US Politics: Judge Dread

[Suttree]

20 minutes ago, King Ned Stark said:

I’m okay with an investigation, but I do believe in innocence until proven guilty, rule of law, and that the burden of proof lies with the accuser.

Not sure why this needs to be repeated ad nauseam but you understand due process doesn't apply here? It's SCOTUS seat not a criminal trial. 

If anything his hyper partisan tantrum yesterday(along with previous lies) clearly show him to be unfit for the seat. Additionally it seems like most reasonable people can say there should be a further investigation. That notably doesn't include Bart himself.

[Lord Dracarys]

Yeah, people seem to be under the impression that this hearing process relies on the same evidence criteria as a courtroom does (I believe this argument was made by Republicans several times during the hearings yesterday). It doesn't. This is a glorified job interview for a lifetime appointment to the highest court in the United States. A job only one person has ever been impeached from. If you as a candidate have a closet full of skeletons indicating you're a serial rapist, and then you lie repeatedly during the interview process, those are both things that probably should prevent you from being hired to that position.

[Morpheus]

Kavanaugh is not a good guy even without the sexual assault. He is a pathological liar and has a tendency to be dishonest even under oath. His character is questionable enough that these allegations cannot be handwaved away. He should be disqualified for many reasons, the possibility that he did these things put it over the top. The Republicans are trying to ram him through for political reasons, outlawing abortion and protecting Trump, they don’t care about the law or process, otherwise they would have dropped him before any of this even came to light. This is not a court of law, the standard of innocent until proven guilty does not apply, it is a job interview, he performed poorly in his first hearing and he was even worse yesterday.

[James Arryn]

10 minutes ago, aceluby said:

You realize this is a job interview, right?  I'd rather have 9 innocent SC justice nominees turned away than 1 rapist given a lifetime appointment.

Whereas if he gets on, we’re one death/retirement away from a complete balance of woman and (alleged) sexual assaulters on the USSC.

[King Ned Stark]

I understand that, I believe the principle still applies.  While I won’t worry for Kavanaugh should he not be voted in even if he was innocent.  He’s wealthy enough to get along.

I do think it is dangerous to assume guilt on anyone based on an accusation.

[DanteGabriel]

2 minutes ago, King Ned Stark said:

I understand that, I believe the principle still applies.  While I won’t worry for Kavanaugh should he not be voted in even if he was innocent.  He’s wealthy enough to get along.

I do think it is dangerous to assume guilt on anyone based on an accusation.

It's not just the fucking accusation. It's his behavior and evasiveness and his own goddamn yearbook quotes.

It's his buddy/co-accused rapist refusing to testify. It's Kavanaugh's own unwillingness to stand up to as much scrutiny as Dr. Ford has subjected herself to. For fuck's sake. There is so much there to look at beyond one fucking accusation.

[Larry of the Lawn]

48 minutes ago, Vin said:

  

At least the Dens are participating in the process here, the fucking GOP wouldnt even hear an Obama nominee, and many GOP senators threatened the same to Clinton.  Hilarious that you think Kavanaugh not getting an SC seat without investigating a bunch of sexual assault accusations is prelude to a Civil War.  I can see all the conservative snowflakes melting already.

[Cas Stark]

For a different perspective:

 

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/09/kavanaugh-ford-hearings-everyone-lost-andrew-sullivan.html

 

And there were times, it seems to me, that he simply couldn’t win. If he hadn’t hired and mentored many women, it would be proof he was a misogynist and rapist. But the fact that he did hire and mentor many of them was also proof he was a misogynist and a rapist, who only picked the pretty ones. If he hadn’t shown anger, he would have been obviously inhuman. When he did express rage … well, that was a disqualifying temperament for a judge. It didn’t help that the Democrats made no pretense of having an open mind, or that any glimpse at mainstream media — let alone media Twitter — revealed that it had already picked a side. This was, for the major papers, especially the New York Times, a righteous battle against another white straight male, and the smug, snarky virtue-signaling on Twitter was in overdrive. Even Kavanaugh’s choking-up was mocked — just another contemptible “bro-crier.”

