White House.
2
Without any witnesses it's he said v she said. If the approve him there will forever be a cloud over him. Better bet would be to nominate someone else and start fresh - it's not like he's the only conservative judge out there.
6
And let the ploy to disrupt proceedings reappear? "Sir, have you stopped beating your wife!"
Nope. This must be disputed and the Democrats faced down.
2
I’d like to see Kamala Harris question him.
15
@Jack
When I watch that clip of her interrogating Kavanaugh, it seems quite powerful. So long as I have the sound turned off. But to anybody that listens to the actual words, and understands English, it is clear that Harris got nothing and made a fool of herself.
3
So how does the GOP's group of old guys avoid the impression that they are there primarily to "rip her a new one"?
It should be a neat trick for them - to pretend they respect this bothersome woman while accusing her of lies and/or mistaken identity and/or fuzzy memory.
For the life of me, I cannot understand why the alleged third party to the sexual assault is not being called to testify under oath??? Oh, yeah.
12
Today Kavanaugh said that he checked his 1981 calendar and he didn’t have a party planned for the evening of the alleged incident.
Duh.... We all now that unplanned party- where there is no parental supervision- are what teenagers prefer and also are where mischief will happen.
Calling that a “proof” that he didn’t go to this party is ludicrous.
10
@Pascal Luse
This convenient 1981 calendar of Kavanaugh's needs to be thoroughly examined by experts to determine if anything has been doctored. Who keeps calendars from decades ago? Then suddenly produces it as evidence? It reminds me of the letter signed by 65 women that was presented immediately after the charge was dropped.
7
It’s amusing they we are actually going through this exercise. Judge K will be seated within a week. His accuser will become a minor footnote in the process. Her lack of any credible evidence gives me pause. Democrats will use this coming Thursday’s dog and pony show to try and make the GOP look bad. As a business owner I will be able to count on solid pro business rulings from the court- Abortion will likely be handed back to the states, and the court can begin to address very important issues such as dismantling public unions.
3
@Mike DeMaio. Why would you want public unions dismantled? So you can have corrupt, unqualified, unprotected, low paid, inept employees in City and State government? Geez, that's bright!
3
NO to Brett Kavenaugh. Prof Ford is being attacked from all sides . She is a woman that is extremely brave for coming out to tell her story. Prof Ford has received death threats; been forced to move from her home; been forced to hire security to protect her. Brett Kavenaugh should not be promoted to the Supreme Court with this cloud of suspicion around him. Why are many documents about Kavenaugh still not released? NO to Brett Kavenaugh. Ray Sipe
15
Yeah sure. We aren’t taking it. I believe GOP women can throw him a curveball he can’t catch. GOP wonej mush have issues with him. Women voters of all ages have issues with the GOP. I think we will see some surprises. Maybe even other women from his past stepping up if he had a pattern. This woman is a psychologist and can explain what most people know about fears of coming forward.
4
The Republican senators are digging in their heels. They don't like the way they got ambushed. It's hard to blame them. It was a cynical and underhanded political hit job. But that's the way it works, guys. Remember Alger Hiss? What goes around, comes around.
3
He has lied under oath. Why do we only hear about his sexual misconduct. Why is his perjury not addressed?
Lies include: documents Manny Miranda stole from the Democratic staff of the judiciary committee.
Lies about his involvement in both the illegal wiretap and torture programs.
Lies about his advocacy of the Pryor and Pickering nominations.
Why.
20
@Naples
So where are those perjury charges if he lied? Nowhere because what you're calling lies are answers you don't like.
1
Kavanaugh should be asked about his drinking issues. If he is a heavy drinker, or was a heavy drinker in prep school or college, perhaps he does not recall this ( and possibly other) incidents such as this sexual assault as he was in a blackout caused by alcohol consumption. As a long time AA’er and a blackout drinker, I know there are many events I still cannot remember.
17
He should also be questioned about his gambling habits.
21
Let’s not forget the thousands of dollars of baseball tickets.
10
@Sarah Smith
She must be questioned too based on her high school yearbook. In particular, she should be asked if she ever played the drinking game "Pass Out."
2
The GOP's contempt for American women will be its destruction.
Couldn't happen to a nicer buncha guys.
16
Subpoena Mark Judge. Let's find out about Bart O'Cavanaugh, the rivers of alcohol flowing through the prep school, his alt-right views of the Obamas, and how "certain women should be struck regularly, like gongs."
19
Just like Trump is acting like a guilty person by constantly calling out "fake news" and "witch hunt", Judge Kavanaugh is acting like he's guilty by not allowing an investigation, a polygraph or witnesses.
13
The chutzpah of Trump, having boasted of his sexual predation on camera, to then attest to the saintliness of Judge Kavanaugh not only boggles the mind, but attests to the mendacious nature of his cheering minions when he did so.
Sensible people simply want further investigation into the Ford allegation to see if there is corroboration available. One might thing that it would be Saint Kavanaugh who would be insisting on a thorough investigation to clear his name. From the Judge we get only a denial.
Instead we see the Republican rush to a premature closure that will haunt them forever!
13
@Phil Zaleon: At this point it should be obvious that a "good person" to Trump is somebody who diverts a substantial fraction of their income to offshore untaxed bank accounts.
9
It seems that Kavanaugh also likes his female clerks (the ones he referred to when accepting the nomination) to look a particular way. See the Guardian's story on how Amy Chua (Tiger Mom) counsels her female law students about how to dress before they interview with him,
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/sep/20/brett-kavanaugh-supreme-...
Is this the lesson he learned from his mentor Alex Kozinski?
10
That reflects on Any Choa. This is the wrong place to complain about that.
1
" You've got to deny, deny, deny and push back on these women. If you admit to anything and any culpability, then you're dead."
Donald J, Trump quote in Bob Woodward's latest book, " Fear".
21
This is going to be a rerun of the Monkey Trials if they allow a lawyer to question her, rather than show us the actual GOP we have elected in the Senate.
Christine Blasey is a top research scientist ( Google Scholar: C. Blasey 7,703 citations through 50 research papers published over 20 years in peer reviewed journals - a very highly cited and large opus over only 20 years)
I interview scientists, and they are extremely cautious in expressing certainty, levels of doubt. She will be pounced on by a lawyer, and made to seem uncertain.
Think climate scientists: how the GOP pounces on this academic trait of extreme caution and says it proves "they dunno nuthin, why should we believe them"
7
@Susan Kraemer: This panel of dirty old men has been selected by only a small fraction of us. We all get the worst of the worst from the slavery-based apportionment of the rotten-state Senate.
7
As I read these comments you get the impression Kavenaugh is the only person in the US qualified for this job. He has a cloud over him that will stay there for ever. It really is in the best interest of American and the GOP to pick another person.
22
@Thomas Renner
As I read these comments, I see a lot more anger than in the previous threads. That diary must be really upsetting people.
In 2012 Mr. Romney’s list of top SCOTUS candidates included Judge Kavanaugh. This coincides with Christine Blasey’s visit to a psychologist. It seems plausible that fearing this selection, Dr. Blasey was trying to create a paper trail in order to derail a possible nomination had Mr. Romney prevailed in the election and attempted to pick Judge Kavanaugh for the bench. This fact of course does not disprove her allegations however it throws into question whether or not the visit was a politically motivated strategy and casts doubt on the narrative that her visit to a psychologist in 2012 lends additional credence to her story.
https://www-m.cnn.com/2012/09/30/politics/court-romney-list/index.html?r...
4
@Jason
When someone has been assaulted and unequivocally harmed by another creating a paper trail is not the priority. Exorcising the memories and making them manageable to live with is the priority.
Now in addition to everything else you consider Dr. Blasey a fortune teller, able to devine the future? Maybe a mind reader? First Romney, now Trump? Who in their right mind would ever imagine Trump being president AND picking an ultra right Supreme Court nominee? No one ever! You are really grasping at straws.
2
@BMUS
No, read my comment again. The theory is that she initiated the same process then as she has now but she didn't have to follow through as Romney lost the general to Obama. Just a theory but at least I have a date and location instead of no date, no location and a 0-3 record so far with named witnesses at the alleged party. Unsubstantiated allegations and lack of evidence should not become the new normal. It actually undermines the claims of legitimate victims and the #metoo movement.
@Jason
As a survivor of sexual assault I can tell you detailed descriptions of what they were wearing, hair and eye color, the progression of what was done to me, but I can’t tell you exactly what day it occurred only what age I was and the season of the year. Location is vivid for one but not the other. This is common because what was done to me created a very strong memory. When and where did not change my life, what happened did.
I totally oppose the appointment of Judge Kavanaugh. I totally believe Ms. Ford. But there are even more reason to oppose the nomination of Judge Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. First Kavenaugh has written that Roe vs Wade cwn be overturned and has ruled a young woman seeking an abortion. He was appointed by a President who has promised to apponint a conservative Supreme Court as rated by the Heritage Society. And most of all for me, a committed woman but also a committed Anmerican, No President should be allowed to appoint a judge who is very likely vote on his looming impeachment.
Trump appears to have chosen a justice just because he has stated that a president should be subject to subpoena or indictment while in office. Yet Trump appears to have committed numerous crimes while in office and appears to be on the verge of escaping prosecution thanks to a Judge he is appointing at least partizlly for that reason.
If republicans believe in the rule of law, they will withdraw Judge Kavanaugh's appointment.
16
Based on my own experience, middle age, and increased competency and self-confidence, I can say that all of this can be captured in one word: Enough.
Just enough with all the nonsense in all the arenas. I’m woke, after a 58-year nap.
188
Based on his background he will definitely be a social change for women; he will at some point overturn Roe v Wade. That is the primary goal of the Federalist group that he's been groomed to do for years. Hence, the vitriolic fight to get him confirmed.
There are of course other judges who are willing to remove women's right to choose but this particular judge has also written that a president cannot be investigated or indicted or any other bother, no matter the crime.
I have no doubt he went into this battle with honorable intentions at least from his conservative point of view. He had probably forgotten - or been too drunk to remember something so irrelevant to himself - his past behavior. He's worked hard to get here; followed the party line, been the good soldier.
And yet here we are. While the conservative movement has been stuck in reverse, Mr. Kavanaugh walked into a minefield of cultural upheaval. It does not give him a pass but he's not owning up to it, either. The entire old white male Senate committee is tone deaf. Plow through his nomination? Of all the dishonorable things Mitch McConnell has said and done that's what he's proud of?
They may still win this battle but as a woman who lives in the real world they will most definitely lose the war. The really appalling thing is they don't care. They think owning the Supreme Court is enough. Instead, they have awakened a sleeping dragon.
249
@Kathy, Oh yes, the old men have awakened their nemesis, and these events of the past two years have galvanized not only one, but TWO generations of younger women. With even a minority of women awakened in my generation in the 60s and 70s we gained much; this protracted process of having male dominance--by force and by lies--exposed in all its ugliness will never be forgotten by those who are seeing its extent for the first time.
2
@Kathy
Yes, the wishes of the Federalists, but Kavanaugh was expressly chosen, and Gorsuch too, in order to save Trump and the Russo-Republicans necks from Mueller.
Kennedy's retirement was quite possibly extorted by his son's compromising relation to Trump when he handled German banking loans to the Grand Yo-yo.
There is much more here than generalized disrespect of women. Locking down Citizens United as well.
3
@Kathy As has been noted in other articles, he will be pulled off the court if it's been determined that he either did it or lied about it. Some people still think Thomas shouldn't be up there. If this new #METOO moment plays out as it should, we might get a crack at the old harasser.
Excellent analysis, but sad too in that it certainly shows how little progress has been made in the public acceptance of sexual assault.
That such powerful men would simply deny things--look at our president--convinced of their entitlement to take from women what they want, and then take again by angrily denying things ever happened.
#Me Too may have galvanized American women but it most assuredly provoked backlash in men who resent the fact anyone would dare criticise them.
I've watched the expressive face of Brett Kavanaugh turn dark in seconds when questioned by Senator Harris, very likely even angrier than at who is questioning more than the questioning by male members of the judiciary.
Its impossible to say that Me Too# has reached critical mass when the country has so much at stake and men are so resistant to acceptance of women's anger at being considered objects.
Yes this is a galvanizing moment. The world will watch and likely marvel at how much dirty linen is assessed to protect male privilege.
284
@ChristineMcM well said! This is visceral on both sides of the issue. In the fiber of each person standing up to the patriarchal status quo is a fire to make this moment translate into real change. On the other side is panic and outrage over the very real potential of massive legal and social change in our country. Its not enough for women to vote in their legal and social interests. Women and other marginalized groups must be part of the legislative process to codify, and cement a whole new order. It seems that is already beginning to happen around the country. More women, more people of color, more LGBTQ, more differently abled candidates running for office. That's the only way we can really change how girls, women, and other marginalized groups are treated.
12
@ChristineMcM:Hey its the electorate that elected these people or are you saying men can't run for office anymore?. Are the Republicans supposed to accept the accusations of the lady from supposed incident 36 years ago?really. How come the groups aren't going after Senator Booker who admitted he groped women when he was a teenager?. Is It because Booker is a Democrat and whatever they do it's OK?. You say we should believe the lady OK I ask why wouldn't you believe the man. A man that is a devoted husband and father with Yale degrees and a jurist without complaints so far so why don't you believe him?.
@ChristineMcM
Surely you don't mean that you want to see greater progress in "the public acceptance of sexual assault!" You may want to rephrase that next time!
1
It's just unbelievable that this group Concerned Women for America do not get it. Almost one in four women have had abortions. About 32% of women in the US military have been sexually assaulted. They face the skeptical "he said, she said" problem from the police, from Congress and from these "concerned" women.
Women have abortions and they want abortions, and they want it all to be private - the assault, the abortion, their mistakes to be caught with that guy with no escape. But they don't want these men to succeed ... you have a serial harasser like Trump, crowing about his harassment on tape (they let you do it!) choosing another harasser for judge, who clerked for a judge forced to resign due to his workplace harassment (he claimed not to know?!). And then the Republicans legal advisor had to resign.
You have a whole Republican judiciary committee whining about how one accusation can destroy them. They have become the voice of white male grievance. Two kids got drunk, and nothing happened, they say. They are refusing to acknowledge that women should have any autonomy over their own bodies.
They demand the right to grab whenever they want, while being careful to ensure it is "he said, she said" because they know it is wrong. They want to be able to continue to do this, and it should not count against them. Only the American voter can make them pay. Can we not as a society send them a message?
513
53% of white women voted for Trump. Some message.
3
@Debra Did you see that CNN interview that was done with those Republican women in Florida? One of them, a prior Congressional Candidate who lost her race in the past, asked the interviewer, "who knows a high school boy that hasn't done something like this? Honestly, tell me that". Unbelievable.
1
Prior to Dr Fords appearance, it was simply a loss for words, a disbelief, as I watched a panel of mostly senior citizen, white, privileged men actively gunning to put another white privileged man in a position of power for my lifetime. And I couldn’t believe not one Republican female available for the task?
And now this tribunal of all white Republican male elders, who clearly do not know what it means to be a young woman coming of age, do not know the fear of rape or being ostracized because you’re a young woman who ‘let bad things happen’ to her are set to hear the testimony of a potential female sexual assault victim. If all jury’s are comprised of peers - there are no peers of Dr Fords here. The Republican component of this advisory panel can only advise from their very minuscule circle of same knowledge and that is what is the most repugnant part of this entire process.
546
@Carolyn
But the problem is not that they don't believe her. I'm sure they do, that's why they want to push things through before more information comes out. The problem is that they don't care.
2
@Carolyn
As repugnant are the female senators who are willing to put party before morality and looking for an excuse to push this nomination through.
3
@Carolyn
I fully agree. In fact, I would suggest that, in future, any MALE member of the U.S. Supreme Court should RECUSE himself from any cases concerning Rowe v. Wade. Why on Earth should a man be determining what a woman may or may not do with her body? It's absolutely outrageous, regressive patriarchy! I'm male myself (a feminist male), yet I can see how absurd it is for yet another male judge to believe he can control a woman's autonomy.
2
1. She said, he said. But only "she" has nothing to gain by her story. And she has evidence from that time to back her up.
2. It's relevant. All young people take risks; but not all young people play power games and use force against vulnerable people. When someone shows you who they are -- pay attention.
3. There is a connection. A person who felt he could do what he wanted to a younger and smaller human being became an enormously ambitious grownup. Craving power is inconsistent with loving justice.
866
@Cal Prof I'm still asking why he has to spend days at the White House preparing his "truth" defense to counter this accusation. Honest people can manage the truth without coaching.
68
Cal Prof,
If I recall, she cannot remember the whereabouts of the attack, the date, and who was present. That seems like fuzzy memory to me.
5
@Cal Prof
And, Kavanaugh was old enough at the time to know better.
16
I think it speaks to Dr. Blasey's intellectually conscientious turn of mind that she has named another person who could conceivably confirm or disconfirm her allegations. (Academics give citations.) If we think that her allegations should be investigated, wouldn't any serious investigation ask Mark Judge what happened?
If he denies that he was even present at events like Dr. Blasey describes, then either she is being truthful and two men are lying through their teeth or suffering from memory loss, or she is in some ways mistaken, or lying. If he corroborates part of her story but not all--say he tells us that it was someone else who did those things to her--that could provide a new perspective on things. If he takes the Fifth, that too could be interesting. Can the Senate subpoena him?
6
@Mark The FBI should be asked to do a background investigation of K, and take whatever time they need to do so. There is no need to ramrod this confirmation through.
5
I hope the only bright spot in this is that the Right and the Center will give up their hypocritical "drone strike feminism" as the globe now sees through our phony concerns for women in countries that have oil that we covet. At least we can now get out of Afghanistan, since the world now knows we don't take care of our girls over here.
13
While republicans have been guilty of sexism, dishonesty and gross hypocrisy in their efforts to "plow right through" Dr. Ford's accusations against Judge Kavanaugh, their most self-destructive sin, when all is said and done, will be their hubris.
15
I like my SCOTUS members to have a “certain look” that includes non sexual predatory behavior.
15
Trump is the GOP.Selfish; women abusers and racist. Trump abused multiple women and GOP backs him; a slap in the face to all women.Kavenaugh is the right wing choice because he will vote the right wing conservative line; no matter the facts. Kavenaugh is Trump's pick because he will protect Trump. Support Prof Ford and listen closely to what she says. Vote out GOP. Ray Sipe Reminder; if GOP wins midterms; they will take away your healthcare; take away Medicare; take away Social Security
17
Isn’t “apex moment” an overreach? If he’s nominated, we won’t be discussing this in 6months. Also, didn’t DT win over 50% of Caucasian women?
4
No. He won over 50% of Caucasian women who voted. Voter turn-out was less than 60%.
5
@PM Actually Trump won the majority vote of non college educated white women who voted.
Not surprising that abortion rights activists will stop at nothing to continue the killing of unborn persons and the well documented and proven selling of their body parts. Most even support late term abortion! And then, for some ungodly reason, they express horror at the mere accusation of high school groping. Any means necessary to continue their evils.
4
I think the side that will go to any lengths is the "pro-life" faction. No one is too base to put in office if they will vote to control women's bodies and keep them barefoot and pregnant.
7
Consider, if you can, that what underlies both supporting abortion rights and condemning sexual assault is the belief that women should be able to maintain bodily integrity.
6
@Tony Taylor It is natural for women of reproductive age to want to maintain the right of bodily autonomy and to resist the forces that would make us reproductive slaves to the State.
6
The Kavanaugh family look so happy ,and rightly so , standing by the President in the Oval Office. Then a big beefy woman pops up from his childhood past accusing the father of touching at a Preppie party where, mind you, she came well prepared with a tight one piece bathing suit under her outer costume over 35 years ago! If it did occur, then the judge must have been blackout drunk! All of the other 4 too..
1
Crude and insulting seem to be hallmarks of GOP communications about women and sexual abuse.
11
Just as Trump is an illegitimate president, if confirmed, Kavanaugh will always be tainted. He handled this badly from the beginning - he should have called for a full investigation immediately. The Republicans always seem to act as if they were guilty. If he is confirmed, against the wishes of the majority of the people, 1) the Supreme Court loses much of its credibility 2) the accusation will be mentioned in any case he takes part in 3) it isn't finished - there are lots of angry women out there. Dr. Ford could appear on as many television shows as she wants, she could write a book, more women could come forward. The Republicans are being particularly stupid here.
16
Should Kavanaugh be voted in impeachment will follow for perjury during his testimonies.
11
McConnell could stonewall Obama's nomination of Merrick Garland for nearly one-year so the people could speak. But rather then wait 6-weeks this SCOTUS nominee must go forward immediately. Lets say now the McConnell, the GOP, Congress and their supporters want to destroy democracy.
17
Republicans have stumbled badly in this matter. They have prolonged the hearings that are necessary to either condemn or exonerate Kavanaugh. Now the matter has taken the front pages and the lede of every major news organization.
Then the Republicans compounded their error by trying to place restrictions on Dr. Ford's testimony, and trying to improve the "optics" of having 11 old white men beleaguer and berate Dr. Ford in front of the nation. The specter of Anita Hill has been resurrected. Protestors have already appeared in Washington and throughout the nation.
Then, in the most cynical move of all, Republicans blamed the Democrats! Really? Blamed the Democrats for something that purportedly took place decades ago?
This has been a disaster for Republicans. They have lost votes over this in the mid-terms, and no matter what they do now with Kavanaugh, there will be severe repercussions. Kavanaugh will be confirmed with a huge asterisk over his head, or he will withdraw or will be rejected, and Republicans will be blamed. Most importantly, the Republican mishandling of this matter has given Red State Democratic senators up for election complete cover to vote against Kavanaugh. They can do so now with a clear conscience, and with the approval of even Republicans in their states.
Then the topper, of course, is Trump's disgusting tweets attacking Dr. Ford, which just cements everyone's view that this administration is utterly venal, opportunistic and misogynist.
Vote!
14
Mr. Kavanaugh's questionable, at best, financial history and his on the record falsehoods should disqualify him from the Supreme Court. I could not care less what Republican women think about this moment or Dr. Blasey Ford. Republicans are on the wrong side of history, period. They would like us to return to 1950. Or maybe 1850.
15
Just politics. Both the GOP and Dems do this sort of thing, and they will sacrifice many along the way.
1
Kavanaugh's work for the first Bush administration alone should disqualify him.
He is the definition of partisan and a political operative in the mold of say Segretti, Attwater and Rove.
Kavanaugh was behind threatening Monica Lewinski in the Clinton impeachment. Kavanaugh set the "gynecological" questions that Lewinski had to answer.
We as a nation have to change this toxic unelected branch of government. It should no longer be "lifetime" appointments, 4 years is fine. The appointments should be made by a bipartisan review board from both houses, not the POTUS.
We have to take the politics out of the judiciary otherwise this "weaponized" 3rd branch of government will destroy us.
10
Men have no idea how women feel about unwanted advances and unwanted advances gone too far. We're too busy feeling rejected or simply moving on to the next opportunity. Little to no thought is given to how the interaction affected the girl/woman.
Now take that and add white and economic privilege to the mix and it's easy to see how much further social (and legal) boundaries are for these boys/men, who since Kindergarten have gotten everything they've ever wanted and do not believe the rules apply to them (because, in the end, they don't).
This nomination has highlighted white male grievance and power, as others have noted. It feels like things are starting to crack.
9
The many instances of GOP politicians and strategists helping to get abortions for the women they impregnate show that the actual medical procedure of abortion is not what their opposition to its use is about.
No, what bothers them is the freedom that access to the medical procedure of abortion confers upon a woman availing herself of that medical procedure...for when an abortion occurs, that woman is no longer weighed down by the debt which naturally follows the arrival of a child (which would be paid into the coffers of corporations and the rich), she is no longer weighed down by the limitations a baby might impose upon her dreams of becoming educated or advancing in a career (thereby making her a "danger" to those whose world might be rocked by the effects of her education or the influences of accomplishments), and she is no longer a person whose fragile ego can be stomped on as being a "sinner" (and thus controlled by the rich, the powerful, the corporate, and the governmental).
True "pro-life" positions would require real and meaningful alternatives to abortion, "pro-life" alternatives like child care, feeding of humans, an aversion to war, environmental policies protecting the natural resources upon which our species depends, and equality of opportunity...just to begin with.
13
@Not Amused. True - 'pro-life' is essentially a last ditch effort to utilize the state's police powers to subordinate women.
1
I am a Canadian and this column escapes my understanding. What I have read says Kavanaugh's entire career consists of his being a partisan hack. I do not know of anyone left or right who says his family is not his first obligation but Kavanaugh's political and social philosophy is one of patriarchy.
In a country being torn apart by partisanship Kavanaugh's nomination was an act of war. When McConnell refused a hearing on Merrick Garland I as a Canadian would expect someone less than an outright partisan to be Republican nominee to the Supreme Court.
The nomination of Brett Garland tells me the Republicans have no desire to see a united country and even as the chasm widens between the Republicans and Democrats the Republicans are intent in tearing the country further apart.
14
This comment will not address the allegations made by Prof. Ford against Judge Kavanaugh. My comments concern only process.
Once again, an issue of critical importance to this country will be addressed in a spectacle of a bitter partisan political circus to be televised nationwide. None of the Senators care about the truth. Few care about Prof. Ford. Republicans will, as discreetly as they can, try to cast doubt on her allegation, so Judge Kavanaugh can be confirmed. Democrats will question her in a manner designed to impugn Judge Kavanaugh, so his confirmation is denied.
In my opinion, Prof. Ford has been completely exploited. Her desire for anonymity has been deliberately disregarded. The woman will be forced to be an unwillingly performer in the circus orchestrated by the Senate Judiciary Committee.
If the Democrats and Republicans- yes, both sides, really cared about Prof. Ford, they long ago could have afforded her a dignified, confidential, method of presenting her allegations away from the spectacle of glaring lights and television cameras. Regardless of what happens to Judge Kavanaugh, her life will be irreversibly affected in ways she was trying to avoid.
