How important is what we did in high school? Kavanaugh accusation

[Just_A_Guy]

13 hours ago, carlimac said:

What if he has repented? 

Carlimac, I missed this yesterday; but I’d respond as follows:

—If he’d done it, and repented, then he wouldn’t be denying it now.

12 hours ago, MormonGator said:

It doesn't matter if you can crucify them or not. If I throw enough dirt at you, even if it's fake, it'll stick. 

 

Asking if I'd be "okay" with it is a loaded question. Like asking if I've stopped cheating on my wife yet. While I wouldn't approve of that kind of behavior, what you did as a minor or in your senior year in high school doesn't reflect the grown up, mature person that you are. 

The logical problem you have in throwing dirt, is that the dirt has to come from somewhere.  Named people have to be willing to come forward, and the number of people I went to high school with is finite.

As for “loaded question”—I don’t know what you mean.  👼   

But seriously—the question is, what are the contours of trust you would be willing to give to someone who you (hypothetically) knew had acted in an abnormally predatory way?

[Just_A_Guy]

1 hour ago, Carborendum said:

Oh.  I see what you did there...

Atticus Finch—the original rape denier.  

(Not really what I was originally thinking of, but I’ll roll with it.)

Edited September 23, 2018 by Just_A_Guy

[Guest]

17 minutes ago, Just_A_Guy said:

Atticus Finch—the original rape denier.  

(Not really what I was originally thinking of, but I’ll roll with it.)

Actually, I was going for the more obvious.  He's a lawyer who always tried to stand up for what was right.  You're a lawyer who always tries to stand up for what is right.

[Just_A_Guy]

9 minutes ago, Carborendum said:

Actually, I was going for the more obvious.  He's a lawyer who always tried to stand up for what was right.  You're a lawyer who always tries to stand up for what is right.

He was also kind of a pain in the neck.  

[zil]

1 hour ago, Just_A_Guy said:

He was also kind of a pain in the neck.  

That's encompassed in "he was a lawyer".

[Guest LiterateParakeet]

nevermind

Edited September 23, 2018 by LiterateParakeet

[carlimac]

3 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

Carlimac, I missed this yesterday; but I’d respond as follows:

—If he’d done it, and repented, then he wouldn’t be denying it now.

 

It's all hypothetical anyway. I don't know either way if he did it or not. 

[anatess2]

[anatess2]

19 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

 

As yours misses mine.   If, as Mark Judge seems to suggest, Kavanaugh was a hard partier/drinker in high school; then his character is *not* above reproach—regardless of whatever his ecclesiastical responsibilities may have been.

 

I did not miss your point.  And you continue to ignore mine.  

You said that a life lived like a saint would make you immune to the accusations of harpies.  You are wrong.  Regardless of whether Kavanaugh, or anybdy else, lived his life like a saint, he is forever tainted as a rapist because you can’t prove a negative and the cries of the harpies magnified by the press coverage and even well-meaning people such as yourself’s spreading of unfounded suspicions are out there to be memorialized til the end of time.  As I have proved to you through the continued attacks on Clarence Thomas’s character until today.

[Just_A_Guy]

5 minutes ago, anatess2 said:

 

I did not miss your point.  And you continue to ignore mine.  

You said that a life lived like a saint would make you immune to the accusations of harpies.  You are wrong.  Regardless of whether Kavanaugh, or anybdy else, lived his life like a saint, he is forever tainted as a rapist because you can’t prove a negative and the cries of the harpies magnified by the press coverage and even well-meaning people such as yourself’s spreading of unfounded suspicions are out there to be memorialized til the end of time.  As I have proved to you through the continued attacks on Clarence Thomas’s character until today.

With all due respect and sisterly affection, Anatess—if you’re going to quote me, then quote me.  What I said was:

. . . it’s also possible for even a teenaged boy to live in such a way that even if someone made such an accusation—virtually no one would believe it.  Someone who has no reputation for getting puke-your-guts-out, blackout drunk (or who is frequently in the company of others who do); is going to have a harder time getting and keeping that sort of patina on their character.

Prudent living in 1995 or 2005 or 2015 doesn’t disprove an accusation from 1985 if, as of 1985, the accused was living a wholly different lifestyle. 

As for Thomas—he was a special case because of latent American prejudice about black men’s sexuality and the fact that he’d married a white woman.  And as a countrrexample I give you Mike Pence, who has lived so carefully that the left has openly groused about he’s immune to this sort of accusation.  