 

To the extent that the hearing went beyond the specifics of Ford’s allegations and sought to humiliate and discredit Kavanaugh for who he was as a teenager nearly four decades ago (a dynamic that was quite pronounced in some Democratic questioning of the nominee), it was deeply concerning. When public life means the ransacking of people’s private lives even when they were in high school, we are circling a deeply illiberal drain. A civilized society observes a distinction between public and private, and this distinction is integral to individual freedom. Such a distinction was anathema in old-school monarchies when the king could arbitrarily arrest, jail, or execute you at will, for private behavior or thoughts. These lines are also blurred in authoritarian regimes, where the power of the government knows few limits in monitoring a person’s home or private affairs or correspondence or tax returns or texts. These boundaries definitionally can’t exist in theocracies, where the state is interested as much in punishing and exposing sin, as in preventing crime. The Iranian and Saudi governments — like the early modern monarchies — seek not only to control your body, but also to look into your soul. They know that everyone has a dark side, and this dark side can be exposed in order to destroy people. All you need is an accusation.

The Founders were obsessed with this. They realized how precious privacy is, how it protects you not just from the government but from your neighbors and your peers. They carved out a private space that was sacrosanct and a public space which insisted on a strict presumption of innocence, until a speedy and fair trial. Whether you were a good husband or son or wife or daughter, whether you had a temper, or could be cruel, or had various sexual fantasies, whether you were a believer, or a sinner: this kind of thing was rendered off-limits in the public world. The family, the home, and the bedroom were, yes, safe places. If everything were fair game in public life, the logic ran, none of us would survive.

[David Selig]

I don't know if he committed sexual assault, but he clearly lied under oath time and time again yesterday every time he was asked about his drinking. Not to mention he's obviously not even pretending to be unbiased anymore with his talk of Democrat conspiracies and Clinton payback. So he shouldn't be confirmed. 

[aceluby]

28 minutes ago, King Ned Stark said:

I understand that, I believe the principle still applies.  While I won’t worry for Kavanaugh should he not be voted in even if he was innocent.  He’s wealthy enough to get along.

I do think it is dangerous to assume guilt on anyone based on an accusation.

So in your mind the only thing that should disqualify someone from a SCOTUS seat is whether they have committed a crime?

Seems like an awful low bar.

[Mexal]

28 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

For a different perspective:

 

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/09/kavanaugh-ford-hearings-everyone-lost-andrew-sullivan.html

 

And there were times, it seems to me, that he simply couldn’t win. If he hadn’t hired and mentored many women, it would be proof he was a misogynist and rapist. But the fact that he did hire and mentor many of them was also proof he was a misogynist and a rapist, who only picked the pretty ones. If he hadn’t shown anger, he would have been obviously inhuman. When he did express rage … well, that was a disqualifying temperament for a judge. It didn’t help that the Democrats made no pretense of having an open mind, or that any glimpse at mainstream media — let alone media Twitter — revealed that it had already picked a side. This was, for the major papers, especially the New York Times, a righteous battle against another white straight male, and the smug, snarky virtue-signaling on Twitter was in overdrive. Even Kavanaugh’s choking-up was mocked — just another contemptible “bro-crier.”

 

To the extent that the hearing went beyond the specifics of Ford’s allegations and sought to humiliate and discredit Kavanaugh for who he was as a teenager nearly four decades ago (a dynamic that was quite pronounced in some Democratic questioning of the nominee), it was deeply concerning. When public life means the ransacking of people’s private lives even when they were in high school, we are circling a deeply illiberal drain. A civilized society observes a distinction between public and private, and this distinction is integral to individual freedom. Such a distinction was anathema in old-school monarchies when the king could arbitrarily arrest, jail, or execute you at will, for private behavior or thoughts. These lines are also blurred in authoritarian regimes, where the power of the government knows few limits in monitoring a person’s home or private affairs or correspondence or tax returns or texts. These boundaries definitionally can’t exist in theocracies, where the state is interested as much in punishing and exposing sin, as in preventing crime. The Iranian and Saudi governments — like the early modern monarchies — seek not only to control your body, but also to look into your soul. They know that everyone has a dark side, and this dark side can be exposed in order to destroy people. All you need is an accusation.