This need not have happened to her. None of our politicians really care about her dignity and desires. She is a pawn in a game designed only to accomplish the political goals of ruthless, self serving intellectually dishonest politicians.
4
I desperately do not want Kavanaugh on the Court. And I believe Blasey and applaud her courage for coming forward. However I don’t think this is the way to derail his nomination. He was 17 years old, drunk, and it was a very different time. The term, sexual harassment, was just being codified. Lately I watched a popular movie from that time, Sixteen Candles, and the rape of a teenage girl is used for laughs! Apparently, since no other women have come forward, this was a one-time mistake. I think youth and inexperience should count for something. Who amongst us didn’t act inappropriately at 16 or 17?
However, the way he has handled this allegation does give me pause. He could have accepted responsibility, said that he very much regretted his actions, and offered Blasey a heartfelt apology. The man of today could have trumped the mistakes of a teenager, and shown himself to be ready to sit on the Supreme Court. Instead he’s just another sideshow act in Trump’s presidency.
4
The House of Cards Ms. Ford built. At first, when Ms. Ford's initial claim came to light I took serious pause. Then when more information came forward the claim started to quickly unravel -- 36 years ago, in high school, at a drinking party, no records whatsoever in regard to the date, time, or place of the alleged incident. Witnesses to the event named but no one recalls any information supporting Ms. Ford's claim. The only person that recalls any details about this even is Ms. Ford. No one in the past 36 years has come forward with a similar story of the experiences of Ms. Ford. Dozens of females that have worked or dated Mr. Kavanaugh have come forward to support his character. Ms. Ford's testimony has become a non-event, a house of Cards.
6
Sen. Grassley's failure to subpoena an eyewitness that Dr. Ford said was there at the time of this offense and participated in it will cause a possible miscarriage of justice. It will cause suspicion about why the senator refused to do so. Any lawyer will tell you that, in any dispute before a legal forum, all requests for subpoenas for witnesses must be honored.
Grassley should subpoena Judge. Without having this man sworn before the committee, there will always be a great question mark as to whether his sworn testimony would confirm her allegation. No potential witness wants to testify in a matter like this one and he will say anything to avoid testifying. But he must be subpoenaed to ensure justice for either side.
Judge's close association with Kavanaugh during the period of time in question makes it essential that he appear and be sworn in before the committee.
10
The right's hyper-patriarchal style of seeing and living result from the bottom line fear that men on the right, primarily, feel when they imagine a life in which they are forced to treat women as equals and with respect...and that baseline fear is that women will treat men just as poorly as they know they have treated women for thousands of years.
6
The whole attitude of Brett Kavanaugh is not of the caliber of one I believe belongs on the Supreme Court. Kavanaugh is a sitting judge. One would like to think a man in this position would be more temperate in his remarks and have the insight of one whose experience should have brought him to a place where he could be more realistic.
Instead of saying: “I categorically and unequivocally deny this allegation. I did not do this back in high school or at any time.”
Perhaps a different tactic and one that would afford more sway with the public would have been to say something like: (Following his above remarks), I welcome a thorough investigation by the FBI in order to clear my name. I am deeply sorry Dr. Ford has held these feelings about me all these years, and my deepest regrets. I do not believe it is in the best interest of this nation to rush my appointment through until this accusation is thoroughly investigated.
Of course, this is what you'd expect from an honest person, and this is what you'd expect from an honest Congress.
11
After 6 women appeared on TV squarely disbelieving the accuser, and a group of 50 (probably conservatives) came out for Kavanaugh, I wonder sometimes about the women alliance.I wonder whether alliance to their men, and don't rock the boat is as equally important to them. 2016, women had a chance of a lifetime and yet they seemed to had gone for the man with a most dubious history of women treatment.
7
The majority of female voters voted for Clinton.
2
Didn’t Kavanaugh say during his earlier testimony before the committee when asked if he ever assaulted a female that he had not done so as an adult? I assume he is excluding what did in High School.
8
"At stake for conservatives are not only future court decisions to restrict abortion rights, but also to advance religious liberty laws and define the rights of gay and transgender Americans."
Are you serious when you say "conservatives" are trying to advance religious liberty? All indications are that the only "advance" would be for "Christians" who believe the entire Bible is about sex, and specifically, control over others' sexuality. Ask people of any other religion whether conservatives are advancing *their* religious liberty. Ask Christians who don't use the Bible to try to control everyone, but who recognize that Biblical social justice themes outweigh sexuality themes by scores. Ask those who prefer no faith.
I really expect better from an institution such as the New York Times. Shame on such sloppy use of words from an orginization for whom words are the chosen instrument by which to shape truth.
At least you got the second part right, "define the rights of gay and transgender Americans." But you could have applied an economy of words and reflected truth better by applying that phrase to all their goals: to define the right of everyone not like them.
And from one editor to another, that sentence reflects bad structure as well. It should have been "the advancement" and "the definition of" for parallelism. And "curtailment" for truth.
6
@Lisa 'Religious liberty' has become a code word for the drive to impose religious dogma and practice on the rest of us.
6
I think that Brett Kavanaugh’s greatest asset that he brings to the GOP is that he will protect the highly debated Citizens United ruling. The fact that he accepted the 45committee, a 501(c)(4) “social welfare organization” payment for all his $ million media blitz recently, and the fact that donors for that organization are held secret (dark money), is interesting. It is reported that the same committee funded Trump’s 2016 ad campaign, Trump’s cabinet members and NRA ads.
For the record, when has a SCOTUS had TV commercials to advocate on their behalf?
14
This country is becoming more divided between men and women than just between red and blue.
4
BMUS,
Are you aware that there were 75 women who appeared on CSPAN Friday night who vouched for not only Judge Kavanaugh's impeccable behavior and character but his unwavering support for women. Many had known Judge Kavanaugh for years and others were law clerks in his office. They all raved at how fair he had been and his decency.
Dr. Ford's story of events that night 36 years ago keep changing. No one has agreed with her that there was a party in which Judge Kavanaugh and Dr. Ford were ever present together. Even her best friend said it never occurred. Apparently her memory is a bit fuzzy. Judge Kavanaugh adamantly denies his attending any party with her or involvement in any sexual abuse crime against her or anyone else.
Judge Kavanaugh wanted to immediately testify before the senate judiciary committee about his innocence and regain his good name and integrity. Dr. Ford by contrast has postponed her testifying six times and also her recollection of events. Why is that.
I trust his word over hers. If sexual abuse actually occurred by Judge Kavanaugh, she would have immediately testified and told her side of the story. Why has she kept changing her story. She has been confused over some very pertinent facts. Did the things she alleged occur, happen the way she said. We need to hear her story Thursday and not accept another postponement. Judge Kavanaugh is ready will she be? If she is a no show, a vote must be taken and he will very likely be confirmed.
24
@WPLMMT
Except that she passed a lie detector test and asked for an investigation, which he has not. It doesn't matter how many women attest to his character if one, and only one, woman was assualted by him. How many woman does it take? I would argue if he were a black man, one would be enough. But, since he's a white male, 2, 3, 10? What's the number? 75? The number equal to those on CSPAN?
5
@WPLMMT Kavenaugh will be a yes vote for the Republicans; no matter what happens. This is a job promotion hearing; most Americans say he should not be promoted. Republicans do not care what the majority wants; only what they want. If Kavenaugh is confirmed over Americas objection; he will be impeached after mid terms. Ray Sipe
5
@WPLMMT
Ford wants to the FBI to investigate. Kavanaugh doesn’t.
Ford wants other witnesses to be heard. Kavanaugh doesn’t.
Ford wants the alleged eye-witness to testify. Kavanaugh (and the eye-witness) don’t.
Ford has taken a lie detector test. Kavanaugh hasn’t.
4
If party leaders mean to avoid images of an all-male panel ganging up on a woman who says she experienced a sexual assault, it's already way too late.
And that photo of the ambitious Kavanaugh holding his daughter out front of him like a purity prop or a misogyny shield is disturbing on many levels, but not surprising considering the recent chain of events.
79
@DMS:So now he's not even allowed to show affection for his daughter?. What kind of nation are you promoting - its a disgusting comment where the honored Jurist is in the White house with his family. The Demons in many people are really showing badly.
4
I, too, noticed the way Kavanaugh grabbed onto his daughter through the whole hearing, which was not a place family should have been allowed to attend. Republican senators kept apologizing to the family for having to hear the questions put to the candidate, as if the purpose of the meeting was a tribute instead of a hearing. And Kavanaugh's strident yelling out the names of the girls basketball team- before Dr. Ford had even come forward. Proactive defense for things that would surface. HUGE red flags.
6
@Larry
The phrase "time and place" comes to mind.
2
It is insulting to men to take the attitude that oh, he was only 17, all guys do dumb stuff when they are young. What is that suggesting? I think men who commit sexual assault are the exceptions, not the rule. Most men do not try to grab just any woman and force themselves on her when drunk. Men are not testosterone zombies incapable of controlling their sexual impulses just because they are 17 and had some beers. I have more respect for men than that. This means that if there is truth to Dr Blasey Ford’s allegation then he is indeed unfit for the Supreme Court.
I am constantly revolted that we have a president who so obviously disrespects women. To Trump women are of two classes—ugly and therefore worthless, or beautiful and therefore his own personal sexy party favors to grab at will. And now we are to have a Supreme Court Justice who wrote next to his picture in a yearbook that “certain women should be struck regularly like gongs” and is accused of sexual assault? I’m sorry, but no. None of the guys I knew in high school or college, none of the men I know and have known in my life have ever had these nasty attitudes about women no matter how young they were. This isn’t about smearing a good man. This is about women being fed up with having the sort of men who disrespect us in power.
117
@SkL
That quote was next to Judge's picture, not Kavanaugh's.
1
One thing the left will not admit to is that if HRC had been elected , the MeToo movement might have never come about. HRC's public and private attacks on her husbands many accusers had a chilling effect on the willingness of abused women to come public. How the left continue to ignore and brush off the actions of the Clinton's, and how they are currently brushing aside the allegations of Keith Ellision's accuser are mind boggling to me. The fact that the Clinton's are revered by the left is equally stunning.
23
@DEVO
Please. Stop.
I am SICK OF the R/D, "liberals" /"conservative" duality.
Its a cop out, and it only causes division.
i am a registered Independent,
I have voted R I have voted D.
I vote the issues not the party.
I view DJT as unfit to serve, not based on his party (which he has destroyed) but based on his lies, temperament,etc.
I am a fiscal conservative who wants a strong defense, abhors deficit spending, believes all people deserve respect and autonomy. And that all children that are born on this earth regardless of skin color, should be adored and protected.
Stop putting me and everyone else in a box. It is so not that simple.
1
@DEVO
Who's president? Hillary?
@DEVO I agree, and I, for one, will never vote for Bill Clinton again. I can't go back and change what I did 20 years ago, at a time when I was less aware that even apparently liberal, intelligent, feminist men treat some women like dirt.
However, that does not mean, now that I am aware, after countless examples like Bill Cosby, Matt Lauer, and Trump (not that I ever believed he was liberal, intelligent or feminist), that many such men do treat women like dirt and feel entitled to misuse and discount them, that I am required to ignore what I have learned and continue giving them a pass.
Let's suspend the questions around not about who remembers or doesn't, saw or did not see what happened at a party.
Among the most recent arguments flooding the internet is tone that four people cited as all the other attendees are each supposedly alleging such a party was not held at their houses. The only other person in question is the victim who states clearly intimates it occurred beyond her own home.
Their question is quite simple but powerful. If the above is so and we know of but five who allegedly attended, where's the house in question?
This is what needs a direct telling response, one we've yet to see and anticipate sooner than later as well.
3
@Ben Brice
accidentally sent before proofing-please excuse
Ford told the Washington Post there were four boys at the party. She did not tell them there were only four other people at the party, as far as I know.
1
“It’s not just a message about Dr. Blasey Ford, it’s about survivors and about women,” Ms. Graves said. “And if they ignore that, I do not see how that is something that goes away fast. It will be a stain that they carry for a very long time.”
If, in the Supreme Court, Kavanaugh's decision on a case overturns Roe v. Wade, there will be chaos.
Hagelin, the former Heritage Foundation VP states: “If the nomination goes through, it will be a victory for anybody who has ever been falsely charged with some sexual abuse accusation.”
Hers is all nonsense, of course. We don't know that Kavanaugh isn't lying, and his drinking in that culture back then raises much suspicion of him. That Kavanaugh is a Republican operative raises more credibility issues.
Trump women are an odd bunch. They love him and his sexual deviance. Thus, accusations against Kavanaugh ring hollow with them. Trump women should simply realize that Kavanaugh is clearly a problem and they can find someone else to support, as this article mentions. Instead they let trump drag them through this controversial political swamp.
The Federalist Society backs Kavanaugh, yet when one looks at the list of notable members of the Federalist Society, only two are women. This nation *is* irreparably sundered by trump's churlish behavior, and Fox Noise profits from the split. They cannot support rational dialog.
26
@Charles
His friend wrote a book about their drunken partying and drug use in High School.
His friend was in the room according to Ford but they aren’t going to force him to testify under oath.
I hope Ford pursues attempted rape charges against Kavanaugh even after the Kangaroo court of a hearing.
4
Look to the shoulders and conscience of Dr. Blasey Ford. This woman who has specialized her advanced education to research and explain the effects of trauma to cause depression and mental illness, will have to carry the weight of the women's movement, the METoo generation, political history including the Anita Hill debacle, the Equal Rights Amendment, social media and the history of the American Senate, the long history of the Supreme Court and popular opinion -- all on her shoulders when she testifies on Thursday. How many eyes and ears will be upon her? She has my respect for her courage and lofty mission, and my sympathy.
70
@nsafir I couldn't possibly agree more...
4
This whole Balsey tempest is just more identity politics by the fascist-like puritanical left run amok with their rigid identity politics and their unbending secular cultism against every common value that has made America ever greater as we have grown and learned over the centuries to be better people and a better nation.
God help us all.
9
@Agent Provocateur
Ironic to hear a rightie bandy about the "f" word while Republicans do everything in their power to undermine "every common value".
8
Yes, allowing women the right to have control of their bodies and to have equal pay is this purported “unbending secular cultism.” It’s actually called democracy for an evolving world ready to cast off once and for all the “originalist” dogma that exalts “white make privilege uber alles.”
13
I feel bad for his daughters. Perhaps they think they know their father well enough to disbelieve the allegations now, but someday they will be old enough to recognize his echo in toxic frat boys, and then, whatever comes of this testimony next week, they will have cause to wonder.
30
@Alex. That's why they say holding public office is tough for the family. Politics can be and these days is often bloody.
1
@Alex
One off--stats suggest you need to rework your thesis. Easy to write this off as a delusional psych major, much higher probability.
1
isn't the real issue with putting kavanaugh on the SCOTUS that he lied under oath during his confirmation to the DC circuit court?
how is it even possible that he hasn't been disbarred for that episode?
52
Precisely. That little hiccup his being glossed over fabulously.
4
If it is being considered as legally appropriate that women have no control over their bodies (consider what the message is here) then it should be equally legally appropriate that men have no control over theirs (again, consider what the message is here). Hm, I wonder how this would play out?
14
Even if the Republicans manage to force this nomination through, Kavanaugh will always be illegitimate, just like the so-called president who nominated him.
Same with Gorsuch. Neither will have earned their seat. They were handouts.
45
@Kip Fortunately, Supreme Court justices can be impeached. We need to take back the House and Senate.
4
Mr. Kavanagh and Mr. Gorsuch will always have asterisk next to their name denoting their legitamacy.
3
whether this is an apex moment for women or not remains to be seen. If he is removed from the nominating process, it could well be. If the sexual misconduct charges don't stick, women's voices and commitment to political action will be even sharper.
23
Every time Trump tweets he induces more people, especially women, to vote against him and those he supports and induces his base of deplorables to vote for those who support Trump. The world will see this November just how many deplorables there are in the United States.
28
Brett Kavanaugh and Donald Trump both represent the pinnacle of white male privillege power misogyny and patriarchy.
If a black boy or man had been accused of acts such as theirs if they were lucky they would not be lynched if a white girl or woman was involved or if their victim were a black female then they could also take advantage of male misogyny and patriarchy.
If Kavanaugh or Trump were accused of assaulting or harassing a black female they would get a Thomas Jefferson and Strom Thurmond pass.
In the 2016 Presidential election 54% of white women voted for Donald Trump. While 98 % of black women voted for Hillary Clinton.
Neither Bill Clinton nor Barack Obama ever nominated a black African American Protestant female to the Supreme Court of the United States.
7
@Blackmamba
Wrong.
54% of White women did NOT vote for Trump. Stop with the erroneous statements. Only a percentage of the population is registered to vote. Of that percentage, only a percentage bothered to vote. Of that percentage, only a percentage are white women.
This has been corrected with links to validated research which can be found with your own search so I’m not going to bother yet again. But when analyzed, statistics state that something like only 25% of white women voted for Trump.
35
@left coast finch
Who cares? If you don't vote, you don't matter.
Folks , this may seem a side issue, but look at Kavanaugh's "friends:"
Matt Judge: his whole career (such as it is) has been writing about his antics with "Bart O'Kavenaugh" and the 100-Keg-Club.
Ed Whelan: tries to get Kavanaugh off the hook by implicating another guy ... smooth move Ed, among other things you just admitted that the party (and attempted rape) happened!
Donald Trump: ...
Kavanaugh's flock of "birds of a feather" ...
36
But did it? It only popped up via an anonymous letter after the hearings were over. "Oh, I just remembered!"
1
If I were accused of something SO heinous, I would vehemently and unequivocally DEMAND a full investigation to clear my name, and to show to the world that I had nothing to hide.
Why does BK not do this ?
Instead he relies on weasels like McConnell to, and I quote : "plow right through this."
HUH?
("plow right through" what ? the allegation that: they locked the bedroom door; that BK hand-gagged her ? that his frat boy accomplice cheered him on as he tore at her pants ? that a one piece bathing suit saved her from rape?)
His "plowing right through" this smacks of guilt.
(Most women are sick of and disgusted by men "plowing right through" them, on so many levels.)
46
So is hatred of men the real agenda here?
5
@Bobo I am a man and I don't detect any "hatred of men" in the agenda. But, of course, I don't think it is my right to sexually abuse women.
1
@Bobo hatred of abuse, yes
As a decidedly-NOT conservative, I concur with the conservatives quoted that Kavanaugh's confirmation is not solely about women's rights, although that's part of it.
It's lying about knowingly receiving stolen documents, lying about being involved in torture policy, failing to properly recuse as a judge, arguing that Presidents should be above the law. It's about being nominated by a president that needs to be shielded from the consequences of his corrupt behavior. It's about the abuse of congressional and executive power, about not maintaining separation of church and state, about not maintaining checks and balances between our three branches of government. It's about naked political greed and white male privilege and not acknowledging equality among our citizens. It's about raw bigotry and cruelty and holding thousands of kids in jails separated from their parents. It's about not being satisfied with merely living in accordance with your own religious convictions but also forcing those convictions onto others. It's about bullying and lying and corruption and disrespect of others and violating national interests and national security with impunity.
Anyone who thinks this is what going in the right direction looks like is a complete moron.
54
bravo
5
I had to look up Penny Nance who is the Concerned Women lady running some outfit to make Christian ideology as she calls it, made into policy for all Americans. She seems to think if she threw $$$ at at nomination of Kavanaugh and ride a bus all summer then she should darn well get him through. They owe her no matter what the truth is.
Do these people have no shame at all or respect for anything but their their own twisted fantasy for America? I have to read twice about her whine about alpha males feeling entitled to any woman from the housekeeper up. And she’s working the streets for Trump? Unreal.
23
For all those on here asking why Dr. Ford didn't being this up sooner, I encourage you to go to Twitter, read, learn: #WhyIDidntReport
22
If Trump won't order the FBI to investigate Kavanaugh for sexually assaulting Dr. Ford (which he never will), I think the New York Times should, and the Washington Post, and LA Times.... Protectors of democracy - do your job!
23
I certainly hope that Kavanaugh never has to support his daughter through an attempted rape. Because, I think he would fall short of the task.
25
I hope that the other women/girls that Kavanaugh has mistreated will come forward, and that the old white guys in the Senate will allow them to testify. I cannot wait until Election Day. VOTE!!!
19
That's the whole problem with this Ford/Feinstein thing: Nobody has come forward. Ms. Ford is out there all alone with something she says happened in 1981.
6
@Bobo
Which doesn't mean it didn't happen. And given both the death threats and the media scrutiny (including the tweet from President Creamsicle) that Dr. Ford has had to endure, if there are others out there who have suffered Kavanaugh's frat boy attentions, I'm sure they're having long, hard thoughts about saying anything and being subjected to the same abuse as a result.
1
Bobo, nope. Kavanaugh's pal was there, and refuses to testify under oath about what his buddy did or didn't do. Dr. Blasey took a lie detector test as well, and Kavanaugh will not. And her being willing, even at the great cost to a good life she had, which is now assailed by the right-wing outrage experts, to stand up, as you say, alone to tell the story, speaks volumes. Should this man, this heavy-drinker who lied about his drinking already, be entrusted with a lifetime appointment to make decisions that impact all our lives in their deepest aspects? No. They need to find someone else. And you might find something more noble to do than throw stones at someone who does know what happened and is paying a great price to speak; you certainly don't.
9
"A judge who could well overturn Roe v. Wade"
NYT got one thing right in this story: Panic is over Roe v. Wade--whatever it takes to destroy the man.
10
Kavanaugh : Even back in High School, HE was on the road to GITMO. And NOT as a prisoner. You sure can pick'em, GOP.
19
Great job, Stein voters! This is what you knew you were getting when you voted third party in a two party system. You KNEW the Supreme Court was at stake but you cared more about ideological purity than my nieces’ reproductive rights. I absolutely hate Republicans but my hatred exceeds all bounds for the absolute traitors to progressive causes that are Stein voters.
24
“Women for Kavanaugh” ? Why not Turkey for Christmas...
7
Let's get real. Trump, Kavanaugh and Senate Republicans have have boldly insulted women voters and almost all of us have been either groped, pawed, belittled, molested, beaten, humiliated, faced an attempted rape or have been raped. Senate Republicans have made a grave miscalculation. The midterms are 44 days away. Please vote like you mean it.
33
A guy named Weinstein gave the metoo movement a kick start, which has morphed into a weaponized tactic to destroy conservative white men. People such as Keith Ellison are exempt.
SJW 1, America 0.
And Miss Liberty weeps.
7
@hawk
Really?? Try telling that to Al Franken.
15
@Bill And Weinstein!
You should have actually listened to some of those original #MeToo stories. Plenty were from conservative white women.
1
For those who dismiss Dr. Ford because she didn't come forward when she was 15 years old, what say you about all of the boys abused by priests in the Catholic Church. Should they also have been expected to report their assaults and rapes 30, 40, even 50 years ago? Please, do you not understand the double standard applied to females? Dr. Ford is being treated with the most callous insensitivity and disrespect. The spectacle is indeed something to behold. The treatment of women by, yes, the Republican Party writ large is a horrendous stain on not only its members but our country. What a miserable shame.
42
@Pat
Many of those repulsed by pedophile RCC priests preying on boys aren’t as repulsed by teenage guys and men preying on teenage girls and women. A more loathsome form of the double standard. To them the attempted or actual rape of boys/men is worse than the same crimes perpetrated against girls/women. The big question is why?
17
Kavanaugh is the most egregious example of self righteous, religious hypocrisy -- a man who would deny tens of millions of girls and women the right to a safe, legal abortion while he revels in the booze fueled, sex crazed debauchery of his youth. Take him down!
25
My, aren't we puritanical now!
4
@Bobo
No, just realistic.
Noodles,
Just think of all the darling babies that Brett Kavanaugh is saving from slaughter. By the way, the 40 Days for Life campaign, a pro life group, starts Wednesday. I will be there taking part outside the Planned Parenthood facility in Manhattan with my friends.
"He boasted most of his clerks had been women." https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/sep/20/brett-kavanaugh-supreme-...
3
" The wages of sin is death...". Or at least, POLITICAL Death.
Right, GOP ???
4
These repugnant Republican Senators on the Judiciary Committee, mainly McConnell, Grassley, Hatch, are hours away from showing their unspeakable singleminded hatefulness to the world. This will be a sham “hearing”. They are simply placating those who demand to hear from Dr. Blasey Ford, and Kavanaugh. They regret that Kavanaugh has to “go through this”. They are despots who time and again demand that monumental decisions be their way or the highway. They are old men. Through the many years they’ve been around they have shown themselves sexists and racists, (See Anita Hill tapes). They are so infused with their own self-importance that they refuse to admit or see anything beyond their noses. They do not care about lying (they do it often) or criminal behavior. Their bullheaded, divisive governing has help fortify this country into a ugly mess. But despite them, the country is watching very closely. We the People, the majority, will not forget this abhorrent behavior. We don’t even need the “interview” to reach that end. The despicable comments they’ve made about Dr. Blasey Ford already clearly show their total lack of compunction about bullying tactics and their complete incompetence to govern in the 21st century.
24
"a president who has faced allegations of sexual misconduct ..."
What? A president who was publicly exposed bragging on videotape about groping women... and 15 women came forward saying he did, and one is suing him now.
Why does the New York Times minimize this to "faced allegations?"
16
Should Cavanaugh be confirmed, he will forever be followed by a black cloud on his reputation just as it has with his colleague Justice Clarence Thomas. Hopefully he will be reminded daily that millions of women will be watching his every decision along with three powerful women in black robes just like his--Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Elena Kagan.
