# The Kavanaugh Effect. **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [November 8, 2018, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189 "2018-11-08T14:43:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2019, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/201 "2019-01-22T22:32:56Z")
> [@Lance\_Turbo](#): > > False. > > However, if you’d like to make the case that Kavanaugh should be removed from the bench without investigating the depth and breadth of his crimes, I’m willing to listen. I’m guessing that this is not actually what you want. He’s almost certainly not going to be removed from the bench via impeachment. You realize this, don’t you? ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2019, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/202 "2019-01-22T22:50:23Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > He’s almost certainly not going to be removed from the bench via impeachment. You realize this, don’t you? I do realize that. **Shodan** , on the other hand, seems to think the House should, “be able to impeach based on the evidence to date.” I think that’s pretty extreme, but I’ll listen if he’d like to try to convince me. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2019, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/203 "2019-01-22T23:18:21Z")
> [@Lance\_Turbo](#): > > Awesome. He clearly and obviously lied about a wide array of topics, and not just about shit he did in high in school either. On what topic did he perjure himself? ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/204 "2019-01-23T00:00:27Z")
> [@UltraVires](#): > > On what topic did he perjure himself? Pretty much all of them. He lies to senators every time he speaks to senators. It’s like his jam. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/205 "2019-01-23T00:03:31Z")
> [@Lance\_Turbo](#): > > Pretty much all of them. > > He lies to senators every time he speaks to senators. It’s like his jam. I’m not the least bit surprised that the question was met with this non-answer dodge. ---
**Author:** ![CaptMurdock](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/captmurdock/32/11736_2.png) [@CaptMurdock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaptMurdock)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/206 "2019-01-23T00:06:27Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Perhaps the House needs to investigate if certain freshman Democrats can pour piss out of a boot with the instructions written on the heel. Perhaps certain members of this board who feel the knee-jerk impetus to provide cover for right-leaning politicians and judges should demonstrate for Congress. ---
**Author:** ![CaptMurdock](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/captmurdock/32/11736_2.png) [@CaptMurdock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaptMurdock)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/207 "2019-01-23T00:13:56Z")
As for Brett’s passing acquaintance with the truth, [here’s a list.](https://www.gq.com/story/all-of-brett-kavanaughs-lies) Please try to keep the _ad hominem_ “counter-arguments” to the absolute minimum. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/208 "2019-01-23T00:23:04Z")
> [@CaptMurdock](#): > > As for Brett’s passing acquaintance with the truth, [here’s a list.](https://www.gq.com/story/all-of-brett-kavanaughs-lies) Please try to keep the _ad hominem_ “counter-arguments” to the absolute minimum. 🆒 Your list sucks. Take, for example, this one: > [@](#): > > **“Drinking game.”** > Date: September 27, 2018 > Under Oath: Uh-huh > > Continuing on with Rosetta Stoning Kavanaugh’s yearbook page, Whitehouse asked what “Devil’s triangle” referred to, and Kavanaugh replied that it was a drinking game with three glasses in a triangle played in a similar fashion to quarters. Again, Georgetown Prep contemporaries had never heard of that definition either, but identified the more commonly known meaning of group sex between two men and one woman. (Curiously, no such definition seemed to exist anywhere online—until a Wikipedia edit was submitted from the U.S. House of Representatives shortly after Kavanaugh’s testimony.) “The explanation of Devil’s triangle does not hold water for me,” said William Fishburne, who managed the Georgetown Prep football team while Kavanaugh was a senior, told The New York Times. Mari (the author) claims “Georgetown Prep contemporaries had never heard of that definition either”, but that is [demonstrably false](https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/04/politics/georgetown-prep-devils-triangle/index.html): > [@](#): > > … former Georgetown Prep students said Kavanaugh’s description of “devil’s triangle” was correct. > > One letter addressed to Iowa GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley and California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein – respectively, the top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee – came from a group of four that identified themselves as classmates of Kavanaugh from Georgetown Prep. > > “‘Devil’s Triangle’ was a drinking game we came up with in high school,” they wrote. “It was a variation on the game ‘Quarters.’” > > The four, DeLancey Davis, Bernard McCarthy, Jr., Paul Murray and Matthew Quinn, said while they did not remember where the name came from, none of them used it in the yearbook “to refer to any kind of sexual activity.” > > “To us, it was just a game with glasses in the shape of a triangle,” they wrote. “If the phrase ‘Devil’s Triangle’ had any sexual meaning in the early 1980s, we did not know it.” ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/209 "2019-01-23T00:32:46Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > I’m not the least bit surprised that the question was met with this non-answer dodge. We are one step closer to a complete classification of things that do and do not surprise you. Fantastic. Really good work. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/210 "2019-01-23T00:35:27Z")
Less than an hour ago, you said, “He lies to senators every time he speaks to senators.” Justice Kavanaugh spoke to Whitehouse (a senator, lamentably) and said that “Devil’s Triangle” referred to a drinking game similar to Quarters. Lie? Or not a lie? What do you think, **Lance**? ---
**Author:** ![CaptMurdock](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/captmurdock/32/11736_2.png) [@CaptMurdock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaptMurdock)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/211 "2019-01-23T00:41:42Z")
So there is a dispute about the Devil’s Triangle - sexual practice vs. drinking game. Well, that settles it. The Republic Is Saved. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/212 "2019-01-23T00:43:45Z")
> [@CaptMurdock](#): > > So there is a dispute about the Devil’s Triangle - sexual practice vs. drinking game. > > Well, that settles it. The Republic Is Saved. > > :rolleyes: The dispute would be about the low quality of your source, if you’re disputing that. ---
**Author:** ![CaptMurdock](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/captmurdock/32/11736_2.png) [@CaptMurdock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaptMurdock)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/213 "2019-01-23T01:01:25Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > The dispute would be about the low quality of your source, if you’re disputing that. Okay…[How about this one?](https://www.vox.com/2018/10/2/17927606/brett-kavanaugh-perjury-lied-congress) [Or this one?](https://www.businessinsider.com/all-the-times-kavanaugh-made-misleading-or-false-statements-under-oath-2018-10) [And in this corner…](https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/brett-kavanaugh-lied-brazenly-repeatedly-under-oath-any-law-student-ncna916031) Well? ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/214 "2019-01-23T03:42:59Z")
> [@CaptMurdock](#): > > Okay…[How about this one?](https://www.vox.com/2018/10/2/17927606/brett-kavanaugh-perjury-lied-congress) > > [Or this one?](https://www.businessinsider.com/all-the-times-kavanaugh-made-misleading-or-false-statements-under-oath-2018-10) > > [And in this corner…](https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/brett-kavanaugh-lied-brazenly-repeatedly-under-oath-any-law-student-ncna916031) > > Well? Let’s just set, maybe as a minimum standard for truthfulness / accuracy, that the subsequent cites you offer not repeat the same exact mistake that your original one did? Vox: > [@](#): > > … Asked about the phrase “Devil’s Triangle,” which commonly refers to sex between two men and one woman, Kavanaugh said it was a drinking game akin to Quarters. > > While he and other classmates admitted the yearbook was full of exaggerations, those definitions Kavanaugh provided under oath didn’t hold up with classmates at Georgetown Prep, as the New York Times’s David Enrich reported: … BI: > [@](#): > > “Devil’s Triangle”: When asked about the term “Devil’s Triangle,” which appears on both Kavanaugh and Judge’s yearbook pages, Kavanaugh told senators he was referencing a drinking game that involved three cups and quarters. But the term is common slang for sex between two men and a woman — and Kavanaugh’s classmates told The Times that they had never heard the term used to refer to a drinking game. Notably, an attempted sex act between two men and one women is precisely what Ford has accused Kavanaugh and Judge of committing. Your NBC News “cite” is just an opinion piece, not really a catalog of “lies”, but it does link to [a New York Times](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/28/us/politics/brett-kavanaugh-fact-check.html) piece that spreads the same misinformation on “Devil’s Triangle”: > [@](#): > > **Yearbook Lingo** > > Judge Kavanaugh’s yearbook page included the entries “Judge — Have You Boofed Yet?” and “Devil’s Triangle.” On Thursday, he said that “boofed” meant “flatulence” and that “Devil’s Triangle” was a drinking game in which three glasses were arranged in a triangle. > > **This is disputed.** > > “Boofed” in the 1980s was a term that often referred to anal sex, and that is how Judge Kavanaugh’s classmates said they interpreted his comment. They said they had never heard it used to refer to flatulence. > > Similarly, they said that they had never heard of a drinking game called Devil’s Triangle, but that the phrase was regularly used to describe sex between two men and a woman. “The explanation of Devil’s Triangle does not hold water for me,” said William Fishburne, who managed the football team during Judge Kavanaugh’s senior year. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/215 "2019-01-23T04:54:09Z")