The Founders were obsessed with this. They realized how precious privacy is, how it protects you not just from the government but from your neighbors and your peers. They carved out a private space that was sacrosanct and a public space which insisted on a strict presumption of innocence, until a speedy and fair trial. Whether you were a good husband or son or wife or daughter, whether you had a temper, or could be cruel, or had various sexual fantasies, whether you were a believer, or a sinner: this kind of thing was rendered off-limits in the public world. The family, the home, and the bedroom were, yes, safe places. If everything were fair game in public life, the logic ran, none of us would survive.

Biggest problem here is the bold statement. What Sullivan is missing is that the allegations are from when he was a teenager and that he has repeatedly lied about his drinking while he was a teenager, both in high school and college. If you aren't allowed to try to understand what he did while he was a teenager, then you have absolutely no way to understand whether the allegation could be true or not. 

Basically, what Sullivan is arguing is that we shouldn't give a fuck about their personal character, only their public persona and that's it. I think that's bullshit.

[Rippounet]

27 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

For a different perspective:

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/09/kavanaugh-ford-hearings-everyone-lost-andrew-sullivan.html

Not that different though:

 

Quote

 

Other witnesses were not called to testify, which they obviously should have been, if only to say (as they all have) that they had no memory of the event. So we were left to judge the credibility of two individuals, who both said they were 100 percent certain.

Christine Blasey Ford was not just credible, her account of her assault and trauma was deeply affecting. She was understandably anxious in such a setting, but kept her shit together, made her case poignantly and calmly — her moments of humor, her need for caffeine, her hair framing her glasses like wisteria were all thoroughly human. In her dignity and restraint and precision, she helped me and I’m sure many others better understand what sexual trauma is.

I do not believe she was making anything up. She has no reason to; she tried to avoid this; she wanted to keep this private; but she wanted, as a civic duty, to pass this along to the relevant authorities. I still don’t understand why Senator Feinstein didn’t immediately forward her letter to the FBI, whose job it is to do a background check on Kavanaugh, while keeping strict confidentiality in the process. Such a referral need not have outed Ford. It could have allowed for a proper investigation, and an airing of all this in a private session. I understand Republican suspicions of the way this turned out.

But once this all had happened, it should still have been perfectly reasonable to have a full FBI investigation, followed by a private hearing for senators to assess the facts of her allegation. The Republicans have no answer to why they won’t do that, and neither did Kavanaugh.

 

 

[Zorral]

29 minutes ago, Morpheus said:

Kavanaugh is not a good guy even without the sexual assault. He is a pathological liar and has a tendency to be dishonest even under oath. His character is questionable enough that these allegations cannot be handwaved away. He should be disqualified for many reasons, the possibility that he did these things put it over the top. The Republicans are trying to ram him through for political reasons, outlawing abortion and protecting Trump, they don’t care about the law or process, otherwise they would have dropped him before any of this even came to light. This is not a court of law, the standard of innocent until proven guilty does not apply, it is a job interview, he performed poorly in his first hearing and he was even worse yesterday.

Nor does he possess the temperament to hold the positions he already holds, much a seat on SCOTUS: alternately weeping, threatening, raging and whining.  Compare and contrast that with the dignified and collected demeanor of Dr. Blasey, despite her admitting she was 'terrified."

As BK established his lack of probity so long ago with lying under oath, treating Clinton and Lewinskie in wasy far worse than he has been --demanding the most intimate, tiny sexual details he could extract -- his bigotry and racism -- refusing to even acknowledge the black father of a Parkland victim, and on and on and on -- including demanding women who work in his vicinity, as does Trump, look and dress and behave like models -- sheesh, what is this troll so fired up about? 

Also to the point, the constant blathering that libs and commies and whatever they call the posters who don't like sexism, racism, bigotry, unfairness, cheating, corruption and selling the USA to Russia  drive them away?  Who is threatening to start a civil war because he doesn't like the way things with Kavanaugh has gone?  Seen this before o you betcha!  If we can't have slavery everywhere all the time we're going to go to war for it.  That worked out so very well didn't it. 

[Zorral]

5 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

Not that different though:

 

 

Andrew Sullivan's an ass, and has been forever.

