I don't believe either of them.
After watching the whole miserable spectacle yesterday, I found neither Dr. Ford's nor Judge Kavanaugh's testimony particularly credible.
As a former trial attorney, it was clear to me that Dr. Ford had been coached on her answers in coordination with the Democrats on the committee, with the tip off being Sen. Leahy stumbling through the printed setup question that elicited the canned 'laughter...uproarious laughter' answer.
Another example of coordination is found in the strong objection by her attorney to questions regarding the polygraph test, followed by her failure to recollect any details of how she came to take the test or who paid for the test. Apparently we have only her counsel's word that she passed, as they have yet to release the actual results.
Regardless of her memories of the facts surrounding the allegations, the appearance of coaching and collusion with Democratic politicians diminishes her credibility as an impartial witness and suggests political bias as a motive for her statements.
Then this happened:
I have no idea what was in that envelope (Lee claims they were only fan letters), but the mere fact that a furtive Congresswomen is passing secret documents to the witness's counsel after the hearing is further evidence of the Ford team's less than forthright political impartiality.
Kavanaugh, on the other hand, came across as a mean drunk. While I believe his tears and anger were sincere (especially when talking about his dad), I did not find them particularly dispositive of his innocence. He has obviously been put through the ringer by the drawn out hearing, and frustration and impatience at having to endure this ordeal to gain a position he clearly believes he is entitled to seemed to be more the motivation than outrage at having been falsely accused.
Once he calmed down, Kavanaugh spent much of the hearing too-expertly filibustering the Democrats (incredibly lame) questioning. He was combative at times, but again, mostly out of anger at the process rather than the allegations. He also clearly liked (and still likes) to drink, and his repeated statements about how much he loves beer left me wondering how on earth the guy was able to post such a stellar academic record with all the partying he did all through those years.
The whole thing left me shaking my head as to what really happened. Ford supplied no new factual corroboration or other witnesses to back up her testimony, and indeed, when asked under questioning about her counselor's notes on the incident stating there were four other people in the room at the time, she admitted that the notes contradicted her hearing testimony that there were only two others. Another credibility strike.
Kavanaugh too, despite his protestations, was clearly no choir boy in high school. He was a smart jock who hung out with a pretty fast crowd. I don't think he is necessarily lying about being a virgin, but as the hearing went on I started envisioning a scenario where his party buddy 'Judge' saw an opportunity to alleviate that condition by exploiting a troubled girl who was having a tough time fitting in.
So while the lawyer in me is still certain that the totality of evidence in no way rises to the threshold necessary to disqualify Kavanaugh, after watching the hearing the 'juror' in me is left with more doubts than answers about what really happened.
Comments
spot on.
mercy buckets, as we used ta say up nort'.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
True. Trials are
battles.
But if there was truly some exculpatory evidence as you say, there is usually an appeal process available.
And you shouldn't generalize your experience to other trials.
But I like the way people are now attacking processes typically used for fact finding. That makes it much easier to just 'believe her' when one doesn't have to deal with facts.
dfarrah
i believe that a person who thinks it's reasonable
in a respectful discourse to place upon the other person the burden of defending a statement that the other person never made might also express surprise at the suggestion that the bizarre and ethically void adversarial formalisms of American jurisprudence are an epistemological joke -- but that's not my problem to solve.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
DId I just accidentally log in to some right wing site?
I can't believe the commenting here.
Dr. Ford mentioned Kavanaugh's name to her counselor and husband years ago (and some friends too). Was she "counseled by Democrats" at those points too?
There is NO visible incentive or reward for this woman that I can see for putting herself in a situation of lying.
There is a HUGE visible incentive for Kavanaugh to lie.
I'm more than disappointed with this diary and the comments.
"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin
This is a non-partisan website.
Perhaps you'd be more comfortable in a less free thinking place.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
Spoken like a kossack.
Part of being a non-partisan site is not suggesting that posters move to other sites for comfort.
Just trying to help clarify...
why a lot of us are here.
A lot of people mistake this place for a mini-dKos.
Just wanted to make sure he hadn't gotten lost.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
Doesn't sound like he's lost, to me
I have, however, seen some comments lately - including some of yours - that show acute intolerance for differences of opinion, up to and including bullying and harassing.
We're not supposed to do that here. THAT is supposed to be a DKos thing, and it should stay there.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
So a comment...
implying that I should not have posted this essay here because it doesn't pass a certain ideological litmus test is your idea of tolerance?
Good to know.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
There You Go Again
Thanks for proving my point.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
Which is?
You make personal attacks against me (accusing me of bullying and harassing) and yet when I reply with simple statement pointing out the hypocrisy of your logic and clarifying why I said what I said you jump on it as if I just threatened your dog.
The plank in your own eye and all that....
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
I never said this, YOU did:
That is totally a DKos "Agree or get outahere" statement.
People who are upset over the (increasingly nasty, acrimonious, and personal) tone of this and related threads are NOT necessarily "not free thinking" - they just don't like nastiness.
Can't wait for the whole shitshow to be over with, since its conclusion is foregone and inevitable - K will be seated and the rest of us will be screwed.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
You misinterpreted that...
and despite my explanation of why I did post it, you continue to do so.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
I didn't say that!
I said I was disappointed in your views and many of the comments. You just did it again!.... you pulled a DKos tactic... distortion of what people actually say in their comments.
Please take a step back and look at my original comment.
"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin
Agree. Honestly, I'm thinking that we 'all' need to take a step
back.
Can't we, as a generally collegial and open-minded nonpartisan blogging community, just present our cases without employing overly heated rhetoric and/or accusations, in order to make our points?
