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No! Just, No!
Sorry, but with all due respect to everyone trying to be respectful and even-handed, the Senate should not devote a single second, a tenth of a second, a microsecond, to the supposed charges against Brett Kavanaugh.
Line it up. Senator Feinstein has for over a month sat on an unsubstantiated 30-year-old allegation of teenage misconduct brought by a progressive activist against a respected jurist, and then brought it forward at the last minute in an attempt to stall the process and if not thwart the nomination, to smear the integrity of the nominee so that he is forever tainted.
Considering the circumstances, the burden of proof should be entirely on the accuser and her supporters. When the return on a successful lie is so high, the presumption should be that the accuser is lying. Until there is overwhelming proof not only of the instant allegation but a pattern of behavior, the Senate should adamantly refuse any consideration whatsoever.
Published in Law
If it was so important to DiFi to get the truth out, she would have done it six weeks ago. She has 24 hours to put it or shut up and the timer started 23 hours ago. The alternative is Mitch’s suggestion to hold the vote the week before the election. Let Joe Manchin and other vulnerable Dim senators squirm.
Except that the FBI have already stated that there is absolutely nothing for them to investigate. If a crime indeed occurred it was not a federal crime and even if it were so the statute of limitations has long since passed. Either they testify under oath during a hearing or nothing, either way it is time to vote. Anything else is just a pointless delay.
It was suggested my John Yoo that, if the committee did anything, it would be to send agents to see what they’d get under oath. Given what we now know, it seems unlikely they’ll do it. If the Senate chooses to move forward with a vote on Kavanaugh this week, I’ll take back everything I’ve said about them.
I’m pretty new to Ricochet so was my first time reading. Terrible thing to have happened to your son, but good to hear he and your family are doing well
Yup.
The one very small glimmer of hope in all of this is that there is a built-in stand-down: She might be able to save face by saying “Maybe I’m wrong…maybe it was someone else…”
It’s just…running out of words to describe my disgust.
Well, we did talk about Bill Clinton….oh wait…sorry…he actually did what we said he did…
And he did them while holding public office.
And the accusations were consistent with his general behavior.
The current accusations are completely out of character of everything else we know about Judge Kavanaugh.
The Senate Committee controlled by Republicans has the authority to send FBI agents to take statements under oath. Hearings will be nasty & ugly. This entire episode is about political power not about the truth. It is about Republicans or Democrats choosing the next SCOTUS Justice.
The hearing will be public, full committee, chaired by Senator Grassley, and it will be next Monday. So, one week delay, putting the Senate on track to vote before October.
https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/meetings/nomination-of-the-honorable-brett-m-kavanaugh-to-be-an-associate-justice-of-the-supreme-court-of-the-united-states-day-5
I can already imagine the Dems’ enlightening questions, such as:
“Dr. Ford, please show us on the doll where the bad boy touched you.”
“Judge Kavanaugh, as a teenage boy at a beer party, didn’t you ever try to ‘cop a feel’?”
“Mr. Chairman, a follow-up. Judge, how many girls did you lie on top of?”
I think I ground the enamel off my molars!
Everything that happens now is to provide cover for Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski. Republicans have to keep them on board, so they can’t appear to dismiss these allegations too hastily.
Perhaps Trump releasing and declassifying all those Russian Collusion documents will dominate the news instead. I’m hoping that will be why they are doing this. Otherwise, they are Charlie Brown and Lucy with the football.
He said it didn’t happen he came out early this morning. And two of Kavanaugh’s high school girl friends.
Rush had a caller today with an interesting observation: Prof. Ford apparently first mentioned the incident to a therapist, though without naming her alleged attacker, during the 2012 election season… when there was concern that Ginsburg’s cancer might prove fatal or so compromise her health as to require her to step down and Romney was expected to appoint Kavanaugh to the first available SCOTUS vacancy if he were elected.
Not even respect. Everyone watching should long ago have known the nature of what the Dems do, and what our side must do in answer.
I do think there is a possibility of coincidence. It is mathematically possible. But I do wonder why the therapist didn’t take very good notes. Her husband claims she referred to Kavanaugh by name (but he has a vested interest in that version, so I discount that somewhat) From what I understand, and has been widely reported, there wasn’t specificity about the event even at that time. I am sure the therapist cannot comment, but just wonder why it was so poorly documented if it was central to her relationship problems.