10
The statute of limitations has expired five times over. Not to mention the fact that he wasn't even an adult when this supposedly took place. This is 35 year old memories from an admittedly drunk (minor) teenager, who can't recall where, or when it happened, about another (minor) teenagers actions that has never been accused of anything for 35 years, until the day he was taking a politically sensitive position. Lets be honest here, you all know this is entirely politics as usual by Democratic Party standards. There is no legal basis for any of this. It is only a smear campaign and another delaying tactic by the Democratic Party, who have publicly vowed to do exactly this. What they don't seem to understand is the next one to be nominated will be even further right than Kavanaugh. Trump will see to it. You know he does have a vindictive streak don't you? Unless the NOV vote follows the most left leaning polls this time around (like your track record has been any good lately) you still won't have the votes to do anything about that nomination either. And you will be stuck with that one. Or you can try to pull out another good soldier to accuse him. But sooner or later that tactic becomes too transparent for anyone to continue to buy into it. And by then what little credibility you had is gone. Have a little more rope there ....
4
It sounds like you're saying he probably did it, or something very close to it.
4
One insight might be that the NYTs, certainly at least this columnist may not understand or realize that the group that has been brought together - is men. False accusations relative calling out a successful father and professional is actually a rather effective herding tool. And believe me - it's working. Although tiring of the ME2 movement, the "false accusation (for absolutely nothing BTW) movement is going to backfire on this little band of women who fear that they wont be allowed to abort their babies any more.
4
Alexander Burns, Elizabeth Dias and Susan Chira reported this article. They're not columnists.
2
@Dixon Duval All Americans should be concerned about the consequences - including unintended - that will follow when the civil rights to bodily autonomy and medical privacy are gone.
2
Democrats underestimate women. Anyone can see this is a naked political, slash and burn, witch hunt with the aim of slandering a man and destroying his career. Women aren't biting because it is so obvious.
4
Trump Inc. have two choices:
A) Give up on Kavanaugh and his confirmation
or
B) Send an Uber to pick him up on First St, after Dems impeach him
4
@latweek
That's one choice, not two.
It’s important to remember that Dr. Ford met Kavanaugh before the party and recognized him at the party and passed a polygraph test as to the veracity of her account. I wonder if ole 100 kegs is knocking down a few shots of Irish whisky to calm his nerves.
12
@Hermes Trismagistus
Why don't you post a link to those polygraph results? Oh, yeah, because nobody has ever seen them.
I cannot help but wonder how Kavanaugh would feel if on Thursday he were asked the kind of graphic questions about HIS hands on a woman's body as those he proposed for Bill Clinton.
27
Great potrayal of the epic, "titanic" moment for women's rights and equality. It's taken on the status of what Joseph Campbell called the "monomyth" or "the hero's journey" portrayed in books from the Odyssey to the Lord of the Rings. Perhaps just perhaps we have a female Hobbit in Dr. Christine Blasey Ford who has been reluctantly forced to confront the modern day dark male forces of Mordor in the Republican Judiciary Committee orcs and their Sauron hiding in the blighted blackness of The White House. The ring of power may about to be cast into the fires of Mount Doom this Thursday as a courageous, unsung heroine sheds the healing light of truth on the darkness of the of the aging white male misogynistic Republican patriarchy. The climatic moment approaches and our Middle Earth nation may emerge better for it. I say that as a trauma survivor. #MeToo. And I say that as a member of a Holocaust family. #NeverAgain.
11
@Paul Wortman, yes, and Dr. Blasey is not the only hero in the saga. Hillary Clinton has run the gauntlet from her youth when she fought nearly alone for universal health care and was ripped up as a women would be in the day--where was Bernie then? And a gauntlet since, decades of vilification, of lies, of faux accusations--of interrogation before the world by a panel republican white male inquisitors for eleven hours straight--and overcame them. Topped off by the right's electing a mentally ill, unqualified, self-admitted sexual predator as president instead of that highly qualified woman--and here we are. But Dr. Blasey and women and men aplenty have had enough, and will become an overwhelming tide against those wealthy would-be tyrants on the right. The forces against us have no shame, but they always overreach, as they are doing now. And they will pay the price for it. We can be heroes, too. It's time.
5
The page reloaded multiple times so I’ll post here,
@WPLMMT
1. “The woman” has a name, Dr. Blasey.
2. Dr. Blasey is calling for an investigation, not “Judge Kavanaugh.” Why? Is he trying to hide something?
3. The serial rapist just caught in California lived a normal life. He’s married and worked at UC Berkeley for 25 years seemingly without any suspicion he was a serial rapist. Some of his victims weren’t believed by police.
These predators know how to separate their personal and crime lives. I’m not the least surprised Kavanaugh has women willing to vouch for him. His last boss was a known abuser of the women who clerked for him. Somehow nearly everyone but Kavanaugh was aware. If true, perhaps he’s not that bright after all.
abcnews.go.com/US/alleged-serial-rapist-caught-27-years-genealogy-search...
16
I'll be very surprised if the white males running the show have learned anything. We are about to find out. Unlike Anita Hill, what will they do now that they are dealing with a white woman making similar claims?
6
If I were questioning Judge Kavanaugh on Thursday, the first question I would ask him is: "Since declaring that you are innocent of the alleged sexual attack of Dr. Blasey Ford when you both were teenagers, why have you not insisted upon slowing down your confirmation to have an FBI investigation in order to have more information in order to clear this allegation from your name? Dr. Blasey Ford has requested an FBI investigation. Why not you?"
21
@Patti Bezzo
And he would respond: because the FBI already conducted a comprehensive background check that involved speaking with almost 1,000 from my past. I passed that FBI check, as I passed 5 prior FBI checks. I have been investigated thoroughly, and came up clean every time. So why should I have to go through all that again, just to mollify some crackpot who sent an anonymous letter, and has absolutely no proof of anything.
1
Trump says Kavanaugh is "born for the Supreme Court." NO! No one is entitled by birth to a public service position, especially a seat in the highest court in the US.
Trump also has said Kavanaugh (and Gorsuch) is from "Central Casting" because apparently to Trump, rich, white middle-aged men look the part of SCOTUS justices.
In just two days, Trump's aggregious Tweet insisting Dr. Blasey Ford or her parents must have reported the attempted rape "if it happened," has generated over 75,000 comments. This is 2 to 10 times or more the normal replies to his Twitter drivel.
Check out the #WhyIDidntReport stories.
10
I think most women don't wants the extremes.
They don't want the extreme feminist views that the NY Times is the media outlet for but they also don't want an admitted sexual predator like Trump who threatens their basic rights.
The women's vote has shifted from anti feminist in 2106 to anti Trump in 2018.
2
Extreme feminist? The New York Times? Hardly. Moderate second wave feminist voices by and large.
1
Kevin Cramer and Orrin Hatch are the worst kind of hypocrites.
They would not be so blasé if Brett Kavanaugh had assaulted their 15 year-old daughter or granddaughter.
10
@Jackson Aramis Sadly, I think they might.
8
Yes. most of Judge Kavanaugh's clerks were women, who just happened to look like models.
I smell pork.
6
How will the Senate treat both the accuser and the accused? Who is the victim in this fandango? Garland was rejected for political reasons without character assassination of the most despicable kind. Democrats will make this a McCarthy hearing. Have they no shame?
3
This creep Kavanaugh has us all telling of our teenage experiences with various kinds of weirdos at dinner gatherings now.
7
The hypocrisy of overturning Roe v. Wade is that people with money and women impregnated by men with money will find the means to have safe abortions. Those without money will end up on a butcher's table or bringing a child into the world that the Republicans vote against supporting with aid. Another hypocrisy is not allowing medicare to provide free birth control for poor women. I bet some of the women on the bus supporting Kavanaugh can easily afford their birth control and use it.
11
Maybe they will decide to have the baby and give it unconditional love. It usually happens that way. So many are thankful they had the child.
@WPLMMT
You miss the point.
1.Why not give free birth control to poor women?
2. In the white male controlled government, the blue pill, definitely not a medical necessity, is considered a prescription drug and therefore free for men.
3. The same people who do not want to provide free birth control are the very people who do not want to support impoverished mothers and children.
4 And it does not "usually happen that way". Many children are ill treated and many mothers who are forced to give birth are not ready or too young to be mothers.
5. It will probably not affect people like you.
If Kavanaugh is confirmed, it will send the message that it is OK for teenagers to sexually assault other teenagers and expect no consequences. It will also send the message that we never believe the woman in a man vs. woman situation where at least one of them is lying. All women in this country should be vociferously up in arms.
11
8/17/98 Democrat President Bill Clinton becomes the first sitting president to testify before a grand jury investigating his conduct. After the questioning at the White House is finished, Clinton goes on national TV to admit he had an inappropriate relationship with Monica Lewinsky.
Missing here is the backlash of men who think fairness and commonsense must apply.
11
It's a pity Wonder Woman's rope is not real. Without such supernatural proof of truth or lie, at least we can suggest some questions to Judge Kavanaugh that might shed some light.
First, have you ever had a blackout drunk and when when was the last time?
Have you ever paid for or suggested an abortion to any woman?
Have you ever hired a fat female law clerk?
Are you aware of any females in your family (mother, wife, sister, cousin, daughter, etc.) having been sexually assaulted?
Since this accusation came out, have you asked those family women if they were ever sexually assaulted?
His reactions to these questions will tell us a lot about the man, regardless of what his oral answers are.
6
Why is Kavanaugh’s friend who allegedly was present during the assault and wrote a book about blackouts and alcoholism be subpoenaed to testify under oath concerning the alleged assault? This would require no FBI investigation nor delay the proceedings. Also, if Kavanaugh admits to being a heavy drinker, which has been proven through a variety of sources, why wouldn’t an alcohol related blackout be persuasive evidence?
Also, I think the Democrats, particularly Senator Leahy, did not advance the theft of the Democratic documents that Kavanaugh received. He claims he didn’t inquire about how they were obtained. If I am presented with items I knew were being offered at a very low price, say jewelry, wouldn’t I be required to determine how they were sourced and now being presented to me?
11
Mostly MALE "victims" in the recent Catholic Church/Priest scandal were believed by the HUNDREDS about sexual abuse and assaults that happened, in many cases, DECADES ago.
Thier word, against the priests. Offedning priests likely won't face any more repercussions than removal or tranferring out of the priesthood.
The MEN who complained were beleived, in other words.
Very few clamored for more investigations, or suggested that abuses that happened decades ago in some cases were "fake news".
Why doesn't someone in media bring up this glaring difference in how this woman Ms. Ford is now being subjected to basically having to have a video of what happened?
21
What do you think are the chances that Judge Kavanaugh's nomination would pass the Judiciary Committee if the vote were held right now?
This is America under Republican control. Not pretty.
16
“Nothing evidently happened in it all, even by her own accusation.” I am sorry... does that mean that anything shy of penetration is nothing?
13
@S S C This mindset implies that unless a woman is killed or beaten to a pulp, she didn't fight hard enough and was therefore not really raped.
If Mr. Kavanaugh was as smart as he likes us to think, he would simply withdraw his name,from consideration, enjoy the excellent position he holds and ignore the “debate.” Olephart
9
Wouldn't it be the greatest irony of all time if Trump were the one who we could point to as the one whose egregious actions -
his own and in defense of others - finally made it so that women did not have to endure sexual harassment and sexual assault as a normal part of their existence?
7
The Kavenaugh’s hearing is not a trial, and the hearing with Dr. Blasey is not in a court of law. This is a JOB INTERVIEW, pure and simple. And Kavanaugh is proving to be “supremely” unfit for the job. Will the next candidate come in please.
10
Sen. Grassley needs to re read his own words from March 26, 2016:
“A lifetime appointment that could dramatically impact individual freedoms and change the direction of the court for at least a generation is too important to get bogged down in politics. The American people shouldn’t be denied a voice. Do we want a court that interprets the law, or do we want a court that acts as an unelected super legislature? This year is a tremendous opportunity for our country to have a sincere and honest debate about the role of the Supreme Court in our constitutional system of government.”
9
"Mr. Trump — who has consistently expressed skepticism or hostility toward women who accuse men, including him, of sexual misconduct — "
You are wrong. 45 is skeptic ONLY when the accusation is made against a republican. If the accused is a democrat, no matter how minor the accusation is, he goes after it and squeezes it for all it's worth.
12
It is a shame that America has had to endure this national nightmare to understand that this is not the direction we want to go. Unfortunately, sometimes it takes being shown the direction we DON'T want to go.
7
People are criticizing Judge Kavanaugh for drilling testimony before he appears before the senate judiciary committee when and if it occurs. There is still no guarantee that Dr. Ford will even appear.
You can rest assured that Dr. Ford's shrewd lawyers are drilling her too in case she decides to testify. She will probably give textbook answers as she is not used to testifying. This is where Judge Kavanaugh has the advantage. He is a lawyer with lots of experience in front of trial cases. He will be as cool as a cucumber and very composed. If he appears like he did during the confirmation hearings, he will be very convincing of his innocence. He will then breeze through the voting process and be our next Supreme Court justice.
1
During the confirmation hearings—you’re referring to when Kavanaugh perjured himself, correct?
10
@WPLMMT. The FBI should conduct a thorough background check on K and the withheld documents should be published.
1
Trump has certainly galvanized a movement of women from the time he declared his candidacy for the president of the USA in 2015. If that is what has taken to awaken the nation to expose the sexual misconduct of men in the public eye then that is just another accomplishment for our nation in the Trump era and under Trump watch.
Judge K is testing how far the movement spearheaded by the democratic party will go to malign and tarnish the most qualified judge and a decent man at least without a doubt since becoming an adult in his path to being confirmed as the justice of the supreme court.
As more information is coming to light about the formerly anonymous woman who sent a letter to Senator Feinstein in July alleging that 36 years ago at the age of 17 a drunken Brett Kavanaugh assaulted her at a party, I am beginning to doubt whether the party that never wanted to see judge K confirmed ever since his nomination is desperately trying to play a dirty malicious game and using and abusing this woman (who is a registered democrat and active in supporting democrats) now revealed as Dr. Ford as a part of a game plan to prevent judge K from taking up the bench of justice Kennedy.
The movement that started with the best of intentions and for the protection of women's right may have reached a fork. Does it want to destroy the future of men like judge K with distinguished service to the judiciary branch of the nation or be fair and not commit travesty of justice to honorable men.
1
@Girish Kotwal
I don't think a man who tried to impose his personal views on a pregnant teenager is distinguished.
Far from it.
8
@Girish Kotwal K's service is not so distinguished. We deserve better on our highest court.
1
What is really being missed here is that if you accept or don't accept whether events unfolded as laid out the real transgression would be if it could be proven that Kavanaugh is lying about it. Even if the act in question isn't as heinous as it's made out to be the lie should be enough to abort his attempt at gaining a seat on the Supreme Court.
8
Never forget that Judge Kavanaugh ruled that a 17 yr old undocumented woman who petitioned the court for access to an abortion could not have one. His arrogance is appalling.
This is how the GOP is trying to get over on women. No compassion, contempt for women lives, exercise of raw power against women, ignoring women's voices, and, when necessary, lying lying lying.
None of the Republican men sitting on the Judiciary Committee are fit to determine the lives of women. 27 yrs after the Clarence Thomas/Anita Hill hearings, it's shocking that Grassley and Hatch are still on the committee.
Brett Kavanaugh is exactly the kind of person we all knew Trump would appoint to the court back during the 2016 campaign. We knew Trump was determined to appoint mean, conservative throwbacks with no respect for women. Men like himself.
What we didn't count on is that, like Trump, his nominee would face accusations of sexual assault and attempted rape.
I don't see how this gets worse for Republicans.
Even if they win for Kavanaugh, the long term cost of this misstep will come back to bite them hard.
Vote in November. If you didn't believe who Trump was in 2016, now you know.
Our lives depend on defeating these people.
16
This fight is really about respect for women. Trump has made it clear that he doesn't respect anyone, women especially. In many of his actions, Kavanaugh has made it clear he doesn't respect women, either. He didn't respect the right a of 17-year-old girl who had been raped to get an abortion. He didn't respect the right of a 15-year-old girl to say no.
The Republicans on the Senate Judicial Committee don't really respect women either, but they're having trouble pushing back because they're fearful of the backlash. They don't respect Ford's right to an FBI investigation, or her right to be heard with an open mind. They're still planning to vote for Kavanaugh no matter what she says.
Ford's story is not only believable by itself, she has been haunted by it for years. The most telling part of her background is that she has spent years researching trauma, depression, and how survivors recover.
13
I didn't believe Judge Kavanaugh about "spying" in the Senate, about his role in the Bush torture and war crimes, and about his lascivious questioning of Bill Clinton when he worked for Ken Starr. And why didn't they provide his complete record to the committee?
Now, I don't know if I believe Christine Blasey Ford, but I'm inclined to. I don't see what she gains by making up a false narrative and subjecting her family to irrational public scorn and death threats. I would like the president to tell his people to stop the threats and vitriol, but that requires some class.
If Ms. Ford is as articulate, sincere and credible as she appears, Kavanaugh should withdraw.
It may not be fair, but politics wasn't fair to Merrick Garland, either.
10
@Occupy Government, etiquette and good grooming should leave the truth in the dust any day. Except when Trump says Kavanagh was groomed for the job.
Both sides in this mess have demonstrated that there are no tactics that they will not stoop to in order to score points on the other side. At this point neither Judge Kavanaugh nor Ms Ford are important any more. They are simply the vehicles for each side to savage the other. The fact that two lives are being torn asunder means nothing to them or the NYT, they are 'collateral damage.'
1
I hope at least one senator asks Judge Kavanaugh if he would like to see his daughters go to the same sorts of parties he attended in high school and deal with the same attitudes and behaviors he and his friends directed toward the girls in their social circle.
13
Describing as "religious liberty laws" the Republican efforts to pass laws freeing mainly Christians from obeying civil rights laws affording equal protection to people in the marketplace is inaccurate. These laws have the crowd-pleasing name because they do a detestable thing. They allow people to impose their own religious beliefs on other Americans by denying them service in places of public convenience like restaurants, hotels, bakeries, places of employment, and elsewhere. Don't be fooled by the nice-sounding name, "religious freedom" or "religious liberty." These are laws designed to impose a Taliban-like religious right on people who disagree with how other Americans have chosen to exercise their Constitutional freedoms. Normalizing these legislative efforts by accepting the name their supporters apply to them furthers the disguised hate-crime nature of these proposals.
10
The Donald put forth judge Kavanaugh's name in nomination because he would guarantee him a get out of jail free card when his indictments were questioned before the Supreme Court after the judge's confirmation. He probably did not consider that this nomination would become a litmus test for women's rights. He probably did not care, either.
10
I don't support either Kavanaugh or Trump.
And yet it is obvious that affair has been politicized beyond all recognition and that a good man, a fine judge, is being railroaded.
Equality demands due process of law. No exceptions.
In our American system, due process demands the presumption of innocence.
Any accusations of a crime must be supported, at a minimum, by credible evidence and by corroborating testimony.
If an accusation is made without any evidence, without corroborating testimony, without witnesses, then it is suspect. Law enforcement in this country will not investigate such allegations.
When such allegations are made 36 *YEARS* after the alleged incident, with:
- ZERO evidence
- multiple contradictions
- denials by every person alleged to have been present - including the accuser's friend, Leland Ingham, who was married to senior Democratic operative Bob Beckel;
- AND when the accused has, in those 36 years, exhibited a sterling record of behavior that contradicts the allegations made - behavior that has been attested to publicly and formally by literally dozens of credible individuals - then due process requires us to side with the accused.
If this transparently political tactic succeeds, then every male candidate for high office will be a target for railroading by each party's slime machines. All it will take is a bit of trolling to find an accuser to recover "repressed memories" and smear the target.
Enough.
No more show trials.
3
@T-BoneI I don't think a man who tried to impose his personal views on a pregnant teenager is distinguished.
Far from it.
6
Saying “ they were drunk” highlights something that seems to have gone unnoticed in the stories I have read.
At the time of the alleged assault , and now for that matter, was not the legal age for the consumption of alcohol 21?
So here we have a Supreme Court nominee who is excused by a supporter even though he may have broken the law.
One wonders if the reaction would be so forgiving if “they were buzzed”?
8
How much of this is about abortion? Abortion is "settled law." Is this really about a jurist who believes in a strong presidency and presidential powers?
This reeks of an attempt to get at Trump by any means whatsoever. Suppose the impossible happens and Kavanaugh fails to be confirmed. What is Trump going to do? Nominate another staunch conservative who may be even more anti-abortion. The democrats can accept that. What they cannot accept is a nominee who may legally side with Trump in any ill-fated democratic party attempt to remove him.
The effect of Dr. Blasey coming forward with the sexual assault allegations will ring in the ears of the choir and fall flat in front of those who ideologically believe in the Kavanaugh appointment. The number of people who were pro-Kavanaugh that switch to oppose his appointment due to these allegations is negligible.
Don't take it from me, that's pretty much what this article says without just coming right out and saying it. To be clear, the effect of these allegations will only be to battle-harden the two opposing political camps, further driving the wedge between left and right voting citizens and their overlords in the congress.
And as such, it will drive more determined voters to the poles, and in the calculation of the Democrats, they think they'll come out ahead because their base is riled up like any opposition party and they have this extra push now, to get ahead. Republicans will only get whipped up if Kavanaugh gets derailed, and no one really thinks that's going to happen because Grassley and McConnel would rather have the 5th conservative on the court than another session of senate control.
To the Democrats, this is the one faint hope they have on any level affecting the judicial appointment and the midterm elections beyond all the work they have done up to this point. I don't begrudge them, not because it is exactly what the Republicans would do in the same situation, but because Dr. Blasey has said this man capable of overturning Roe v. Wade, attacked her.
2
If Republicans have relied on Roe v Wade as a wedge issue to advance the "libertarian" interests of their donors, wait until they feel the backlash of a Roe v Wade appeal.
Women will not be forced back into the dark alleys illegal abortions. Or the lifelong traumas of not being listened to.
Go ahead, Republicans. Make our day.
9
If I was Dr. Blasey, I'd show up at the Congressional inquisition with a half dozen of the best legal/publicist/political experts available. When the GOP appointed mouthpiece for the Senate Judiciary Committee asks each question, Dr. Blasey and the six advisors would huddle and one would step forward. Dr. Blasey would then say, "Since this committee has chosen a surrogate to ask the questions, I call on one of my advisors to give you my answer."
6
There should simply be an investigation. This is a lifetime appointment that will affect future generations. Aren’t they worth a little extra time?
And, as a woman who has been lucky enough not to have suffered a sexual assault, I can “categorically” say that I would never falsely accuse someone of sexual assault. Why would I put my reputation as an honest person on the line? Even if I hated someone and didn’t think they belonged on the Supreme Court I wouldn’t do it. It is a tiny minority of women who would be willing to do that. The false idea that women lie about sexual assault as much as men do is asserted by men who have no respect for women. Dr. Blasey Ford’s allegation should be investigated.
And I’m certainly tired of the “it’s unfair to Kavanaugh” line. There is rarely ever evidence of a sexual assault. That is why it is still so common. You want unfair? Perhaps after thousands of years of society always believing the man over the woman when she was beaten up, raped, or assaulted, we should just turn the tables. I’d settle for about 500 years of automatically believing the woman instead of the man. If men truly feared being clapped in prison simply based on a woman’s testimony I bet we’d see the rates of sexual assault drop pretty quickly.
13
There’s been quite a lot of ends justifying the means going on in the Senate over the last few years. I hope that the short sightedness of this doctrine comes home to roost on McConnell’s head this November. Refusing to confirm the opposition party’s judges, and now jamming through his own without giving an adequate examination may pay dividends in the short term, but I tend to think that in the long term it won’t be worth it.
4
Many people are acting as if Kavanaugh is on trial. He's not. This is a job interview. There are lots of other qualified applicants for the position of Supreme Court justice. Kavanaugh would best serve himself, his family and his country by withdrawing his name. No one is insisting he be fired from his current job.
6
If Brett Kavanaugh is such a sterling character, his credentials should speak for themselves, and he should be confirmed with little opposition. Instead, dark money special interest groups are spending millions on an campaigns for him, turning a serious decision into a political circus and indicating that he is not really qualified.
The allegations made by Christine Blasey Ford, if true, relate to Kavanaugh's recent effort to use his judicial position to prevent the 17 year old immigrant from obtaining an abortion. In both cases, he was willing to inflict pain on a powerless girl in pursuit of his personal desires. This is not a beneficial attribute for a judge.
Kavanaugh's hiring of female law clerks may not be at all altruistic. Reports that he desires a certain look suggest that he may enjoy the eye candy. Also, given that he can make or break their careers, he is building up a contingent of women who will vouch for his character - or else. Once again, whom would people believe, the powerful man or the powerless woman?
7
Politics aside , this situation drives the need for individual to national education and awareness of both sexual violence and binge/blackout drinking ... both as individual issues and taken together . What are the facts and dynamics involved in both ? How do we accurately educate and inform ourselves , institutions and nation ? What solutions , driven by respected research , exist ? May not be sexy , just effective !
If we listened only to the mainstream press, we might think that women are the only people that matter when it comes to electoral politics. Unfortunately for them, the men do count also, and comprise a major portion of all voters out there, so what do they think? Whatever their politics, how do they think about an attempt to scuttle someone at the height of their career based on nothing more than half-remembered events from over three decades ago? If this attempt succeeds, how will this affect everyone's professional careers going forward? Will a person's work to advance themselves be open to destruction based on a single individual's accusations based not on facts, but on simple workplace animosities? There is more than one angle to the story of Blasey vs. Kavanaugh, and it would be nice to see the press address all of them.
It's amazing, but we really do live in in amazing times. It's good in a sense that we're moving beyond the pablum of which celebrity behaved badly one night, to important issues for the nation, but this one's as troubling as some of the others. Jude Kavanaugh may well be innocent, but this isn't a criminal trial. It's a job interview, for perhaps the most important job in the nation, and in a job interview - particularly this one - any reasonable doubt is sufficient.
8
@Tansu Otunbayeva
"Reasonable" = supported by evidence, including sworn testimony of witnesses or other corroborating evidence.
Dr Blasey has put forth no evidence whatsoever.
No corroborating testimony.
No details of where or when.
The alleged witnesses contradict her story.