You’re really going all in on this Devil’s Triangle business. What do you think your last cite says? To me it looks like it says Kavanaugh’s explanation of Devil’s Triangle is disputed and then it quotes one of Kavanaugh’s classmates disputing it. That said, Devil’s Triangle is not one of Kavanaugh’s obvious lies and I never claimed it was. There’s a bunch to choose from. There’s no need to concern yourself with Devil’s Triangle unduly. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/216 "2019-01-23T14:58:35Z")
> [@Lance\_Turbo](#): > > … That said, Devil’s Triangle is not one of Kavanaugh’s obvious lies and I never claimed it was. … I already quoted exactly what you claimed. You said “He lies to senators every time he speaks to senators.” Now we have established that is not correct. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/217 "2019-01-23T15:22:11Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > I already quoted exactly what you claimed. You said “He lies to senators every time he speaks to senators.” Now we have established that is not correct. False. “He lies to senators every time he speaks to senators,” means he tells at least one lie every time he speaks to senators, not that every word out of his mouth is a lie when he is speaking to senators. He lied in his 2003 hearing. He Lied in his 2005 hearing. He lied in his 2018 hearing. He lied every time he was under oath in a senate hearing. Also, you have not established the truth of his Devil’s Triangle explanation, you have demonstrated that it may or may not be true. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/218 "2019-01-23T16:15:24Z")
You claimed earlier that it was clear and obvious that Kavanaugh lied. Now you at least recognize that it is neither. Progress, I guess. You claimed that Kavanaugh lied about never blacking out. To prove that a lie is easy - all you need is a specific instance of Kavanaugh blacking out. When did that happen, who witnessed it, and how did that witness or those witnesses know that Kavanaugh had blacked out? That’s all it takes - one _ **specific** _ instance. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/219 "2019-01-23T16:41:04Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > You claimed earlier that it was clear and obvious that Kavanaugh lied. Now you at least recognize that it is neither. Progress, I guess. > > You claimed that Kavanaugh lied about never blacking out. To prove that a lie is easy - all you need is a specific instance of Kavanaugh blacking out. When did that happen, who witnessed it, and how did that witness or those witnesses know that Kavanaugh had blacked out? > > That’s all it takes - one _ **specific** _ instance. > > Regards, > Shodan But that is the problem with proving perjury. It must be shown that the witness made a statement that is knowingly false. When you are dealing with subjective things, then it can never be proven. What does it mean to “blackout”? Kavanaugh may believe that to mean something different than you or I do. Even if you find 20 people who would testify that Kavanaugh was at a party blasted off of his ass and pissing in a closet, he can say that he remembers the events of the night perfectly well. Even if you find people who will say that the morning after a party Kavanaugh told them that he got drunk and didn’t remember anything from the night before, he can claim that he was just a young kid lying and trying to impress them with his drinking prowess. You can say the same thing about most of these other “lies.” Especially the one about “personally handling” the Pryor nomination. What does that mean? That he was involved? That he was the point man? Even if you show that he was copied on every email about Pryor and hosted a party for him, he can say that yes he was involved in the nomination process but he did not personally handle it, that was Mr. Smith’s job. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189/220 "2019-01-23T16:52:19Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > You claimed earlier that it was clear and obvious that Kavanaugh lied. Now you at least recognize that it is neither. Progress, I guess. > > You claimed that Kavanaugh lied about never blacking out. To prove that a lie is easy - all you need is a specific instance of Kavanaugh blacking out. When did that happen, who witnessed it, and how did that witness or those witnesses know that Kavanaugh had blacked out? > > That’s all it takes - one _ **specific** _ instance. > > Regards, > Shodan Basically none of this is correct. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-kavanaugh-effect/824189.md?page=12)