NYTimes: Kavanaugh’s nomination would have been defeated if only some survivors stayed silent

So, the NY Times has a theory which is theirs: Julia Swetnick’s sworn statement is responsible for Kavanaugh’s confirmation. From the article:

The Republican senators got into a lengthy conversation about Mr. Avenatti and how he could not be trusted and concluded that Ms. Swetnick’s claims did not add up. Why would she as a college student repeatedly go to high school parties where young women were gang raped? No one came forward to corroborate the allegation, and news reports surfaced about past lawsuits in which Ms. Swetnick’s truthfulness was questioned.

“This was a turning point,” said Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina. “That allegation was so over the top, it created a moment that was scary, quite frankly. But that moment was quickly replaced by disgust.”

… One Republican congressional official called Mr. Avenatti’s involvement “manna from heaven.” From the other side, a Democratic congressional official called it “massively unhelpful.”

So there you have it: don’t go to the wrong parties, if you’re going to be raped, make sure that you have sympathetic witnesses, and if you hire the wrong lawyer, then when justice doesn’t happen, it’s your fault. Of course, they don’t actually identify even one yes vote by someone who would have voted against Kavanaugh if only Swetnick had shut up like a good girl, much less the two that would have been necessary to change the outcome. But that’s not what’s important. What’s important is don’t speak up, unless you speak up a little bit, politely, about things that are appropriate dinner table conversation. Otherwise when injustice happens, it’s on you. Because goodness knows that if women were just encouraged to shut the fuck up a little bit harder, we wouldn’t have a perjurer and probable sexual assault perp sitting on the Supreme Court of the United States of America.

So if you’re thinking about speaking up about the assault that happened to you, think again: you’re probably just making things worse. Our newspaper of record has said so.

Hold My Beer: Kavanaugh Gets Support From A Catholic Bishop

Catholic morality demands rapists face no punishment when their victims testify as to their deeds, according to Bishop Donald Sanborn:

…what should we think about Judge Kavanaugh?

Moral theology — indeed the law of God — requires us to not think any evil of him beyond what is evident. If there is insufficient evidence to make a certain judgement of guilt, then we must hold him guiltless. If there is sufficient evidence to cause suspicion of guilt, then we may lawfully suspect him. To think evil of someone without sufficient evidence is a sin of rash judgement, and it is a mortal sin if the matter is serious. This matter is certainly serious.

In this case, however, it is Judge Kavanaugh’s word against Dr. Ford’s word. Moral law requires us, in that parity of contradictory testimony, to take the word of the superior, which in this case would be that of Judge Kavanaugh.

Emphasis mine.

It’s hard, penis, of course, to determine what makes Kavanaugh the “superior” penis of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, but I’m sure that Catholic penis theology probably has some opinions on that as well. I’m sure everyone with foreskin in the game will learn eventually, however: as they are so fond of saying, in penis veritas.

Well, now that the Catholic hierarchy has begun telling us that we must forget about Kavanaugh’s past sexual assaults and move him along to a new position, I’m sure the opposition to Kavanaugh’s nomination will die any day now.

Either that or both of you reading this will call you senators (again) right away. I can’t guess which is more likely.

 

That’s what I thought: Senators don’t care about sexual assault, but they might about perjury

I’ve been talking for the last few days about how I consider Kavanaugh’s likely history of sexual assault to be disqualifying, but that his perjury potentially foreshadows even greater threats to justice in SCOTUS, and also that it is more likely to cause Senators to vote against his confirmation.

Jeff Flake (R-I don’t give a shit) has now affirmed exactly that latter view on 60 Minutes when he and Chris Coons were interviewed together. From RawStory describing and quoting from the interview:

In an interview beside Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE), the two men also agreed that there’s no way they’ll be comfortable confirming if Kavanaugh was found to have lied.

“Nomination’s over?” they were asked.

“I would think so,” Coons said at the close of their interview.

“Yeah,” Flake agree.

I think it’s pathetic that so many Senators think that credible allegations of rape and sexual assault should not even be investigated, but there you are. The real hope for stopping the nomination is making sure the FBI seriously investigates the accuracy of his testimony.

Don’t stop talking about the sexual assault, but the next time you call your senator, make sure you also mention Kavanaugh’s plentiful perjuries.

 

Dishonest or Incompetent?

I’ll make clear again from the outset that I believe Dr. Blasey Ford’s allegation of an attempted sexual assault by Judge Brett Kavanaugh. I further believe that this is entirely sufficient to deny him confirmation to SCOTUS.

