Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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The Romulan Republic
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Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

Post by The Romulan Republic »

So as you (hopefully) all are aware, the same Republican leadership who blocked Obama from exercising his Constitutional right to nominate a Justice to the Supreme Court to fill Scalia's seat by refusing to hold hearings on the basis that we should wait until after the election and let the voters decide (thereby effectively stealing a Supreme Court seat in defiance of the spirit, if not the letter, of the Constitution) are now busy ramming through the far Right judge Brett Kavanaugh before the Midterm elections. Much has been made of Kavanaugh's possibly voting to repeal Roe v Wade, but of possibly even greater important than that very serious issue is the fact that he is pretty open about his belief that the President should be effectively immune to prosecution, subpoena, and potentially even lawsuits-effectively placing Donald Trump, and future Presidents, above the rule of law. Considering that the "President" who appointed him is currently facing multiple investigations, this alone ought to disqualify him. And yet the Republicans are hell-bent on ramming him through with minimal time to examine his nomination, and while blocking much of his record from view.

They haven't been entirely successful in that last, though: it was recently reported that Kavanaugh has a history of gambling. Perhaps more significantly, it turns out that Senator Diane Feinstein, acting on an anonymous tip, has now recommended that the Justice Department investigation Kavanaugh, according to some sources for sexual misconduct:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/13/us/p ... stein.html

Excerpt:
WASHINGTON - The senior Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee referred information involving Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh, President Trump's nominee to the Supreme Court, to federal investigators on Thursday, but the senator declined to make public what the matter involved.

Two officials familiar with the matter say the incident involved possible sexual misconduct between Judge Kavanaugh and a woman when they were both in high school. They spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to discuss the matter.
The FBI has however apparently declined to investigate because the matter is outside their jurisdiction.

Perhaps these revelations might block or at least delay his appointment. That would require solid Democratic opposition, plus two Republican defections. You have one week to call your Senator if you want to make a last push to block this scumbag from America's highest court. Failing that, though, these developments lay the groundwork for a possible campaign to impeach Kavanaugh and remove him from the Court once the Democrats retake Congress.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

Post by Ziggy Stardust »

Who the fuck cares if he has a history of gambling? Unless he's an out of control gambling addict in deep debt to organized crime, it's really not an issue, not without more context for what "history of gambling" even means. Does that mean he's gone on a few trips to Vegas? That he and his buddies play small stakes poker while smoking cigars? What does it have to do with anything at all, other than some bizarre attempt at shrill moralizing?

And "possible sexual misconduct between Judge Kavanaugh and a woman when they were both in high school"? Given the chances that they were both underage when this alleged incident occurred, and this country's long backwards approach to dealing with underage sex, I'm going to have to take this with a HUGE grain of salt unless more context is given. This seems like some pretty puerile attempts to just throw everything they can at Kavanaugh to try and smear his public image, regardless of the credibility. Hell, it honestly reeks of a rather cynical attempt to ride the "Me Too" movement for political gain, as opposed to arising out of any genuine concern over this particular alleged incident.

I mean, I don't want Kavanaugh confirmed, either, but honestly, at the moment, I find this to all be rather disgusting, in the absence of more information or context about these accusations.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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Ziggy Stardust wrote: 2018-09-13 10:38pmWho the fuck cares if he has a history of gambling? Unless he's an out of control gambling addict in deep debt to organized crime, it's really not an issue, not without more context for what "history of gambling" even means. Does that mean he's gone on a few trips to Vegas? That he and his buddies play small stakes poker while smoking cigars? What does it have to do with anything at all, other than some bizarre attempt at shrill moralizing?
You are aware that gambling can be an issue when giving someone a security clearance, for example? Because gambling debts can make one vulnerable to bribery or blackmail.
And "possible sexual misconduct between Judge Kavanaugh and a woman when they were both in high school"? Given the chances that they were both underage when this alleged incident occurred, and this country's long backwards approach to dealing with underage sex, I'm going to have to take this with a HUGE grain of salt unless more context is given. This seems like some pretty puerile attempts to just throw everything they can at Kavanaugh to try and smear his public image, regardless of the credibility. Hell, it honestly reeks of a rather cynical attempt to ride the "Me Too" movement for political gain, as opposed to arising out of any genuine concern over this particular alleged incident.
If you had read the full article, you would know that Feinstein contacted Justice after receiving a tip from a woman who claimed to have been victimized by Kavanaugh, who wished to remain anonymous. So this isn't simply a political smear, unless you are going to fall back immediately on the presumption that "the woman is lying". In which case, I will unapologetically tell you to go fuck yourself.
I mean, I don't want Kavanaugh confirmed, either, but honestly, at the moment, I find this to all be rather disgusting, in the absence of more information or context about these accusations.
I suggest that you avoid immediately smearing the accusers' character and motives, if you do not wish others to make presumptions about your motives.