“…by the mouth of two or three witnesses the matter shall be established.”
Sorry, one lone accuser with no substantiation, no matter how eloquent or persuasive a speaker, just doesn’t cut it.
But not wildly out of character for an intoxicated high school boy and girl. Kids do dumb things.
Then they grow up.
More detail:
I think the good Doctor won’t say a thing. I think her attorney will do the talking. Thus a strategy to enrage the inquisitors to perpetrate said optics of “old white men attack woman.” The GOP will be polite but forceful, and be portrayed as monsters. Meanwhile here comes the bloviating grandstanding of Kamala Harris and T-Bone on Kavanaugh.
the committee is 11-10 Republicans. Jeff Flake can vote this down and Kavanaugh won’t get a Senate vote, and I think he will. I could see him pulling a “I can’t be sure, so we should get someone without these charges so since I’m not sure, I vote no” and frame it as a mild homage to McCain’s sense of standing up for what’s right.
I don’t think Jeff Flake is torturing himself over the hearing. I think he’s made up his mind either way. My gut tells me Kavanaugh’s going down in committee.
What has Flake got against Kavanaugh?
If they allow this tactic to succeed, they will get a whole lot more of it. This woman is immune from any repercussions and it’s very easy to make these accusations when untrue. It is very unwise to give them any credence at all. The democrats would never allow this to happen to their nominees (partly because they will all be female).
Diane Feinstein should be publicly censured for this stunt. And the people of California should be made to pay my taxes in penance for foisting this horrible person on the rest of the nation year after year after year.
I think Flake preens a bit as a Republican who stands up to Trump.
its not personal on Kavanaugh or even as a shot at Trump. It’s about the Flake brand as he leaves and gets a job in media or perhaps tries to appeal to a broader audience to run nationally
Amen. The truth has come out. The woman, a leftist political activist, is getting revenge on Kavanaugh because his mother was the judge who presided over the foreclosure of her parents’ home:
https://dailycaller.com/2018/09/17/kavanaugh-ford-foreclosure/
Now, the case appears to be a whole lot of nothing, but people have exacted revenge for lesser things . . .
More than a bit. I think that Flake is wandering occasionally into Trump Derangement Syndrome territory.
This doesn’t necessarily mean that he’s a bad guy, but I think that it is irresponsible in a significant Republican leader. This was the problem that I always had with McCain, though I voted for him consistently (except in the Presidential primaries).
The situation presents a good answer to Jonah Goldberg’s regular question about why people ask if he “supports Trump.” In a political coalition, it is important to know that your allies are not going to abandon you when the going gets tough, or after they get what they want from your loyal support. This seems a particularly difficult point for Libertarians and Conservatarians to understand, probably for the same reasons of temperment that lead them to be Libertarians or Conservatarians in the first place.
This lack of loyalty is precisely what leads to the “lack of vision” that Ben Sasse complains about (in Goldberg’s recent podcast, for example). We used to be united behind Reagan’s vision of a strong defense, free market prosperity, and support for family and traditional values. The Libertarian types basically said that they like the free market stuff, are a bit dubious about defense, and really hate the family and traditional values voters (or at least hate their policies). Thus, we have breakdown.
It’s tough to hold together a coalition. Jonathan Haidt’s work shows that loyalty is one of the six key “moral foundations” — which is essentially absent in both Libertarians and Leftists. For this reason, they organize on a purely transactional basis, which makes for weak coalitions.
I don’t know. It seems unlikely that Ford would have even known the name of the judge, who (according to the linked story) did not even make any substantive rulings.
“but I think that it is irresponsible in a significant Republican leader.”
It seems that to be a significant Republican leader the only requirement is to sabotage the Republican Party.
The accuser doesn’t know when or where it happened. The witness she named says it didn’t happen. The accused has categorically denied that it happened. The cross-examination is gonna be fun. Look for the usual suspects to object constantly to any attempt to pin this woman down (please excuse the idiom) on basic facts. I guess it’s gonna be hard for the accused to establish an alibi: “Judge Kavanaugh, were you somewhere in Maryland near the beach during the early 1980’s? Ahaaa!