Please!
Blue Onyx
"Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong."
~~W. R. Purche
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
@Fishtroller02 Ok then.
If you say that's not what you meant, I believe you and apologize for misinterpreting.
(reply to Fishtroller02)
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
Thank you.
"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin
Seriously?
People joined this site so they could feel free to say what they want without being shut down and told to leave if they don't like what's said. If one disagrees with someone then state the reasons why without attacking them personally.
There is no right or wrong opinion on this topic. That's all they are. People's opinions. I agree with what the other maven said.
Exactly...
So take it up with Fishtroller02.
Or do you agree with him/her that I shouldn't have posted this here?
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
Distraction, distortion, derision, and division
Complaining about the TONE of a discussion (and this one, as well as its relatives, has gotten very ugly) is not the same thing as objecting to the SUBSTANCE of a discussion.
It's all squeals of kittens in a box on the way to the river - no matter what we say or how we say it, Kavanaugh will be confirmed and we peons will be screwed even harder than before.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
The tone here isn't ugly.
It's actually relatively civil as things tend to go when this topic comes up.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
Now that's a relative perception
I've seen quite a bit of meanness and spitefulness, and apparently so have some other people. It hasn't gotten to the point of overt personal attacks on users on this site - not yet. But if we don't dial it back....
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
I think the dems
will successfully block the appointment.
All they have to do is drag out the FBI investigation until forever.
dfarrah
@dance you monster Sorry, dym, I gotta
Sorry, dym, I gotta say I'm on the other side of this issue. If somebody has a problem with the site for insufficiently toeing the Democratic (or any) party line, well, then they should look for another site, because this one isn't going to change.
If we start believing that we need to be purveyors of dogma/talking points from either side, then we basically destroy the reason this site has for existing. There's no need for any more websites that replicate either party's dogma; god knows there's enough of them, with the big media corporations leading the way.
I'm not pissed, by the way (in either sense, heh). It's simply that somebody logging on here to express consternation and shock because we aren't, I don't know, Democratic enough? is being silly. It's not like we aren't up front about what we are.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
You missed my point.
I'm not defending a position that we need to toe a Dem line here, and I don't think Fishtroller was arguing for that, either. He/she did express that in the arguments here we have been seeing more right-wing perspectives of late, as others have noted, too. There's no reason we can't consider those perspectives, but it does seem quite unusual for the audience this site attracted at its outset.
My issue was NHK's reply, which basically said GTFO. From the conversation that ensued, I'm not the only one who perceived that -- or its inappropriateness.
It is Brett Kavanaugh who thinks this issue is
partisan, not me. The question here is whether this man has the resume to have a life time power over many peoples lives. His attitude towards women is clear in his past rulings and in his faux concern for Ford. That you and I don't share the same view on this issue and I can bring you to task for your view is what makes this site work. Or haven't you noticed?
I was told by Dkos when given an year off that I should find some other place to share my dissents from some of the diary writers and commenters. Are you telling me the same thing????
"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin
He pretty much said that he will get even
for what he has been put through since Ford made her accusation against him. You can read his opening statement that he made before he addressed the sexual assault charges and watch it as well as his fiery testimony. Asking Kobar if she had blackouts from drinking was childish.
He will arrive on the court with the biggest chip on his shoulder imaginable.
If he isn't confirmed Trump will appoint someone just as bad as him anyway. But without the baggage that is going to follow him regardless. The FBI is 'possibly' going to look into the other witness statements and if they find more women who say they were assaulted by him then it should be game over. This is if the FBI does their job properly.
I agree, snoopydawg. It's likely over for him.
Trump will nominate someone else. Why put another Clarence Thomas on the Court?
I'm beginning to think that this has been a watershed moment for the Republican party. The nation, such as it is, has been pushed into disgust for them. It's not so much about the details in this case, but it's the final straw. It's starting to dawn that the Republican party wants a very different country that most Americans do, when you analyze it. It's a matter of survival. If you fall on hard times, and many will, the Republicans would prefer to put you to death than offer you food stamps. Who can doubt this?
Regarding the FBI, was there a crime committed back in those high school years, or just a demonstration of bad character? I thought I read something about the lack of a statute of limitations in the state involved.
It's a shame that the only other choice the people have is the Democrats, who are apt to nominate a Roberts to the court, or someone in the bag for predatory capitalism and usury. Lifetime appointments are absolutely absurd. Give them ten years and let them stand for nomination again. Then we would have some accountability for some of these asinine decisions the court has made that young people have to live with for most of their lives.
Most definitely this has been a watershed moment
for the GOP. It's been made clear since they started the nomination process that they would disregard any previous procedures for how nominees are determined to be acceptable for the SC. The GOP has hidden most of his previous cases and other information that would expose any dark secrets. The WH has basically used executive privilege to not release over 80% of information that is normally relevant to making a decision.
This is an excellent point.
The social safety nets have been whittled away every damn time they come up for review. Billions are taken out of the food stamps program every 5 years when the farm bill is written while farmers get more subsidies. The huge Agra farms that are owned by corporations not only get more tax breaks and subsidies, but they also get deregulated. This is why people in NC are wading through pig shit and other toxic waste after the flooding. But I don't just blame the republicans for that. Democrats have gone along with the cuts too. Let's remember that Bill Clinton gutted welfare as we know it because it was what the republicans couldn't do when Shrub 1 was president. And as Mollie is reminding us Obama put SS on the table and signed the farm bills that had the cuts to food stamps in it.