And now a friend of hers - a sympathetic witness, who was married to Bob Becker, a top Democratic Party official in DC - has contradicted her story and said that she, the friend, doesn't even know the accused.
It is not at all unreasonable to believe that the accused is telling the truth.
The only way to side with the accuser is to throw away our presumption of innocence and all standards of fairness and due process.
Is the desired political outcome here worth destroying the bedrock principle of our democracy and our Constitution, of our freedoms as Americans?
Is it worth it?
1
This should not be turned into a political debate. He is being considered for a LIFE TIME appointment to the highest court in the land. He should be above reproach. If there is even a hint of impropriety, then he should not be confirmed. It's that easy. It's bad enough we have a president who is questionable (to say the least) with regard to women's rights, we do not need more in positions of power. I was not a fan of Mrs. Clinton but if we could go back in time, I would surely vote for her today just to keep Trump and his cronies out.
9
Let's for the moment and argument's sake, give Brett a robust dose of tailor benefitted doubt. Let's imagine and Dr. Law may have attended a teen party where he possibly became so blind drunk sotted, as to truly have no recall of events which may or may not have ensued. Psychologists tell us this is not impossible under such circumstances.
We know this hearing will not provide additional witnesses including a damaging alleged eyewitness, expert or experiential testimony such as by the FBI, assault survivors and psychologists, and one-sidedly eliminates important sensitive questioning by the Senators themselves. It's essentially devolved to an arguably "he said she said" popularity contest.
Even if impossible to determine to any degree of assurance who's more probably not lying and either, both or but one is possibly involuntarily disillusioned by other factors, is Kavanaugh, with a dubious history of truthtelling under oath still a viable candidate as a potential justice for our nation's Supreme Court, even under these extremely generous circumstances?
Allowing for all included as so generously imagined, I would absolutely not want to go to my grave having established as familial legacy my having been a party to greenlighting any so tainted an appointment.
I'm an older white male who imagines most women would not either.
4
I hope the Senate Judiciary Committee gets beyond a “he’s the one – it couldn’t be me” battle of asserted memories. As grave as the alleged drunken assault is, I’m struck by a degree of public persistence by Judge Kavanaugh, displaying in more recent, sober public remarks a kind of frat-boy privilege about his past and the plight of less fortunate women. His remarks in the last few years at two law schools that “what happened at” his prep school or law school should “stay there” at the very least sets a poor example for a Federal judge. In dissenting against permitting a teenage immigrant to get an abortion, he offered support to anti-abortion advocates, when silence in a losing cause would have been more decent to the petitioner. A privileged private-school, inside-the-Beltway background should not automatically bar a lifetime, pivotal Supreme Court seat. However, the continuing shadow of Kavanaugh’s privilege – in the old-fashioned socio-economic sense without reference to race or gender – suggests he is willing to dismiss the rights not only of less fortunate women, but also of other Americans, including those seeking: to be represented by unions at the workplace and in the public square; to vote without discriminatory restrictions or being packed by political party affiliation into legislative districts that dilute their votes and smother their legislative voice; and access to affordable healthcare without the return of the preexisting conditions barrier
6
This brings to focus the obsession of anti-abortionists, who have never relented in their effort to overturn Roe vs. Wade, and the same dogged determination by conservatives to roll back the New Deal. While many women were motivated and mobilized to come out against Trump, and their protests garnered much attention, conservatives - including conservative women - were continuing their behind the scenes efforts at setting in place the siege engines to break down what has been considered accepted law. It will take more than outspoken rage, commentary, and public marches for women to achieve their ultimate goal of full equality. It will take single-minded focus, over decades, using every tool and tactic, as the conservatives have used, never ceasing in pursuit of their objective.
Women have come a long way, but the fact that 13 states - almost all of them former Confederate states - have not yet voted to adopt the ERA, leaving it one short of the 38 required to ratify it, is clear evidence that the fight for equality is not yet won. To win it women are going to need to increase their efforts at education and winning legislative power in these 13 backward looking states. This is something that won't change overnight, or because of some high profile rallies or protests.
So many women have fought so long and courageously, and while they've won great gains, these are too often taken for granted. Maybe this Kavanaugh battle can be the Concord and Lexington for full equality.
9
An equally critical issue brought to center stage is that of binge drinking , period , but especially among teens . It’s also termed blackout drinking , which is too often glorified yet can have the kind of consequences we’re hearing about now. Binge drinking that’s episodic in an ongoing pattern is an addiction and demands our attention as individuals and as a nation . Let’s glean critical wisdom flowing from this deeply unfortunate and tragic episode by tackling both binge drinking and the tragic violence , sexual and/or otherwise , regardless , with research based education and treatment all around ... individually and nationally . #ASANation
1
By most accounts, Mr. Kavanaugh has been an excellent and highly regarded Judge. I pay very little heed to what happened 36 years ago when he was 17.
1
Alas this has less to do with what happened years ago than with how the GOP is willing to use any tactic to bully its way into power no matter who gets hurt or how it undermines our Democracy and those qualities that truly made America great. Kavanaugh is a flawed candidate by his willingness to lie and financial debts that make him open to further corruption. Imagine if he had said, "I have no memory of assaulting Christine, but if I did at one of the drunken parties, I want to know and make amends to her. How can we find out? We would all be applauding him and want him on the highest court. Sumter Coleman
1
@Shanalat
yes, he has intelligence and skill but beyond that the regard stops by many at the substance of his past decisions. Are you absolutely sure you want Roe v wade over turned. Are you sure you agree a President , any President, can not even be investigated for wrong doing. Do you support his increased powers for corporations over wages , pollution, product liability. Do you support his attempt by delay and force imprisonment to have state power over a women's body? Does this later one remind you of a younger self forcibly laying on a women with his hand over her mouth so she cant scream?
6
I have so much gratitude for Dr. Blasey coming forward and for all the women and men in the comments on these articles who have stepped forward and finally divulged the secret they have been harboring for years because they thought they were alone. It took me 50 years to divulge my secret to friends and family. I am no longer alone. The normalization of telling about the experience is a first and important step toward ending the feeling of helplessness on the part of the victims and this behavior on the part of the perpetrators.
29
In 2016, Mitch McConnell set the standard on how to proceed with this controversy over the Kavanaugh nomination when he decided to"Let the voters decide" on the Garland nomination.
Time to once again apply that standard -- "Let the Voters" decide the Kavanaugh nomination in the 2018 election -- after all this is their country, isn't it. If they give Republicans continued control of the Senate, Kavanaugh will be approved. If Democrats take control, he will be disapproved.
If the McConnell standard was good enough in 2016, it should be good enough in 2018.
104
@Pat Choate. Let the voters decide.
1
@Pat Choate The rule applies, if only it
suits him.
Note to Rebecca Hamelin: Sen. Fenstein’s reason for for withholding Dr. Blasey’s letter was not to further the left’s agenda, but to keep her word to Dr. Blasey of not going public before Blasey was ready. I can’t think of a more admirable reason!
69
As far as I’m concerned, men like Trump, Grassley, Hatch, and McConnell have already damaged the GOP with their insensitive remarks re: Dr. Ford’s allegations and the certainty of Kavanaugh’s appointment. The “collective” GOP” is too stupid or too arrogant to see how the tide is changing. By dismissing Dr. Ford outright, they cement the caricature of a group of largely old, white men seriously out of touch with the present.
Dr. Ford’s testimony will only add to this GOP caricature, giving it more color (white). And what does she have to gain, and at what expense? I don’t doubt her for a moment. And If I were Kavanaugh, I’d be standing on a table screaming for an investigation with a sleeve rolled up and ready for a polygraph test.
And yet he’s done none of those things. Decide for yourself about who is telling the truth here. For me, it’s very clear.
72
@Hey Joe: It doesn't matter. When the courts are packed with "Federalist Society" dyslexics, they'll be useless to everyone and the litigants with the deepest pockets will dictate settlements after decades of aimless litigation.
4
Kavanaugh is damaged goods whatever the outcome of the torture the GOP plans to dole out on Blasey—and they will. He has lost all honor and should get while the getting is good! If he is such a fine person why did he tangle himself in the Trump cabal in the first place??
61
@Grandma
He has not "lost [his] honor."
He has been accused, 36 years later, of an assault which he categorically and firmly denies and will deny under oath.
That accusation is completely unsupported by any evidence or any corroborating testimony whatsoever. None.
The accuser's story is full of contradictions and lacks any specifics as to place and time.
Those alleged by the accuser to have been present have each denied any recollection of this alleged incident.
And now, a woman who is a friend of the accuser and who was married to a senior Democratic Party official, has come forth to not only deny the incident happened but that she ever even knew the accused.
And the accuser's high-powered partisan lawyers have the gall to demand that the accused testify BEFORE he even has a chance to hear the accusations against him.
Again: I don't support either Kavanaugh or the current president, but this process is a disgrace.
We cannot - must not - allow people opposed to Kavanaugh to create a star chamber.
What country are we living in?
To those who support this travesty: What will you say and what will you do when these tactics are turned against candidates and nominees whom our side favors?
What will you do when the Republicans adopt your MeToo McCarthyism and produce GOP women accusers alleging, without evidence, that a Democratic candidate for Senate - say, in Texas or Florida - assaulted them 10, 15, 20 years ago?
Destroy due process, and reap the whirlwind.
2
@Grandma Trump sullies everyone who has any dealings with him.
@Grandma: There is no way this experience won't spoil this brat even worse than he is already.
It is now much more about women's rights, women's health and abortion rights. Simply cannot believe I have been fighting this fight for 50 years! I would like R. Hagelin & Penny Nance to explain their caring/providing plan for these unwanted pregnancies. No plan..just guilt. As I said in my 20's..50 years ago..keep your laws off my body! I dearly hope we can return to any rational behavior & thought concerning just about everything..but most importantly a female's right to steer her destiny.
41
For years the CIA, has overthrown governments by orchestrating grass roots movements of protest, riots. The crown jewel was their removal of the Soviet Union. This is payback from Russia. The USA is destabilized and it’s constitution and institutions are being revealed to the world as weak. The next step for Putin’s intelligence machine will be to influence even more discord and turmoil and the protests will take to the streets. The curtain of invincibility has been removed, America’s institutions are becoming frail. What is currently going on in the shadows, is much bigger than 30 percent of American voters, made up of angry, ignorant white men, dupes , ultimately being manipulated by Russian intelligence.
12
This is once in a life time opportunity for women to define the future of daughters of this country. The white male senators must get the message that a NO means a NO. Kavanagh shut her mouth than and should not be allowed again.
37
We all knew, it was a matter of time, before Trump starts to spewing and tweeting unkind allegations about Dr. Ford and why she didn’t report it 30 years ago. Or some lowlife congressmen making fun of her, or Mitch McConnell, saying regardless of what happens, he is going to plow through it, meaning the confirmation of Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. These are the upstanding characters who are running this country. Are they stupid or what, how many 15 year old girls reported being sexually abused 30 or 40 years ago? Dr. Ford was a child and probably, the first question they would have asked her was how did you behave to make him do that to you? Now, she is an educated adult who feels a sense of responsibility to speak up, considering Kavanaugh’s position on the Supreme Court, and what it means for women at large, and Russia investigation.
I’m proud of her for coming forward, but her life will never be the same.
103
@BB I whole heartedly agree with you. Sexual assault at any age is trauma and every victim struggles to come forward. Let her voice be heard and her is any woman who has been sexually assaulted, no matter the timeline.
5
“They further discredit the entire #MeToo movement if they take down an innocent man,” said Ms. Hagelin, a former vice president of the Heritage Foundation. “If the nomination goes through, it will be a victory for anybody who has ever been falsely charged with some sexual abuse accusation.”
I don't understand how Judge Kavanaugh's nomination would be "a victory for anybody who has ever been falsely charged with some sexual abuse accusation.”
You will have eleven male Republican U,S. Senators saying that they believe Judge Kavanaugh and voting to confirm his nomination and ten Democrat U.S. Senators, including four female U.S. Senators, saying that they believe Professor Christine Blasey Ford and voting to reject his nomination.
The claim is made that this would be "a victory for anybody who has ever been falsely charged with some sexual abuse accusation.” By what standard of logic could this possibly be true?
17
I personally know two women who were sexually assaulted 40 plus years ago. I am as close to them as I am to anyone in their networks of family and friends and have been so for decades. Yet each revealed these traumatic events to me only decades after they happened. I have known and been close to one of the victims her entire life! Sadly I bet millions more Americans can say the same thing. Victims tend to stay silent about these events for many reasons. Questioning their validity because they sometimes wait years to come forward is ignorant and insensitive at best. I believe the Times should cover this aspect of sexual assault far more. #whyvictimswaittotell
58
@Mike Alexander
I am one of those who did not report to any family members. But opened up to my husband about 40 years later, who really did not understand what I was talking about. I wish my counselor friend was still alive to listen to my story, the reality I went through as a 8 or 9 year old. Can you believe I do not even remember how old I was when it happened! My molester is part of my extended family. In a way I was forced to have social relationship with his family. Gradually I was able to push myself away from his family. My family still do not know what happened. I guess I should visit a therapist at this age of 68. But I feel that I am a strong person and can handle myself well in front of his family. I guess I am letting go of molester without punishment.
4
The trouble, PR, is one that no child, or traumatized victim, is likely to be able to recognize clearly, and that is that because of the silence, the perpetrator is enabled to go on molesting other victims. For years, and how many? Many. If one would come forward, if two or three, the red flags would go up, and there would be vigilance, or even accountability, and justice, it may be. But without the truth, only the molester wins. It's more than his getting off from what he did to you. It's his getting off what he did to many.
3
"Our reporters traced the major plotlines of the [Russian effort to hack our election], and it’s clear: The Russians carried out a landmark intervention that will be examined for decades to come. Well-connected Russians worked aggressively to recruit or influence people inside the Trump campaign."
-- Today's NYT
Welcome to our "Fake" President".
22
What do the Republicans have to be proud of after Mitch McConnell rams through Kavanaugh's nomination, which you know he will? Two sex abusers, Kavanaugh and Thomas, and one stolen seat, Gorsuch on the Supreme Court. That's what the party of Lincoln has become.
76
@Ron: God's Select Little Pet Goldfish, all there as if by magic.
1
This is a pathetic last ditch attempt by the Democrats to bring down a good man to score political points with women. The women fighting back, or #MeToo, appear weak and hysterical, totally lacking in critical thinking skills. 36 years after the fact, Dr. Ford has a revelation about a party that she cannot remember who was there, how she got there or how she got home. Her alleged four key witnesses, say they were not there. This unfounded attack is not even willing to be verified by Dr. Ford who has numerous excuses for not being willing to testify, including she cannot fly for a Monday hearing but maybe for a Thursday hearing. Whatever your polls show, this slanderous attack on an upstanding candidate for judge will backfire in a very bad way for Democrats.
5
@Sue Mee Nope, it won't backfire. Because there are way too many women (and men) who have experienced something like this, kept it silent, lived in shame and pain, and never forgot. You can slander Dr. Ford all you want (and you will, and you are) but you and I both know that what she is doing is brave and shows an impeachable dedication to the values of this country.
Are't you tired of sex offenders being the face of your party?
7
Or perhaps not. You’re making some very large assumptions considering you were not there.
1
@Sue Mee The committee should request an FBI investigation and the release of ALL documents currently withheld.
Did Kav or did he not lie at least three times under oath at his hearings?
18
Millionaire white male senators have learned nothing since Anita Hill, because they don’t have to - they make, interpret and twist the law to suit their soulless quest for power. Not a statesman among them. And even if voted out after this debacle, they retire in style.
32
@kat perkins It's not that they haven't learned. They knew who Thomas was, they knew who Trump was, they know who Kavanaugh is.
3
Just looking at the picture of Kavanaugh with his wife , two daughters and the President who openly admits to touching women inappropriately makes me ill. What is wrong with men who molest women, then think they can get away with it, by blaming the victim. I would ask what would either of these two men, (I use the term loosely) what would think if someone molested their wives, or daughters, but given their misogynistic views, they probably wouldn't care. Worse yet, are all of the religious right's fanatical devotion to these two. Right wing hypocrisy at its worst!
20
Republican men cannot seem to grasp two things.
First, undergoing a sexual assault is an existential experience that is hard for anyone who hasn't been assaulted to fully understand. Especially if you are a girl or woman, the assault is a message of the worthlessness of who you are––you are inconsequential, disposable precisely because you are female.
Second, they seem either ignorant or indifferent to the reality of just how *many* women have had this experience.
For political reasons if nothing else, Republicans ought to take off the blinders and learn how their jokes, dismissals, and denials are going to sound to millions and millions of people.
32
Any man who forcibly covers with his hand a woman's mouth to prevent her from talking, speaking, and / or screaming is not fit to work with other human beings, let alone serve as a jurist.
No wonder Kavanaugh has spent his adult life treating women with kid gloves. He knew that one day, his drunken antics would come back to haunt him.
29
If Judge Kavanaugh is innocent as he claims, why isn't he calling for his accuser to be given a fair opportunity to share her experience? That would remove the lingering stench that his appointment without a fair hearing will leave, a stench that will last a lifetime as it has for Justice Thomas. For his part, his present denials lack sufficient credibility to the point that he could be disqualifying himself for misrepresenting the apparent truth: he partied with his privileged Georgetown Prep classmates on a regular basis, and may have acted as claimed, but he did not rape her and has no memory of that evening.
16
@Q I’m continually amazed at the number of people who confuse her testimonials with verifiable facts. What makes her accusations more factual than his denials?
I’m more than interested in actual facts which can corroborate her narrative. And not merely circumstantial evidence surrounding the nature of 1980s DC area private school social life, the repressive nature of sexual assault psychology generally or the fact that she shared a similar uncorroboated story with a therapist.
Believing her story isn’t the same as proving her story. Accusations aren’t facts and must bear the same scrutiny and standards of skepticism as denials.
It blows me away how many people simply grant her accusations the status of truth simply because they want to believe them yet simultaneously accuse Kavanaugh of lying for similar flimsy reasons.
2
Is Dr. Ford a coward? Anita Hill had the courage to testify under oath to the Senate Judiciary Committee but I'll bet Dr. Ford doesn't.
3
@Paula
She's already agreed to testify. What is your point? And considering what happened to Anita Hill, just writing the letter to Feinstein took more bravery than most of us can claim for ourselves.
6
@Paula I've found that actually reading the story is often illuminating.
4
Hasn't she already agreed to testify this next Thursday?
6
Kavanaugh lied under oath several times. That alone should disqualify him for any position on any court. Then the majority his records were not released which I found very peculiar. The public has a right to know everything about him. This is a life time appointment on the highest court in the land. Then I watched the hearings and he avoided answering many pertinent questions that we all had a right to know. Now it comes out he is being accused of attempted rape. We find out that he was working with a corrupt lawyer to put a story out that it was someone else who tried to rape that girl and not Kavanaugh. Then we find out that the new guy they are accusing is a lie. The woman knows Kavanaugh and says there was no mistaken identity. I mean, c'mon, the guy is not fit to serve on the scotus. The republicans are so drunk with power they are making awful decisions that are the country is disgusted with. They will pay a very high price in the upcoming midterms this November. If they don't think women are going to come out in droves to vote, they are sadly mistaken. See what happened after the Anita Hill hearing to republicans. This will be much worse. People have had it with the corruption.
41
@kay I wonder why his confirmation is not being fought based on him lying under oath, for which there seems to be considerable (and recent) evidence. Instead, the democrats are banking on as-of-yet unproven allegations that, given his position as a judge, are arguably less relevant. This Supreme Court nomination is one of the most important things to happen in decades and will have effects for many years to come, but the democrats appear to be making a purely political, rather than an evidence-backed legal, play.
2
"Among women, just 28 percent supported Judge Kavanaugh while 42 percent were opposed, including half of college-educated women"...
It is very sad that, in 21st c., US women are still sidelined and ignored. Globally, US sets example and shows leadership. Every other day we read about women in rural India being raped, killed, with little or no consequence. Also, in Africa and other third world countries. Yet, here, in the most modern, democratic nation, women are still not respected. The hearing for Kavanaugh reflects same. The hearing is a travesty of fairness. Bunch of old guys trying to railroad him thru for GOP platform. Why not drop him, and find another jurist more representative of US values of equality? Vote the bums out!
15
Pretty sure the President misplaced his smart phone or one of the “good guys” in the WH stole it from him. That was too long without a Twitter storm. I don’t believe this President has that kind of self will. Question. When does 45 = 25? Then Donald Trump the 45th President comes face to face with the 25th Amendment. Tic tic tic tic.
1
The Republican party is the party of monied privilege, most of whom are men. The visceral contempt many women feel for male sexual abuse may also help other abuses by money.
12
Our nation must now decide whether “all men are created equal” (in a document signed by all men, land-owning men, the only ones allowed to vote in the Constitution as originally written) OR “ALL mean and women, high and low born, important or unimportant, powerful or weak, rich or poor, young or old, citizens or not, etc. are created equal, equal under the law, in need of EQUAL JUSTICE under the law, protected by the law, viewed as having control of their own bodies - under the law.
Rape, even attempted rape, especially attempted rape in a locked room with an onlooking accomplice, ROBS A WOMAN of control over her own body.
The question of abortion is the question of rape. And a man who refuses to allow even one abortion (and we know he has) is now accused of refusing to allow NO to forced sexual contact.
Imagine: an act that could have led to pregnancy, is denied by a man said to be highly, highly intoxicated at the time. Would he have supported a young woman’s ability to make her decision, had he succeeded in his assault and left her pregnant?
The moral and ethical issues here are magnified by a GOP minority bent on imposing its christo-fascist will upon a nation that began with these words: “All men are created equal.” The meaning of those words was limited - limited! - at the time they were written. And they are limited still!
I believe Professor Ford!
17
The female republican senators are the worst of the bunch. They are the ones who need to be sacked and replaced if they vote along party lines instead of standing up for due process and the integrity of our system of government.
37
@Southern Gal why hold the female senators to a higher standard? Due process and integrity in government is basic decency, and is everyone's responsibility regardless of gender or political party.
2
Dr. Blasey is her correct name. It's weird that in a week of reporting, this it the first time, I've seen her named correctly.
The GOP has demanded that she do a basic she said, he said with her requests ignored: no FBI investigation and no public testimony by the witness/accomplice Mark Judge
4
The FBI is not authorized to investigate alleged disputes between adolescents.
1
Shanalat, it is authorized to do background instigations of persons seeking government employment, especially for high office. Including for perjury regarding past events. Attempts to minimize this crucial matter fool no one.
4
And belatedly, Congressional Republicans clinch and say, "Oh, is our treatment of Dr. Ford backfiring on us?" Every woman who has been sexually assaulted and kept silent precisely because they feared being treated like Dr. Ford is being treated will bring that to the ballot box in November.
36
The Gender Over People party will ram this nomination down the throats of women. The message is clear. Vote.
14
If Kavanaugh is confirmed, every single day for the rest if his life millions of abuse survivors in American will wake up every day with the knowledge that they were severely let down by the GOP.
15
I am 68 years old. This case has made me reflect back on my 17 year old self.
I had strong sexual urges toward women when I was 17. I am certain that I was guilty of sexual misconduct at that age. Probably the only thing that protected me against having committed sexual assault when I was 17 was, that at the time, I found women (okay, girls) to be strange and perplexing and a lot more than a little frightening.
I am now very sorry for any sexual misconduct I had committed at that time. My only excuse is that I was just an inexperienced, naive kid.
Judge Kavanaugh, why would you presume to have a position of moral superiority on this matter?
7
@DK
If indeed Judge Kavanaugh, explained what you just did, and offered a truthful apology his character might be understood in a different light. That he continually lies about the impossibility of such an occurrence points to the real flaw in his character.
1
@DK@ 17 attempting to find out if a girl is interested in sex typically didn't happen through a poem recital or starlight stroll with conversation. As you put it naiveté ruled. Many if not all boys simply had "stray hands". If the girl allowed you to continue then it was likely that you did. However if she said no or stopped you- then you stopped. This, if anything is what happened. Kavanaugh isn't saying he has the moral high ground.'
1
It seems that #MeToo's effect on the polis and Mao's Cultural Revolution in China have a lot in common--mob mentally moving about like random wind, rain, and floods--nothing rational about it.
2
@Alice's Restaurant, your false analogy is a logical fallacy and so your implied claim to "rational" thought more than a bit ironic.
1
@jb
Big surprise, as you learned in your Philosophy 1A course as a freshman--All analogies are false but are used to illustrate a point, some are better than others.
Without question the #MeToo mob is hardly rational--point of fact, belief in Ford (sounds Huxley, doesn't it) without evidence or corroboration. A leap of faith, as in God, one might say.
We can "believe" the earth is at the center of the cosmos if we wish, as we once did, in fact, but was that rational or just group-think--the mob--at the time?
If Kavanaugh has a shred of decency; if his ambition has not overruled his common sense; and if he can resist being swept along by a tidal wave of right wing money and 'conservative' influence peddling by the NRA, the 'Christian' right, the Federalist Society and their ilk --
He should now take a deep, cleansing breath, take stock of his situation, and withdraw his name from consideration. For the good of the country, for the sake of his family and his own ability to walk freely in public with his head held high... he needs to step away.
At this point, he will be fortunate if he is able to credibly continue in his position on the Court of Appeals bench. If he is permitted to sit side by side with the already tainted Clarence Thomas on the Supreme Court, the Court surely will be sullied forever.
16
The only point in this affair is to ensure, by any and all legal means, that Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination sufferthe same fate as that of his predecessor nominee.
3
Kavanaugh is tainted on too many levels to be a SC justice . Between the sex assault, who paid his debts off and the lying about emails on prior confirmation hearings he just has too many negatives. Why are Republicans fighting so hard for this guy when there are other quality candidates.