[anatess2]

1 hour ago, Just_A_Guy said:

With all due respect and sisterly affection, Anatess—if you’re going to quote me, then quote me.  What I said was:

. . . it’s also possible for even a teenaged boy to live in such a way that even if someone made such an accusation—virtually no one would believe it.  Someone who has no reputation for getting puke-your-guts-out, blackout drunk (or who is frequently in the company of others who do); is going to have a harder time getting and keeping that sort of patina on their character.

Prudent living in 1995 or 2005 or 2015 doesn’t disprove an accusation from 1985 if, as of 1985, the accused was living a wholly different lifestyle. 

As for Thomas—he was a special case because of latent American prejudice about black men’s sexuality and the fact that he’d married a white woman.  And as a countrrexample I give you Mike Pence, who has lived so carefully that the left has openly groused about he’s immune to this sort of accusation.  

You are wrong.  Kavanaugh living a saintly life will not save him.

And you are wrong about Pence too.  He is forever known as the guy who will electricute gays.  That’s what they used on him.  If the harpies felt rape is the strategy he wouldn’t have been able to escape that either.

Edited September 23, 2018 by anatess2

[anatess2]

[Just_A_Guy]

2 minutes ago, anatess2 said:

You are wrong.  Kavanaugh living a saintly life will not save him from the harpies FOREVER.

I’m confused.  First you seemed to be telling me that Kavanaugh can’t be guilty because he’s lived such a saintly life.  Now you’re telling me that in the long run, it doesn’t matter whether Kavanaugh lives a saintly life or not.

Which is it?

[anatess2]

6 minutes ago, Just_A_Guy said:

I’m confused.  First you seemed to be telling me that Kavanaugh can’t be guilty because he’s lived such a saintly life.  Now you’re telling me that in the long run, it doesn’t matter whether Kavanaugh lives a saintly life or not.

Which is it?

Well, therein is the problem.  You haven’t understood anything I said.

Let me see if I can bring you back to what this was about.

I posted a meme about mothers with sons fearing their son’s lives can be ruined at anytime by false accusations.

You said they won’t if they live such a life that accusations can’t stick.

I said you’re wrong.  Sons, including Kavanaugh,  living a saintly life is not going to save them from the ruination of false allegations.

[Just_A_Guy]

10 minutes ago, anatess2 said:

Well, therein is the problem.  You haven’t understood anything I said.

Let me see if I can bring you back to what this was about.

I posted a meme about mothers with sons fearing their son’s lives can be ruined at anytime by false accusations.

You said they won’t if they live such a life that accusations can’t stick.

I said you’re wrong.  Sons, including Kavanaugh,  living a saintly life is not going to save them from the ruination of false allegations.

I’ve understood it, I just don’t agree with it.  

And while you’re coming closer to the gist of what I said, you’re still not quite there.  What I said was,

 This is true; but as a parent of boys who *will be* teenagers I plan to make sure they understand that it’s also possible for even a teenaged boy to live in such a way that even if someone made such an accusation—virtually no one would believe it.  Someone who has no reputation for getting puke-your-guts-out, blackout drunk (or who is frequently in the company of others who do); is going to have a harder time getting and keeping that sort of patina on their character.   

Frankly, you seem to be falling into the same trap that the radical feminists do when talking about rape:  when someone says “hey, you know, there are certain prudent life-choices you can make to reduce the chances of this happening to you”, the immediate reply is “Victim-blamer!  How DARE you!”  And then they express bafflement as to why these things keep happening even as they condescendingly mock that church-girl Michelle Pence and her weird rule about never being alone with boys.

In this case you offer Kavanaugh as an example of why prudent living is purportedly worthless and anyone, anywhere might randomly get accused of misconduct—blithely ignoring the fact that if Mark Judge’s statements mean what they seem to mean, then Kavanaugh (at least, during the time period in question) wasn’t really an example of “saintly living” at all. 

Now, I will readily concede that in certain third-world pseudo-dictatorships, false accusations—when believed by The Right People—can have dire, even lethal consequences for the accused.  And even in the US, there will always be fringe kooks and partisans who are willing to believe the worst of you based on absolutely zero evidence.  But speaking, in our particular culture, people who have lived prudently and stick to their guns tend to find themselves being exonerated once all the evidence has been weighed.  And I would note that if failing to get a SCOTUS seat and having to spend the rest of one’s life on the DC Circuit bench constitutes a “ruined” life—I think I just might be able to deal with that kind of “ruination”.

[anatess2]

Washington Post, explain why you “hid” Keyser, a woman, behind “four boys”.