These are at the very least questions worth asking before giving him a decisive vote and a position for life on the highest court in the country, where he will shape the very fabric of the nation and its laws for decades to come. And frankly, considering that his nomination is part of a transparent campaign to place Donald Trump effectively above the law, I consider pretty much any tactic short of committing a felony to keep him off the Court morally justified, at this point.

I am sick of hemming and hawing about the tone of the opposition when we are facing an existential threat.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

Post by Mr Bean »

The real problem with it is the fact it was leaked (Likely by Feinstein staff I don't see this coming from the FBI side) with about 200 rumors swirling around here everything from that odd 200,000$ worth of baseball tickets was a sideways way to get money to his mistress to it was a rape hushed up for the local hero to he's got an bastard out there.

Who knows what it is but we don't have anything to go on there, it's main attraction is the fact it's a possible titillating sex issue from a Trump nominee in the age of me too movement.

Never mind the simple fact is Kavanaugh is disqualified for the position for lying multiple times to Congress under oath.

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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

Post by The Romulan Republic »

There are innumerable reasons why Kavanaugh should not be on the Court, but the more we can come up with to either get a couple defections to block him, or failing that have grounds to impeach him, the better.

I will concede that the lack of solid information and abundance of rumours is unfortunate, but I don't know what else Feinstein could have done, other than conceal it from the public altogether or violate the source's wish for confidentiality (which we all know would expose her to death threats and harassment from the Alt. Reich.
"I know its easy to be defeatist here because nothing has seemingly reigned Trump in so far. But I will say this: every asshole succeeds until finally, they don't. Again, 18 months before he resigned, Nixon had a sky-high approval rating of 67%. Harvey Weinstein was winning Oscars until one day, he definitely wasn't."-John Oliver

"The greatest enemy of a good plan is the dream of a perfect plan."-General Von Clauswitz, describing my opinion of Bernie or Busters and third partiers in a nutshell.

I SUPPORT A NATIONAL GENERAL STRIKE TO REMOVE TRUMP FROM OFFICE.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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Ziggy Stardust wrote: 2018-09-13 10:38pm I mean, I don't want Kavanaugh confirmed, either, but honestly, at the moment, I find this to all be rather disgusting, in the absence of more information or context about these accusations.
Irony of this is that the Republicans would gladly throw whatever they can. I believe Kavanaugh himself has a history with that back in the 90s...

And that's why you're fighting with one arm behind your back. You're losing a lot of fights when you try to play fair and the other sides doesn't give a shit.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

Post by Esquire »

If your underlying thesis is that the other side is more evil than you, it is a very bad idea to make 'who can be the most evil' the only thing that matters. There isn't that much of the Productive Discussion Commons left; let's maybe not burn the rest?
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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Esquire wrote: 2018-09-14 10:42am If your underlying thesis is that the other side is more evil than you, it is a very bad idea to make 'who can be the most evil' the only thing that matters. There isn't that much of the Productive Discussion Commons left; let's maybe not burn the rest?
But that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying in the real world with real consequences where you can potentially make a real difference by doing what is comparatively mildly distasteful (certainly not a race for the most 'evil'), you maybe shouldn't cast such a critical eye on politicians playing political games.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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Unless you can show specifically why the exact same race to the bottom that inevitably happens in every other even vaguely similar situation won't happen here, I absolutely will be critical.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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Esquire wrote: 2018-09-14 08:38pm Unless you can show specifically why the exact same race to the bottom that inevitably happens in every other even vaguely similar situation won't happen here, I absolutely will be critical.
But I'm not claiming a race to the bottom happens, so why do I need to show it?
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

Post by Esquire »

Your initial position, as I understand it, is basically ' The Republicans, being underhanded people, are doing some slightly underhanded things and winning because of it. Therefore, we should also do those underhanded things, to return to parity.' Is that fair?

