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Post by Deleted on Oct 8, 2018 10:11:59 GMT -5
He actually looks a little like James Woods, I think. l'il bit. He made me think of a warped and none-too-skillful portrait of someone painted circa 1782.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 8, 2018 15:31:15 GMT -5
Well, this should help heal the vast divide and deep resentments arising from Kavanaugh's confirmation hearings. Bravo, Mr. President. Bravo.
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Post by Optimus on Oct 8, 2018 15:55:12 GMT -5
Politically motivated? She's polling at like 1%. She was probably high when she said that.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 8, 2018 18:15:21 GMT -5
okay. This is not appropriate, at all.
or this:
He was not "proven innocent", and the polls I've seen indicate that more than half the nation feels that Kav and Trump owe the apology.
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Post by celawson on Oct 8, 2018 18:26:43 GMT -5
Well, once again Trump goes too far. He said some things I agree with - Supreme Court nominees DO deserve a dignified advise and consent process. It's been degraded over the last couple of decades into the opposite of dignified. That's wrong. And this one was the worst.
But no, Kavanaugh wasn't "proven innocent". And no, I don't think Trump should apologize on behalf of the "entire nation" in a situation such as this. But a comment acknowledging regret for how difficult the process was, IMO, would have been fine.
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Post by nighttimer on Oct 8, 2018 20:22:05 GMT -5
Well, once again Trump goes too far. He said some things I agree with - Supreme Court nominees DO deserve a dignified advise and consent process. It's been degraded over the last couple of decades into the opposite of dignified. That's wrong. And this one was the worst. You will never find any serious liberal who would agree Brent Kavanaugh was treated worse than Merrick Garland.
Oh, and to add a little acidity to the golden shower Mitch McConnell pisses all over your "dignified advise and content process," the slimy little fuck has now declare the "rule" which he used to justify the Republicans denying Garland a hearing and President Obama his Constitutional prerogative to submit a nominee for the Supreme Court will not apply to President Pussygrabber.
At times, I confess to wondering just how painful was the surgical procedure an immoral, rat-eating, stinking piece of human excrement like McConnell had to endure to remove his soul and cauterize any sense of shame?
Regretfully, it seems not nearly painful enough.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 10, 2018 23:05:02 GMT -5
Well.
ETA:
I'm guessing they simply get dismissed as moot. But it's just incredibly weird that we're seating someone on the Supreme Court with this stuff still hovering.
But then, so much is weird these days.
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Post by Vince524 on Oct 11, 2018 11:52:59 GMT -5
okay. This is not appropriate, at all. or this: He was not "proven innocent", and the polls I've seen indicate that more than half the nation feels that Kav and Trump owe the apology. No, he was proven innocent, nor was he proven guilty. How could he be expected of a charge where nobody but the accuser remembers, or even remembers the party? And she can't give a date? He could have a rock solid alibi but can't provide it as we're talking a range of years. According to Mitchell, the one who questioned Dr. Ford, the evidence not only wouldn't be enough to bring a criminal charge, it wouldn't win in a civil suit with a much lower burden of proof. www.scribd.com/embeds/389821761/content#from_embed This may have been linked before. I've been away from the board for awhile due to personal stuff and I didn't back read.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 11, 2018 12:10:27 GMT -5
Please read the whole thread, Vince. This is not a college boy who got awkward on a date and thought she wanted a kiss when she didn't, or where a drunk girl gave consent and then regretted it, and now the poor, poor boy is being unjustly punished when it's purely he said she said and he totally meant well. This is a guy up for a lifetime position on the Supreme Court who has credible testimony, corroborated to some extent, that he may have, more than once engaged in attempted rape and forcing attentions on girls who were utterly unwilling. We know that a bunch of people who used to hang out with him at the time believe the allegations are true. We can demonstrate that TODAY, NOW, he was perfectly willing to lie under oath about a pile of things from that era, including his blackout drinking. We know that he exploded at his hearings with partisan outrage about "What goes around comes around." And we know that the White House deliberately limited the investigation into this to prevent the FBI from talking with dozens of people who tried to come forward with evidence.
So. PLEASE, fer the love of pete, do not conflate Judge Kavanaugh with the poor hapless college boys for whom I know you have great sympathy. Innocent or guilty, this is not at all the same situation.