This is correct. Maryland has no statute of limitations for sexual assaults and if any woman thinks that she could prove enough evidence that Kavanaugh assaulted them they can bring charges against him.
I recently read that every democrat voted for Scalia. Kerry and Obama both voted for Roberts and Alioto to move out of committee. And we know how instrumental Bidet was on getting Thomas confirmed. One last thing. I heard that the justices don't have to be appointed for life. Just that they can be. I've read too many articles lately to provide a link for this.
Oh yeah. Why is it so important that Kavanaugh gets appointed to the court? There are plenty of other nut jobs that will rule the same way as he would. If you're interested in how he has ruled on other cases I linked to an article about this in wind dancer's FBI essay. Actually both articles I linked to are worth a full read.
Thank you pointing to those links for info.
I haven't checked out that essay yet. I do recall the business about lifetime appointment options, now that you mention it. Also, I believe any president can expand the court or shrink it. I should look it up rather than dropping possible misinformation.
People are starting to take this sort of thing in stride, but in a woke way.
It's gotta make you wonder, though, does the swamp have a basement?
That she talked to other
people is not probative. Anybody can say anything anytime.
She originally brought up K when he was on Romney's short list. So what? The witnesses she produced contradict her story. That they contradicted her is actually worse than having no one to corroborate at all.
dfarrah
Who/what witness are you talking about?
You keep saying this, but I am not aware of any witness that she “produced” nor of any witness who contradicted her. The only actual witness is Mark Judge, and he refused to testify to support Kavanaugh. He said he doesn’t remember. Dr Ford’s friend who she said was at the party also said she didn’t remember it. That’s not saying it didn’t happen, just that she doesn’t have memories of that specific gathering. She did say she believes Ford regardless of her lack of specific recall. There’s no witness that contradicted her, that I know of.
Anyway, it’s a bit odd how obsessed you are with attacking this woman, while you appear to have no issues or problems whatsoever with Kavanaugh’s many lies. Or his evasions, his obvious bias and partisanship, his odious positions like justifying torture and literally unlimited presidential power, and the many other problems with his legal mindset as well as his entitlement and spoiled frat-boy temperament.
And he’s still going to end up on the Supreme Court anyway ffs. So don’t worry, your idol will be in a position to ruin many more lives very soon.
Pssst...when was Romney president?
Did I miss a few years?
I think the poster is confused by K's claims that Dr Ford's allegations were "refuted" (he used the word every time he mentioned them) by the three people she said were there. You are correct. They have said they do not remember which is not a refutation.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
LOL - took me a minute
I totally missed the part about “Romney’s short list” and had to go back and read again to get your reference! Funny mental typo, for sure.
Yes, I think she’s simply repeating talking points directly from Kavanaugh’s use of the exact same lie in his testimony. But perhaps she knows something we don’t, so I asked. ...
Ford told her husband that she had been assaulted
soon after they started dating, but she didn't mention his name until they started therapy because they were redoing their house and she wanted two front doors because of her claustrophobia and PTSD after the incident.
She mentioned PJ in her testimony and when the sex crimes woman was questioning him about an entry in his calendar that had PJ's name on it her role in questioning him came to an end. This is when the republicans started questioning him. This is covered in the article I linked to previously on this thread.
Pssst. Supposedly
Ford said she brought up the K incident to her therapist when Romney publicized his list of potential nominations.
dfarrah
It's SOP
It's standard operating procedure and always, as far as I have seen on this site, gender-related with that one. All males are perfect. Period. Any time light is shown on their behavior that might suggest otherwise, a dick-hungry, lying whore is to blame. Period. Have a look at comment history. (Dkos kicked him/her off, and not for being a Russian bot. Think 'hysterical woman' comment instead -- at least a complaint at the helpdesk pointed it out and linked to it.)
Nope, that one appears to hate women, and idolize men, apparently for nothing other than plumbing. Oddly enough, however, while men are supposed to have sex with women, women are untrustworthy whores if they have sex with men. Quite binary, albeit bizarre, and a comment history review shows such.
Pffft.
The me-too movement is trying to replace normal fact finding procedures with "Believe Her."
This is not acceptable to me.
dfarrah
Leland Keyser?
You haven't heard of her?
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/sep/29/leland-keyser-to-tell-f...
dfarrah
She did not refute anything
Like I said above, and you would know yourself if you were serious about the facts, this friend did not refute anything, and she said she believes Christine Ford. She says she does not remember the gathering or knowing Kavanaugh in high school. That does not mean it didn’t happen, or that she’s saying it didn’t happen. There’s a difference, as you must know. Claiming she refuted anything is a lie, pure and simple.
Plus, CS, her attorney has issued a stronger
statement, which was sent to the Senate Judicial Committee overnight, Friday.
Here's the link,
Christine Blasey Ford's friend is not refuting Ford's allegation, will cooperate with FBI, lawyer says
By Ariane de Vogue, CNN Supreme Court Reporter
Updated 3:26 PM ET, Sat September 29, 2018
and,
Blue Onyx
"Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong."
~~W. R. Purche
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
Well, I should
have used clearer language and said that she doesn't corroborate Ford. That said, I couldn't care less if Keyser says she believes Ford; Keyser doesn't even know Kavanaugh.
I mean, are we really to select a judge base on this number of believers vs. that number of believers?
dfarrah
the word "probative" is legalistic jargon that
has no significance in this matter -- and i mean the word has no significance, nevermind the legalistic concept it represents.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
Of course it
doesn't, when we are supposed to simply believe someone sans evidence.
dfarrah
You expect goddamn video or what? Jfc!