The obvious next iteration, played out again and again in every competitive field, is for those dastardly Republicans to do something even more underhanded. At which point this repeats, ad infinitum, until everything good and potentially-beneficial has been sacrificed on the altar of competitive efficiency. That's the race to the bottom I'm talking about, and any time you suggest using underhanded means 'just this once,' yes, you absolutely do need to address it.

EDIT: Spelling. Besides where because should have been in first paragraph; stupid phone autocorrect.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

Post by The Romulan Republic »

Too many people seem to think "The Democrats are weak, therefore we need to be just as brutal, nasty, dishonest, unethical, and criminal as the Republicans."

The mistake here is that they fall for the classic fallacy of equating strength with lack of ethics. This is the mistaken premise underlying all "ends justify the means" bullshit- the presumption that the more ruthless and underhanded means are automatically superior/necessary. Very seldom do people who preach "necessary evil" seem to stop and ask themselves first whether the evil is actually necessary.

You don't have to be unprincipled to be strong. Indeed, having principles in the face of adversity takes great strength, far more than abandoning them for a short-term advantage does. We don't need to be like Republicans in order to win- and if we did, I'm not sure how much it would then matter, in the larger sense, who ultimately won. But we do need to be strong: unafraid to speak our minds, not so quick to compromise on matters of principle, and when we have an advantage, use it. I don't think most voters want a "Democratic Tea Party". But most voters do want a Democratic Party that can be seen to be standing for something.

Edit: I guess what I'm saying is that there is a place for ruthlessness, but we still have to have some lines we won't cross. Where we draw those lines exactly is legitimate grounds for debate.

I will say that if any Democrat dares to vote for Kavanaugh, they should have their sorry collaborator ass primaried at the first opportunity.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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Esquire wrote: 2018-09-14 09:22pm Your initial position, as I understand it, is basically ' The Republicans, being underhanded people, are doing some slightly underhanded things and winning because of it. Therefore, we should also do those underhanded things, to return to parity.' Is that fair?
Nope. It has now come out that the allegation is attempted rape, by comparison to how the Republicans appointed Gorsuch, this isn't even close to parity.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

Post by The Romulan Republic »

Attempted rape allegations should at the very least be grounds to delay the nomination while the allegations are investigated.

I fully expect the Republican leadership to keep trying to ram through the appointment of a possible rapist, however.
"I know its easy to be defeatist here because nothing has seemingly reigned Trump in so far. But I will say this: every asshole succeeds until finally, they don't. Again, 18 months before he resigned, Nixon had a sky-high approval rating of 67%. Harvey Weinstein was winning Oscars until one day, he definitely wasn't."-John Oliver

"The greatest enemy of a good plan is the dream of a perfect plan."-General Von Clauswitz, describing my opinion of Bernie or Busters and third partiers in a nutshell.

I SUPPORT A NATIONAL GENERAL STRIKE TO REMOVE TRUMP FROM OFFICE.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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With Clarence Thomas as precedent, everyone knows what they're going to do.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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Why are people acting like "A bunch of the guy's friends say he totally wouldn't do that" is any form of defense or evidence against allegations of sexual misconduct?
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

Post by Jub »

On the one hand, I can totally see this as being true with all the condemnation that would come with such. If my level of scorn could get that much worse given his abhorrent politics.

On the other hand, bring up 30+ decade-old allegations isn't a great look in the eyes of many moderates. Unless more women come forward or there was a rape kit run at the time or even a police report that was never prosecuted it's unlikely anything comes of this. Even if there was evidence this is probably outside of the statute of limitations in most places so I doubt there will be any legal recourse.