First, for the umteenth time, a Supreme Court hearing is not a criminal trial. It's not the same burden of proof whether you go to jail (or even whether you get kicked out of school) or whether you get a lifetime position on the highest court in the land. For the latter, you are supposed to demonstrate not only the highest intelligence and credentials, but also enjoy the highest character for impartiality, judgment, truth, respect for the rule of law, and temperament.
Taking aside the allegations, the behavior Kavanaugh exhibited in his hearing would have doomed him ordinarily. Hell, it would have doomed him for a much lesser job, frankly.
And taking aside whether Kavanaugh should have gotten the seat -- Trump's speech was WILDLY inappropriate. Not only was it false to say Kavanaugh was proven innocent and wrong for him to apologize on behalf of the nation, I completely disagree with c.e. that it would have been okay if Trump had simply expressed "regret" that the hearings were so unpleasant. No, that would not have been fucking okay. Doing that is still politicizing the issue, it is still expressing a position that the Democrats and accusers were wrong and the GOP was right, and that's just not fucking appropriate in this context.
First, the Supreme Court, as everyone but a few of us nerds seem to have forgotten, is not supposed to be a partisan institution. It's not supposed to be "under" Trump. It's not supposed to be a way for a party to ram through legislative priorities. Trump giving his opinion on the hearings AT ALL, much less at that event, is fucking inappropriate.
Second, again I ask -- what exactly do you all propose should have happened when accusations like this arise with regard to a Supreme Court hearing? And what do you do if the prevailing party is just going to blow it off if the minority party doesn't somehow force them to confront it? The process was not pretty, but I don't see, under the circumstances, that it could have been pretty.
Third, FFS, taking aside the allegations, the guy LIED in his confirmation hearings--I don't think there is any way around that--and he said blatantly partisan inappropriate things, and in the opinion of a great many of us, displayed an utter lack of judicial temperament, and he's fucking completely getting away with it.
LOTS of us, and not just lefty activists by any means, but law professors and retired CONSERVATIVE judges and CONSERVATIVE commentators and even friends of Kavanaugh, think he should have been disqualified for point three alone, taking the allegations aside. MOST PEOPLE THINK THIS. And lots of us are people pretty familiar with how this is all supposed to work -- and people who didn't shriek about Gorsuch.
In that context, Trump doing a "Poor Kav was so wronged" speech is so fucking inappropriate I can't even begin to see how anyone can defend it.
ETA:
I'll add this, on the he said/she said -- if you think Professor Ford is lying to bring Kav down for some reason, you have to believe:
(1) that she's been planning it for many years, long before he was a Supreme Court justice, and that she told her therapist about it and other acquaintances. (2) that to carry out her grudge, she was willing to sacrifice her professional and personal life. The woman is still in fucking hiding because she's getting death threats from the alt-right, FFS. This is not a reality TV attention whore. This is a quiet wife and mother with a professional career.
Why on earth would she do that?
If you think she was really attacked, but might be wrong about who the attacker was, you are completely overlooking the fact that SHE FUCKING KNEW KAVANAUGH. He wasn't a stranger in an alley she only saw through a haze of terror and later identified in a line-up. She knew him AT THE TIME. As Mark and I and a host of experts have said, that's just completely and totally different. You don't mistake an assailant you know -- especially one attacking you at a little party where you've been hanging out together all night.
Kav had far, far more reason to lie than she does. As far as credibility goes, he did in fact fib about a whole host of "little" things (some of which are directly relevant to these allegations, like his drinking habits), which here in the legal world, we regard as some reason to think he might fib about other stuff.
Seriously -- a president apologizing to the man because, before confirming the man to a lifetime SCOTUS position, he was questioned about this stuff -- it's just batshit. If he really wanted to apologize, do it in fucking private. And don't do it on behalf of the nation.
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Post by Optimus on Oct 11, 2018 16:51:43 GMT -5
From a "burden of proof" standpoint, I agree that Dr. Ford basically has little more than nothing in the way of evidence to back up her claims. Her testimony seemed credible and earnest in some places, and flimsy and straw-grasping in other places. I believe that she was likely assaulted at some point, and I believe that she believes it was Kavanaugh, but I'm not convinced that it was, nor am I convinced that it wasn't. I have no idea what the truth is. Having said that, though, the fact that a significant number of people who personally knew him back then (and now) have no problem believing that it's something he would do says a lot about his character back then. If he wasn't a total douche-bro back in high school and college, and was actually a decent person, then I seriously doubt so many people who actually knew him back then would all say, with a pretty loud voice, "Yeah, totally sounds like something he'd do." Additionally, even if one wanted to ignore the accusations and "who he was back then," the fact that he possibly perjured himself several times (or at least came perilously close) in his sworn testimony (now and during the 2004/2006 hearings), and even the Bar Association has distanced themselves from him, says a lot about his character now. Do we really want someone that slimy on the SCOTUS? Any of this by itself (and certainly all of it together) is enough that his nomination should've been withdrawn, or he should've voluntarily declined, or he shouldn't have been confirmed. Either way, he does not deserve to be on the court and I find this entire fiasco infuriating. It should be Merrick Garland in one of those seats, not Kavan-brah.
