Five plus hours of stress, anger and posturing on the part of twenty one Senators and what have we learned?
Well, we know the work at the Ministry of Truthiness is a never-ending endeavor. After Kavanaugh provided his definition of the "devil's triangle" as a modified form of a quarters drinking game a staffer somewhere in Congress immediately set about to update the Wikipedia entry for devil's triangle to match.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/09/27/politics/devils-triangle-edit/index.htmlWe know the Republican committee members ran out the clock by committing their outrage at the "process" to the record, abrogated their responsibility to ask critical questions of the accuser to a last-minute hired gun "expert" to avoid the risk of appearing sexist then limited direct questions of Kavanaugh to obvious softballs allowing him to re-assert his innocence.
We know Kavanaugh must have learned something from Bill Clinton from all of that work on the Starr committee. Over the last few days, Kavanaugh adopted a little bit of verbal / logical jujitsu straight from the Bill Clinton handbook. He started combining a denial of assault allegations with a gee-this-is-embarrassing statement that I'm not guilty cuz shucks I was a virgin well into college. Didja catch that? Didja see what he did there? He conflated a charge of a sexual assault with sex, then denied having sex. THAT WASN'T THE ALLEGATION. Sexual assault is not limited to uninvited sex (rape). It is completely possible to sexually assault someone while remaining a virgin. It's also possible to remain a virgin while being a complete *******.
We know that Kavanaugh and many of his supporters claim to be disgusted by an "advise and consent" process that has morphed in their mind into a "defame and destroy" process. In this mind set, going forward, all of us better worry about anything we did as a teenager or college student becoming fodder for public discussion in 201x America lest the public recoil in horror at our prior "gaffes" which are present day "crimes."
Huh?
If someone is being hired to work as a carpenter or operate machinery or work as a brand manager at a Fortune 500 company, the "Kavanaugh experience" would be light years over the top and wholly inappropriate.
Kavanaugh isn't under consideration as a back-hoe operator or middle manager of a company making candy bars. He is being considered for a key job in one of the most crucial intellectual and moral functions of a government that controls nuclear weapons and sets (or used to set) the pace of the free world.
One doesn't need to hear a victim's claims of sexual abuse to discern that Kavanaugh is not Supreme Court material. He was already on the wrong side of the line based on his refusal to turn over documents related to his work in the Bush II White House and his indefensible flip flop on the merits of pursuing legal action against a sitting President.
It comes down to this.
We are hiring someone for a position requiring high-quality decision making based on logic and communication abilities. One candidate being proposed might live a STERLING life of propriety and charity NOW but has allegations from MANY indicating he spent at least six years from high school through college in a binge-drinking fog with allegations of misogynistic behavior if not actual sexual assault (and worse). In fending off accusations, the candidate actually produced a calendar from one of the years involved that DOCUMENTED his very busy itinerary of keggers. Others have produce yearbooks with handwritten entries making direct references to boorish, sexually tinged behavior.
Presumably, somewhere, there is ANOTHER candidate in waiting. That person might have identical views on regulation, antitrust, property rights, civil liberties and any other hot-button issue as candidate #1. But candidate #2 has no trail of accusers alleging assault or worse and no yearbook entries seeming to brag about drunken parties or sexual conquests.
Who's the better candidate?
Does this really require any thought?
I have no problem with someone making judgments about me NOW based upon my MORAL behavior as a teenager. I didn't know as much about politics, business, technology, the law, or human behavior then as I do now but my decision making process and moral compass then would not reflect poorly upon me now.
Is that too much to ask for a Supreme Court nominee? Or Representative or Senator? or President?
We'll find out shortly.
WTH