I'm not saying that people can't or shouldn't come forward even years later, just that crowing about it like it's a sure thing that certainly happened isn't a great look.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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Jub wrote: 2018-09-15 01:14amOn the other hand, bring up 30+ decade-old allegations from when he was in high school isn't a great look in the eyes of many moderates.
For a Trump appointee it's practically mild.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

Post by The Romulan Republic »

Ralin wrote: 2018-09-15 01:09am Why are people acting like "A bunch of the guy's friends say he totally wouldn't do that" is any form of defense or evidence against allegations of sexual misconduct?
This. So much.
Jub wrote: 2018-09-15 01:14am On the one hand, I can totally see this as being true with all the condemnation that would come with such. If my level of scorn could get that much worse given his abhorrent politics.

On the other hand, bring up 30+ decade-old allegations isn't a great look in the eyes of many moderates. Unless more women come forward or there was a rape kit run at the time or even a police report that was never prosecuted it's unlikely anything comes of this. Even if there was evidence this is probably outside of the statute of limitations in most places so I doubt there will be any legal recourse.

I'm not saying that people can't or shouldn't come forward even years later, just that crowing about it like it's a sure thing that certainly happened isn't a great look.
Is it a sure thing? No- although even saying that is controversial among some segments of the Left, given the focus on believing sexual abuse victims (which is in turn a response to the long and ongoing history of them routinely not being believed, being called liars, and told they were "asking for it"). But I do think its enough to put his appointment on hold while it is investigated further, or would be if the Congressional Majority had the collective conscience and sense of duty of the average mob hit man between the lot of them.
Don't know why you feel Feinstein facing a challenge from the Left is relevant here, but I think there were good reasons for her not to come forward with it right away- those being the desire to investigate further first, and the accuser's understandable desire for anonymity. I also think there were good reasons to bring it forward, though- that being that the public needs to know that the Supreme Court Justice the GOP (Greedy Old Rapists) are shoving down their throat may be a sexual predator.
"I know its easy to be defeatist here because nothing has seemingly reigned Trump in so far. But I will say this: every asshole succeeds until finally, they don't. Again, 18 months before he resigned, Nixon had a sky-high approval rating of 67%. Harvey Weinstein was winning Oscars until one day, he definitely wasn't."-John Oliver

"The greatest enemy of a good plan is the dream of a perfect plan."-General Von Clauswitz, describing my opinion of Bernie or Busters and third partiers in a nutshell.

I SUPPORT A NATIONAL GENERAL STRIKE TO REMOVE TRUMP FROM OFFICE.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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The Romulan Republic wrote: 2018-09-15 08:13pmDon't know why you feel Feinstein facing a challenge from the Left is relevant here, but I think there were good reasons for her not to come forward with it right away- those being the desire to investigate further first, and the accuser's understandable desire for anonymity. I also think there were good reasons to bring it forward, though- that being that the public needs to know that the Supreme Court Justice the GOP (Greedy Old Rapists) are shoving down their throat may be a sexual predator.
Listen you ignorant little shit. Senator Fienstein had this for months (She got the letter in JULY) and didn't hand it over to the FBI right away. If she held on to it for 'investigation' purposes, why didn't she mention it at the hearings? Why are we only hearing about it now, when functionally all it will do is look like a smear campaign instead of being brought up when she got it.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

Post by TimothyC »

We have a name now, and a bit more detail:
Emma Brown for the Washington Post wrote:Earlier this summer, Christine Blasey Ford wrote a confidential letter to a senior Democratic lawmaker alleging that Supreme Court nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her more than three decades ago, when they were high school students in suburban Maryland. Since Wednesday, she has watched as that bare-bones version of her story became public without her name or her consent, drawing a blanket denial from Kavanaugh and roiling a nomination that just days ago seemed all but certain to succeed.

Now, Ford has decided that if her story is going to be told, she wants to be the one to tell it.

Speaking publicly for the first time, Ford said that one summer in the early 1980s, Kavanaugh and a friend — both “stumbling drunk,” Ford alleges — corralled her into a bedroom during a gathering of teenagers at a house in Montgomery County.