You keep saying it. You also claim to have been raped at gunpoint but don't remember exactly how old you were. Did you know your age when you went to the cops? Why didn't you just say no? Why didn't you stop him? Why were you some place that could happen? Why were you near him? What did you do to deserve it? You wanted to have sex with him, didn't you?
Feels fucking awesome to be asked the same fucked up questions you've been puking up about Ford, doesn't it?
Here's a reminder of what you said on another essay about her, and another older one regarding harassment.
Earlier this week
https://caucus99percent.com/comment/370820#comment-370820
My bold.
From back in Nov when MeToo hit the fan
https://caucus99percent.com/comment/310886#comment-310886
Fwiw, I had been 15 one month when a rapist took my virginity. It was over 30 years ago. I don't remember what I was wearing or the exact date, but like the judge you idolize, it's in a calendar book that I still have.
STOP VICTIM BLAMING! I'm beginning to think you're a troll, or worse, on Brock's payroll, because this is a pattern with you. If harassment, assault or rape are the subject, you ride in slut shaming and victim blaming. Eyes wide open right here, dude!
I was busy the day your wrote that comment.
Belatedly to mention it, deja, on that day, you fucking owned the internet.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
it wouldn't regardless of what anybody was
expecting anybody to believe. it's epistemologically inapplicable. nothing about these hearings and this process (other than perhaps the swearing of oaths to tell the truth) has anything at all to do with the formal processes of a lawsuit, a trial, or a courtroom (EDITED: Replaced "the law" with "a lawsuit, a trial, or a courtroom") . with respect to receiving an appointment to the judiciary, supreme or otherwise, every citizen, kavanaugh included, is entitled to exactly nothing. no rights to face an accuser, no rights against "self-incrimination" (which is to say, not literally self-incrimination, but that declining to answer a question can perfectly well be grounds for denying the appointment), no presumption of innocence. it is up to the applicant to persuade us that he is qualified (intellectually, morally, temperamentally, ethically, etc.). it is not up to us to prove that he is not. the burden of proof is wholly on the candidate.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
Not so much
The witnesses she produced contradict her story. That they contradicted her is actually worse than having no one to corroborate at all.
Not the same as saying that the witness contradicted her. Did you perchance read the article that I linked to? I didn't make it clear that it's a link not just part of my comment. There are many tweets that have videos of key parts of testimony.
ETA link
https://theintercept.com/2018/09/27/live-christine-blasey-ford-brett-kav...
Ye Olde Big Lie Technique
Repeat the same falsehood often enough, and people start thinking it must be true. We ought to be wise to that one by now...but somehow we are not.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
Wonder who he learned that from
It couldn't be the guy who keeps saying that all of the economic recovery is his doing when the recovery has been going on for about 100 months before he got into office. His actual accomplishment is that he has not crashed it . . . yet.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
I posted above that
I should have used clearer language - that Keyser does not corroborate Ford's account.
My lack of carefulness has nothing to do with trying to promote a 'big lie.'
dfarrah
I didn't accuse you of lying or spreading one
I accept your clarification of what the witness said. It's Kavanaugh who is getting away with misleading people because of the way he's saying it. And how he's saying it.
Look. I have no idea if he was the one who assaulted her or not. I did find her testimony credible and believe that she was assaulted. The facts that she does remember are the ones that seem tied to the emotions she had at the time.
I don't think that Kavanaugh should be allowed on to SC because for one thing he hasn't been forthcoming or honest when he was questioned. He dodged too many yes or no questions and refused to answer others. The republicans have held back too much of the papers that are normally given to both parties so they can decide if he is the right person to be appointed. Sure seems like they are hiding something that would preclude him from being appointed. This should concern everyone. On both sides of the isle.
He has perjured himself and finally I don't want him confirmed for the reasons Big Al stated. Kavanaugh should have withdrawn long before Ford made her accusation. His behavior after she did has been reprehensible in my opinion and Trump should pull him and appoint someone else who won't try to get even for what he has been put through. He said that. That was a threat to the democrats. And to us.
Well, I'm involved in this discussion
mostly because of my own personal experience (with a federal suit/hearing). Personally, I don't believe that anyone in this thread intends to be offensive.
BTW, Blasey Ford--according to The Washington Post--didn't name Kavanaugh to her counselor in 2012.
Here's the reporting,
Blue Onyx
"Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong."
~~W. R. Purche
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
She also testified that her husband recalls she named Kavanaugh
during the session. The therapist didn’t write down the name. And got the number of attackers wrong. One might infer that the therapist didn’t take the best notes. I thought the point that Ford sought out the therapy records to find out whether the session had been documented or not, and shared them even though they were both incomplete and contained an error, showed a sincere effort on her part to provide truth and facts as best she could.
Hi, CS--good to see you! Have no argument
with what you stated. I was simply trying to make a correction to Fishtroller's statement, since all of the newsprint accounts that I've read, have stated that in 2012, Ford identified Kavanaugh only by 'description.' (the excerpt I've quoted is represented as being the exact wording in the therapist's clinical notes)
And, yes, I'm aware of the inconsistency between her therapist's notes about the number of witnesses, which, I agree, isn't Dr Ford's fault.
Have a nice weekend!
Blue Onyx
"Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong."
~~W. R. Purche
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
So who do we believe?
Ford or her therapist?
Why even ask? Ford, of course!
What if her therapist had it seared in her mind that Ford said there were 4 attackers?