19
Do any of these Republican lawmakers have wives or daughters? They must...Yet, their boorish behavior would evidence no female influence in their households. I would be sleeping on the front lawn if I made any semblance of the comments GOP representatives made this weekend---
9
My mother watched as my father, laughing, forcibly took off my clothes and let me run away in shame to my bedroom. She never tried to stop in nor in any way ever referred to this incident. She had been hospitalized at the Mayo Clinic for post partum depression and I believe blamed me for it forever after.
She yanked my brother off of me in the back yard as he straddled me, beating me with all the force his 8 year old fists could muster. She towed him back into the house never offering a word of concern for me. My best friend from childhood who was standing next to me yelling at my brother to stop recently confided to me that watching me get beat up to this day was a traumatic event.
One time I confronted my parents with this event in a letter. Dad berated me and denied ever having raped me. Mom was furious because several weeks later he had another heart attack which she attributed to my letter. My sister-in-law introduced me to someone as "This is Barb, the Trouble-maker."
I earned a MS in Marriage & Family Therapy. It has been useless.
I stood outside the Springfield Capital in Illinois, largely pregnant as a busload of Phyllis Schlafley 5th graders entered the capital bearing loaves of bread. One little girl stepped out of line, looked up at me and asked "You kill babies don't you?"
I have been sick to my stomach my entire life.
15
@Barbara Maier, I am so sorry these things, these people, had that power over you.
And hope you know that so many of us, male and female, are on your side, the side of victims and survivors. You aren't alone, either as a survivor, or as a decent human being. Best wishes, sincerely.
4
@Barbara Maier, I hear you and believe you! It is awful that you had to experience that as a child from those who are supposed to love and care for us. There are a lot of us out here to support the unheard voices. Be well, be safe.
4
Thank you and bless you.
So, would Kavanaugh leave his daughters alone in a room with Trump? I'm sure Trump wouldn't leave his grown daughters or his wife alone with Brett.
7
No one should be surprised about Republican trickery and subterfuge to ensure that Kavanaugh is elevated to the Supreme Court. These are the people, after all, who looked the other way despite the fact that their chosen candidate for the highest elective office in the country was a serial, sexual predator, amongst a long list of other serious character deficiencies. Now they are willing to compromise, essentially lose, yet another piece of their morality again, this time setting aside a credible account of attempted rape which they viciously attempt to discredit and bury. The question now is do these people possess any moral compass whatsoever? The Trump Republican Party will certainly be cast as the most ethically bankrupt in our national history. And to think that the Mueller Investigation has not even completed its important work.
12
Trump and Trump's White House legal advisors did not check Kavanaugh's personal history and his private life experience? They just checked his legal career? Trump made the final decision based on what? Because he is a Catholic and an expert on law? Because he has been a Federal judge for many years? Now the nomination became a soap opera. A sex scandal. What kind of president we have now in the White House? We are living in a dangerous world with a careless president.
11
@Mclean4 No, because he is on record saying a sitting president cannot be indicted. That is Trump's only hope of not going to jail
3
@Mclean4
Sex scandals are nothing new to the President, he is handling his own just fine, thank you. It would never occur to him check a nominees personal life.
After all, he still refers to all those in his entourage under indictment as "good men".
2
There is now substantial written evidence that both Judge and Kavanaugh had extremely serious abuse of alcohol problems when
Dr. Ford encountered them in high school, substantially supporting
Dr. Ford's allegation of their attempt at gang raping her at that time
when Kavanaugh and Judge were drunk.
7
, Representative Kevin Cramer, a Republican challenging Senator Heidi Heitkamp, waved aside Dr. Blasey’s claims in a radio interview on Friday. “They were drunk,” Mr. Cramer said. “Nothing evidently happened in it all, even by her own accusation.”
North Dakota, are you listening. This statement by Kramer basically is saying if a guy does this to a girl it is OK, no big deal. Just put your daughter or your sister in those shoes and see if you are ready just to pat the guy on the back like Kramer is. A vote for someone who feels girls can be abused without consequence would truly be deplorable. I hope voters in that state are better than this.
15
Trump hasn’t just “faced allegations of sexual misconduct.” He has bragged openly of sexual misconduct.
18
If we are looking at the anti abortion movement, let’s look at some of the other ugly bits of it too. We might recall some of them from when Todd Akin stirred up some controversy. We might recall that some don’t believe that rape is legitimate. We might recall statements such as this,
“If a woman has (the right to an abortion), why shouldn’t a man be free to use his superior strength to force himself on a woman? At least the rapist’s pursuit of sexual freedom doesn’t (in most cases) result in anyone’s death.”
Lawrence Lockman M.E. Republican Party.
Women who oppose abortion should be very careful of the company they have been keeping.
9
Think about this. and the headline. A Supreme Court Justice candidate is being scrutinized because of the way he may have assaulted a woman, and the President of the United States not only thinks this is OK but calls the candidate a fine man. The President of the United States even says women are “fighting for” this candidate!
Has this country stooped that far? The United States is that immoral that we are called by this country’s leader to seek the land’s law judge to be a potential woman abuser? This country can’t come up with a better choice out of the millions of people it holds? The so called Christians in this country also think this would be ok?
We’ve been let down. Leaders with no guts to step forward and put this all to a halt hide in their film flam corners. They don’t even want to be the ones to ask questions to the potential victim! They’d rather have strangers to the country’s citizens ask the questions, lawyers they choose, who have never needed to be elected, a protection of their spineless souls!
We’ve lived the disgusting since Donald Trump took over previous grit of this country. He’s been determined to undermine education with Betsy DeVos, the woman with no college degree in education. He’s tried to throw healthcare under the bus, save for John McCain, now gone. He’s begun to toxify our grandchildren’s environment, deregulating promises to their health and safety.
And now he chooses a fellow potential groper to lay the law of our land?
12
How USA has exposed itself to the world, hiding in it's plain bigotry. No women's rights over their own bodies. Why do the Conservatives think they, especially men that they have a say on women's bodies. Not only the women have a no say on their bodies, in spite of being victims in sexual assault cases, they are blamed and the men in privilege make sure these women can not be heard. Even worse is, they are women who support these men with evil intentions, and have propelled a sexual predator who has no clue about governing, as the President, just because they believe in the rights of the fetus, when women are burning in shame for life for no fault of theirs. All these men women made sure Clinton, the very first candidate to talk about reproductive rights of women is never made the President. What an irony. In spite of all this, #Metoo movement, LGBT communities are swimming against the currents and gaining. I hope Dr Ford gets her fair trail unlike Dr Hill whose testimony did not matter to the male dominated senate, with even Democrats siding the Republicans and confirming a sexual predator to the Judicial System, the last and final say about human rights.
8
I agree with reader, Tad. This stinks in every way. I have always had a lot of respect for Dianne Feinstein but this releasing of the letter at the last minute isn’t cool. She has sunk to low levels of ugly partisanship. And Kavanaugh’s reputation is ruined. This woman is referencing something from high school she can’t even fully remember. I’m a democrat but it all stinks. I’m tired. I’m really tired. Politics is wearing on me.Trump every day. Australia is sounding good
No fifteen year old girl in the early 1980's had a fighting chance of being believed if reporting sexual assault.
She would have been blamed, and destroyed.
There was a reason Dr. Blasey didn't report the assault as a 15 year old.
Fast forward to 2018. A fifteen year old girl has, depending on the state and county where she lives, and her socioeconomic class. maybe a 70% chance of being believed.
And she will still be blamed. But she is somewhat less likely to be mentally and emotionally destroyed.
Amazing progress over 35 years, isn't it?
September 25 is National Register to Vote day. Is your registration up to date with a correct address? Do it now.
15
@Myrasgrandotter I was assaulted when I was 13, by a man who appeared to be in his 20's, while I was at a friend's house. I managed to escape and told my parents. They shamed and beat me and did not report the incident to the police. I was forbidden to discuss it further.
"who would be a potentially decisive vote on litigation over women’s rights — including the right to terminate a pregnancy."
If some people think that making abortion illegal again will put an end to women terminating an unwanted pregnancy is mind boggling.
The women with the means will always find a way for a safe abortion while women without will end up at the mercy of butchers.
7
It's one thing to be on the wrong side of history, but it's entirely another for the Christian Right to be on the wrong side of their own book.
One of the most powerful and understated stories in the entire Bible, a small, shining jewel of counter-intuitive and revealing light is the masterful story of the woman caught in the act of adultery.
So a woman is dragged by the legalistic authorities forcibly and publicly in front of Jesus by men with angry eyes and rocks close to hand. A murderous threat is palpable in the air all around. With righteous outrage the men insist that Jesus himself must help in the condemnation (and stoning) of *this* woman caught in the very act of adultery.
(Uh, so where was the man then??)
Jesus simply refuses to follow the expected line of outrage, ownership, and violent condemnation, the one where SHE must be punished for such unregulated sex.
Yet into this never-ending, infinitely-repeated proverbial scene, Jesus injects truth and tender care for the wronged one, the powerless one (nearly always a woman). "He who has no sin throw the first stone". And after the accusers have the small grace to slink away in confusion, metaphorical(?) rocks in hand, the nameless woman is left standing alone with Jesus, who with quiet compassion invites her to depart and live well with his lingering benediction.
If only those who fiercely claim this book for their tribal possession would read it for what it says rather than what they wish it to say.
19
"We have no knowledge of his behavior."
A denial algorithm produces that sentence automatically and in every language used in countries where there is a free press, and "men will be men, boys will be boys."
Here in Sweden a trial is now being held on a man charged with rape, a man referred to as "kulturprofilen", born in France, joint owner along with his wife, a member of the Swedish Academy (think Nobel Prize in Literature), of a "culture club" where Academy members hung out.
He was reported long ago in a letter to the head of the Academy. The then head dismissed the letter as unimportant. 18 women were interviewed by a Dagens Nyheter reporter about their experience of sexual harassment and worse. Male Academy members, admirers of profilen, said "we have no knowledge of such behavior." Same for profilen himself, "not once did I ever do any such thing." Same for his wife, not him, not my man.
Such universal denial statements are simply meaningless. Only in a court of law, if there, is there a chance of learning bits of the truth.
Must every woman wear a wire? It seems so.
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
Citizen US SE
9
According to many accounts and Kavanaugh's own hand , he drank a lot. Not once in a while, but a lot, To excess. He was the TREASURER of a "club" that sought to drink 100 kegs before the end of high school. And the drinking didn't stop there. It happened in law school as well. And likely in between . The "witness" he was pictured with can't remember a lot of what he did back then. People that drink that much usually engage in other anti social behavior as well like drinking and driving and destruction of property. What bothers me is the depiction that the Kavanaugh now was the guy back then, that maybe he partied a little. Kind of like he smoked a little pot in college. The guy back then, by any current standards, was an alcoholic. I know. I was like that back then. I haven't had a drink in about 33 years. And I know I did a lot of things then I am ashamed of. But to imply that the person I am now is the guy I was then is 100% false. I am responsible for it. The same is true of Kavanaugh. Let's look at the big picture: He is a changed man....today. But the Kavanaugh of 35 years ago is likely to have done things like what he is accused of... well as other things. To come to that conclusion, you have to be able to see him like he was back then. I can. He pulled it together. But he is 100% responsible for everything he did back then. He may not remember a lot of it. But someone does. Who to believe? Trying to black it out memory? Or blackout memory?
7
The first words out of the mouth of Penny Nance refer to the millions of dollars spent. Are we to conclude that because millions were spent, therefore the nominee must be confirmed? And then we read Rebecca Hagelin referring to Kavanaugh as the innocent man. It appears that she has already concluded, before any testimony has been given, that the accuser is lying.
These two women offer a very warped view of how the American legal system is supposed to work. No thanks, ladies.
8
@Tom Q. These 'church ladies' who want to force their archaic worldview on all women, revolt me.
Trump and Kavanaugh are men cut from the same cloth. They care only to keep their lives on a track where they need not pay for their past grievances, no matter what. They'll lie and lie and lie.
Meanwhile, with their consciences tied in knots, they both exude this something, this attribute they're hiding something.
Trump's been shoveling money at his victims for decades. He's got accountants creating avenues where he's gotten the money laundered for years.
Kavanaugh's simply been betting against time, just waiting it out, believing what he did he may regret but at the end of the day it was stuff lots of guy do. He commited drunken, teenage stuff that was wrong, maybe, but wasn't 'that' bad.
All the while, all these years, hoping no one would ever come forward and accuse him of his wrongdoings. Well, apparently he wanted too much, reached for a a brass ring a bit too far.
And while hoping the worst he'd have to endure would be the night he violated a 15 year old girl simply becoming a regret he'd take to his grave, he hadn't given enough credence to the notion the the day might come when that same 15 yr. old would become a woman, an adult who'd spent her life wrestling with what happened to her-what he did to her-would eventually gather her courage, stand before him in the here and now looking for justice.
9
Trump only feels comfortable with ethically challenged men. Period. That's his milieu because he can't deal with the strain of faking decency and humaneness. It is inevitable that many of his picks and associates will continually test/eat way at, the boundaries of healthy societal norms, as at the start of the Third Reich in the thirties. Talk about a cancer! They will systematically chip away at the rights of those groups they consider weak. Women included.The Supreme Court is the highest court in the land, and it will become irredeemably corrupt if K. gets in there for life, resulting in a further decline of America into fascism, whether or not Trump is removed from office. We can only hope that the country has learned enough from Anita Hill's suffering to insist that Dr. Blasey's allegations are accorded the serious consideration they deserve. I believe her, and so I believe that while the Thomas confirmation was a travesty, a Kavanaugh confirmation would be a tragedy.
7
What women were "galvanized" by Donald Trump's campaign?
Other than self-loathing ones...
"My place has always been in the kitchen, and, occasionally, being tossed aside for a newer, younger, better looking woman" - As far as I can tell that is Donald Trump's only appeal to women.
For Trump, women are like furniture. Or jewelry. Something to be worn. Good for Melania that she refuses to play that part.
The modern GOP would rather serve a narrative of women as property, than take on their greatest benefactor. Their latest "Sexist In Chief".
Is, "He said he didn't do it" going to be the catchall of the modern GOP? You bet it is!
Republicans have a message to all the women out there, "Know your place".
Food for thought.
8
Mr. Trump is determined to secure his get out of jail card . And the Republicans ? They can barely control their hatred and fear of women combined with lust for power.
12
This is a country of 325,000,000 people. We can find a better, more agreeable, less divisive candidate than Judge Kavanaugh. I mean this guy was essentially James Spader in “Pretty In Pink” during his High School years. A Horatio Alger tale this is not.
Secondly, his female defenders seem to be coming to this whole situation from a position of wounded pride rather than with a respectful appreciation of the lifetime of pain his alleged actions have caused Dr. Blasey. One gets the sense that privilege is the binding code. I certainly felt like the chastised help - a gardener that planted the petunias in the wrong bed - when I saw them take to the airwaves on Friday. Such righteous indignation that one of their “100 Keg Club” members could be accused of such an act!
9
Kavanaugh "boasted that most of his clerks had been women." Now Dean of Law at Yale is investigating how female law students were taught by Yale professors to look like a "model" to be selected by Kavanaugh to serve as law clerks. Sexist anyone?
15
@Pam Farris
This is not true.
The funny thing is the same people that play this off as a teenage indiscretion would have no qualms about trying somebody even younger than Brett was at the time as an adult for something like murder or robbery. In fact, Brett himself would approve of this.
10
@Ben
Very good and real point Ben. The prism has many angles not included in this discussion. Brett should be reminded of his "tried as an adult" perspective when his youth is brought up.
The professional woman I know believe the Judge. She is 36 years
late. Sorry.
So you know 1 professional woman, and you believe her? Impressive.
@Steve
The professional women I know all believe Ford. You may want to cast a wider net on who you know, Steve. As many women go a life-time of 80+ yrs without calling out their abuser, she is 36-years on-time. As for the sorry, what are you sorry about exactly? That many women you know would have reported this when they were 14? Good for them! I hope that's true and that all young, teenage girls hear this. That they don't need to wait a life-time or 36 years to come forward. That they will be heard and believed, even at a young age! The only thing that you should be sorry about is that we didn't have that culture in the US in the 1980's and then think about why that was.
1
Candidate for POTUS recorded bragging about grabbing.
POTUS might end up tried in SCOTUS if Mueller delivers.
Candidate for SCOTUS selected by elected POTUS.
Might end up judging that case.
Accused of assault.
POTUS publicly intervenes, taking side against accuser on Twitter.
And somehow this all just goes on and is "normal".
Is this what all the rage and anger that elected POTUS was supposed to produce?
Because that is where we are, America.
8
There are other concerns about Judge Kavanaugh beside the claims of sexual assault. That he's still boasting about drinking to the point of blacking out as though it's a badge of honor should be a giant stop sign. That Donald Trump is convinced that Kavanaugh will be his get-out-of-jail-free card when the Mueller investigation report is issued is another red flag. Trump's own faux hysteria that's manifested itself in Trump's shockingly ignorant tweets smearing Dr. Ford should be actionable.
These same Republican leaders were thrilled when a combination of dirty tricks, a compliant Electoral College and a massive Russian propaganda campaign supporting Trump and demonizing Hillary Clinton installed the still-unfit Trump into the White House, despite Trump's distant second-place finish in the popular vote. Like everything else that's gone wrong in our nation since January 2017, these hearings, and the upcoming midterm elections, are only about one person. And it isn't Dr. Ford.
8
Just as I never understand why public employees who work for taxes vote Republican, or union members whose unions are under never-ending assault from Republicans, I fail to understand how any sensible, reasonable, educated woman can or would vote for Republicans when the Republican Party is a collection of misogynistic white men who think of women as objects, treat them like life is a sex joke and want to have total dominion over the lives, bodies and health choices of women.
You want to live your life according to what you perceive as this moral precept or that? Fine, go ahed and do it. Just don't think others do and have any less a right not to believe and do what you do.
Go ahead, live life as you believe it should just don't dare and do stop trying to impose yourself and your ways on the entire civil society.
Lastly, what we are seeing is inevitable. Women are now receiving 60 percent of all college degrees and over 65 percent of all advanced and professional degrees.
White men are getting left far behind -- of their own doing -- and in 20 years women will run most everything because they will be 70 percent of the people qualified to do it.
And that is one of the biggest reasons the Republican Party, the fortress of the white male, is going out of business and taking with it the women peculiar to their gender who support it.
11
The overriding attribute of modern Republicans that is at play here is shamelessness. The tax cut, the opposition to Obamacare, and now the attacks on Dr. Blasey Ford all illustrate the Republican descent into Trump-like rejection of the concept of shame. Trump has proven that his support levels refuse to waver, regardless of how repulsively he behaves. Republican lawmakers have taken his cue, believing they can lie and deceive and behave just as repulsively without penalty.
Senators Grassley, McConnell and others will be permanently diminished if they follow through on their shameless behaviour. Trump, helplessly at the mercy of his personality disorders, cannot acknowledge shame. The senators are doing this with full awareness, knowing they are wrong and moving forward regardless. I'd like to know what they tell themselves in introspective moments.
5
I find it offensive that Trump and other politicians question the credibility of Dr. Blasey-Ford, a psychologist, on her accusation of sexual assault against Judge Kavanaugh. Haven’t we learned that most women, especially young women, do not tell people when they have been sexually assaulted and may not remember exact dates and times? Why are politicians victim blaming Dr. Blasey-Ford? Let her testify and stop making offensive comments on social media and on the news!
I am a 52 year old school librarian. I was raped by my brother’s friend in my own bedroom when I was 16. I did not tell anyone about it and felt ashamed and afraid. I recently told my family after having a discussion of sexual assault. My 21 year old daughter has been sexually assaulted at college, student got expelled after 30 women came forward, and routinely gets cat called and harassed by older men as she goes about her day.
This morning I heard a commentator on the news say the “me too” movement is a farce. This is so disturbing because now women feel that can come forward with what has happened to them and the tide is turning when it becomes unacceptable and criminal to sexual harass, assault and rape women. Shame on politicians who are questioning Dr. Blasey-Fords motives and victim blaming her on the media.
13
Unless you have experienced or personally witnessed the unavoidable pain and potential mortality of pregnancy and childbirth, and the years of motherhood afterwards, you can't fully understand the brutality and domination theology of Kavanaugh, Trump, and all the other GOP men who believe they have the right to control women's reproductive choices.
Kavanaugh would even restrict a woman's right to contraceptives!
Kavanaugh would have done well to read the book "God is Not Great," and acquire some humility about his rigid Catholicism.
Instead, he was nominated in the hopes he would help outlaw abortion and punish women for it (as Trump himself has advocated), and to provide Trump with immunity from indictment and prosecution.
The only woman who would back Kavanaugh and Trump (a self-confessed serial adulterer and sexual assaulter) are gender traitors.
10
When a Congressman declares he supports Kavanaugh because many of his fellow Congressmen have probably behaved equally badly, he supports misogyny and the old boys club that allows treating women badly. When Trump declares that if Kavanaugh's attempted drunken and violent rape of Kennedy had actually happened, a police report would have been made right then, he is showing his ignorance of real life and lack of empathy and sympathy for women - which we already knew. When Kavanaugh wrote in the brief on Clinton's impeachment long ago that all the sordid details of the affair with Lewinsky must be written down in great detail, he was displaying a lack of humanity and a desire to humiliate at any cost someone with more power than he possessed or should ever have.
These three examples are the signs of misused power that continually is used to assault a political opposition in general and women who try to make their way in a man's world. These are not the leadership traits needed to help America through the present morass we are in. Instead, this lack of feeling for another, the crude and often violent assault on our senses and the fight for power above all feelings of humanity rule our society.
The Kavanaugh nomination represents the fight of the good, the respect for human rights over the crude, the religious fascism of the true believer, and the greed that could very well precipitate the next economic meltdown and in turn a real Constitutional crises.
6
The most powerful kingdom of males is at stake. It concerns not only the US.
3
We should all protest Grassley's efforts to turn the GOP's questioning over to some high powered female litigator. That it would "protect" Christine Blasey Ford is laughable. The only ones it would protect are the GOP senators on the committee--who are already under fire for their lack of respect for Ford and for women more generally. And it gives them a proxy to try eviscerate her with a hand in a velvet glove.
9
Republican so much want society to be back in 1973, civil right back in 1963.
Control over other people bodies by supreme court goal, touch it, and fail to get control.
4
I wish we'd include men amongst the women rising up against the misogyny of the GOP and Trump culture. For one thing, a lot of men are sickened by misogyny and seeing women mistreated and have themselves participated in protests, speaking out and defending women. For another, since the GOP and Trump (and all misogynists) simply do not care what women say, think or feel, making it clear that there are men who loathe men like that as well aides in portraying them as the dinosaurs and knuckle-dragging oinkers they are. Let's not frame this as men v. women, but as the enlightened v. the unevolved, and both of those include both men and women.
10
Supreme Court decisions and an all out grab for power have gotten us here.
Citizens United, that’s a bizarre name for a terrible decision letting big money interests get their way over the will of the majority.
And McConnell who wields power like a hammer. —No Mr. Obama you can’t have a Supreme pick that is rightfully yours. Or for that matter, any other judges.
Bad decisions, bad faith, bad intent. Did those wise men who wrote the Constitution make it strong enough to withstand all the bad we are dealing with? I hope so, but I’m not at all sure.
7
A couple of issues associated with the central topic of the alleged assault have not been discussed.
Where were the adults (the parents) who owned the home where the party occurred? It seems that there was NO adult supervision at a party for teenagers. Is it any surprise that booze and sexual misconduct became an issue? Perhaps the parents who owned the home should be prosecuted for contributing to the delinquency of minors.
It seems obvious that Judge Kavenaugh has a drinking problem, both from this incident and from his bragging about subsequent drinking binges. Furthermore, if you look at an untouched photo of his face, he appears to have the tell-tale blemishes of a heavy drinker. Perhaps this needs to be looked into further. Do we want a heavy drinker sitting on the Supreme Court?
6
"“This is a distillation of the entire two years’ trajectory for women in this country,” Ms. Laguens said. “Are we respected? Are we believed? Are we equal?” The evidence of the past 30 years indicates that ALL of the above are, if not yet fully realized, well on the way - Trump's election notwithstanding. The problem with viewing l'affaire Kavanaugh as the apex of this process is the absolute flimsiness and coldly politically calculated nature of this particular #MeToo episode. Perhaps the rage generated by Trump's brazen boorishness is clouding the judgement of (generally forward thinking) women everywhere? Who knows. But this is decidedly NOT the political hill which progressive women want to die on. The facts say that Mr. Kavanaugh IS a good man, who advocates for women. Failing to confirm him because of this trumped up charge simply compounds one injustice (Trump's election) with another. It is high-leverage revenge more than anything else. Millions of Americans (including millions of women) see it this way. When progressive women lose this one, it is likely to set the movement back rather than of advancing it.
1
I hope this is right about raising consciousness, but i'm afraid it really is just wishful thinking.
2
I don't know what all these Republicans are worried about if Judge Kavanaugh isn't confirmed or withdraws. What do they think the political philosophy of Trumps next nominee will espouse?
3
kavanaugh holds a key to a possible presidential indictment in his hot little hands. he has said that a sitting president cannot be indicted, and THAT is what makes him different from the other conservative jurists the heritage foundation has lined up for consideration of this stolen SCOTUS seat.
“Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh positioned himself as an ally of social change for women in America.”
Only if you are blind to this man’s need to control every aspect of women’s lives. Having a wife and two daughters does not make Kavanaugh a champion of women’s rights. He is an ally of those for who social change means restricting our right to control our futures by denying us equal protection by law. Kavanaugh is the antithesis of an ally of women.
It won’t stop with overturning Roe v Wade. Birth control and access to it are also on the block with the executioners standing ready to strike. From the PBS Newshour 9.21.2018,
“Millions of women like Jackson could soon get their medical care at Obria clinics if CEO Kathleen Bravo has her way. Bravo is positioning her growing company to become a nationwide alternative to Planned Parenthood, but with one key difference. Obria doesn't offer abortions, condoms or any kind of birth control, except fertility awareness methods that many call natural family planning.” www.pbs.org/newshour/show/how-the-next-supreme-court-justice-could-affec...