While his friend watched, she said, Kavanaugh pinned her to a bed on her back and groped her over her clothes, grinding his body against hers and clumsily attempting to pull off her one-piece bathing suit and the clothing she wore over it. When she tried to scream, she said, he put his hand over her mouth.

“I thought he might inadvertently kill me,” said Ford, now a 51-year-old research psychologist in northern California. “He was trying to attack me and remove my clothing.”

Ford said she was able to escape when Kavanaugh’s friend and classmate at Georgetown Preparatory School, Mark Judge, jumped on top of them, sending all three tumbling. She said she ran from the room, briefly locked herself in a bathroom and then fled the house.

[Republican senators rush to Kavanaugh’s defense after sexual misconduct allegation]

Ford said she told no one of the incident in any detail until 2012, when she was in couples therapy with her husband. The therapist’s notes, portions of which were provided by Ford and reviewed by The Washington Post, do not mention Kavanaugh’s name but say she reported that she was attacked by students “from an elitist boys’ school” who went on to become “highly respected and high-ranking members of society in Washington.” The notes say four boys were involved, a discrepancy Ford says was an error on the therapist’s part. Ford said there were four boys at the party but only two in the room.

Notes from an individual therapy session the following year, when she was being treated for what she says have been long-term effects of the incident, show Ford described a “rape attempt” in her late teens.

In an interview, her husband, Russell Ford, said that in the 2012 sessions, she recounted being trapped in a room with two drunken boys, one of whom pinned her to a bed, molested her and prevented her from screaming. He said he recalled that his wife used Kavanaugh’s last name and voiced concern that Kavanaugh — then a federal judge — might one day be nominated to the Supreme Court.

On Sunday, the White House sent The Post a statement Kavanaugh issued last week, when the outlines of Ford’s account first became public: “I categorically and unequivocally deny this allegation. I did not do this back in high school or at any time.”

Through a White House spokesman, Kavanaugh declined to comment further on Ford’s allegation and did not respond to questions about whether he knew her during high school. The White House had no additional comment.

Reached by email Sunday, Judge declined to comment. In an interview Friday with The Weekly Standard, before Ford’s name was known, he denied that any such incident occurred. “It’s just absolutely nuts. I never saw Brett act that way,” Judge said. He told the New York Times that Kavanaugh was a “brilliant student” who loved sports and was not “into anything crazy or illegal.”

Christine Ford is a professor at Palo Alto University who teaches in a consortium with Stanford University, training graduate students in clinical psychology. Her work has been widely published in academic journals.

She contacted The Post through a tip line in early July, when it had become clear that Kavanaugh was on the shortlist of possible nominees to replace retiring justice Anthony M. Kennedy but before Trump announced his name publicly. A registered Democrat who has made small contributions to political organizations, she contacted her congresswoman, Democrat Anna G. Eshoo, around the same time. In late July, she sent a letter via Eshoo’s office to Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee.

In the letter, which was read to The Post, Ford described the incident and said she expected her story to be kept confidential. She signed the letter as Christine Blasey, the name she uses professionally.

For weeks, Ford declined to speak to The Post on the record as she grappled with concerns about what going public would mean for her and her family — and what she said was her duty as a citizen to tell the story.

She engaged Debra Katz, a Washington lawyer known for her work on sexual harassment cases. On the advice of Katz, who believed Ford would be attacked as a liar if she came forward, Ford took a polygraph test administered by a former FBI agent in early August. The results, which Katz provided to The Post, concluded that Ford was being truthful when she said a statement summarizing her allegations was accurate.

By late August, Ford had decided not to come forward, calculating that doing so would upend her life and probably would not affect Kavanaugh’s confirmation. “Why suffer through the annihilation if it’s not going to matter?” she said.

Her story leaked anyway. On Wednesday, The Intercept reported that Feinstein had a letter describing an incident involving Kavanaugh and a woman while they were in high school, and that Feinstein was refusing to share it with her Democratic colleagues.

Feinstein soon released a statement: “I have received information from an individual concerning the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court,” she wrote. “That individual strongly requested confidentiality, declined to come forward or press the matter further, and I have honored that decision. I have, however, referred the matter to federal investigative authorities.”

