Well, today’s posts were inspired by Happy Lendervedder’s list (post #81), in which Biden was one of the two remaining candidates he’d apparently like to see as the nominee.
Looking at that picture, it looks fairly apparent to me that his hands are not actually in contact with her (or her apparel).
cluthlu needs to run again …
Thank you. I swear sometimes it’s like I’m invisible around here.
You’re not. I always appreciate your posts. 
I guess I could have posted this in the Al Franken thread but since it isn’t really about him I may as well put it here.
Given how the accusations of sexual assault/harassment/impropriety have swept through Hollywood and ended, or severally damaged careers in the last weeks, it seems likely to me the same thing is starting in Congress/Washington or the political world.
Bush I, Roy Moore and now Al Franken are seeing past bad behavior come back and bite them in the proverbial ass. I am going to predict this is just the beginning. For that reason, I see no point in trying to predict who will be running in 2020.
Given how this issue seems to snowball once it gets going, I fully expect anyone we could name today may well be guilty of some foul actions that will destroy their career. Apparently, most members of my gender are vile pigs who have no clue how to treat women or others under their authority. I won’t be surprised if the next nominees for both major parties aren’t even on anyone’s radar yet because the purge is just about to begin.
[QUOTE=Kolak of Twilo;20607208
Given how this issue seems to snowball once it gets going, I fully expect anyone we could name today may well be guilty of some foul actions that will destroy their career. Apparently, most members of my gender are vile pigs who have no clue how to treat women or others under their authority. I won’t be surprised if the next nominees for both major parties aren’t even on anyone’s radar yet because the purge is just about to begin.[/QUOTE]
30 years ago, it was a different world. The “casting couch” was taken for granted. A boss making demands of his “sexy secretary” was considered only a little out of line, unprofessional- not disgusting and criminal.
No one in a zillion years would suggest a man should face criminal charges for slipping his opposing actress some tounge while reheasing a kissing scene. She could & maybe should slap him, sure, but that’s about it.
So we have to judge actions of the past by the standards then, not today.
But Moore- you have to go back a loooong time before his actions were in any way acceptable. Like a century or more.
Just to touch back on this subject from last week, it’s at least Charlie-Rose-level stuff:
Look, it’s his damn castle. He can be naked all he wants. But groping, lewd call, ect are right out.
Could he masturbate in front of them Louis-C.K.-style as long as it was in “his damn castle”? I’m trying to understand your position here. Is it no-contact, no-foul? Is the location important? This-and-that are ok if done from a home-office but not ok at a different location?
No contact, no sexual moves at all. Just in the home.
Just being naked is not sexual.
Imagine, if you can, that Franken’s latest incident never happened, and his personal integrity is, as far as the public knows, beyond reproach. And imagine that he managed to get nominated, and ran in the 2020 general election.
Franken would be, as far as I know, the first Jewish presidential candidate on a major party’s ticket. Not only Jewish, but the archetypical New York Jewish comedian (prior to his political career.)
If you think this ((( ))) shit is bad now, imagine what it would be like with Al Franken as Trump’s opponent. There is a major resurgence of anti-Semitism right now. Granted, it’s sometimes selective and inconsistent. Trump actually has a more personal connection to Jews than any president so far. I mean, he has them in his own family. But the baffling miasma of anti-Semitic sentiment rarely makes sense. Some of it is outright trollery; some of it is repetition of ancient canards and conspiracy theories, with a modern face-lift; some of it is true David Duke, white supremacist bullshit. And no, I don’t think that everyone, or even most, of the people that voted for Trump are part of it. But it exists.
And it would be deployed as a political weapon by Trump’s strategists, from the highest level inner sanctum advisors to the posters on The_Donald. It would be deployed in subtle ways, and in not-so-subtle ways.
And it would be very, very, very ugly to witness. We’d have seen the same thing if Bernie had somehow been the nominee - and with the socialist connection, to boot. Even if they campaigned their asses off at every steel mill and coal mine and factory in the Rust Belt, they’d still be vulnerable to the ((( ))) bullshit. Like it or not, the “meme war” is in fact real, and it does affect voters.
A black candidate - like Corey Booker, who I think is a strong contender - would be vulnerable to the same bullshit that was slung at Obama for 8 years, but frankly, this new alt-right element seems to be even more virulent towards Jews than towards blacks. And the election of Obama (twice) tells me that America is collectively less racist than it’s sometimes made out to be. But, of course, there was no alt-right at that time. Trump was attempting to stir up some of the racial bullshit with the birther crap, but it was nowhere near as bad as it seems to be at the moment.
Personally I don’t think there are bad people, just bad ideas. The voting population is malleable, highly susceptible to the ever changing winds of public opinion, and furthermore I think people with bad ideas, even racist ones, can change their minds if the right messages reach them - or at the very least, be compelled to put aside racial bias to focus on more immediate economic concerns. Propaganda isn’t inherently bad or good. It’s an effective tool. But right now it’s primarily being used to promote bad ideas.
The Democrats don’t seem to collectively be very good at propaganda right now. They need to change that if they’re going to challenge Trump, because I think a second term is quite possible.
Based on the accounts of the Rose accusers, it’s pretty clear he was (assuming they are telling the truth) deliberately exposing himself to them. That’s not okay when they’re your employees. If it was some random guest, sure, they can always just leave.
I am not excusing his other behaviors, groping, etc.
But if it was only nudity, I dont think the issue would be as nasty.
and I cant find much in the way of details about the accusations, being as the Washington Post is hiding behind a paywall.
I use Chrome to view the WaPo and The Atlantic. That browser lets me thru the paywall on my MacBook.
Kind of a PITA to switch browsers, but those are pretty important periodicals.
I use news.google.com as a way to browse stories. I set WaPo, NYT, Atlantic, and others as specific sections and get their headlines there. If you click through from google news it is designed to let you through the paywall.
You kids are your fancy schmancy computer ways! 
If they want to hide behind a paywall they can go to hell. They arent important then.
Paywall: open up browser in incognito mode. Paste link in URL box. Read.
How about Sherrod Brown / Richard Trumka? Labor or get out.
I’d suggest a black VP candidate for balance, but Chris Rock told me there’d never be a black VP, so never mind.
I’d suggest Samantha Power for VP, but apparently she’s not a natural-born citizen–no, wait, that’s a stupid rule, and she emigrated as a child. She’s still more a regular American than is whatever sort of spaceman Trump is.
So, let’s get rid of the natural-born citizen rule, and we can then draw from a bigger pool of candidates. This job is too important to hobble ourselves in this way.