Are there any reports of a woman objecting, at the time, to Al giving her a fanny pat? Did he ever get his face slapped? I suggest that if a woman really found a fanny pat to be a ‘groping’, Al would have gotten a response-without-thinking face slap, or, at least, a startled “What! Stop That!”
10 years later, in the middle of the great ‘women coming forward’ era, reporting a fanny pat is just, to me, a bit lame.
[Redacted for main point.]
No, I’m electing someone to represent me and act on my behalf. I expect integrity and good judgment.
Committing adultery, for example, is a pretty strong signal that someone is not capable of keeping his/her vows and has the bad judgment to engage in an activity which he/she knows he/she ought not to be doing. Call it lack of self-discipline, or being untrustworthy, or just plain stupidity, but it matters to me when I enter the voting booth.
Do I think that Franken is incapable of being a good senator? No, but I begin to have doubts.
I think Franken ought to consider stepping aside for both ethical and political reasons. If this were a case of Franken not knowing when to turn off his occasionally risque comedic schtick, that might be forgivable. But it does seem with these latest allegations that his behavior has transgressed the boundaries of propriety without any sort of reasonable explanation, and he’s not running away from these allegations. I can at least admire the fact that he’s owning up to his behavior, but that doesn’t absolve him. As others have probably said already, ideally, there’s something unsettling about knowing that the people who vote to pass laws that, among other things, impact personal conduct both on and off the job (Title IX, EEOC, etc), are themselves violating the spirit of the laws they enact and uphold.
Beyond that, I’ll confess my greater concern is that I don’t want progressives to lose a senate seat. Franken is replaceable. Everyone’s replaceable. I’d rather have Franken replaced with a democrat.
Want to point out - 21 pages, yet no posts yesterday. Becoming yesterday’s issue. Not necessarily a commentary on the issue’s significance, as much as on the public’s attention span. Glad AF did not resign precipitously.
He’s cancelled at least one appearance in order to “reflect and spend more time with his family”. There will likely be an ethics investigation, which is going to keep this in the news if only at a low level, and don’t be so sure that there aren’t other women who will come forward between now and Christmas. I was just watching CNN about an hour ago, and they were interviewing two female Democratic legislators who were calling for him to resign.
This issue has not reached nothingburgerdom yet.
pretty much all the hollywood people accused of harassment/assualts have been quickly fired from their jobs/shows/etc. Some quit on their own. No investigation, they are gone.
Does that mean hollywood has higher standards than politics? And yes I know someone in office cannot be fired in most cases.
Are you saying that they wanted it?
NYT is equivocating with Glenn Thrush too, last I heard.
I’ve been wondering about this: How much risk this attitude carries of splintering the feminist wing from the Democratic Party: On the extreme end, maybe driving then to go form their own Pink Party or something. Or maybe a milder form of just depressing the feminist vote. I’m not a feminist, but if I were, I imagine attitudes like Dinsdale’s (and his seems widely shared among the rest of the Democrats) would be infuriating. Anyone worry it’s infuriating enough to have some effect on election results? Or are most of you confident that the vast majority of Dem women prefer protecting abortion rights to punishing sexual assaulters?
some states have recalls such as what happened in CA when Arnold S won office . I have not heard if Minn has recalls but if they do that is a way to “fire” a guy in office.
I worry about a lot of things, but I think the accuracy and objectivity of your insight into the motivations of feminists is worth no more than mine into the motivations of Trump voters.
some people only care about keeping power or getting power. Which explains why Trump was given a pass for 2 divorces, cheating , grabbing, etc . from “social conservatives” last year .
Are feminists among those people?
I’m not claiming any particular accuracy or objectivity. I wanted to hear people’s opinions. I’m especially interested in people like you, that have appeared less willing to excuse Franken and are disappointed in the rest of the Democratic Party for doing so. Any chance you stay home, or vote for Jill Stein or something? Or if you were in MN, would you vote to re-elect Franken?
Never suggested it had, or would. Merely observing a trend.
Was in a discussion the other day among several women, where we discussed whether feminism included folk who believed policies and interactions and opportunities ought to be “gender-blind” (to the extent possible/practicable), or whether it required supporting advantages to historically disadvantaged sectors. I firmly believe the former, and often trend towards the latter, so I consider myself to have strong feminist tendencies (to the extent a white middle-aged, middle class male can). But I am far from single issue on feminism or any other one topic. There is benefit from grand gestures. But also benefit from taking a larger view.
By that definition, I’d be a feminist. That’s probably more than a little disconcerting not only for me, but I imagine for self-identified feminists as well.
I don’t think that forming a splinter party has any practical use at this point. Not living in MN, I pick the best candidates I can. Barring asteroids or medical emergencies, I will be voting, and not for Jill Stein.
If I lived in MN, I would be asking for AF’s resignation (calling his office, calling the Democratic Party). At election time, I would expect him to get primaried, and would actively support a reasonable alternative.
Thanks for your frank response. Imagining, one step further, that you lived in MN but your calls for resignation ultimately fell on deaf ears and Franken either was not primaried or won the primary, and in the general election it ends up being Franken vs a Republican (seems like the most probable outcome to me), would you vote for Franken, vote for the Republican, or not vote at all? Which of those choices is the least bad to you?
There’s absolutely no chance I’d stay home (I’ve never missed an election since I was 18), and near-zero chance I’d vote 3rd party for President. If I were in MN I’d vote against Franken in the primary. In a hypothetical Senate general election, if Franken were the nominee, I’d probably vote 3rd party (or leave that part of the ballot blank), unless his Republican opponent had been a strong advocate for women (which would include strongly denouncing Trump and other GOP abusers – IMO, if one hasn’t strongly denounced Trump and other abusers, one cannot be a strong advocate for women), in which case I’d consider the Republican (though considering all the issues, I can’t think of a single Republican in office that I could actually vote for – even the very few strong denouncers of Trump are unacceptable to me on various other issues due to the great harm their policies do to America). If his Republican opponent were an unapologetic abuser like Trump, guilty of far worse things towards women than anything Franken has done, then there’d be a non-zero chance I’d vote for Franken.
But even if Franken doesn’t step down (and I still think that’s pretty likely, based on the conversations I’ve had), he has no future with the party. I don’t think any abuser does any more, thankfully, unlike the Republicans, who increasingly are becoming the party of Trump and Trumpism (and Roy Moore), which includes explicit toleration of abuse of women and girls. I could be wrong about the Democrats, of course, but within Democratic politics (as opposed to general election politics), I still feel my political instincts and track record is good, so I still am willing to trust my gut.
Why would any group splinter off from the group that gives them some power? That’s the beauty and the problem of a 2 party system. The internal factions don’t have much real choice.