(oh just shut up, me
)
dfarrah
She has GoFundMe pages
The goal set forth was $150K, and she's raised over $700,000 so far.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
Sorry, dervish--I just duplicated your post, more
or less. I was answering your earlier comment about Ford saying that friends were helping her raise money.
My apologies!
Blue Onyx
"Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong."
~~W. R. Purche
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
Oh well that kills her story all together.... that people wante
to help her with her costs proves she had a motive for coming forward?? What are you saying here?
"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin
@Fishtroller 02 No, you logged into a
No, you logged into a politically independent site. If independence of mind bothers you, well, as someone else once said in a different context, it's a big internet.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
It is a right wing view that Ford was totally manipulated
coached and used by the Democrats to sabotage Kavanaugh.... in fact Kavanaugh says he believes she had this experience (not with him) and then turns around and says the Dems made her come forward and colluded with her on testimony.
So this view is a right wing view and that's why I challenged it. And I was soooo harsh saying that I was "disappointed" with the view, wasn't I?
One thing about a free exchange of opinions is that they can be shared here, and also can be called out for what they appear to be. I didn't call the writer "right wing". I said the OPINIONS reflect a right wing view.
And they do. That's called freedom of dialogue... at least in my book. The writer claims I said that he should leave the site or should have never posted this... and that is NOT what I wrote. Are you also going to suggest I find some other site?
"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin
@Fishtroller 02 You can stay here and
You can stay here and express whatever you want. But if you expect views here to conform to a standard set of Democratic talking points, or even liberal ones, you will be disappointed.
I believe your original comment said something like "Have I logged into a right-wing site?" That's what I was referring to.
I don't really care whether you are a Berniecrat, a straight-up Democrat, a Republican, a libertarian, a Green...well, you get the idea. Whatever your political leanings are, they're your own business. But there is no ideological or partisan rule here on C99. Once there is, the site will no longer have a reason for being.
The majority of us here share a number of beliefs about the world. For the most part, we have arrived at those beliefs through logic and fact, not partisan or ideological loyalty. Of course, we also make moral judgements here, a process which, by its nature, is not merely a rational or logical exercise.
We have suffered a political re-alignment in this country, so the moral principles most of the people here share no longer fit comfortably or exclusively into one political ideology. Most of those beliefs used to be the purview of the Left. Since the Left has been efficiently deconstructed in the United States, those moral views have gone into exile.
At the same time, a number of people on the right (and people with no adherence to right or left) have noticed that the world is being run by a bunch of psychopaths who are likely to get them killed. This has resulted in some people who used to be my opponents coming over to talk. They want to talk mainly because nobody sane wants rulers who protect a future in which most of us die after being stripped of our human rights and driven into poverty for some indeterminate length of time. The brutal exercise of power has become blatant enough that some on the right have begun to see it, and not all of them are resorting to the easy scapegoats (Black people, immigrants, Muslims, foreigners, homosexuals) that the Right often has in the past. Those who have a saner, more ethical, and more accurate view of the situation sometimes show up at places like this. I'm just as willing to talk to them as I am willing to talk to you.
However, just because they see the same situation I do doesn't mean they have abandoned all their right-wing views. There's a gentleman here whose handle I'm forgetting (darn it!) who invariably defends capitalism when the rest of us criticize it. There are a couple of people who regularly say things that I think represent extremely traditional, and even occasionally sexist, views of women. I'm still willing to talk to them. I do, however, reserve the right to opt out of a conversation that I think is particularly irritating or farcical.
That's kind of how this place works, unless things have changed at some point while I wasn't looking. The result is that people will not always respond the way you expect. The same happens to me. The same happened to me in this diary. I get surprised when people respond in what I see as boilerplate ideological responses, even if the boilerplate is liberal, mainly because, for me, my appraisal of the facts has transformed my thinking, rather horribly; few of the old boilerplates pass muster now.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
@Fishtroller 02 Again, 19 people think
Again, 19 people think this site is RW partisan, or that it should be Democratic? (I refuse to dignify the Democratic party with the moniker "left-wing.")
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
I think you're misreading this.
Of course, this whole thing has been politicized to death. But look back over this thread. The arguments are to discredit the testimony of a victim of sexual assault (she flew somewhere, so she's a liar) and the accounts of other witnesses to his drinking behavior (he passed his classes so he couldn't have stumbled anytime that week, could he?). Who else is doing that now? Republicans, of course, and right-wingers in general. Those 19 (now 22) thumbs up aren't a plea to get cozy with Dems who are using this opportunity to scuttle a nomination, but a recognition that this thread is doing a disservice to the victim of an assault that no one has said did not happen.
There's a point at which you drop the politics and regard the person. Ford was injured for a lifetime of hurt, and had to recount it before millions of people she'll still have to face every day hereafter, and the person who did that to her was likely testifying before that same committee and all too likely will be rewarded for his behavior with a cushy, prestigious job ruining other people's lives. And we are debating plane flights and stumbles. I'm sickened by this thread myself. I tipped Fishtroller's comment. And there was nothing Dem about it.
Her credibility
should be tested as much as his.
People don't get to run around accusing people without evidence.
How can you assert that she is in so much pain when her flying around clearly indicates that the claustrophobic stuff was hoakum?
She wants people to believe that she has been seriously traumatized and has debilitating claustrophobia hence her first plan to drive, but she doesn't have debilitating claustrophobia. Do you know what debilitating means?
Maybe she has other forms of trauma that she would like to cite as examples, but the airplane stuff was just hoakum.
dfarrah
More of this shit.
Look, the flying thing was explained far upthread. Are you ignoring responses to your comments? For that matter, if you had been paying attention to the coverage, you'd not have needed that explanation.
