I fully admit to hoping that the recent allegations by Reade were outright false, but I also acknowledge leaving at least some space for the possibility that they could turn out to be true, despite being skeptical. Filing a police report knowing that the statute of limitations are long expired is only intensifying my skepticism. It’s a move that, IMO, makes absolutely no sense except to keep the story in the news.
I concede that it’s on the one hand possible that she’s a woman who’s finally found the strength to come forward after all these years and finally tell her side of the story, but it seems that she already took advantage of that opportunity way back when everyone else was describing similar stories of inappropriate touching.
But filing a police report knowing that there’s no way to prove the charges just strikes me as trivializing the event, which would seem to be the opposite of what someone in her situation would want to do. I understand that people can process trauma in their own individual way, but I’m also of the opinion that at the end of the day, any accusation - certainly one this serious - has to have substance. And this move seems to be trivial, and done out of some kind of personal spite that doesn’t necessarily seem connected with sexual trauma.
Blasting his name out on Twitter and a podcast only to file a police report that has no mention of his name (or any name) certainly does not help her claim.
I have no doubt that Joe was probably a touchy, feeling, butt-pinching creep back in the day, but that seems to have been litigated already and the country seems to have nominated him, for better or worse.
In an ideal world, Joe Biden wouldn’t be the Dems’ best nominee. But we don’t live in an ideal world and it’s either an imperfect, flawed, old Joe Biden or 4 more years - and possibly more - of this shit show.
If this is directed at me, it looked like a pretty solid piece of journalistic investigation to me, at least as a starting point. We’ll see what else happens over the next several months.
I don’t know. I don’t have all the answers here. This isn’t an easy thing to figure out, so all I can think of is to stick to the principle that all allegations must be taken seriously and investigated. Even when it’s someone that I’m rooting for politically. I’m not certain what the extent of this and “endgame” of this is or should be, so I’m playing it by ear a bit.
You can hide behind “I don’t have all the answers” if you want but it makes your calls for further investigation pretty hollow. You want more but can in no way articulate what “more” is. You wanted a serious investigation, the NYT clearly did a thorough investigation but now, “it’s a start”.
Why is it hiding to say “I don’t know”? This looked like a serious investigative article, AFAICT.
I’m trying to be careful to make sure my anti-Trump preference and bias isn’t leading or helping me rationalize or excuse some sort of less rigorous attitude WRT taking sexual assault allegations seriously. What am I supposed to say if I’m not absolutely certain?
You can say you’re uncertain but still accept that this has been investigated as far as possible. I’m sorry there’s no magical way to know the absolute truth.
I don’t know if I accept this, but I don’t need to immediately – there are months and months to go. There’s no need for me to make this decision right now (not that I matter in the scheme of things anyway!).
Well, if this is basically your most burning political passion, I’m rather surprised you are so at sea as to what can be done about old accusations like this.
What can be done? Keep investigating until there’s nothing more to investigate. I’m at least sure of that. If there is anything more, hopefully it’s still being investigated. There’s a good possibility I’ll never know if this occurred, but I can still hope and advocate.
Earlier in the thread, you suggested that the DNC should hire the best PI in town. Is the NYT not a comparable investigation? You wanted coworkers, associates andfriends interviewed. They did that. You wanted employment records reviewed. They did that. You were waiting for more people to come forward. Nobody has and his earlier “touchy feely” accusers didn’t corroborate anything this accuser said.
You want the investigation to continue but you’re fresh outta ideas. Oh well, you’re no expert on investigations of old sex crimes, merely an extremely interested observer. You are sure there must be something else to continue with.