I wonder what term you and John Mace would use.
And what do you know? No new Al Franken allegations after Dec 12!!
Amazing coincidence!
… it still seems obvious to me that a man who liked to grope women would have had a whole lot more accusers coming forward, from a much longer time span. Where are all the women who worked with him on SNL, etc.? They’re not all still trying to build careers (thirty-odd years later), so it’s implausible that they’re all terrified of reprisals for saying ‘we all knew to stay yea-many feet away from Al’ or ‘we all knew he’d grab your boob or butt if he got the chance’ or whatever.
Some of those who aren’t in show biz anymore would surely have come forward, if there were any truth in the recently-created portrait of Franken.
Exactly. From the moment I heard Franken say he would be resigning 'in the coming weeks", I’ve suspected the announcement was phony and made to take the pressure off and buy time. I don’t think he truly intends to resign at all and will ultimately do so only if it can’t be avoided.
I’ve read suspicions online that Franken was hoping/intending to use Moore’s election combined with Trump’s alleged groping in order to rationalize keeping his seat, and if so he can’t be happy about Moore’s defeat.
Well, most of them are liberal in their politics for one thing, and they move in circles friendly to Franken. Further, now that Franken is giving at least the appearance of resigning there isn’t much motive to pile on. No point in kicking a dead horse. We’ll see who else might come forward if and when he announces that he’s reconsidered and will not be resigning after all (either that, or he just lets the ‘coming weeks’ stretch into months and years as he waits out the governor’s seemingly difficult task of coming up with a replacement suitable to fill his shoes :rolleyes:). I’ll believe Franken’s resignation when it happens, but for now I ain’t buyin’ it.
Franken obviously just doesnt know where to draw the line. What was considered funny and Ok as a actor/comedian is not Ok as a Senator. He is not the kind of abuser like Weinstein. What he did was not appropriate, but I am not sure if it rose to him resigning. But it would be fair to use it against him in an elections.
Putting yourself out there publicly as a victim of sexual assault is not fun. In fact, it really, really sucks - having to relitigate, over and over, what may have been a traumatic experience for you with a public who often doesn’t like you or want to believe you. Even if you aren’t facing a court of law, if you’re accusing a public figure you can almost certainly count on death threats at the very least. It shouldn’t be surprising that nobody else came forward. He’s out - there’s no more need to come forward to get him out of office, and at that point the risk-reward in going public with an accusation shifts drastically.
Pressured would work. Convinced it’s best for the party that he leaves. The reason I wouldn’t use “forced” is because there actually is a process to literally force people out of the Senate and there are people who have literally been forced out after going through that process. Franken did not go through that process. He didn’t even begin the process. He left voluntarily. Had he not been convicted by the party leaders, he could have (SHOULD HAVE!) stayed.
How large of a number would you need, exactly? It seems like however many come forward, you can just say ‘oh that’s not enough’. It seems like half a dozen should be plenty, but it’s clearly not enough for you, so how many?
And it’s really not surprising that women don’t want to announce to the entire nation “I got groped by this politician and it made me uncomfortable”, and subject themselves to the sort of questioning and insults that we see in this thread. It’s especially true when the person who did it is apparently going to be out of office shortly, so coming forward doesn’t actually serve any useful purpose. People generally don’t do unpleasant things if there is no motive to do them.
My initial thought and motivation for specifying the date was my cynical belief that reporters and editors wouldn’t put too much effort into investigating further claims because it’s just not sexy anymore. I’ve enjoyed the variety of responses to my ambiguous claim.
Should be at least one per week, and he’s been in the Senate for about 9 years, so 52 x 9 = 468. Any number of accusations less than 468 is suspect. Where are the other 461 women???
FYI: alt-right twitter botnet amplified calls for Franken to step down. Doesn’t mean he shouldn’t have stepped down.
Pseudo news websites set up to link to. Organized, with ties to Russia and Roger Stone.
I’m curious about the question of how many newsroom decisions are made based on Twitter volume, etc.
Probably too many. Certainly both CNN and MSNBC were wall-to-wall with ‘Franken must go’ commentators, for a while there.
Must . . . obey . . . Twitter. Powerless . . . to . . . resist.
Kudos for humor and I tend to agree with underlying point: we shouldn’t exaggerate the effect of these bots.
What I found more interesting was the evidence that the Russians were still targeting wonkish Democrats disproportionately with subterfuge and disinformation campaigns. Even Dems who aren’t especially hawkish.
Why does advertising work, even when the tendentiousness is obvious?
Why might twitter propaganda bots work, even if the reader is aware of their existence (which they typically weren’t in 2016)?
Illusory truth effect: repetition of bogus and false claims like, “Mike Pence’s marriage was saved by gay conversion therapy”, make people more apt to believe them. This applies even when they are being debunked. Ironic? Yes.
Our memories are prone to mixing up true and false information. (This is especially true when we are half-listening, I hypothesize.) Regardless, it’s best to memorize the source when you encounter a fact that appeals to you.
Wiki article:
Rational Wiki only has a stub. This should be rectified:
ETA, from Vox article:
[INDENT]We’re not sheep. It’s not like we’ll believe anything we read on Facebook. The effect misinformation has on our minds is much subtler; it works on the margins. But in today’s world, where a few platforms dominate information sharing, the margins are huge, filled with millions, and influential. [/INDENT]
Reviving this thread to post a link to this article:
which links to (and seems to be occasioned by) this New Yorker article:
The Case of Al Franken—A close look at the accusations against the former senator
I’m a Minnesotan who voted for Al Franken both times.
I want him back in the Senate.
At this point, he’s been punished for the allegations, right or wrong. He resigned, he’s been out of office. He’s served his penance.
Given the kinds of people that get elected in this country, especially Republicans, I don’t want to hear a single word about how he can never run again. That’s bullshit.
I agree with Matt Yglesias and Nate Silver’s takes. Franken did the right thing by resigning, and the Democratic party is significantly stronger because of it, IMO. Franken used to be my absolute favorite Senator, before these allegations (and his response) came to light.
If he wants to run again, I’d have no problem with that – the voters could decide if he should return to office. I’d probably support a different Democrat, if I lived in Minnesota – I think it’s important that we have a very, very high bar for public service in relation to inappropriate conduct with women. Even relatively minor misbehavior like Franken’s is disqualifying, IMO – at least if it happens outside of one’s teens or twenties. I think it’s appropriate to have a zero tolerance policy for high office for things like groping, or even faux-groping. At least until our society sticks to a consistent standard of treating women and girls with decency and respect overall.
Al Franken 2020.
He doesn’t seem so bad now, does he?
Democrat writes a skit and 25% of the actresses involved are offended. Pretends to grab woman’s breasts and photo is taken - admits it, does not lie.
Democrat is run out of town on a rail.
Republican rapes several women. Several prominent women testify that he raped them. Republican denies, denies, denies. Women are smeared.
Republican is hailed as a hero, and given prominent post.
This is how it goes.
It was wrong to ask him to resign without due process.
Many of us had doubts about Tweeden’s story in particular, and the others appeared to boil down to ‘I asked for a picture with him and he put his hand around my waist’-level of “harassment.”
We know now that when someone asks to take a picture with a public figure, that public figure would be smart to do what Bill Maher does: put both his hands up in ‘peace sign’ gestures. Both hands completely visible = no chance for false accusations.
My guess is that there have been times Franken was a little handsy. Not George H.W. Bush-level handsy (pinching butts), but more prone to grabbing women by the waist during photo ops then he should have been. That’s not appropriate for a public figure. But I’m troubled by equating it to “sexual harassment.”
In any case: due process. It’s important.