The FBI redacted Ford’s name and sent the letter to the White House to be included in Kavanaugh’s background file, according to a Judiciary Committee aide. The White House sent it to the Senate Judiciary Committee, making it available to all senators.

As pressure grew, the New York Times reported that the incident involved “possible sexual misconduct.”

By then, Ford had begun to fear she would be exposed. People were clearly learning her identity: A BuzzFeed reporter visited her at her home and tried to speak to her as she was leaving a classroom where she teaches graduate students. Another reporter called her colleagues to ask about her.

On Friday, the New Yorker reported the letter’s contents but did not reveal Ford’s identity. Soon after, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) released a letter from 65 women who say they knew Kavanaugh when he attended high school from 1979 to 1983 at Georgetown Prep, an all-boys school in North Bethesda.

“Through the more than 35 years we have known him, Brett has stood out for his friendship, character, and integrity,” the women wrote. “In particular, he has always treated women with decency and respect. That was true when he was in high school, and it has remained true to this day.”

As the story snowballed, Ford said, she heard people repeating inaccuracies about her and, with the visits from reporters, felt her privacy being chipped away. Her calculation changed.

“These are all the ills that I was trying to avoid,” she said, explaining her decision to come forward. “Now I feel like my civic responsibility is outweighing my anguish and terror about retaliation.”

Katz said she believes Feinstein honored Ford’s request to keep her allegation confidential, but “regrettably others did not.”

“Victims must have the right to decide whether to come forward, especially in a political environment that is as ruthless as this one,” Katz said. “She will now face vicious attacks by those who support this nominee.”

After so many years, Ford said she does not remember some key details of the incident. She said she believes it occurred in the summer of 1982, when she was 15, around the end of her sophomore year at the all-girls Holton-Arms School in Bethesda. Kavanaugh would have been 17 at the end of his junior year at Georgetown Prep.

At the time, Ford said, she knew Kavanaugh and Judge as “friendly acquaintances” in the private-school social circles of suburban Maryland. Her Holton-Arms friends mostly hung out with boys from the Landon School, she said, but for a period of several months socialized regularly with students from Georgetown Prep.

Ford said she does not remember how the gathering came together the night of the incident. She said she often spent time in the summer at the Columbia Country Club pool in Chevy Chase, where in those pre-cellphone days, teenagers learned about gatherings via word of mouth. She also doesn’t recall who owned the house or how she got there.

Ford said she remembers that it was in Montgomery County, not far from the country club, and that no parents were home at the time. Ford named two other teenagers who she said were at the party. Those individuals did not respond to messages on Sunday morning.

She said she recalls a small family room where she and a handful of others drank beer together that night. She said that each person had one beer but that Kavanaugh and Judge had started drinking earlier and were heavily intoxicated.

In his senior-class yearbook entry at Georgetown Prep, Kavanaugh made several references to drinking, claiming membership to the “Beach Week Ralph Club” and “Keg City Club.” He and Judge are pictured together at the beach in a photo in the yearbook.

Judge is a filmmaker and author who has written for the Daily Caller, The Weekly Standard and The Washington Post. He chronicled his recovery from alcoholism in “Wasted: Tales of a Gen-X Drunk,” which described his own blackout drinking and a culture of partying among students at his high school, renamed in the book “Loyola Prep.” Kavanaugh is not mentioned in the book, but a passage about partying at the beach one summer makes glancing reference to a “Bart O’Kavanaugh,” who “puked in someone’s car the other night” and “passed out on his way back from a party.”

Through the White House, Kavanaugh did not respond to a question about whether the name was a pseudonym for him.

Ford said that on the night of the party, she left the family room to use the bathroom, which was at the top of a narrow stairway. She doesn’t remember whether Kavanaugh and Judge were behind her or already upstairs, but she remembers being pushed into a bedroom and then onto a bed. Rock-and-roll music was playing with the volume turned up high, she said.

She alleges that Kavanaugh — who played football and basketball at Georgetown Prep — held her down with the weight of his body and fumbled with her clothes, seemingly hindered by his intoxication. Judge stood across the room, she said, and both boys were laughing “maniacally.” She said she yelled, hoping that someone downstairs would hear her over the music, and Kavanaugh clapped his hand over her mouth to silence her.

