He doesn’t have “an exact location” (or an “exact year”), but he’s “pulling that information from” Ford’s WaPo interview:
Replying again to clarify the reasons I believe her all in one post:
Her story seems completely believable: so believable in fact that many people are arguing that “this sort of thing happens all the time” and so shouldn’t disqualify Kavanaugh. Especially the lack of detail in her memory was noted by experienced sexual abuse prosecutors as being consistent with the experience of sexual abuse victims. Her classmates have come forward in support of her, saying she’s an honest and believable person.
She’s a married 51-year-old professor with kids, who gained no benefit from going public, and in fact was immediately subject to horrendous death threats (which anyone who is familiar with the ugliness of the right wing in this country would know would happen).
She knew him. He was known to drink heavily. He’s known to become angry and belligerent after drinking. He’s repeatedly lied about other things. There’s evidence (e.g., from his yearbook) of him treating women horribly. Other women have come forward. There are persistent rumors about his expectations of his female interns.
Her story contains details (e.g., about his high school buddy) that someone who made up a story wouldn’t know.
She mentioned the attack to her therapist years before Kavanaugh was nominated.
Kavanaugh was a member of a frat that thought rape was such a joke that it was suspended for chanting “no means yes and yes means anal” outside a women’s shelter. He was also a member of the “Tit and Clit” club, whose goal was to “get drunk and get laid.”
Not only do I believe her, I doubt the sincerity of people who claim not to believe her.
It wouldn’t have worked with me. I would have expected him to withdraw his nomination as part of his confessional. And I expect there would have been mass protests if it went any other way. I still expect protests if Kavenaugh goes through - and I’m skeptical he goes through if they get some better evidence than “nobody else remembers anything, their forgetfulness corroborates her story!” I’m sorry, but “guilt by association” isn’t going to cut it.
However, if Ford and Martinez come and go with nothing more than foggy memories and not a single confirming witness materializes, and Avenatti’s “gang rape” stuff turns out to be a sham (I want to know more about that, what the fuck is he waiting for?), then I suspect Kavenaugh will go through with a lot of upset dems out on the streets (depending on the weather), and a lot of republicans sitting at home happy the Senate republicans didn’t roll over.
But many of you are…drum roll…assuming guilt (or innocence) automatically. I agree, when someone is going for a position on the USSC this sort of thing should be investigated, even if I don’t really see how much could come of an investigation based on what we know so far. But you never know…something solid might come out. However, in this thread there are a hell of a lot of certain people. Not people saying something along the lines of ‘there are definitely questions here’, but folks who are flat out certain this is what happened (or didn’t happen) based solely on their own predispositions, politics and worldview. You are one of those who seems very certain about all of this, which is why I used your post to ask my question. To me, this seems really shaky all around.
I acknowledge my own bias though…I definitely don’t want Kavanaugh on the USSC, so I definitely think that there are enough questions to warrant setting him aside. However, I also see that this is all based on some pretty sparse evidence of something that happened decades ago to teen agers who were drinking heavily. To me, as I said up thread, this seems like a lot of the false memory stuff from the 80’s with supposed black mass day care or parental abuse cases (or UFO abductions or any number of other things). At this point, this is as likely an explanation as anything else, since this as well as everything else is based on such sparse actual data. Believing either party at this point comes down, seemingly, to ones political view point or predisposition on such things, not any sort of hard evidence. Sure, the story is plausible…but then, the counter is plausible as well. Two drunk teens in a room, boy tries to go all the way with a slightly incapacitated and totally unwilling girl. Totally plausible. Two drunk teens, girl thinks more happened than actually happened, and over time has magnified that into real belief she was almost raped. Even without either party being deceptive and both being honest, believing one of the above (and there are other plausible alternatives) depends more on the person asserting belief or disbelief in one or the other than on actual evidence.
Perhaps something solid will come out of the hearing on Thursday, but my WAG is that both sides will hear what they want to hear, and believe what they already believe, and that neither will be based on solid evidence, but instead on gut feelings and predisposition. I’ll simply be happy if there is an excuse to not have Kavanaugh on the USSC, but I’m not sanguine about who we will get next up…
Well, Thomas needs a buddy.
Is this second person to do this in this thread or the did the same guy do it twice?
Not all hispanic name are interchangeable.
I laid out my detailed reasons for believing her story. And my position isn’t that he should be shot, it’s that the accusations should be investigated.
To be honest, I would expect that the investigation would turn up evidence of other “incidents,” which is why I want it (and why Republican senators don’t). But if it doesn’t, then I guess he’ll be confirmed. And if it turns up evidence that Ford is lying, well hell, I’ve been wrong before. (but I wouldn’t bet money on it)
I suspect he’s trying to get yet another delay in the vote. That’s the Dem strategy here: delay, delay, delay.
(bolding mine)
Avenatti said he was waiting for proper security to be in place before his client came forward, but said he would sometime tomorrow (he said 48hours, and that time would be up by tomorrow). It’s plausible. He’s also closed down his twitter as its been overloaded with trolls in response to his claims.
Except Kavanaugh flatly denied being at the party or knowing Ford. So if either of these stories is true, it’s disqualifying.
Well, I do think the American people should have a say via the next election before we give anyone a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court.
The Fox interview he also said that he remained a virgin for many years after the alleged attempted rape. How does that answer the accusations? Attempted rape doesn’t change your virginity status. Neither does the Deborah Ramirez accusation that he exposed himself to her.
He parses his answers very carefully.
I totally agree that it should be investigated. We are talking about a lifetime position on the USSC after all. But a lot of your (and others) posts seem pretty certain of guilt. Perhaps you are just trying to make the point that this is serious and deserves investigation, but the tone of many of the posts in this thread are of rock solid certainty.
FTR, I don’t think Ford is lying…but as I’ve pointed out, not everyone’s story who is wrong is lying or has a motive. There are a lot of cases of false memories, and that’s even without alcohol or drugs in the mix. I also don’t think that any plausible investigation, at this stage, is going to determine one party is lying or not, not unless a lot of evidence is out there (or a lot of witnesses that haven’t come forward…or a bunch of other victims if this is a thing with Kavanaugh). I guess we shall see, but I’m not holding my breath that a ton of new stuff is going to be revealed that we don’t know of right now.
My question is NOT “what should we do about this unresolved debate”. My question is how did it become a resolved fact in your mind? There seems to be considerable room for reasonable doubt there, on both sides, but your statement, without qualification, was simply “She knew him.” Why are you pushing this as if it were a fact?
One of them is lying. I believe her. And I stated exactly why.
If so then he really has nailed his colours to the mast. He has to be confident he will have them when it counts because right now he is all in.
See, rock solid certainty. I think they could both be telling the truth, or what they think is the truth. Or one could be lying. Or both could be lying. To me, there are a lot of plausible variations here.
But you said it all right there…you ‘believe’. And it’s impossible to shake the faith of the faithful. 'Nuff said.
I’m not interested in quibbling over points which would come out in an investigation. If the investigation shows that they never met, then I’ll accept that; I’ve been wrong before. But I’m not going to argue over a thing that neither of us knows for sure–I’m not sure what the point is.
And regarding the reason I believe that fact, I laid it out in my response to you–refer to that.
For fuckin real, if there was ever an occasion where it actually made sense to delay a confirmation vote until after an election, to give the American people a chance to weigh in, it’d be when the Senate is contemplating putting an alleged sexual predator on the court, when they’re putting someone with historically low approval levels on the court.
Why is it the Republican strategy to push it through without proper vetting? They went a year until Gorsuch was nominated, why is it critical to get this seat filled?