Bravo admits replacing PP is her ultimate goal, and she is petitioning Congress to do so. Every woman and man who support women’s autonomy and equality should be appalled.
“Ms. Laguens said. “Are we respected? Are we believed? Are we equal?”
We are not, and we never will be as long as men like Kavanaugh are granted the right to control our lives.
17
I think both are speaking truthfully but whether or not they are telling the truth is uncertain. He was drunk and does not remember. So he is speaking truthfully. Same for Dr Ford. She believes what she is saying. But the only named witnesses do not remember so there is no corroboration. I question the ultimate goal. Is it to keep him off the Supreme Court, force him to resign from Court if Appeals, get disbarred or have a criminal trial. I think the majority of teen age boys tried to push a teenage girl further than they wanted. Do we destroy all of their lives with an accusation.
2
You say: a majority of boys have tried to push a girl further. Is this true? If it is true it is not okay, but I doubt it. Further, you almost say, because everybody did it, it could not be wrong. Well, I disagree.
@Vincent Papa
That you consider turning up the music, pinning someone down and covering their mouth so forcefully she thought she would die, "pushing a teenage girl more than they wanted" is part of the problem here.
If she had gone to the police and (was taken seriously, with paperwork filed) Kavanagh would not be in the position he is today.
1
@Vincent Papa
Ah, here's a solution: Why not raise those boys to respect the opposite gender? Consider how their behavior may be destroying the lives of the girls they are "pushing".
1
While puttering around in my kitchen this morning, I decided to listen to "Adult Alternative" station for some background music. "MY NAME IS LUCA' came on and I just stopped doing what I was doing, remembering, that was once me - that song is just as relevant today as it was in 1987. That is obviously the "America" that Trump and his loyalists and this GOP want.
And every day they stake-claim our country with this ideology of theirs, they are pinning us down, putting their hands over our mouths.
I've been there. I don't ever want to go back to those "MAGA" times again.
This is not television, this is not radio. This is us. Don't NOT vote. Democracy is not a spectator sport.
11
Finally, someone use that "A" word instead of women's reproductive rights or women's health issues. After all is said and done isn't this the life of a baby human being we are talking about?
2
"Trump Galvanized a Movement of Women."
Nonsense. That was Harvey Weinstein.
Despite Trump's famously poor self control with respect to women, his administration has done nothing to reduce the status of women in this country.
And Kavanaugh has already stated that each case will be considered on its merits, not on public opinion or fear.
The faux panic over Roe v. Wade in the left wing press can only be charitably described as disingenuous.
Anyone seriously interested in the issue understands that Roe was a privacy decision, not an abortion decision. Further, it was applied narrowly to a subset of laws in the state of Texas.
1
Finally, someone used the "A" word instead of women's reproductive rights or women's health issues. After all is said and done isn't this the life of a baby human being we are talking about?
2
@Larry
No. That is not what this conversation is about.
1
@Larry As someone who has given birth to two children and had one miscarriage, I can state unequivocally that, no, this isn't the life of a baby human being we are talking about. And, if you are honest with yourself, you know it too.
Here's a thought experiment - a box of 100 embryos and a 2 week old baby are in a house that is burning down, and you can carry only one of them out of the fire. According to you, you MUST pick the box of embryos, because that's saving 100 human babies, and let the 2 week old infant burn to death. Is that the choice you are really going to make? If not, then it shows you really don't believe an embryo is the same as a baby, and your rigid anti-abortion stance is based on a complete lie. If so, well, you're a monster.
2
Allowing Dr. Ford to testify without an FBI investigation is incomprehensible. Under any other circumstances a governmental body would insist on getting the facts surrounding civil or criminal violations. Dr. Ford's desire for such an investigation lends to her credibility; theCommittee's resistance to such an investigation telegraphs the notion that this testimony is no more than political window dressing.
Should the judge be confirmed, this might increase the odds of the democrats taking control of the senate next year.
11
This is the scene when the an old, now fossilized order is desperately fighting, but yielding, to an emerging order struggling to be born. And that of all people- really of ALL people - it would be Donald Trump who finds himself as the orange, inglorious vanguard placed atop the fading establishment to lead the desperate and losing fight against the new one? Well, that speaks volumes of the generational cohort who put him there.
4
There's been a major fracture in the political bedrock, with #MeToo being the first wave of a continuing tsunami. This second wave looks to be much larger than the first. Century-old walls are crumbing, revealings horde pf predators scrambling for cover that is ever more difficult to find.
11
I'm a male. When I was very young I was abused several times by my female, teenage babysitter. Over the years it has bothered me that she took advantage of me. Shame stopped me from telling anyone about it.
Now years later I'm relieving those events. My abuser has a great career and a nice family if social media is to be believed. The point is this. I would never dream of upending her life. For one it would be wrong no matter what her profession. Secondly I wouldn't be believed. Her stellar life since is evidence. Three I have a hazy remembrance of the specific events although I could tell you where we were and what room it occurred in each time. Should I tell the world? I would not do that to her.
Years later I had interviewed for my dream job. Unemployment was high and I felt everything rode on getting this job. A high ranking female employee told me I had the job, there was just some paperwork to fill out. Then she said the only problem with me working there was "she didn't know how she was going to keep her hands off me". I was stunned silent.
I didn't get the job. Maybe I should have reported her but I didn't. The thought never crossed my mind. At best it would have been a he said, she said.
2
please note that your story - and it is an awful one - is not about someone poised to be selected to a lifetime position of trust and hopefully good jurisprudence. THAT is a major part of the current reluctance to seat that man on SCOTUS.
1
@Brisco Darling "I would never dream of upending her life...I would not do that to her." The problem with that argument is the babysitter is not up for US Supreme Court Justice, is she? Kavanaugh would be making decisions that would upend the lives of millions of people. I'm not sure why that's hard to comprehend. What you decide to do or not do about your babysitter is your business. But Kavanaugh wants to make my life, MY LIFE, his business. And for that right, he cannot be a man who sexually assaulted a woman. I don't care how long ago it was.
4
Thoughtful and well done article. I appreciate how difficult it was for Dr. Blasey to come forward at age 15. I admire her courage to do so now. Even today young women don’t always disclose sexual assault. My daughter attends a college where a freshman was raped last year, she was only 17. She was afraid to come forward even though her roommates encouraged her to do so. It ruined her freshman year and has caused her to withdraw from her classmates and has had a profound impact on her confidence and wellbeing.
12
I think Vegas odds on Dr. Ford testifying next week are 1/5. Her side will use 'conditions for testimony' as a delaying tactic. New ones will be added each day. I thank the dems and reps for the great theater. And besides, who needs the testimony, people have already decided she is/isn't telling the truth. Can't wait for the next few SC nominations to see what charges magically appear.
2
Or maybe just get interested in the truth. There’s always that.
Really what is the rushing and hiding about with Kavanaugh? He’s 50 something and it is a lifetime appointment. Vet him. Get his information.
1
Tyranny of the minority - white, non-hispanic males over 64 years of age total less than 7% of our US total population. What percentage of US Senators, US Federal Judges, US Billionaires, etc. etc, etc, do they represent ?
We have surrendered the power in our country to this demographic and we are paying the price.
As one of the 7% it is clear to me that we must vote female, youth, brown in this November election to begin to create counter-power to the group that is doing so much damage to our society,
With any luck, Kavanaugh's nomination will go down and then Dems will take majority in the House and Senate. Then the repair and change work begins.
7
Judge Kavanaugh's part in them, or what we know of it, in the proceedings already disqualifies him. When Democrats called for the release of all of his records of government service in the White House, Kavanaugh did not support their release. When Democrats and some Republicans called for an FBI investigation into charges of a sexual assault, Kavanaugh did not support it.
Kavanaugh’s silence shows that he does not live, even if he judges, according to ordinary legal standards. Judges base their judicial decisions on all available facts. They instruct jurors to regard as accusatory information or documents withheld which might have been expected to be exculpatory. They are respectful of all parties to a case.
Kavanaugh's “interview” itself should show, but has not shown all, judicial qualifications: competence, impartiality, philosophy, and temperament. He supports withholding documents which, by that act alone, permits the presumption that they are incriminating beyond his ability to interpret them favorably. He does snot favor an investigation. He shows no respect for Senators of both parties who wish to have a full record and an honest and fair hearing as part of an informed and reasoned decision, one which does not preclude political considerations.
What seems paramount in Kavanaugh’s silence is his contempt for opposition and his ambition to acquire judicial power to make decisions by diktat in accordance with his preferred political positions.
10
I just know too many women (3 is too many) who support Trump, and are fine with the negative aspects to women of that support. As they have indicated, none of those problems would affect THEM as women. Being of the moneyed class, they and the other women in their lives can just go wherever they need to go and get the treatment they want. Equal rights and fair treatment of other women is, in their words, those other women’s problem, not theirs.
9
Here is what I think. There are surely other qualified Judges available to a Respectable Republican Party. Not so sure Trump or McConnell will pick them but I think they are there and ones that if the Democrats had picked or agreed with them to nominate Republicans would love. So perhaps changing a million of what it takes to be accepted as successful in America would be a very good thing.
8
Elections should be about more than abortion rights. People have very mixed feelings about those issues and power politics will not solve them in a way that promotes a sense of justice being done.
I'd add that Kavanaugh's views are significant for more than abortion, religious freedom, or the rights of gay and transgender people. His views on property rights, voting rights, speech and presidential powers are also important. This controversy is a proxy war over what our citizens think about all those issues.
Unfortunately, it is impossible to have discussions that might move us to a better place when it's all about political power.
28
@Betsy S: Kavanaugh believes establishment of religion are more important than establishments of science, because the former reflect people's "sincerely held beliefs", and thus their emotional well-being.
1
he is so backwards in his thinking. can’t we get “his” god OUT of politics once and for ????
To my mind the genuine apex in the decades-long struggle over the legal and social status of American women was the nomination of Hillary Clinton for President. But then most Euro-American voting women chose Trump at the ballot box. Women are a majority. Since their right to vote was recognized they have thus enjoyed the power to direct government policy. All women need do to advance their interests is to vote accordingly, as men do to advance their interests. But most women don't do that. Through their decisions as voters or abstainees, they have been as responsible for our national circumstances as any other demographic group. I therefore cannot sympathize with the position that women are somehow innocent victims in all of this, clawing their way inch by inch toward fair treatment. As a demographic group, most women have simply failed to stand up for themselves.
5
Christine Blasey Ford deserves to be heard and her accusations taken very seriously. However, many commenters have already past judgment on Brett Kavanaugh's guilt based solely on Dr. Ford's recollection of events. She may very well be telling the truth but in a court of law an impartial jury would have to conclude, based on the information known to the general public to date, that her accusations lack critical details, evidence or witnesses. Not one person has stepped forward stating that they vouch that such a gathering/party in someone's home ever occurred which would help support Dr. Ford's claim. Surely, she had many friends that attended parties with her. And no one has stepped forward stating that they ever recall seeing both Christine Ford and Brett Kavanaugh in anyone's home at the same time. Our system of justice is built on the presumption of innocence until proven guilty. Granted, these Judiciary Committee hearings are not a court of law. Nonetheless, Dr. Ford has brought this accusation against Brett Kavanaugh. The expectation should be that the burden of proof is on her. He does not have to prove his innocence. Otherwise, accusations could be made against any man or any woman at any time for the sole purpose of causing irreparable harm. Dr. Ford deserves to be believed if she is telling the truth. But an investigation would need to bring to light more evidence in support of her accusation. Until then it continues to be one person's word against another's.
5
@Jake, Dr Ford said there was a witness, Judge (isn't that name weird in this?) who says he doesn't remember. Both men should be hooked up to a lie detector. Judge doesn't want to lose a friend or his friend's future. Never the less, no matter the outcome of this hearing he and his friend will be remembered for the rest of their lives for what happened to Dr.Ford. And never believed for their *not remembering.*
8
@Jake
Dr. Ford has indeed placed Mark Judge at this party and even in the very same room! Why is the Judiciary Committee not interested in hearing what Mr. Judge has to say... under oath?!
10
@CM, With so many comments on Dr. Ford's fuzziness on her experience, a really important question to ask would be:*Did you put a mickey type pill in this young girl's drink without her seeing it?* (This kind of pill now is called *a date rape" pill.)
It is sad the GOP doesn’t realize that it has taken itself hostage. Trump can easily make another nomination but the GOP won’t get to confirm him/her if they aren’t in the majority. This moment is like FDR vs. Hoover who went down in defeat and took the party with him. It was 20 years and 5 presidential cycles before the GOP got another chance to govern. Is history coming full circle?
7
Did Kavanaugh get so drunk at some high school parties that he was unable to remember what he had done (as his high school friend tells us was common enough at Georgetown)? If so, he has no way to claim, as he has under oath, that Ford's accusation never happened. One does not need to be super sharp to see that argument, but should someone who is not able to see it be on the Supreme Court?
56
Why do I get the feeling that about 41% of the country would be very happy if we were living The Handmaids Tale?
14
There are people on public sex offender lists in the U.S. whose crime was no more than such an incident. The girl was 15. Was she closer to 14 or 16? He was 17. Close to 18?
It is clear that the Judge is highly qualified. But, the sex offender rolls includes thousands who may have led productive lives but for the life time sentence of being sex offenders. In addition to being a pivotal moment for women perhaps the status of sex offenders needs public scrutiny. Evidence points to very low rates of recidivism among sex offenders. Yet they are marked for life.
5
@Vid Beldavs: Not sure where you get your "evidence," but expert studies show that sex offenders have the highest recidivism rates of all offenders. And that only includes those who are convicted of offenses that other studies show are the least reported of all crimes.
1
The more people want to make this a referendum on #Metoo or #Resistance, the less I think they believe in the truth of the actual allegations. Her lawyer's hesitancy in letting her make the allegations under oath and her refusal to let her cooperate with Senate investigators all point to lawyer worried about her client being charged with perjury and whose real goal is to delay the confirmation process. Why can't the Senate subpoena the accuser, fly her in, and have her testify tomorrow? Let's hear what she has to say, if she'll say it under oath, and hear how confident she is about events from 36 years ago, and hear how she responds to questions. This should be done as soon as possible. If the allegations are true, why isn't she rushing to testify?
1
@Caleb Mars
She wanted an FBI investigation, which is performed under oath, before testifying before the committee, which she had agreed to do.
7
@Caleb Mars
Facts please. SHE asked to testify -- with a full scale FBI investigation, witnesses, etc.
GOP senators and Kavanaugh said NO. No witnesses. NO investigation (as they had mandated with Hill). Rush her in in two days (as she is struggling to find ways to protect her own life. And her children. OUR WAY OR ELSE.
WHAT "Senate investigators?". Grassley's personal staff -- no bias there! One already resigned because of his own history of sexual harrassment.
Her LAWYER stopped nothing -- Dr Ford made the decisions.
Kavanaugh refuses a polygraph test. What is he hiding??
As for force her on a plane and rush here after we have called her "crazy!" Mixed up,and a liar -- why not just have her write us a letter which we can burn on the Capitol steps as we laugh at her. OR maybe fly in her witnesses too?
This abuse of power shows just how desperate Republicans are to hide the truth while pretending to care about it.
And women are seeing this and making decisions about which legislators WE want to have power over our lives.
7
@Caleb Mars why isn't she rushing to testify? you can't be serious. It does not take much imagination to place yourself in the shoes of someone who has survived a sexual assault and then been the target of death threats for speaking up - and seen what happened to Anita Hill and see the response from the current stack of GOP men who are already calling her a liar. This woman is credible, for sure she suffered an assault, (therapy notes, she's talked to people about it), she wants to testify, she does not want to be further assaulted like Anita Hill was and the way she is being now by all the folks like you who do not understand and/or are the ones who are only interested in politics, not the truth. Shame on you. This is exactly what spawned the Year of the Woman and, fingers crossed, will spawn a second act.
6
The article quotes someone as saying they were both intoxicated. Was she? Both men in that room were in her narrative. Many are less understanding of female victims being intoxicated.
Mr Kavanaugh’s prior rulings have also shown preference for employers over employees. He seems to believe in extreme protections for Presidential behavior.
He may have also said untrue things about his legal interpretations.
Just not a good choice for such an important and powerful position.
13
What we have is an at most 40% of the population scattered around the country but mostly in the non-urban areas, dictating policy. If this isn't tyranny, and I repeat the word for emphasis, then what is? By pandering to this base, Republicans hope to keep their power, Donald Trump notwithstanding...I pray they fail and that hugely victorious Democrats can start putting the country back together...
78
this division exposes deep flaws in our system of election and representation.
will we ever do anything about it?
hard to imagine when one segment hold the rest of us in their vicelike grip.
OTOH, even Mitch McConnell is mortal... I think.
1
Maybe it's time we reconsider how we get SC judges. Maybe we should rank all judges in the country and whoever is the #1 judge would go for confirmation if they wanted to become an SC judge when there is an opening, then go down the line if #1 doesn't want it. Base the rankings on sound legal judgment, fewest rulings overturned, control of the courtroom, feedback from lawyers who have come before the judge, knowledge of the constitution, clean record as to lying and criminal convictions.
1
By refusing to allow a fbi background investigation into Kavanaugh's accuser's case, Kavanaugh, Trump and the Republicans are together trying to hide something. If he were not guilty, they would have no objection to the background check. They want to appoint a Republican judge at all costs- who we should assume will support overturning Roe vs Wade based on his past rulings, and block Trump's impeachment if that situation will arise in the Supreme Court, and otherwise rule in favor of white conservatives and Trump in a case. The Supreme Court bench would have a white conservative majority with Kavanaugh's and Gorusch's appointments.
24
not just appoint a conservative justice - but get it done ASAP with both eyes trained on the upcoming election.
not just appoint a Republican, but one who would be sure to vote in favor of Trump should he be dragged into legal fights that wind up in front of the Supremes.
not just govern, but rule, taking advantage of every lever of power available while within their grasp, knowing full well they would not be able to get away with this stuff if they were not in complete control of our government due to Constitutional quirks guaranteeing over-representation to the more rural, conservative areas of the country.
a wise man (Mitch McConnell, I do believe) said that with an election day this close, no Supreme Court nominee should be brought before the Senate for confirmation so as to let the American people weigh in with their choice at the polls first. now, what's good for the goose is not good for the gander, eh, Mitch?
1
Many guilty of sexual misconduct have had to pay the price , but Trump has not yet had to . It appears that he thinks that he can bully his way in this situation , and he’s been quieter than usually lately , it would be best for him to not speak anymore about this and let the two people work it out .its tragic enough.
9
Just watched a rebroadcast of "Confirmation," the movie about the Anita Hill-Clarence Thomas debacle in 1991. Made me sick at my stomach to see that what is happening to Dr. Ford is basically the same thing that happened then. Same "why didn't she come forward until the last minute?", etc. Just as with Hill, relevant witnesses that might corroborate her account are being shut out of the proceedings. All she is asking for (as was the case with Hill) is for the committee to do a thorough investigation of her account and then judge the nominee's fitness to be one of nine people who will determine women's rights for a long time.
46
Judge Kavanaugh and the Republicans ought to welcome a full investigation that can clear the Judge’s name from accusations. Why on Earth are they resisting an investigation?
47
@Tony
Maybe it's because they are afraid of the outcome.
6
The GOP politicians at least are not hiding their goals anymore. They are on full display now. White males fighting to secure their privilege and the power of the American oligarchy against women and other ethnicities. This Supreme Court pick would ensure for decades that those privileges are protected. A rightwing Supreme Court will ensure that the mega donors will retain power and gerrymandered districts stay in place. For the GOP it's all about winning now, winning at all cost.
15
What bothers me the most is that the Heritage society has a list of many reactionary judges who would vote to ban abortion so why not cut Kavanaugh loose and substitute one of them? There is still time. But Kavanaugh believes that presidents should not be indicted, subpoenaed or even investigated. And depending on the results of the Mueller investigation, the Supreme Court may very well be hearing cases involving Trump. Is this why they are trying so hard to ramrod this appointment through?
And if Kavanaugh and the republicans believe so strongly in his innocence, why are they so afraid of an FBI investigation and the questioning of the witness, Mark Judge under oath?
17
Even if Democrats leaked Ford’s story at the last minute, so what? The current Senate has so little leverage against Republicans. Someone had to do something to derail a frightful Supreme Court nominee. I’m just glad someone acted.
22
Seen from afar, it is strange that one, unelected, political appointee, could become the decision maker concerning an issue such as abortion. Many other Western, democratic countries have gone through the process of debating this emotional and controversial issue. The decision is then made via referendum or their democratically elected law making institutions.
31
The Supreme Court does not decide whether or not abortion is legal or illegal. The states decide whether or not abortion is legal via their democratically elected representatives. The question that comes before the Supreme Court is is it constitutionally legal for any state to outlaw or restrict abortion. This of course could also be settled by federal law but the pro abortion forces have never had sufficient votes therefore they have used the Supreme Court
1
Recent revelations regarding using the 25th amendment to remove Trump should be recognized as a major warning to Americans of the country’s political instability.
No one has the courage to implement Trumps removal and that fact alone is cause for alarm.
Putin has succeeded in destabilizing the United States, his greatest dream accomplished. Our next election will be hacked again by Putin operators, their goal to keep Trump in office!
35
@Michael kittle
The problem with removing trump is that VP Pence will then take over the White House.
I'm not sure he wouldn't be worse then trump.
Pence is smarter and more devious and will attempt to push his "religious" beliefs on all of us.
As the saying goes: Be careful what you wish for.
4
@angfil....yes, there is a risk regarding VP Pence but the odds that he would be more unstable and dangerous than Trump are minimal.
Pence has preserved his relationship with Trump by humiliating himself but, other than that, there is no evidence that his religious values would have an destabilizing effect on government.
We Americans should not worry ourselves into accepting the status quo. The price with Trump is too high!
Women have escaped from the leash! Who knows where our power will take us? Thank you Dr Ford and all the other women who will no longer sink into the shadows.
51
The "presumption of innocence" applies as much to Dr. Ford's accusation of assault as it does to Judge Kavanaugh's presumption of innocence. We must also presume that the accuser is not making a false allegation. That, too, would be illegal. Why do I keep hearing this presumption of innocence only applied to the men in question?
9
Only if many, many women are elected this November to offices at all levels of government can we believe that Roe v Wade is safe.A conservative Court May chip away at its guarantees but women governing in State Houses and Congress will not let this assurance to women and their health be stripped away.Vote in November for WOMEN!
14
Lots is being made about why Dr. Blasey-Ford did not disclose this criminal attempted rape until recently.
Fifteen year old girls simply do not disclose such encounters, in fear of having what
little social contact with peers they enjoy removed by overly protective, paranoid parents (as if there's some shortcoming in how the girl handles negotiating her life, though rarely is help in that respect forthcoming)...instead of seeing the boy(s) involved facing the criminality of what they have done, which is the proper and ideal outcome. It's the boys that are (criminally) misbehaving, yet it is the girl that faces punishment for something she DID NOT DO.
Until the day that American parents raise their children differently, this will continue to happen.
31
Kavenaugh made it very hard, practically impossible, for a young immigrant to get an abortion. It’s obvious where he stands on abortion rights for women. What if men became pregnant, breastfed children? The discussion of who has the right to make decisions about men’s bodies...would not even be a thing. Thank you, Dr. Blasey Ford. You’re an incredibly brave woman.
15
This is the key statement in this report:
“This was a reckoning of what was promised. There’s been millions of dollars spent, thousands of volunteer hours spent on behalf of this nominee, it’s finally coming to the vote.”
The GOP bought this seat and by god, they’re going to fill it.
21
“It feels almost worse, because we have social media this time around to see vocal pushback from the people around the country,” Ms. Burke said, “and we still have an unresponsive set of politicians.”
Actually it is worse. We still have to deal with Senators Grassley and Hatch who were part of the ambush of Anita Hill. And, Dr. Ford's claims of sexual assault and possibly attempted rape are more serious than were Anita Hill's claims of work place sexual harassment.
51
75 women appeared yesterday on CSPAN at an I Stand With Brett event and they were all very accomplished in their own right. Some were friends from many years ago, some former girlfriends and others had worked as law clerks for him. They all raved at how wonderful a human being he was and of his high moral character. They did not have to be there and had nothing to gain but to defend a man who they felt was being wrongfully accused of a sexual abuse crime he did not commit.
This woman cannot even remember important facts about the abuse. Had she been drinking and how much? That is an important fact that should be mentioned. Judge Kavanaugh says he was not there. His friend said he was not there. Do you think she was even there? Witnesses should be located to fill her in on the details. She seems to have very little recollection about that night.
1
So now we know there are at least 75 women he didn't try to rape. I'm impressed.
I just read the memo he wrote for the Ken Starr "witch hunt" of Bill Clinton. Not that I am fan of Bill Clinton but that memo is nauseating. He had no empathy or respect for Ms. Lewinsky and no amount of expiation will overcome his distasteful actions. To me it showcased a diseased mind. Then we don't even know his other actions during the Bush Presidency, they have conveniently hidden it, though some of it came out.
How can such a partisan man be part of the Supreme Court? Of course he belongs there if the court has become political and there's no evidence to the contrary in my jaundiced mind.
Americans should look for ways to select a future occupant of the Supreme court seat in a non-partisan manner, I don't know how but I do know it cannot be left to "experts."
Then find a way to limit potential damage by an eight or ten year term and strengthen impeachment rules. We have to do this to protect ourselves.
I believe, Ms Ford, be strong. Face the angry white men arrayed against you, we are with you.
38
Answer is to go back to requiring 60 votes in the Senate to confirm. McConnell and GOP set out to STEAL judgeships so of course they're not looking for the wisest least partisan candidates. The tragedy is that without a non partisan Supreme Court the GOP is destroying our democracy! Sumter Coleman
1
@Gary Valan I second your ideas around finding ways to reform the process of selecting or nominating supreme court justices, and we should consider term limits as well. I thought that Supreme Court justices are supposed to be impartial to partisan considerations, not legislate from the bench, and uphold the Constitution as written. The Supreme Court should not be a partisan football.