Interesting read.

https://mobile.twitter.com/KimStrassel/status/1043708347977949186

We need that unredacted letter.

In any case, the midterms clock is ticking and nothing has happened or improved but delay delay and delay the vote.  Dems get what they want, Ford is just anothe tool to be discarded after the delay succeeds.

Edited September 24, 2018 by anatess2

[Guest MormonGator]

And the beat goes on...

[Guest MormonGator]

It's funny how the same people screaming about Kavanuagh are oddly quiet about Keith Ellison. 

[anatess2]

DELAY DELAY DELAY.  That’s the objective.

DEMOCRATS ARE SCUM.

 

[Just_A_Guy]

This sounds like pretty weak sauce so far.  Wonder if she’s doing to do another “will-I-or-won’t-I-testify?” game.  I daresay they’re hoping to try to push this out to after the election; and then (if they turn either house of Congress) try to use the Garland argument against Trump. 

Edited September 24, 2018 by Just_A_Guy

[anatess2]

7 minutes ago, Just_A_Guy said:

This sounds like pretty weak sauce so far.  Wonder if she’s doing to do another “will-I-or-won’t-I-testify?” game.  I daresay they’re hoping to try to push this out to after the election; and then (if they turn either house of Congress) try to use the Garland argument against Trump. 

Ok, Never Trumpers.  Let’s see how important the SCOTUS is to you.

[estradling75]

7 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

This sounds like pretty weak sauce so far.  Wonder if she’s doing to do another “will-I-or-won’t-I-testify?” game.  I daresay they’re hoping to try to push this out to after the election; and then (if they turn either house of Congress) try to use the Garland argument against Trump. 

Indeed but another accusation was so predicable (I even predicted it and said I was waiting for it).

It was predicable for two reasons...

One IF Kavanaugh is a the sexual assault monster he is being painted as there would be more then one victim in 30+ years.  The whole MeToo movement should be bringing all his victims out to be heard. (And there should be many)

Two IF this is a Democratic hit piece.... then the assault has to continue to derail and delay his confirmation.

It does not matter what side you fall on the innocent/guilt of Kavanaugh to see this coming. 

[anatess2]

8 minutes ago, estradling75 said:

Indeed but another accusation was so predicable (I even predicted it and said I was waiting for it).

It was predicable for two reasons...

One IF Kavanaugh is a the sexual assault monster he is being painted as there would be more then one victim in 30+ years.  The whole MeToo movement should be bringing all his victims out to be heard. (And there should be many)

Two IF this is a Democratic hit piece.... then the assault has to continue to derail and delay his confirmation.

It does not matter what side you fall on the innocent/guilt of Kavanaugh to see this coming. 

Notice DiFi's talking point - we have another accusation so the Thursday hearing should be postponed... giving an excuse for Ford to not go under oath once again.  What is it now... 9 times?

[Just_A_Guy]

8 hours ago, anatess2 said:

Ok, Never Trumpers.  Let’s see how important the SCOTUS is to you.

Seems like half my party thinks SCOTUS so unimportant, they have absolutely no theoretical problem with the idea of a former seventeen-year-old rapist taking a seat there.  Whatever Kavanaugh personally did or didn’t do, this whole episode has been most . . . illuminating.

We’ll see whether Trump has enough wind left in his sails to carry this through, I guess. If not, he can nominate someone else.  If he runs to the right/constitutionalist with his next nomination, SCOTUS is safe and we’ll be the better for it.  If he runs left, it will show that some of us (*cough cough*) were right to mistrust him all along. 

Edited September 24, 2018 by Just_A_Guy

[Guest MormonGator]

10 minutes ago, Just_A_Guy said:

Seems like half my party thinks SCOTUS so unimportant, they have absolutely no theoretical problem with the idea of a former seventeen-year-old rapist taking a seat there.  Whatever Kavanaugh personally did or didn’t do, this whole episode has been most . . . illuminating.

We’ll see whether Trump has enough wind left in his sails to carry this through, I guess. If not, he can nominate someone else.  If he runs to the right/constitutionalist with his next nomination, SCOTUS is safe and we’ll be the better for it.  If he runs left, it will show that some of us (*cough cough*) were right to mistrust him all along. 

The bar is set so high for Trump that he'll never be able to satisfy the NeverTrump conservatives. He could abolish abortion by fiat, demand prayer in public schools, forbid homosexuals from suing bakers/florists, appoint nine conservatives to the supreme court, and the NeverTrumpers on the right would still find something to complain about.