Everyone, the accuser, the witnesses who have offered to come forward, and yes maybe even the Democrats for the most part, have asked for corroboration, for full investigation of the charges. Well, almost everyone. The ones standing in the way, or curtailing any look that is conceded, have been Republicans, for what to any sensible human being would seem obvious reasons. I may be no friend of Dems, or of their handling of this hearing, but I can sure as hell see the perfidy of the Republicans and call that out.
To the matter at hand, if you spent, urging people who can do this investigation, one small fraction of the time you've spent berating us that it hasn't been done yet, you'd actually be doing something useful.
@dance you monster Something monstrous
Something monstrous is going on in this country that didn't used to happen, or at least it happened only rarely. The powerful and unscrupulous have figured out that they can use the damage and pain suffered by oppressed people, the stories of those injustices, to advance their own rotten aims. That's pretty dreadful, and its aim is to defang criticism of the powerful by hiding the powerful behind various sympathetic characters, so that if you criticize the powerful, you end up criticizing the sympathetic character as well. At that point a character attack can be mounted against the critic as a bigot or cruel bastard. (This is not what I think you are doing, by the way--I'm just laying out the situation as I see it).
What this does is take the causes that the Left used to champion, and use those narratives to ends other than the empowerment of the oppressed and the transformation of their conditions. Meanwhile, part of the Left tries to fight for those traditional causes, while part of the Left tries to fight the entrenched powerful and their system, resulting in the Left being divided against itself in a most vehement way. This is what I meant when I said elsewhere that the Left had been efficiently deconstructed in this country. The Left, what's left of it, hasn't figured out a good counter to this terrible discursive move.
What I'm saying is, Ford's pain can be genuine, the injustice she suffered real, and the spectacle we're watching can still be a work, and probably is. Or she could be as false as the right thinks she is. I suspect that is not true, though I have no way of knowing what's in her heart. But what I do know is that a person of integrity drawn into a situation that wretchedly corrupt will end up becoming a pawn unless they are incredibly gifted in the use of power and language. If they are, they might be able to hold onto their personal integrity and power, with effort (I knew one or two people on the Hill who did). Most people will either be corrupted, or become pawns in a process beyond their control.
I almost hope she is false, because if she's for real, she's going to have to live with the aftermath of this once those in D.C. are done with her, the same way Lewinsky did, and that's not going to be fun, regardless of how much GoFundMe money she acquires. If she's false, at least she went into this hellish process on purpose, and knowing what she was in for. I can tell you as a rape victim, I sure as hell wouldn't go there and testify before those people--for my own sake.
Assuming she is what she appears to be and not what the right says she is...
then she is an innocent who has gotten swept up, pain and all, into a toxic political fight. In which case, you're right, the only ethical way to proceed is to separate her from the process. But how can that be done? And how do I know that she is what she seems? My best guess would be that she is. But in a world where the news circulated through mainstream sources tends to be so often false, indeed mendacious, how can I simply believe her the way I once would have, because she's a woman stating that she has been raped?
Yes, there was a time when I would have believed someone simply because they said that, unless I knew facts that definitely cast doubt on those assertions. How can I do that now about a story circulated through the corporate press, promoted by a national political party? It could be true, given how Kavanaugh seems and the type of person he is: a well-connected powerful man. Given the culture of non-accountability around people like him, it wouldn't be surprising to find many perpetrators among them.
But can I simply *assume* it is true? That's the issue here. At one time, any ethical person on the Left would have simply assumed it was true, else they would have been a horrendous misogynist bastard. But now? How can I #BelieveWomen when the woman in question is quite literally surrounded by mendacious scoundrels? This is a thorny problem for me. I don't know whether she's true or false. I'm sticking to what I'm sure of, which is that the powerful arrayed around her AND the powerful arrayed around Kavanaugh, are false, proven false, repeatedly. That's why I try to keep some discursive distance between myself and the spectacle unfolding on screen; I see unscrupulous people on both sides, and a woman in the midst of them who may be an innocent victim who's getting re-victimized in front of my eyes by the process, or may be false, in which case she's going to end up doing harm to those who have truly been hurt, like everybody who makes a false accusation.
I guess in the eyes of some, that makes me monstrous, sexist, cruel. But I can't simply turn off my knowledge of the political corruption and deceit that infects both our public institutions and our news media. The best I can do is back away, and I probably should.
One thing I will say; little good will come of the process unfolding up there, even if Kavanaugh is defeated. It's not like the next horrendous candidate is going to be a mensch.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
First off, . . .
. . . I know for a fact (since we've met) that you're not monstrous, sexist, or cruel. We're just on different sides of the divide you describe.
And it appears to me that little good will come of this week. Maybe no good, in the absolute sense, but just a tiny bit less bad, at best. I see this as setting a milepost, or like saving a game when you are called to attend to other tasks, so when you come back to this issue you can start from that new marker and not have to go back to the beginning to do (and endure) it all again. We had the Anita Hill hearings as a milepost for this one, a commonly understood reference point, to permit us to understand this present hearing. We didn't have to make everyone endure that much more suffering to get to the comprehension of the problem (sexual harassment and the impunity of the powerful in perpetrating and perpetuating that harassment) that we comprehend now but just haven't done much to stop. Whatever the outcome now, with the Ford/Kavanaugh hearing, we won't have done much more, but we will have a new milepost, we're mapping a little more ground, so the next time we'll spare the next victim a little more of the pain that Hill and Ford and others have gone through. Sounds like incrementalism, I know, but Americans don't seem to learn in great leaps. I'm not sure if any humans do.