‘“They were drunk,” Mr. Cramer said. “Nothing evidently happened in it all, even by her own accusation.”’ - I hate when people say “nothing happened” as though it doesn’t count as assault if there was no penetration. Making someone feel uncomfortable or scared is wrong and that means “something happened” whether it be sexual assault, violence, harassment or anything else.
17
The Republicans will surely argue that Dr. Blasey Ford must have strong corroborating evidence in order to derail Kavanaugh’s nomination. It’s interesting that in West Virginia and many other jurisdictions a person accused of rape/sexual assault can be convicted upon credible uncorroborated testimony of a victim thereby subjecting the defendant to harsh penalties including loss of freedom. If this is the standard that only needs to be met in order to incarcerate someone, why shouldn’t Kavanaugh be subjected to the same test? After all, his freedom is not at stake-only his job.
14
Sexual harassment and violence transcend parties and politics. Unfortunately, some GOP Congressmen have proven time and again unable to treat women with equality, dignity or respect. The unseemly haste with which a razor-thin majority of the outgoing Senate thrusts its choice for a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court is a mockery of constitutional propriety. Refusal of Dr. Ford’s request to conduct the customary FDI investigation raises doubts of a ‘coverup’.
Under such conditions, the Democratic and moderate Republican senators, if any, should consider a walk out and a parallel conclave.
4
Talk about bad visuals: Grassley, Hatch, McConnell all dyspeptic old men yammering like they are owed this unpopular candidate with no real vetting and McConnell even telling some evangelicals it was a done deal without even hearing Ford- that the GOP Senator Clerics have spoken.
And then Kavanaugh with a daughter not much younger than the woman was who is now bringing up the twist in his coronation.
One thing is certain- none of them represent American women.
60
Isn't the question not what horrid act Kavanaugh may have committed as a teen, but whether he chose to lie about it when the matter came up late in his confirmation process. I'm inclined to believe professor Ford based only on who has more to gain from lying about it, but why not in a case like this consider asking Kavanaugh taking a lie detector test as professor Ford did?
11
The irony of gender bias men in positions of power promoting the disenfranchisement of women via laws about their bodies. We really are not that different from The Saudi’s... the Supreme Court needs to be 50% women otherwise it does not reflect society.
14
It's a done deal. Mitch McConnell said the judge will be confirmed. The hearings on Thursday will be just a farce.
7
The vote to confirm Kavanaugh will determine whether or not the Republican party (a party comitted to "alternative truth") can survive into the near future. The midterm vote in November may determine whether democracy can survive on this planet. Ironically, today's Republican party (or the party that mascarades as Republican) fully intends to erase our republican form of government and replace it with an Aristocracy of corporate donors and foreign mobsters. In doing so they are attempting to destroy America's greatest gift to the world.
7
If Brett Kavanaugh is being truthful and did not commit attempted rape 36 years ago, wouldn't he be in the front of the crowd requesting a suspension of the hearings and the vote until the FBI could investigate Dr. Ford's accusation fully?
If Brett Kavanaugh is being truthful and did not commit this crime, wouldn't he be willing to take a polygraph exam as Dr. Ford did? While those exams are not full-proof and not admissible in a court room, just his willingness to undergo the examination would speak volumes to the American public.
If Brett Kavanaugh is being truthful and if he is truly an advocate for women, he would be lending his voice loudly and clearly in support of Dr. Ford even though he believes she is mistaken. Clearly something occurred in that bedroom 36 years ago. Would that also be the Christian thing to do?
Is Bret Kavanaugh behaving this way? Instead, he is hunkering down for hours and hours with White House staffers to prep for this week.
This does not pass the smell test.
53
Seeing the picture of of Judge Kavanaugh, his wife, and his two daughters made me wonder, if he should die, would he want his wife to remarry a man like Trump, or would he want, or allow, his daughters, when they came of age, to marry a man like Trump? I would hope not. But then given his quest for power perhaps he would.
7
Would Kavanaugh want his daughters to attend parties with boys like him?
7
Brett Kavanaugh is being convicted in the court of public opinion even before we have heard his testimony before the senate judiciary committee. Christine Ford is being held as a hero and and we have not even heard her speak either. There is an extreme bias against Judge Kavanaugh that was evident even before these sexual abuse accusations.
The Democrats vowed not to see him confirmed and they are living up to that promise. This stunt of Dianne Feinstein's of presenting allegations of 36 years ago was very clever. The only problem is that Dr. Ford is confused about what actually occurred that night some 36 years ago. Judge Kavanaugh is not and vehemently denies any of this took place. Who is telling the truth. I would say Judge Kavanaugh a man of impeccable honor and caliber who will most likely be confirmed to the bench.
@WPLMMT
I'm glad you have a crystal ball that detects when confusion occurs. The fact it can detect truth is even more astonishing.
I'm convinced your crystal ball really says the confusion is coming from within the administration. As to the truth... the numbers speak for themselves. Are we up to 7 lies a day yet? It figures that 45 would want yet another criminal in his pocket, joining Flynn, Manafort, Papadopoulas, Gates, Cohen et al.
He may well be confirmed, but the stain and stench of the process that allowed his confirmation will be long remembered.
9
The entire Kavanaugh confirmation process has been an effort to hide the truth. First only 8% of the relevant documents were made available. These were selected by a friend of Kavanaugh. Of these 42,000 pages were only made available hours before the hearings started and others were declared committee confidential. Then, when a claim of sexual assault was made, the Republicans refused to allow an FBI investigation. The refused to call an eyewitness to testify. They refused to allow others that Dr. Blasey had told about the incident to testify. This is an Orwellian version of a confirmation process.
37
It stinks to high heaven. His confirmation would forever taint the Court.
6
It has never been more clear why we as a nation need more women representing us in our states, in Washington, and in judgeships around the country.
13
Goodness knows that Grasley and the other republicans on the committee will do everything they can do to silence Dr. Ford, stifle the evidence of Kavanaugh's actions and, as McConnell put it, "plow right through" any real investigation and vote on his approval next week. In the end, none of this is of any real consequence. What truly matters is how Senators Murkowski and Collins choose to vote. If they summon up the courage and integrity it will take to vote no, then the republicans may achieve the worst of both worlds because of their despicable behavior: Kavanaugh will not sit on the bench, and millions upon millions of women, appalled at the treatment of Dr. Ford by the GOP, from Trump on down, will vote on November 6 and turn both houses of congress from red to blue.
11
Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh is going to be investigated for perjury by Feb. 1 2019.
He needs to plead out now like so many others have done and save his pension and freedom by cooperating with federal authorities.
What has been discussed and what has he promised?
He should make sure he gets to see his girls more often than alternate Saturdays.
After the new congress is seated there will be a no mercy attitude.
5
Dear Penny, How about all the dollars and energy spent electing President twice, both times with a majority, so that he could appoint Merrit Garland? Don't they deserve to have *their* political will put into action.
13
Ms. Nance remarks seemingly almost bitterly that “there’s been millions of dollars spent...on behalf of this nominee, it’s finally coming to the vote.”
As though the volunteer hours, bus tour, and staggering amount of money entitle Kavanaugh to an appointment to the Supreme Court.
It’s no wonder that all of the Kavanaugh TV ads, I have seen, feature women. Kavanaugh’s PR staff have taken a page from the Trump misogynistic playbook.
Team Kavanaugh is a throwback: preppy and discreet.
13
If he did it maybe, just maybe, a society can look past it because of his age when it happened. His alleged victim was admittedly inclined to do so, as per her interview with WashPo. But, if he did it, now he's lying about it and telling his and all such victims that they are entitled to no acknowledgement, not to mention an apology, for what was done to them. But the Trump Doctrine is that you deny and denigrate. So, if it happened, Kavanaugh should either acknowledge and show remorse and dare Trump to accuse him of weakness and pull the nomination, or take a hike.
7
As a survivor of teenage rape I have gone through nearly every emotion possible since this story first emerged. Ultimately what I feel is despair and extreme sadness for a country supposedly based on the high principles instilled in me while growing up. Justice. Opportunity. Equality. Integrity. Ultimately all of these principles are meaningless. I knew this when I chose to not report being raped. I knew that the process, the blaming would only lead to more trauma. And to what end? In my case I didn't see any benefit in speaking up, only pain. Somehow it is always her fault. Those who ask "why now?" should consider that.
Dr. Ford had the courage to speak up. Incredible courage for which I applaud her. Personally I cannot imagine any motive other than love of country, sacrificing herself to the incredible public scrutiny and more for the sake of a greater good.
Grassley and others can dismiss it. Trump can and will be ignorant. In so doing they validate all the misgivings and fears of every girl or woman who has experienced some form of sexual assault. The GOP and those who support the position taken are telling survivors everywhere that fundamentally we don't matter. Ramrodding through a political agenda is more important than the principles upon which this country was founded. More important than investigating a heinous crime that has marred a woman's entire life - a crime with the capacity to haunt the survivor until the end of her days.
28
No one in the GOP said that the accusations against Al Franken were politically motivated.
McConnell and Grassley weren’t complaining about needing a speedy process when they refused to even have hearings on Merrick Garland.
Why would voters think that such hypocritical people should be trusted with running out government?
138
@Josh Wilson
Why would Democrats keep trying to comprise with lying hypocrites?
The notion that the pro-birth movement cares about children is one of the biggest lies in American politics, if not the biggest. So-called "Pro-lifers" cheered their Dear Leader when he separated children from their immigrant parents and sought to defund programs that make life better for children and their working parents. Virtually none of them would adopt an unwanted child, particularly if it meant giving up the recreational time they use to block access to abortion clinics. So-called "pro-lifers" love the death penalty. They do nothing to make life better for children who are already born or to address infant and maternal mortality statistics that are a disgrace for a developed nation like the U.S. Piety isn't morality and being smugly self-satisfied about one's beliefs isn't being religious, Christian, or kind.
18
@Thomas Pain
Thank you for using accurate terminology.
They want more and more humans born, no matter how much suffering that creates.
I have taken it a step further, referring to the anti-abortion crowd as pro-gestation slavery.
That's what they want: for women to be slaves to the disproportionate reproductive burden Nature has given them.
3
As a 58 year old progressive feminist, I could never understand why women tolerated misogyny each and every day. Then again, I am not traditionally "femme" and I speak my mind. The price I have paid is to not fit into mainstream patriarchy. The "price" feels most likely a gift. I was naive when Hillary Clinton ran for president. I thought our society was farther ahead re- sexism and misogyny. It was appalling and continues to be today how Secretary Clinton has been treated.
Yep, the boys do not want to share power. Whites do not want to share power. Nonetheless, they are fortunate that when we have more power, we will share it. It will be a shocker for them that we all win when justice is served.
43
I think he did it. I'm saying it despite the admonitions of right wing pundits who tell me I don't get to say that because I don't really know. I think she was traumatized and enraged by the experience and when she saw him at the threshold of the Supreme Court, she realized she had to stop this ghastly trick on women and their freedoms. . A nasty little woman hater getting to decide to overrule Roe v Wade. ( even though those same rightwing pundits tell me I can't say that either because it would be unfair to Brett Kavanaugh). I'm very grateful to Professor Ford for having the courage to face the elderly white men who want to destroy her( as I was grateful to hillary Clinton for getting on the debate stage with the vicious, woman hating brute and more then holding her own). This whole thing is a metaphor for what women have to go through to stand up for their rights and to demand justice for the wrongs that have been done. Kudos to her attorneys too. They are going toe to toe with the "mighty" chuck Grassley and besting him at every turn. We are being heard.
47
'We live in an age of unreason and lies, an age of violent outrages and all kinds of assaults on the truth.' (The Washington Post)
The GOP is rushing through Kavanaugh's nomination for many reasons and 2 are paramount;
#1… "highlight material that suggests that once on the Supreme Court, Kavanaugh will vote to eliminate or severely limit the right to abortion" This speaks volumes to djt campaign promise he made to his religious evangelist following. This promise just takes one guy in a seat of power who can overturn a rule of law.
#2… " that he will protect President Donald Trump by repudiating the principles established by the famous 1974 case that required President Richard Nixon to turn over the Watergate tapes to a grand jury (United States v. Nixon). " Bingo, the brace ring.
The universe calls up the courage of Dr. Blasey to bring to the surface an act of sexual assault which clearly questions the "private face", the 'private character" of Brett Kavanaugh. All I have seen is the well polished and well versed "public face". Will the real character of Brett Kavanaugh 'who would be a potentially decisive vote on litigation over women’s rights' please stand up?
Let the public testimony begin for this is "a wrenching apex in the decades-long struggle over the legal and social status of American women, unfolding in the shadow of a presidency that has profoundly alienated many women."
47
@mary: Kavanaugh will not stop at kicking abortion down to state level-politics. Separation of church and state is at stake in this nomination.
3
Great article. But the only way that Kavanaugh is the "crest of the wave" of an energized and rightfully furious movement of women horrified at the GOP's and especially Trump's treatment of women is if there are much bigger waves right behind this one that will hit land in November and again in 2020.
38
The tone and rhythm of the article is a reflection how firmly convinced the reporters are that women are to rise against Mr. T and his captives/supporters in November.
Well Mr. T, who has shown his bias against women’s equal rights, appears to me still popular among Republican women.
I hope the reporters will prove right in early December. But I do so with deep pessimism.
17
Excellent summary of events this far. I never understood why anyone would need so many people coaching him to tell the truth.
55
The only ground Trump and his judge nominee Kavanaugh share in common is their common contempt for women, and common accusations of sexual assaults on them which they will never admit. Still Kavanaugh's record of sexual exploits pales into insignificance when compared to Trump who is determined to send Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court hoping to get the return favour in future.
88
The conflict is not about a single incident, remembered or forgotten, disqualifying or without consequence.
The conflict is about the place, perception, and power of women in modern America, especially under a misogynist President whose vitriol has called women dogs and lowlifes, described them as bleeding from their faces--even as he has paid for their silence for extramarital sex he swears he never had.
In this man-made environment, women's status has been deliberately contoured by law and culture to allow perpetual open season for male predators.
This decision, especially its political process, will display the power dynamics and the country's vision of women as citizens.
But there is no vision where there are only deaf ears! The images of women must be formed formed their words!
Trump's response makes his bullying obvious by its ignorance. The FBI does not investigate local or state crimes. It would gather facts, develop a timeline, a list of relevant persons, and background and context so that the Senate and America might be best informed about the nominee for a lifetime Supreme Court seat.
Why then does the President ignore the million words of women who have answered his query, on social media for the third or fourth time, sharing their own experiences as women and children in America, blamed and banded, scared and fearful, broken, for why they didn't tell?
Why does he even now refuse to hear the honest weight and truth of so many of democracy's voices?
264
@Walter Rhett-Thank you for putting in words so eloquently what millions of us feel and think. You deserve your own NY Times column.
55
@Walter Rhett
“They were drunk,” Mr. Cramer said. “Nothing evidently happened in it all, even by her own accusation.”
This says it all. Cramer's version of "nothing happened" essentially says men can do just about anything except penetration and still believe they've done nothing wrong. The effects upon the woman are invisible to them. Ignorance is evil in such cases. And Ann is right, you deserve your own column. Always such well written and thoughtful comments from you Mr. Rhett.
5
@Ann
Yes, beautifully written. Thank you Mr. Rhett. I think we all know the answer to your question about why the deaf man can’t hear.
Excellent but sad analysis of the issues.
the men
13
@NYT moderators: Comment not finalized. Should not have gone through.
13
@ChristineMcM This comment may not have been finished, but it makes perfect sense to me! It is "the men" and their feelings of entitlement that encourage this behavior.
Trump hasn't just "faced allegations of sexual misconduct." He has boasted of multiple sexual assaults on women, and acknowledged that the taped voice doing so was his. When will the press, and all of us, speak plainly about that? If there was ever a time for the plain truth, it's now.
823
@jb Indeed!
The elephant in the room...stomping around destroying, hating, dividing. Every other man in the public eye who has been accusued of sexual misbehavior has lost his respected place in the public eye - lost his job, at least. In this case after 19 accusations and a taped admission, we elected him President.
You couldn't write a movie script like this - it would seem too phony, too unbelievable.
6
@jb
Tell that to Juanita Broaddrick.
@jb either now or two, possibly 12 years ago
"Standing beside President Trump at the White House, Judge Kavanaugh... boasted that most of his clerks had been women."
And according to Yale Law School faculty cited here a few days ago, candidates were advised that Kavanaugh preferred not just female clerks, but a certain kind of female dressed in a certain way.
616
The GOP's portrayal of sexual victims as somehow politically motivated because they dared to speak out before election day is sickening and telling. In their twisted lust for power, the candidates are always the victim. How dare Mrs. Ford attempt to tell her story just when Mitch McConnell's plans were coming to fruition?
I hope that no one who has witnessed the actions of the GOP over the past 2 years ever forgets what they have seen.
696
@P. McGee
I agree. And uniquely so when the victim has so much to lose by coming forward. She's not some nobody.
Google Scholar shows that Dr. Blasey has a LOT to lose. 50 papers published in 20 years.
https://scholar.google.co.nz/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=christ...
C. Blasey
Christine Blasey
Cited by 7,703
I interview top research scientists in another field. I have seldom come across scientists with so many citations.
161
Dr Ford makes a credible witness. But we will not have justice for women until the “nobody” women count, too. All women deserve to be heard. Not just attractive, white educated women. Every.Single.One of us.
1
What does that have to do with it?
Trump did not "galvanize" women. Trump lied, cheated and stole his way into office and he is continuing to get away with it. That upsets everyone.
409
Something tells me the 28% of women supporting Kanvanaugh
is misleading. Let's not forget 53% of white women voted for Trump, they tend to vote in much larger numbers than non white women. If Kanvanaugh is confirmed, those white women can't be counted on to "punish" Republicans in the upcoming election.
49
@Ken calvey, you mean of white women who voted-- and consider how many people thought Clinton would certainly win and didn't vote, or voted green. Add to that the poll results showing lost support for Trump among republican women--and your conclusion, though possible, is far from sure.
4
@Ken calvey
Ken, 53% of white women did not vote for Trump. 53% of white women who voted, voted for Trump. That's not a happier statistic, but it is more accurate, and it pays to be accurate. As a white woman who voted and was in the 47%, I try to remain hopeful that enough stayed home that learned their lesson and won't let it happen again. And I hope that people of color, women especially, come out in droves, in defiance of voter suppression attempts, in November.
I don't just hope actually; I pray.
6
@Ken calvey
WRONG! How many times must this be corrected and when will you all bother to look at actual statistics before spouting off falsehoods?
This has been posted here REPEATEDLY since November of 2016, so I’m not going to bother to waste my time redoing the research you should be doing before posting totally erroneous and false facts.
Only a percentage of the total US population is eligible to vote. Of that total, only a percentage of those eligible bothered to vote. Of that group, only a percentage are white women. Of those white women, 53% voted for Trump.
I’ve posted these numbers with links to verified research ad nauseum so I’m not going to do it again but when you analyze the actual statistics, something like only 25% of all US white women actually voted for Trump!
6
The picture is a reminder of the embarrassing spectacle that was Kavanaugh's acceptance speech after his nomination by President Trump.
Leave the wife and kids at home, Brett. You're not a rock star. Would Amy Barrett have paraded her husband and seven kids in such a manner? I doubt it.
And go and coach a male basketball team, Brett. It's less creepy.
222
Many people are asserting that, even if he is guilty, it was years ago, people change, and something one did as a dumb teenager shouldn’t ruin his life. Okay, but then the question becomes, if people should be forgiven for past misdeeds, then why not admit he’s guilty? His defense could be, “I was a dumb teenager but I have changed and I’m sorry.” Except it’s not valid because he’s guilty. It’s funny how few people are questioning how this event ruined HER life. I don’t hear a lot about how sexual assault ruins the victim’s life, just a lot of hot air, mostly from privileged men, about how she should consider what her accusations have done to him.
570
There's a reason the crime of rape has no statute of limitations.
3
@JP
According to experts, sexual predators rarely change.
4
@JP If the event happened, one reason Kavanaugh might be denying it is because he was too drunk to remember.
1
" ... Trump couldn't contain his frustration any longer ... the president's tweet reflected growing anger ... Increasingly convinced [Dr. Blasey’s] accusations were a Democratic plot ... " Paranoia is moving up the long list of Mr. Trump's personality disorders. Mr. Trump reminds me of the movie "Men In Black", where the Edgar character (an evil alien in a bad fitting human body) tries to act like a normal person but invariably gets frustrated and spews green bile everywhere while breaking everything within reach.
261
@Steve Kennedy, Excellent! You hit the nail on the head, quoting Men in Black. Very true.
2
If such a purportedly “conservative” legal scholar, political lawyer and judicial official would sign up to this process with an allegedly very promiscuous and abusive Chief Executive, the thick-enough, privileged-only commonality and bonhomie could halt public function of the word “conservative”. Identity and meaning of the word “conservative” in social, political, ideological and legal contexts of Washington D.C. and the West could effectively end in 2018.
“Conservative” as a word goes back only about 150 years, a narrow historical timeframe, not a longstanding tradition of thousands of years as those who identify with the word tend to imply but misrepresent.
But gender and sex issues in grand old theatre dates back to at least 411 BC with the play Lysistrata by Aristophanes. The woman Lysistrata convinces the women of Ancient Greece to withhold sex from all men until the men stop their war. Such practice would meet the economic or risk-associated definition of “conservative” which might remain functional.
24
It’s not about left vs right. Women are left, right, and center. They have been sidelined for way too long. They have been silenced and silent for way too long. The world is better when more people thrive and feel empowered to be their best selves. We are talking about over 50% of our population. Fear not; allow women equality. Yes, I say “allow”, because that’s how I was raised, sadly. Kavanaugh’s views, on virtually every issue, deny minorities. In this case, we’re speaking about a majority.
72
@Az
"Allow women equality"
Hear, hear.
Equality defined as equal rights under due process of law.
Equal right to the presumption of innocence when accused.
Equal right to demand that any accuser bring forth credible EVIDENCE and CORROBORATING TESTIMONY - not "repressed memories" 36 years after the fact - before being subjected to a star chamber.
Equal right to, at a bare minimum, HEAR THE ALLEGATIONS FIRST before being asked to testify under oath about those allegations.
Demand equality, yes - under our existing constitutional protections known as DUE PROCESS.
If we dispense with due process - as you and so many others are rashly, foolishly, recklessly demanding we do - then we will truly be lost.
Our democracy depends on due process.
We MUST preserve it, in this case and in every case.
@T-Bone Who’s fighting against an FBI investigation, again? Kavanaugh or Ford?
If Trump nominates somebody, anybody, it is not about the best person for the job, it’s about who will protect him and make him look good. Yes, Democrats have reason to suspect all Trump nominees.
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@DSS
Is there anybody, anywhere who could ever make Trump ' look good'?
@DSS
Yes Trump has appointed a Justice to Obstruct the Mueller investigation.
This is not about Kavanaugh, it is about Trump's corrupt intent in nominating him.
The law and the Constitution are mathematical. You have to follow the logical connections. You have to focus on the most important threats.
Trump is the threat. Focus on Trump.
If Brent Kavanaugh is confirmed, which he should not be, the Republicans who've supported him will pay at the polls.
107
@Barbara Elovic I think you are right. But, I hope those results happen.
3
At this point, I am not that interested in whether the attack happened or not. What is more important to me is how the Senate is handling the accusation and how Judge Kavanaugh has responded. I am more concerned about whether there is a pattern of lying before the committee rather than what may or may not have happened and the undue haste with which this appointment is being rammed through. This reeks of privilege gone amuck.
261
Kavanaugh needs to be grilled under oath about his participation in the conspiracy to pin the assault on an innocent third party. Not that he will come clean--neither he nor any of his backers in the Senate have any integrity left.
5
"“This is a distillation of the entire two years’ trajectory for women in this country,” Ms. Laguens said. “Are we respected? Are we believed? Are we equal?”"
That's none of the above, according to the Republican Party as shown by their current behavior.
This man does not belong on the Supreme Court, period.
122
Dianne Feinstein certainly pulled a fast one. At the last minute, she shocked the senate with a letter from Dr. Ford accusing Brett Kavanaugh of sexual abuse allegations. The one thing though that we have learned in the last few days is that she is having a difficult time remembering some important facts that occurred that night 36 years ago. And Ms. Feinstein even admitted that she is not sure all the facts that Dr. Ford does remember are actually true.
How can you accuse a man of something if your memory is fuzzy? I wonder if this is one of the reasons Dr. Ford keeps postponing giving her testimony before the senate judiciary committee. She does not want to come across as being confused and uncertain as to what actually occurred that night. If you accuse a person of committing the heinous crimes as she alleged did occur, you better be darn sure that they did take place. Her credibility is beginning to be called into question.
12
@WPLMMT I'm sure her delay has nothing to do with the death threats and having to move out of her house away from her kids to preserve the safety of herself and her family. Nothing to do with being personally and publically attacked by our vindictive president. Nothing to do with knowing that her every word will be picked apart in excruciating and public detail for months and years to come. Nothing to do with the knowledge that she must speak before a combative and dismissive group of powerful men who will attack and deny any missteps. Nothing to do with the knowledge that how she handles this coming week will affect her credibility for the rest of her life.
14
@WPLMMT
Let's not bemoan the apparent lateness of Feinstein's revelation. We might be moved to remind how only 42,000 (just 2% of his legal output over the years) of K's documents were released to Democrats, and just one day before the confirmation meeting was scheduled.
1
@WPLMMT
and why does Judge Kavanaugh need ten hour long coaching sessions for several days in a row if he is telling the truth?
17
"At stake for conservatives are not only future court decisions to restrict abortion rights, but also to advance religious liberty laws and define the rights of gay and transgender Americans."
Every American citizen has the same set of rights and they are laid out in the constitution for all to see. No one, to my knowledge, is in the process of redefining them for anyone.
