Yes: that the olive branch is traditionally not accompanied by an invitation for the recipient to fuck herself with it.
“I’m willing to bury the hatchet and let bygones be bygones, as soon as you admit you’re a lying bitch!”
Out of interest, given that Ginsburg and Breyer (I think that is the pairing) voted together more often than Scalia and Thomas, is there an equivalent of “Uncle Tom” for Jews who suck up to Gentiles that we should be levelling at Ruth Bader Ginsburg?
Mr. E: That simply restates the question to “Is it reasonable for her to hold this belief?” And, if you think so, then it becomes “Is it reasonable to consider an attempt to extract an apology nineteen years later ‘extending an olive branch’?” The answer to the last one is a laughable No, obviously.
Now, let’s see Bricker explain why he’s exploring only one side here, while insisting he’s being neutral. Maybe, for once, it can be something different from the usual …
Sorry, but I don’t see a request to “come clean and admit what a horrible person you are for what you did to us” is extending the Olive Branch. Extending the Olive Branch would be “I know we don’t agree about what happened, and I’ll never understand why you said what you said, but it’s been 20 years and perhaps we can let it go and try to get along.”
Yes he is a Justice. Yes he is very intelligent. And yes he is not Scalia Jr. But he is a horrible legal writer.
I think we all get your point, we (or at least I) just consider your hypothetical to be so devoid of plausibility that it’s not worth discussing.
Yeah. Demanding an apology - I’m sorry, “politely requesting” an apology - is not extending an olive branch, by any definition of the term.
Although I’m not one of the special few that Bricker has deemed to have a reading comprehension level above grade six, so I guess I’ll just go back to studying for my geography test.
Nor would such a genuine offer be made via an answering machine message, but in person.
Whether Hill told the truth, exaggerated or fabricated her testimony about Thomas is known only to Hill and Thomas. The rest of us must accept that her confirmation hearing testimony was held to be not credible. That being the case, how is a request for an apology or an explanation unwarranted?
More to the point, the OP explicitly invites us to make that assumption.
He does not say simply that Ms. Thomas was tone deaf. No, no – he says that no matter what you think about what actually happened, she was tone deaf. It is that assumption I attack.
The OP should withdraw his claim about “…regardless of politics or one’s personal beliefs about that past event…”
sigh
And the OP’s line about “…regardless of politics or one’s personal beliefs about that past event…”
What about that? You ignore it?
Not so. The vote was not on the veracity of the testimony, but on whether Thomas should be a SC Justice. The vote was a narrow “Yes.”
Speaking for myself only, I thought both Thomas and Hill were really shading the truth so that i didn’t believe either of them fully. I would’ve voted no.
Extending an olive branch means that you offer a concession to the other party to encourage reconciliation. The ‘olive branch’ itself is symbolic of this concession.
And, in fact, it would be rude to request to see it. Even under the guise of “extending an olive branch” to your auntcle.
By a 52-48 vote, and that’s the best way you can support that assertion.
That’s a pretty detailed definition about olive branches. To me, the phrase simply refers to peace, and I still fail to see why an offer of peace cannot be predicated on a request for an admission of the truth.
No more than you have. :rolleyes:
There was no offer of peace in the message as you transcribed it.
To that, I throw in with the people that say “fess up for the stuff you said about my husband” is not an olive branch. She may (although, as stated, I find that possibility to so remote as not worth discussing) be right about Hill, but it is not an olive branch.
It may have been phrased as a request, but stripped of semantic sleight-of-hand, I honestly think the content is demanding. And insulting – as if Hill would have apologized by now if she’d ever thought about it (or prayed about it), and needs to be prompted to think.
The missing essential olive-branchiness is intent. What of “goodwill” is there in suggesting Hill needs to publicly apologize for lying, however nicely put? It might have been olive-branchy, if still deluded, if Virginia had said something like “I called to say that I forgive you for lying all those years ago.”