At one point, she said, Judge jumped on top of them, and she tried unsuccessfully to wriggle free. Then Judge jumped on them again, toppling them, and she broke away, she said.

She said she locked herself in the bathroom and listened until she heard the boys “going down the stairs, hitting the walls.” She said that after five or ten minutes, she unlocked the door and made her way through the living room and outside. She isn’t sure how she got home.

Ford said she has not spoken with Kavanaugh since that night. And she told no one at the time what had happened to her. She was terrified, she said, that she would be in trouble if her parents realized she had been at a party where teenagers were drinking, and she worried they might figure it out even if she did not tell them.

“My biggest fear was, do I look like someone just attacked me?” she said. She said she recalled thinking: “I’m not ever telling anyone this. This is nothing, it didn’t happen, and he didn’t rape me.”

Years later, after going through psychotherapy, Ford said, she came to understand the incident as a trauma with lasting impact on her life.

“I think it derailed me substantially for four or five years,” she said. She said she struggled academically and socially and was unable to have healthy relationships with men. “I was very ill-equipped to forge those kinds of relationships.”

She also said she believes that in the longer term, it contributed to anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms with which she has struggled.

She married her husband in 2002. Early in their relationship, she told him she had been a victim of physical abuse, he said. A decade later, he learned the details of that alleged abuse when the therapist asked her to tell the story, he said.

He said he expects that some people, upon hearing his wife’s account, will believe that Kavanaugh’s high school behavior has no bearing upon his fitness for the nation’s high court. He disagrees.

“I think you look to judges to be the arbiters of right and wrong,” Russell Ford said. “If they don’t have a moral code of their own to determine right from wrong, then that’s a problem. So I think it’s relevant. Supreme Court nominees should be held to a higher standard.”

Staff writers Beth Reinhard and Seung Min Kim and researchers Alice Crites and Julie Tate contributed to this report.
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The Romulan Republic
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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Yeah, this doesn't sound like something just made up to smear Kavanaugh now. I'm going with "probably true". Its not enough to convict him in a court of law, but it damn well is enough to make me think that the vote should be put on hold, or his nomination withdrawn pending further investigation.
"I know its easy to be defeatist here because nothing has seemingly reigned Trump in so far. But I will say this: every asshole succeeds until finally, they don't. Again, 18 months before he resigned, Nixon had a sky-high approval rating of 67%. Harvey Weinstein was winning Oscars until one day, he definitely wasn't."-John Oliver

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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

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The Romulan Republic wrote: 2018-09-16 11:07pm or his nomination withdrawn pending further investigation.
Why should anything be done 'pending investigation' if you don't think an investigation will prove anything?

This is a Trump appointee. Personally I'd be surprised if he hadn't sexually assaulted someone at some point.
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Re: Kavanaugh hearings- now with sexual misconduct allegations.

Post by The Romulan Republic »

Ralin wrote: 2018-09-16 11:14pm
The Romulan Republic wrote: 2018-09-16 11:07pm or his nomination withdrawn pending further investigation.
Why should anything be done 'pending investigation' if you don't think an investigation will prove anything?
The main thing would be whether more women come forward, with more recent accusations. Sometimes, when one person speaks up against someone wealthy and powerful, it triggers a landslide of follow-up allegations as others who were afraid to speak are motivated to come forward- see Cosby, Weinstein, etc.
This is a Trump appointee. Personally I'd be surprised if he hadn't sexually assaulted someone at some point.
Indeed. Birds of a feather, after all...
"I know its easy to be defeatist here because nothing has seemingly reigned Trump in so far. But I will say this: every asshole succeeds until finally, they don't. Again, 18 months before he resigned, Nixon had a sky-high approval rating of 67%. Harvey Weinstein was winning Oscars until one day, he definitely wasn't."-John Oliver

"The greatest enemy of a good plan is the dream of a perfect plan."-General Von Clauswitz, describing my opinion of Bernie or Busters and third partiers in a nutshell.

I SUPPORT A NATIONAL GENERAL STRIKE TO REMOVE TRUMP FROM OFFICE.
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