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Post by celawson on Oct 11, 2018 21:37:47 GMT -5
Optimus wrote: I agree with Optimus here 100 percent. Cassandra wrote: Her story was not corroborated at all. Leland Keyser, her friend Ford claims was there, could not corroborate. www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6244715/Leland-Keyser-told-FBI-felt-pressured-friends-Christine-Ford-revise-statement.htmlNo other people she said was there have corroborated. The only people corroborating anything are her husband decades after the fact, and her therapist, decades after the fact, and whose notes had inconsistencies with Ford's later account, and whose notes have not been allowed to be released. Hmmmm.
And where's this "more than once engaging in attempted rape"? The other allegations were so not credible that they weren't even part of the hearings. There were no other allegations of attempted rape.
And what did he lie about? He said he drank sometimes to excess. The Devil's Triangle explanation has been corroborated better than Ford's entire accusation. And the blacking out? No one has claimed they saw him drink to the point of blacking out. NO one. Yet you're mentioning his "blackout drinking" as if it is a proven thing. It's not. The Bar Association statement says more about the politics of the Bar Association than actual character analysis of Kavanaugh. Here's some information about the politics of the ABA, and it's just what you'd expect for an association that would come out against Kavanaugh. www.dailysignal.com/2017/11/17/sasse-to-aba-the-american-bar-association-is-not-neutral/ Show me one complaint of judicial temperament problems during his 12 years on the bench, and I will retract my statement. If it's only about the circus hearings he just went through, then I'm cutting him some slack.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 11, 2018 21:58:41 GMT -5
Her story was corroborated by her therapist,among others -- she told the story years ago.
What, you think she's been plotting an elaborate set up for years before his Supreme Court nomination?
The behavior at his hearings was more than enough -- in particular, his "what goes around, comes around." Again, if I did that shit in a job interview, I'd be toast and rightly so -- regardless of my resume.
Becoming a Supreme Court Justice is not some kind of participation trophy.
If this is the best the Republicans have to put forth, they're in an even depressingly degraded state than I thought they were in.
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Post by Optimus on Oct 11, 2018 22:08:02 GMT -5
Optimus wrote: I agree with Optimus here 100 percent. Well, I agree zero percent with you cutting out the rest of my post, robbing it of its context, because while you might agree with that one part of my post, it's likely that you categorically disagree with my overall point, which was that - regardless of the veracity of Ford's claims - Kavanaugh is a bad dude and shouldn't be within 100 miles of the Supreme Court. Absent the context that you conveniently omitted, your post makes it sound like I agree with your position on this matter, and I absolutely do not.
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Post by Optimus on Oct 11, 2018 22:16:04 GMT -5
Her story was corroborated by her therapist,among others -- she told the story years ago. Unless I missed the story, this is incorrect. Not only did Dr. Ford never turn over the notes she claimed to have that corroborated her story, she has never even identified her therapist. Again, maybe that was reported somewhere and I just can't find it, but Dr. Ford claiming that she was in therapy for this and claiming that her therapist took notes that she also claims to be in possession in, but never turns those alleged notes over nor identifies her therapist, is not at all equivalent to "her story was corroborated by her therapist." Again, though, I support her and not Kavanaugh. If anyone has a link to where she ever released the notes or anyone ever actually talked to her therapist, please post it so that I can update my position on this. Otherwise, we have an uncorroborated claim by Ford that is indistinguishable from "I have an invisible pink dragon living in my garage and I also refuse to show you my garage."
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Post by celawson on Oct 11, 2018 22:28:36 GMT -5
I agree with the part of Optimus' post that I quoted. Thought that would be obvious, since that's all I quoted before I said "I agree with Optimus here", and left out the rest. Meaning here rather than the other part of his post. We need a good emoticon of a puzzled face.
To clarify the therapist note issue - This is what USA Today reported:
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