@dance you monster Hey, dym. I'm
Hey, dym. I'm afraid that last was me getting carried away by my own rhetoric, and not a response directly to you. As I said at the beginning, I don't think you're doing a character assassination on me.
Sometimes I think there's no point in trying to maintain the old values, and that I should simply "know when I'm beaten," and accept the brave new political world the Clintons, Bushes, Gingriches of the world built for me. I'm just not good at accepting defeat, particularly when the condition of defeat is basically silence. There's no place for me in the debate as it stands, which is why I keep fighting the terms of the debate in order to try to carve out space, over and over again, for my views.
However, whatever I decide, it would be with no rancor toward you. I always look forward to the possibility that we might meet again, seed-saver.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Geez you are so far off!
I left the Democratic Party in 2017 and voted for Jill Stein in 2016. I am totally for independence in thinking and in opinions. I just happen to think and voice my opinion that the view expressed by the writer of this diary reflects the position of right wingers. That's IT... no invitation for him to leave the site and find others... nothing like that. But that is the first thing he suggested to me. And now you are doing it.
Cut it out.
"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin
Sometimes righties and
lefties agree on some issues, such as exploitation of a situation.
I don't believe that Ford is being exploited.
dfarrah
I too think you have misread his intent
People are well aware that this site is non partisan. If I understand him correctly he means that the accusations against Ford are something one would see on a right wing website.
@snoopydawg Here's what it looks
Here's what it looks like to me:
"Bad website! Bad, bad website! You have comments on you that would be at home on a right-wing website! Bad commenters! Bad, bad caucusers! Aren't you ashamed to be talking like right-wingers? I'm so disappointed in you! Did I accidentally log on to Drudge? This place is just as corrupt as the corruption it criticizes!" This is a paraphrase of various comments.
The overarching theme seems to be that C99 is a bad place and the people on it are bad. Right-wing, sexist, misogynist, cruel. The reason for this seems to be that certain comments were made. Certain comments were made in this diary, which makes C99 a bad, corrupt, cruel, misogynist place.
Yet C99 is a place where any comment can be made if it exists within the bounds of civility. That's the only rule. We can change that and say that people here are not allowed to question the motives or integrity of people claiming to have been sexually abused. We can further say that people here are not allowed to question the motives and integrity of POC fighting racism, women fighting sexism, LGBT people fighting homophobia, etc. That would make it a different website, though it might, on occasion, be impossible to meet all those goals simultaneously, as in the case of Clarence Thomas, where one person claimed to be victimized as a woman, and, in response, the accused claimed to be victimized as a black man.
If we changed the website in that way, it would become appropriate and sensible to condemn the website for having right-wing, or putatively right-wing, comments on it; to say how disappointed one is in the ideology of commenters, their lack of unquestioning loyalty to oppressed groups, etc. Of course, such commenters wouldn't last long, as they'd get temporarily or permanently banned for breaking the rules of the site, and soon these arguments wouldn't even happen.
People got angry and offended, affronted even, by some of the comments here. I understand that. I, too, got angry and offended while reading some comments to this diary. Do any of my responses look like this?
"Did I accidentally log onto a David Brock website? Are all of you Hillbots? I'm very disappointed in all of you. This site is just as corrupt as the Democratic party."
I didn't say that in response to MsDidi. MsDidi had just said that people in disagreement with her couldn't possibly be survivors, and might even be perpetrators. Do you have any idea what it feels like to be a survivor who gets told something like that? I was told that people who held my views were likely to be sexual abusers. Yet the only reason I'm even mentioning it right now is to make the point that I haven't responded to people on the other side with the assumptions of bad character and bad behavior, the blame, and the attempts to shame, that I've seen here from some of the people on the other side of the argument. The closest I came was to express surprise, twice, at comments that had been uprated by many people, in a "do you *really* believe this?" kind of way.
Yes, that expresses disapproval. But politely, and with a focus on the ideas held, not on the moral character of the commenters, or of the website.
I don't assume that MsDidi and the 14 people who uprated her comment are cruel, horrible people, that they don't belong on this website, that their presence makes the website something alien and alienating to me. Even when I said I was horrified by her comment, I focused on the specific content that horrified me, rather than making generalized character attacks on commenters or--for God's sakes--on the website.
When I think of the amount of unpaid labor and pain that went into making this website a going concern...well, maybe that's why I tend to refrain from attacking C99 as an entity, which seems to be damned easy for other people to do.
We can make a website that disallows certain views. Or we can make a website that requires nothing from its commenters but civility, and allows them to hash things out according to the values of the site, which hopefully include a respect for logic, reason, and truth. But if we do that, it's no longer appropriate to suggest that people who disagree with one's position are bad people because they made certain comments, that the site is a bad site because certain comments are displayed on it, or other such blanket expressions of blame and shame.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Agree
I barely recognize this place.
@coolepairc Because there's a
Because there's a couple of right-wingers here? Or because everybody's not toeing the line and reciting anti-Republican talking points?
Or is it because someone called a survivor's testimony into question, which is a much thornier issue than it used to be?
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Agree, NHK. Left me with more questions,
and somewhat less certainty.
As far as 'coaching' is concerned, my only personal experience did not consist of prompting me to tell a certain 'story,' or, telling me 'what' to say.
Met with the hearing attorney for quite a few hours--two days in a row--with my local attorney, and his extensive files. What the trial attorney did do, was question me extensively. My impression was that he was testing my veracity, partly, by comparing what I said to the notes of the other attorney. (Who, BTW, had complete confidence in my integrity and accuracy--that, I know for certain.) At times, he would jump back to a topic--sorta out-of-the-blue. (Again, trying to test me, I thought.)