He's never right about anything.

 

[Cas Stark]

5 minutes ago, Mexal said:

Biggest problem here is the bold statement. What Sullivan is missing is that the allegations are from when he was a teenager and that he has repeatedly lied about his drinking while he was a teenager, both in high school and college. If you aren't allowed to try to understand what he did while he was a teenager, then you have absolutely no way to understand whether the allegation could be true or not. 

Basically, what Sullivan is arguing is that we shouldn't give a fuck about their personal character, only their public persona and that's it. I think that's bullshit.

I don't think that's what he's arguing, but I'll leave it at that, his piece speaks for itself on the topic of the reasons for a sphere of privacy that is respected by all.

[ThinkerX]

Meanwhile, lost in the back and forth bickering here, the Kavanagh mess has been delayed:

 

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/the-latest-gop-delays-kavanaugh-vote-for-investigation/ar-BBNFi8H?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=msnclassic

 

Senate Republican leaders have agreed to delay a final vote on Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh to allow time for an investigation by the FBI of the sexual misconduct allegations against him.

Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, the No. 2 Republican, says, "There's going to be a supplemental background investigation," which would delay a vote "no later than one week."

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

1 hour ago, Cas Stark said:

He's condemned as a predator rapist sex criminal, all you have to do is read this thread.  It's gone beyond him not being confirmed.  And any investigation is very unlikely to come up with definitive evidence to prove or disprove the allegations, so he's guilty and no way to prove otherwise

With regards to your comment about conservatives not posting here, there are two main reason. The first one is yes, there is some group think here, but the reason that brings us all here likely appeals to more liberals, so it’s going to lead to more liberal posters in the politics thread, But second, most of the conservatives that do come to post and argue here do a terrible job of having an honest exchange of ideas. They largely just want to troll to “own the libs” Those two things play a large role in why there are few consistent conservative posters here.

Regarding this comment, yes you’re right, an investigation is unlikely to definitively prove that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted Ford. The only way you’d get that is if it’s true and Judge spills the beans. I doubt that will happen, but given his behavior, it would appear that there’s something shady there. However, what an investigation can reveal is that Kavanaugh has lied like crazy during his hearings. We already have some of his classmates coming out and calling BS on several of his claims. Sexual assault aside, we need to know if he is going to be an honest actor, or if he’s lying to conceal a checkered past.

And then there’s the whole issue of him being a complete partisan hack. Someone like that, regardless of the side you’re on, should not be on the Supreme Court.

[King Ned Stark]

22 minutes ago, aceluby said:

So in your mind the only thing that should disqualify someone from a SCOTUS seat is whether they have committed a crime?

Seems like an awful low bar.

No, I don’t think that.

Do you think that if Ford’s claims somehow turn out to be completely false, that Kavanaugh is still unqualified for SCOTUS

[Fez]

So the vote's been delayed, and Trump said to a press scrum (I think he was meeting the Mexican President at the time, maybe?) that he would defer to the senate on these matters. So now the questions become, who does this investigation get assigned to, how many resources do they have, and what is their actual scope (e.g. can they seek warrants to obtain any documents that Kavanaugh doesn't want to turn over)?

[ThinkerX]

There are also other stories not pertaining to the Kavanagh mess.  Among other things, it seems we managed to avoid a government shutdown (remember the fretting here about those during the Obama years?)

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/ap-source-trump-signs-spending-plan-avoiding-shutdown/ar-BBNG8UI?ocid=msnclassic

 

And as a consequence of last weeks news - a minor storm that inflicted utterly trivial damage on a insignificant faction of the country - there is a push to extend voter registration deadlines way down south.  I figure it's just barely possible a few posters here might be affected by that.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/voter-registration-extension-sought-in-flooded-s-carolina/ar-BBNFiKw?ocid=msnclassic

 

And an opinion piece on a labor movement that will turn into a major issue regardless of the party in power or governmental efforts to thwart it:

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/workers-are-ready-for-their-cut-of-this-booming-economy/ar-BBNGbBj?ocid=msnclassic

 

That I, of all the posters here, have to be the 'voice of reason' or the 'adult in the room' in these threads, should be truly disturbing, especially to long term posters.