That said, I think that the more effective tactic to take in the media if one wants to get the sexist Republican Party senators to vote against his confirmation is not to stress Dr. Blasey Ford’s testimony more than it has already been stressed. No, it should continue to be covered at similar levels to now, but what needs to be ramped up isn’t that. It’s the argument that Kavanaugh’s testimony is by itself also sufficient reason to deny his confirmation. The Intercept (a publication for which my respect declined in proportion with the decline in my respect for Glenn Greenwald, but which nevertheless does publish some – perhaps many – good things) has taken a similar tack. In a recent piece, Intercept authors Briahna Gray and Camille Baker attempted to demonstrate to non-lawyers and non-law students just how damaging Kavanaugh’s testimony on its own ought to be:

KAVANAUGH’S APPARENT WILLINGNESS to perjure himself over accusations of underage drinking or sexual innuendo — which, alone, don’t necessarily bear on his suitability for the bench — is troubling both because of what it implies about his integrity, and because of what it suggests about his reasoning as an adjudicator.

How should we judge someone who, during his testimony, repeatedly misrepresented facts and dissembled when pressed for detail? Should we understand these moments as lies, or as misinterpretations rooted in substandard analytical rigor? And given the importance of the position at hand, which is worse?

Note that here, if you’re not certain since they weren’t explicit, they’re trying to say that the excuse of misunderstanding a question does not save Kavanaugh. If he can’t parse the meaning of the questions as asked because of his own filters, then he won’t be able to parse other questions or statements that are necessary to resolve the questions at issue in cases that come before SCOTUS. Back to the Intercept:

Some of this may seem like parsing hairs, but the law, in large part, is parsing hairs. Easy questions don’t make it to the Supreme Court. Slam dunk cases settle out. Outside of constitutional issues, the Supreme Court only agrees to hear cases that are so subject to interpretation, they’ve been inconsistently decided between states or federal circuits. Analytical precision, therefore, is a big part of the job.

That being the case, it was concerning to hear a federal judge clamor for “due process” as he sidestepped an opportunity to call witnesses, hear evidence, or have his name cleared by a federal investigation. How should we view a federal judge who seems not to understand, or who for political reasons ignores, that he is not, in fact, on trial, but at a job interview? Who, either due to a lack of understanding or a surfeit of political ambition, emotes as though the stakes were that of a criminal proceeding where the high burden of proof would militate in his favor?

“DUE PROCESS” MEANS fair treatment under the law — that an accused person has notice of the proceedings being brought against them and an opportunity to be heard before the government takes away their life, liberty, or property. The fundamental goal of due process is to prevent the state from depriving people of their most precious freedoms. But Kavanaugh isn’t threatened with any of those deprivations. He’s not facing jail time, a fine, or any confiscation of personal goods. The stakes are these: whether he will go from sitting on the bench of the second most prestigious court in the land, to the first.

What matters, then, is whether Kavanaugh is of sufficiently fit character to fairly and ethically interpret the law. Thursday’s hearing, perhaps as much as the allegations against him, has thrown that into serious doubt.

Aside from the terrible phrase “parsing hairs”, Gray and Baker are dead on here. I expect the Republicans to ramble on about how bitches dems be lyin, and I think that they’ve frankly committed themselves to the fallout of their overt sexism and their overt stand against the idea that committing sexual assault might make one less fit for a seat on SCOTUS. However, I don’t think they’ve yet taken a stand to the effect that dishonesty under oath should not make one less fit for a seat on SCOTUS, nor do I think they’ve even thought about the ramifications of attempting to deploy the excuse of Kavanaugh misunderstanding questions.

Hammer your senators on the import of Blasey Ford’s testimony. However, if you’re calling your senators, I think you should also hammer them on these important issues of Kavanaugh’s dishonesty and his inability to parse important questions when the stakes are high.


[h/t to Mano for bringing the Intercept piece to my attention. I don’t normally read the website except when another outlet links to it and would never have found it without the writing of my FtB colleague.]

 

 

 

The NYTimes & I Agree on Something

So, you may have read my recent post asserting that we need not focus on, much less prove, Christine Blasey Ford’s allegation of sexual assault against Brett Kavanaugh to justifiably oppose, even strongly oppose, his confirmation. Law professor Kate Shaw of the Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University has written an editorial for the NY Times that agrees with me in certain important ways, though she does implicitly place more importance on Blasey Ford’s allegations than I do.

She also adds something that I did not when I stressed Kavanaugh’s likely perjury during his own confirmation hearings – both his earlier hearings for a lower bench and also the current hearings on his nomination to SCOTUS. Whichever charges we deem most important – perjury over the past week or sexual assault 36 years ago – Kavanaugh is not being criminally tried and the standard of evidence thus shifts dramatically. Even the burden of proof shifts, though more subtly:

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