I've always understood that attorneys don't want any 'surprises.' So, I'm 'guessing' that it's the reason that both of them covered any and all possible venues of questioning/topics.
At any rate, I had no complaints.
We won.
Blue Onyx
"Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong."
~~W. R. Purche
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
Nothing wrong with preparing a witness...
to answer questions you expect the other side to ask.
Coordinating the questions and answers with hearing panel members (as was clearly evident) is a whole different issue.
Glad your case turned out so well.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
Thanks. BTW, NHK, wasn't disagreeing
with anything you said about coordination between her attorneys and Dems. I've only read her opening statement, and didn't get to hear the AZ prosecutor or the Senators question her.
I did hear all but the first 10 or so minutes of Kavanaugh's testimony. Sounded to me like he had an overdose of caffeine--not beer!
Hey, thanks for this thread. I like it when folks are given the latitude to think outside the box, as opposed to being expected to pick sides.
Blue Onyx
"Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong."
~~W. R. Purche
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
Your quite welcome.
and no worries.
I knew what you meant.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
I had a much less generous thought . . .
I have seen coke users (no, not the soft drink) do this with their mouth and nose, It occurred to me particularly as he was sniffing long before he started his crying scene.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
Hey, WD13--you never know! ;-D EOM
Blue Onyx
"Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong."
~~W. R. Purche
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
You are quite the
one-person gossip machine.
dfarrah
I absolutely believe both of them.
I believe them no less that I believe history books written by survivors of their era, which form the foundation of a modern Western education.
I also know a thing or two about how memories are stored when the brain is intoxicated — and what three decades of living life on earth can do to those memories.
And I most fervently believe that the outcome of all of this has almost nothing to do with those long ago events. Instead, I am certain that this moment is about one's current political and social desires, going into the future — because that's the only thing that really means anything.
A good article in the New Yorker about K's demeanor
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-ford-kavanaugh-he...
It looks to me like maybe K has just now figured out that there ain't gonna be no forgiveness. Not anymore. For decades, much male misbehavior has been predicated on the notion that hazing, harassment and even assault of women will always be indulged, smoothed over, and forgiven, no matter how crude and cruel, on account of how cute us women find him and how we just can't do without him. Except, we can. And K, and other men are hurt and angry and crying because Mommy isn't here anymore, and we, many if not most women, are not in a forgiving mood.
As for the lady, using the term advisedly, my first reaction is that I am happy and grateful that my daughter has chosen to raise my teenaged granddaughter in a small town where sleepovers are allowed only if Mom has met the parents and NO private house parties at all. My second is that it is a hard and cold world and the Lord doesn't love stupid.
A Republican Party strategist was quoted as saying he would be willing to loose the House to get K confirmed and I think that may have just happened. I suspect K did the Rethugs no favors at all, electorally speaking.
Mary Bennett
Have you seen how he answered some questions?
There are videos of his testimony in the link I posted in my comment. As I stated I don't want someone with his demeanor on any court. He seemed pissed that anyone would question his integrity. He interrupted democrats and gave snide comments back. And what's with all that sniffling? Allergies?
She was only used to question Ford, but when she started questioning him and asked him about the people who were named in his calendar where he mentions "PJ" the republicans stopped her right then. Ford mentioned "PJ" too.
Regardless of his attitude, his previous testimony when he might have perjured himself he is going to be confirmed. As many have stated this is just a circus for the rubes. Democrats had so many chances to question him on more important topics, but they had no intentions of doing so. Ringling brothers came to DC.
Right.
"I'd like to be your next Supreme Court justice because..." What? What's this?
The ruling classes need an extra party to make the rest of us feel as if we participate in democracy. That's what the Democrats are for. They make the US more durable than the Soviet Union was.
Perjury
Considering that K perjured himself in his 2004, 2006 and 2018 confirmation hearings, nothing will happen to him for doing so in the "hearing." Evidence for those perjuries have already been posted.
No. Allergies tend to turn your eyes red and his didn't even turn red with over a half-hour of "crying." I have a theory that I have already stated elsewhere in this thread and best not repeat.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
He was always going to be confirmed.
The right does have the House and the Senate. They wouldn’t pass up the chance to pack the SCOTUS no matter who the candidate was/is.
What I want to know is what did Di-Fi hope to gain from this shit show? The way she handled this situation destroyed a lot of the ‘credibility’ of all involved in the left. She damn well should have made this an issue in July.
I'm tired of this back-slapping "Isn't humanity neat?" bullshit. We're a virus with shoes, okay? That's all we are. - Bill Hicks
Politics is the entertainment branch of industry. - Frank Zappa
This was my question too
I would lean towards her trying to keep Ford's name out of the hearings as she asked if Feinstein hadn't apologized to him because of the protesters who didn't want him on the court. People are supposed to have a say in what government does right? But that ship has sailed and now people are arrested for protesting their reps to try to get them to listen to them..
Democrats have been helping Trump pack the courts with right wing justices. The republicans stalled hearings during Obama's tenure and that's why there were so many openings. Gee. Makes one wonder why democrats lost 900 seats because they saw no reason to vote for democrats when they weren't trying to pass legislation that would help them. This republican obstructionism during his presidency was just bullshit in my opinion. Democrats had many ways to make the republicans start governing. So did b
Barry.
obstruction?
i consider it sedition.
as i've argued before, in any other country it would have been viewed as a constitutional crisis.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
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