18
@Richard -- They're set out in the Constitution -- emphasis on the next clause here, I don't want to use capital letters -- as interpreted by your courts. Re-interpretation has granted and taken away rights time and time again.
You write "to my knowledge". Your knowledge, I must say, seems remarkably limited, and perhaps voluntarily so.
13
@Richard, that's an massive over simplification. As you know the Constitution is but a small foundation for a whole legal system of laws, lawyers, judges, police, prisons and so on. It's the details of all those other parts that really define people's rights in practice. And the supreme court sits at the head of that system, it makes decisions that will allow or disallow abortion and gay marriage, defend rape survivors, and all those other social issues that control millions of individual decisions that people make in this country.
Every American Citizen has the same set of rights eh? Ever heard of DWL? Ever heard of #MeToo? Ever heard of victim blaming? I'm guessing this stuff doesn't happen to you. But just because you don't see it doesn't make it not real.
9
@Richard
If the rights in the Constitution did not need defining and redefining, we wouldn't need Judge Kavanaugh or any other judge.
4
The vote will be the deciding factor in who is believed and who is not. Let the vote begin.
10
Political or civil equality? Is it one or both? Political is a closer reach and could be of more significance over time. One goal at a time makes more sense. Respect in a general sense is possible with good female leadership plus the end of misogynistic male behavior.
7
I want to set to one side all of the grandiose claims and talking points of both sides of this matter and address two specific points.
One is that the burden is on Judge Kavanaugh to demonstrate that he is fit to be a Supreme Court Justice by testifying truthfully and to be perceived as doing so; it is not on Dr. Blasey Ford to prove he isn't. He has boxed himself in with his categorical denial; he can't use the mistaken identity defense or the "we were just teenagers" defense or the "it was nearly 40 years ago and I have been redeemed" defense.
The second is that there is no way that this will be a replay of the Anita Hill debacle. The times, they have changed, as evidenced, in part, by the #MeToo movement. We have advanced out of the dark ages in understanding the dynamics of sexual assault allegations. The Senate committee has changed also, at least on the Democratic side. We now have 10 strong members, 4 of which are women; Dr. Blasey Ford will be protected should the Republicans be so brain dead as to attack her personally.
Speaking for myself, I think the Kavnaugh nomination will be toast after this hearing.
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@PeterLaw sad to say, the barriers they’ve set up, the attempt to force a very quick hearing, the refusal to allow other witnesses, their pre-statements, all point to a replay, even with #MeToo.
2
Re the ‘toast’ statement. I do so hope you are right.
2
@PeterLa I hope so!
This entire situation stinks. Not because of the multitude of issues surrounding the nominee, but because of the extent to which it reveals that the selection of justices isn't based on their jurisprudence or their ability to fairly weigh complex cases and then vote for verdicts predicated on the facts and appropriate utilization of precedent. Rather, the nomination and confirmation processes have become a methodology for prejudging cases with judicial proclivities that are virtually set in stone. Presidential nominations have been rigged (e.g., superdelegates), congressional districts have become rigged (gerrymandered), the Electoral College is rigged (tilted toward the lesser-populated states), the election process is rigged (courtesy of Citizens United), media coverage is biased (thanks to the demise of the fairness doctrine) and the courts were the only bastion. That's now gone. Can ours or any democracy survive such an onslaught?
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@Tad La Fountain: No it cannot survive. Perhaps, after the election in November, our system may begin to recuperate.
1
@Tad La Fountain
It's important to know whether the nominee for a lifetime appointment to SCOTUS is of good character and possessed moral authority. He should have demanded that the FBI conduct a thorough investigation into the allegation. He response has been questionable at best.
4
@Tad La Fountain
A brilliant summation of how far things have gone wrong with our "democracy"
With gratitude (weighed down by sadness and fear for our country's future)
2
Either we're equal, or we're not. Either we are fullscale complete human beings, or we're ancillary, dependent, less than men.
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@slightlycrazy
Equality demands due process of law. No exceptions.
In our American system, due process demands the presumption of innocence.
Any accusations of a crime must be supported, at a minimum, by credible evidence and by corroborating testimony.
If an accusation is made without any evidence, without corroborating testimony, without witnesses, then it is suspect. Law enforcement in this country will not investigate such allegations.
When this allegations are made 36 *YEARS* after the alleged incident, AND when the accused has, in those 36 years, exhibited a sterling record of behavior that completely contradicts the allegations made - behavior that has been attested to publicly and formally by literally dozens of credible individuals - then due process requires us to side with the accused.
Stop politicizing this. I don't support either Kavanaugh or Trump.
But it is crystal clear that a good man, a fine judge, is being railroaded here.
STOP IT.
@T-Bone How manly of you to command a woman to STOP IT. You do not speak like that to somebody you consider to be an equal.
But then, a couple of your other statements also belie your insistence that you do not support either Kavanaugh or Trump. And several others come close to telling us women to suck it up and shut up. BTW, police investigate crimes all the time for which they have to search for the evidence. That's what much of police work is about, searching for evidence.
It's all down to the strength of Dr Blasey Ford's testimony now, unfortunately. Unless Mark Judge regains his teenage blackout memories and goes on the record. It's a lot of pressure on one woman.
26
@Duncan Mark Judge did regain his teenage blackout memories and put them down in a couple of books. And he name one "Bart O'Kavanaugh" as one of his heavily drinking classmates who drank so heavily that he "passed out" on the way home from a party. Could it have been the very party at which he molested Miss Blasey?
1
It's worth remembering that until the Trump presidency, Supreme Court nominees could be subject to filibuster and require 60 senate votes for confirmation, which meant that nominees needed to be good enough to have broad support. But in 2017 the GOP ended that. Kavanaugh would never have even been nominated if we still had the filibuster and 60 vote rule. We really need to go back to requirement that all federal judges need 60 senator support to be appointed.
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The Senate was the greatest deliberative body because of that 60 vote requirement. It was more genteel and respectful than the House, because legislation and agreement on Presidential appointments required more discussion and persuasion to arrive at such a majority. It meant Senators had to be respectful and familiar with each other.
This is what John McCain was talking about. Mitch McConnell has ruined the very thing he cherished so much. In doing so, he is ruining all our institutions.
5
@Steve
I agree although I think that Harry Reid changed the procedure during the Obama administration because Republicans were obstructing appointments to lower federal courts. Lifetime appointments are too important to be partisan. If the public cares about this principle,, there will be political pressure to make appointments of judges less partisan. I don't see that happening yet.
4
@Steve. It is true that the GOP changed the rule for Supreme Court votes, but it was Democrat Harry Reid who set the precedent for all other types of votes in 2013. I knew it was a bad idea then because it would come back to haunt us eventually. And now here we are.
1
The GOP taints itself no matter how this turns out.
Ram Kavanaugh through (courtesy of McConnell) and the tsunami that hits the GOP in November will dwarf anything even remotely imaginable to the human mind.
Bully Dr. Ford next week and they’ll get the same result (as above).
If the Kavanaugh vote does indeed take place before the midterms, and he is not confirmed, those who voted “Yes” will have signed their own pink slip.
I am wholly, singularly hyper-focused on one - and only one - date on the calendar.
One date. One opportunity. One chance.
11/6/18. VOTE.
887
@Guitar Man Absolutely right. I am sharing your post.
1
@Guitar Man Please vote and encourage your friends -every vote COUNTS - to vote out all who support Trump/Kavanaugh in November. We Can Make a Huge Difference - JUST VOTE!
@Guitar Man
May you be right.
1
Mr Kavenaugh is a fake. He may have had many women working for him a coach on his daughters team but by siding with Trump and the immoral GOP with their history of women abuse and his immoral act of rape when younger he ruined it for himself and family. I hope he is no longer a coach for a girls team and should not have a job as a janitor in the court house. He needs to take a lie detecter test and I still won't believe him since he is an ally with the biggest women abuser in government who got away with his women abuse Trump. How did the GOP get this bad morally and still get votes. That shows you all his supporters got questionable characters also. Very sad.
138
If Clarence Thomas got away with it There is no reason Kavanaugh won't.
52
@Tom
The FBI investigated that one, so, whether or not the FBI finds them guilty, they are still guilty?
6
@Tom
However, It's a very different moment in time with very real consequences on Nov 6.
13
@Richard -- Elsewhere I commented that when you gave an opinion qualified with "to my knowledge" your knowledge appeared sketchy, and I wondered if it might be sketchy by choice. Your comment here confirms me in thinking that I was correct in my wondering.
The FBI identified that Thomas was an avid consumer of pornography, both printed and on the "adult movie-house" screen, and that he had often boasted of his sexual appetites to co-workers and to subordinates. This information, which would have supported the plausibility of Hill's narrative, was kept from presentation during the hearings by executive-branch and senatorial personnel.
The FBI can find out a great deal in three days. It must be allowed, however, to share what it finds.
You really should get out more. This world is not only what you are told about it by Fox News. This world includes facts. They will surprise you.
1
"In his first appearance before the nation, Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh positioned himself as an ally of social change for women in America."
In that appearance, Kavanaugh also told a brazen lie: “No president has ever consulted more widely, or talked with more people from more backgrounds, to seek input about a Supreme Court nomination.”
The truth is that Trump looked at a short list of 25 possible nominees chosen by the Federalist Society. Kavanaugh's lie was not only brazen, it was easily proven to be a lie.
In my book, if Kavanaugh would lie about one thing, he'd lie about another. He has no business being a judge, let alone a Justice on the highest court in the land (Of course, the Supreme Court ain't what it used to be.).
547
@Vesuviano I listened to that acceptance (of nomination) speech by Kavanaugh. My take was that he had not written it. Trump had.
5
@VesuvianoThe nominee reflects the character of the appointee. Each has none.
5
@Vesuviano
It is Dr Blasey who has made an allegation without any foundation - no evidence, no corroboration whatsoever, 36 years after the fact and flatly, categorically denied by every single person she alleges to have been at the alleged event.
She has zero basis for these allegations.
The proper venue for them would be Maryland law enforcement, which still, due to no statute of limitations in that state, has jurisdiction over any such alleged claims.
And yet she has never gone to law enforcement with them - not 36 years ago, not 6 years ago when she claimed to have remembered tg in a private discussion with a therapist. Only now.
Against her "repressed memories" we have the accused's lifetime record of sterling begavior, and sworn affidavits to same by dozens of colleagues, clerks, superiors and private acquaintances including multiple former girlfriends.
Against this public record of decades of impeccable behavior toward behavior we have a partisan activist's reconstruction of an event from 36 years ago - with zero evidence or corroboration or even specific details about when and where.
How dare you pile on and accuse this man of lying. Shame on you.
If Genesis was the beginning of good vs. evil between men and women, then this and today seem like the perfect final battle and chapter. Hopefully the book will never be reopened again after this.
1
It is very clear what the objection to Brett Kavanaugh is about. Roe v Wade. This is what it has always been about. They are scared to death that it will be overturned if he is elected to the Supreme Court. We have already seen states place more restrictions on abortion so it should not be an issue. Will it ever be overturned? As a pro life woman, I would love for it to happen but I am not holding my breath. I am involved in the pro-life movement and will be participating in a bi-yearly campaign that starts next week with thousands participating around the country and world.
I attended a meeting of pro life activists a few years ago and I remember one of the speakers stating that it did not matter which political party held the presidency. She went on to say that it is pro life groups that have been responsible for saving innocent lives in the womb. We have certainly made a difference with many people joining the cause including men, women, young and old. Each year we see move people joining our movement.
5
70% of Americans including the majority of Republican voters DO NOT want to see Roe v Wade overturned. This is fact. So yours is a losing battle.
111
@WPLMMT
Who, or what, gives you the right to tell me, or other women, what they can or cannot do with their bodies?
If you’re concerned about the death of innocents, why don’t you work on prison reform?
The religious rights’ hubris is not only offensive, it’s hypocritical. Go pick on some of those politicians in Washington if you have all that righteous energy to expend.
We don’t tell you how or what to believe, and would appreciate the courtesy in return.
15
Pro-life supporters would have genuine credibility if they gave full throated support for sex education in public schools, free preventative birth control for all women (and men) and public policy financial support/social programs for poor women who must support these children they would have to bear.
But they do not.
The vast majority just want to put women “in their place” of subservience and forced childbearing. Cloaking themselves in “concern for the unborn” until women started dying is what got Ireland’s CATHOLIC citizens to overwhelmingly vote in a referendum to legalize safe abortion. They saw the real world results of making abortion illegal. It was dreadful.
History marches on. And we move forward - not backwards.
11
In his latest assault, Trump declared just last night that Kavanaugh "was born for the Supreme Court," which implies that Trump believes those post-birth, formative school years drinking and abusing were part of cultivating his SCOTUS credentials.
119
It is almost as though "Republicans" have built a wall in their brains as opaque and ill-considered mentally as the physical one they espouse, for no better purpose than to keep out thoughts that threaten their self esteem.
Fascinating from Dr Ford's point of view - a PhD for her students - and a cross reference with fMRI for medical students to research how the brain works when it denies its own truth.
Once we figure that out we can get everyone to use common sense and not be frightened of their own lack of self respect.
There we might even find the Love the Evangelicals are denying.
20
"In his first appearance before the nation, Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh positioned himself as an ally of social change for women in America. Standing beside President Trump at the White House, Judge Kavanaugh spoke of being a father of daughters and a coach to a girls’ basketball team. He hailed his mother’s legal career. He boasted that most of his clerks had been women."
He doth protest too much. Now we know why.
157
A Kavanaugh appointment is about more than alleged sexual misconduct. It’s about the future of women in America to be treated as equals and with respect. It doesn’t take a legal scholar to understand why the Right is pro Kavanaugh and why Trump picked him.
187
@DSS
I am not a partisan. I don't support Kavanaugh's views.
I am an American, and I am appalled by the absurd and disgusting belief that a fellow American who has never in his life been accused of any inappropriate behavior toward women - let alone abusive behavior - should have his career ruined, or be hanged by the court of Twitter, solely on the basis of 36 year-old accusations that are unsupported by ANY evidence or corroborating testimony of any kind.
Do you have sons? A husband? A father? How would you feel if a male relative with a spotless reputation were presumed guilty of extremely vague - no specific place, no specific time - a set of horrific allegations that were never brought to or investigated by the police, never supported by any sworn testimony then or for thirty years following, with every alleged witness categorically denying, along with your son/husband/father, every single aspect of the allegation?
Do you have any decency at all?
14
@T-Bone Wait for the hearing. I think it will be clear who is lying and who is telling the truth.
Hint: those who seek power, will dig their own grave.
@T-Bone Do you have daughters? A wife? A mother? Nieces? Aunts? How would you feel if one of them were sexually abused yesterday or years ago but it was too traumatic, terrifying or costly to tell about it then? The trauma does not magically disappear but remains to haunt the person for years, indeed a lifetime to come. There is a strong analogy to the soldiers who come home from war. The stress of trauma is so apparent, the American Psychiatric Association termed it Post-traumatic Stress Disorder in 1980 (although it has been occurring since the Trojan War of the 12th century BCE). PTSD is irrespective of what caused the trauma--physical, sexual, emotional abuse or war, the trauma is there. It is also irrespective of gender.
1
"Ms. Laguens said. 'Are we respected? Are we believed? Are we equal?'"
Is *due process* respected?
Are the *presumption of innocence* and other age-old *constitutional rights* of defendants in this country still believed?
Are Americans *equal before the law*?
Or is this merely a political movement aimed at settling scores?
If the latter, then what will Ms. Laguens and the other political jacobins do when the revolution turns, as it inevitably will, against them and their comrades?
7
They will gladly allow questions and allow questioners time. There will be no rush.
8
@T-Bone Kavanaugh and the men of the Senate. Have rejected due process
18
@T-Bone
The "presumption of innocence" applies as much to Dr. Ford's accusation of assault as it does to Judge Kavanaugh's presumption of innocence. We must also presume that the accuser is not making a false allegation. That, too, would be illegal. Why do I keep hearing this presumption of innocence only applied to the men in question?
3
The political outcome involves a calculation about how the GOP can mitigate the damage while getting their justice on the court. Plowing through in the words of Sen. McConnell. The question of how much damage is baked into the process to get to a narrowly-tailored "he said-she said" dynamic. There will be only the two witnesses. No investigation by a non-partisan professional before testimony. The male GOP senators' questions will be asked by a female attorney who appears sympathetic. The entire process is rushed by an arbitrary set of deadlines and ultimatums. Any congressional investigation as to whether this is a credible allegation ought to include both Democrats and Republicans in the planning. Every effort should be made to establish what criteria is to be used in a hearing for "advice and consent." The country deserves better than another raw exercise of political power in pursuit of a Supreme Court justice.
91
@rdelrio And now there are allegations of a second incident with a second woman, this time at Yale.
Kavanaugh will be confirmed "come hell nor high water". This stain on the nomination process will linger for decades on each and every judgement of the Supreme Court. Both the accuser and accused should have their right to appear before the judicial proceedings to allow for both their answers to be heard by the committee overseeing the hearing. Then let the committee decide - as if we don't know how they will decide!
27
@Majortrou Unfortunately, any stain Kavanaugh brings with him to the SC won't negate any of his votes. And last time I checked, the "stain" on Clarence Thomas (now 27 years old) hadn't invalidated any of his votes.
2
Let me understand this:
The majority of white women voted for Trump - knowing his is a
- misogynist,
- sex abuser, and
- vowed to nominate Supreme Court justices who would overturn Roe at a time with one opening and given the age of the court very likely even more.
And only now, when nothing surprising has happened, when Trump is doing exactly what he said he would do, and surrounds himself with people of his own low ethical standards - now, these white women Trump voters are upset?
Does everyone remember how few votes swung the key states?
I’ve heard of buyers remorse but come on. This one had buyer beware written all over it.
255
@Blue
That's why the other candidate received the majority of votes. Only the outdated Electoral College put him in office.
For the second time in less than 20 years, we have a president who not elected by the majority of the voters.
Abolish the Electoral College!
89
@Blue As a group, I find the designation of white women as a political group to be broad to the point of being nearly meaningless.
2
@Blue
NOT TRUE! A “majority of white women” did NOT vote for Trump!
Only a percentage of women are eligible to vote. Only a percentage of those eligible bothered to vote. Of that percentage, little over 50% voted for Trump. This is NOT A MAJORITY OF WHITE WOMEN. Of all white women, only something like 25% actually voted for Trump. Stop saying a majority voted for him; 25% is NOT A MAJORITY!
5
When the Dems take back the house they can impeach him for perjury, and use his pro impeachment Clinton memos to build the case against him. Live by the sword, die by the sword as they say.
352
@Jason and after they impeach him the Senate will refuse to ratify so what has changed, other than a brief moment of self-righteousnous? This is true for Trump as well. Who controls the Senate rules the world
5
@Molly Gordy
Yes. That's what the Dems need to do. We dems still don't realize that the Republicans have waged a total war against us for 25 years. They've been playing hardball while we've been playing softball. They are disciplined, orderly, and ruthless. We need to knock them down, and put our boot on their necks. Anything less, we'll keep losing our country to them and their backwards mentality.
@Molly Gordy
The Rebus have been waging total war against us for 25 years. It's time to return the favor. They are disciplined, orderly, and ruthless. And we try to go high, while they go low....sorry, that's not going to work anymore. We need to knock them down and put our boot on their necks. It's the only way to protect our country from their backwardness.
He’s readily impeachable by prior statements.
244
“A judge who could well overturn Roe v. Wade — handpicked by a president who has faced allegations of sexual misconduct — now faces an accusation of sexual assault”.
Let me update that last sentence to account for recent news: “......while an aide of his greatest Senate supporter Grassley resigned today amid his own accusations of sexual abuse...”
369
@Nuffalready
he was NOT handpicked by the president. he was handpicked by GOP handlers and the federalist society.
trumpster was given a list to pick from.
3
I pray the Women of this country are strong enough to refuse to accept the insults coming from the Judiciary Committee and the POTUS this time around. Women should not be regarded as second class citizens and the GOP along with sexual abusers have to recognize this. Dr. Anita Hill was treated with contempt. Please do not allow Dr. Ford to be treated the same way.
137
@Philip W
Sorry, Phil, but you are mistaken. Women in this country ARE second-class citizens.
We are taxed the same as a man but if you will recall, Phil, the Equal Rights Amendment was murdered in cold blood by the religious right-wingers under Reagan.
They said it had hung around too long and not been passed. What was it? 72 years?
So, after it's murder the Republicans did supply a new Amendment: It was 206 YEARS OLD and dealt with how the men got paid.
Have you ever heard the term "Pyrrhic Victory"?
Well, that is what "Kav, The Caveman" is going to prove to be: The Republican's Pyrrhic Victory. In the end, Kav will prove to be the undoing of both the Republican Party and the Evangelicals.
That's the thing about "Poor Little Rich Boys".
They never have any friends who warn them that sometimes when you win... you lose.
38
I love your comments so much, rosa!
1
Kavanaugh may be a good father and husband but accepting the appointment on the Supreme Court by this President places himself square in the middle of the #MeToo Movement. And it’s not on the right side. President Misogyny himself has laid the groundwork, and unfortunately Kavanaugh has to dance around the issue of women’s rights, knowing full well how this President stands.
And now with this accusation from the past and hearings next week, Kavanaugh is beginning to take on an altogether different persona, and it’s much worse. Best if he distance himself from the President and state he wants to spend more time with his family.
54
@cherrylog754
This simply will not happen!
4
Well, we all know now why so many of his law clerks were women!
Kavanaugh is not interested in promoting or protecting women and the more we learn about him, the more creepy he sounds. He should not be on the Supreme Court where he will continue to issue rulings that denigrate women (not to mention democracy, the environment, Native Americans, workers, etc.)
201
There are two kinds of feminism: feminism of equality and feminism of protection. The first states that women are equal to men in every respect and deserve the same rights and responsibilities. The second claims that we need special privileges due to our gender. In Kavanaugh ‘s nomination, the two collide with what might be catastrophic consequences for the future of American women. If confirmed, Kavanaugh may kill Roe, which will deprive women of the right to regulate our bodies in the same way as men are allowed to regulate theirs. But if his confirmation is scuttled because a woman’s accusation is believed solely because of her gender, then women will be seen as fragile and easily traumatized, in need of protection against the rough world of male aggression. If a man showed up claiming that Kavanaugh savagely beat him up in high school, would he be believed? People often invoke “The Handmaid’s Tale” but seemingly without having read Margaret Atwood’s book, which shows how theocracy deprives women of freedom by offering them safety and protection. Atwood’s handmaidens are never assaulted or molested by strange men because they are never out in the world on their own. The have traded freedom with all its dangers for the safety of red robes and the shelter of their ‘fragility”. So which way is the Republic of Gilead?
22
Every vote will count this November!
112
@Catalina
Keep dreaming. The GOP will continue to suppress votes that go against their candidates when ever where ever they can.
Oh, and by the way, since you are from Mexico, your country is paying for the wall!!!!
1
I suspect almost all Democrats decided to vote against Kavanaugh as soon as he was nominated regardless of qualifications. The few on the fence democrats are in Trump country and fear defeat. This whole thing is about tainting Kavanaugh. Half the people in the US are men and apparently they can be accused of something 36 years ago with no facts. And they are supposed to sit there and take it. I have no idea what happened but I know one thing. Nothing has been remotely proven and until apparently today the accused is considered innocent.
The media and a large number of people somehow know Ms. Ford is telling the truth but have no idea about what she has said or is going to say. Many have dismissed Mr. Kavanaugh's denials as lies. I must remind NYT readers of the shameful coverage of the Duke Lacrosse case in this paper. When it was all over not the slightest apology. We are told women never lie...Tawana Brawley, UVA Frat case, Duke Lacrosse, etc.
12
@Bill There are so many other aspects to this than whether Dr. Blasey (I notice you won't even use her name) can prove her case. The ongoing gender bias and disrespect is still appalling. As is the attitude and awful comments by so many Republicans. The information, previously held secret by Republicans, about Kavanaugh needed to be made public. He simply is not of the caliber to serve on the highest court of the land. His behavior years ago in tandam with Ken Starr tells us a lot about his prurient interests that he no doubt would prefer not to be public. Tough beans. He is not SCOTUS material. Period.
87
That's three examples versus a veritable tsunami of actual instances of sexual harassment/abuse of, and violence against, women by men. If you don't thinks so, ask the women/girls in your life.
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@Bill
Well said.
Americans who care about due process will not take it. We will not stand for kangaroo courts, star chambers, denunciations and convictions-by-twitter without a shred of evidence or corroborating testimony of any kind.
The backlash will be fierce.
Wise Americans who remember the last century's McCarthyist nightmare in this country - or the even more terrifying star chambers of the Communist regimes of Asia and Eastern Europe and Cuba - will not let this stand.
What is at stake now is the very foundation of our republic - due process, the presumption of innocence, the cornerstone that is our Bill of Rights.
10
No matter what, the GOP has made its mind up.
Kavanaugh will be confirmed no matter what.
They stood in the way of Merrick Garland and now no one will stop them.
Public opinion means ZERO.
Professor Ford doesn’t stand a chance.
It’s Anita Hill redux.
327
Probably. Sigh. But even if this guy is not confirmed, anyone Trump puts forth is bound to be a disaster, because everyone he surrounds himself with is awful. Like attracts like.
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I wonder, Manderine (largely because I crave finding a ray of sunshine in the nuclear winter of the Trump administration).
Perhaps Senators Collins and Murkowski will realize how dangerous voting Yes on Kavanaugh will be to their continued service in the Senate. Perhaps Senator Flake will realize that his Presidential ambitions will be severely compromised if he alienates too many of the majority of USA voters — meaning WOMEN — by voting Yes on Kavanaugh. Those 3 could throw the nomination.
Are they feeling the pressure? Will they cave as GOP toadies, as each has, with few exceptions, done in the past? We can’t know now.
Sad.
42
Sad but true. So disheartened.