"[M]any Kavanaugh foes are eager to implement a new standard that they would never agree to live under themselves"

I once looked up data on how sexual assault allegations are resolved, and a strong majority are never reported, a portion of those that are reported (best guess 2-8%) are found to be perjurious, and of the rest, most fall into the bin of “insufficient evidence to indict.” What’s going on, in my view, is that most of the political haymakers on both sides fall into that bin. It doesn’t mean we don’t take them seriously, but rather means we remember the allegation, and its strengths and weaknesses, and if we get a certain number of similar allegations, then we review and see if we have sufficient evidence to indict.

In the Kavanaugh case, I think it’s clearly in this bin, but if a bunch of other accusers were to come forward in the coming years with cleaner cases than that of Ms. Ford, or quite frankly if a bunch of accusers were to come forward claiming Ms. Ford was prone to making reckless accusations like this, I’d be very happy to use that as a pretext for removing the guilty party from their job.

Mark Judge, his chief character witness, wrote it. The workaround is that getting blind drunk and hooking up a lot does not necessarily imply sexual assault of the type Ford alleges. Again, you’ve got, theoretically, three very drunk people in a room. Is it any surprise that the testimony on both sides is a mess?

“The problem is, Dr. Ford can’t remember when it was, where it was, or how it came to be,” Sen. John Cornyn (Texas) says. “There are some gaps there that need to be filled.”

You don’t say?

This has all the earmarks of a late hit-job designed to delay the confirmation past November elections so vulnerable Democrat incumbents in the senate won’t have to vote Yes on the nominee.

Unless someone can come forward and corroborate this story, this is a stretch. The other person in the room who Ford named, does not corroborate the story. It is not clear what happened, except that he tried to “disrobe me”. I am not sure if something got accomplished or not. A bunch of high school kids getting super drunk and doing stupid things, is probably a story for most people in Washington. Unless something can be shown that he did something, someone can corroborate it or others come forward showing a history, this is a he said/she said scenario. The question is who is more credible. But something done 36 years ago, between 15 and 17 year olds when they were all drunk, is probably questionable on the accuracy and credibility all around. I am not saying he is innocent, but given the current facts, it is hard to judge him as being guilty.

Keep in mind here that the criminal standard of guilt is “guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.” You can find one person more credible and still not come to that conclusion.

This is significant because had Ford brought the matter to the police in the early 1980s, the end result would have been one of the known legal categories, and had Kavanaugh been exonerated, that would have been the end of it. This is another huge issue in accusations of sexual assault; you have cases where both parties are credible, but insufficient evidence to indict, and you have cases where neither party is credible or sympathetic (say the hooker raped by a drug dealer), and yet there is a conviction.

In short, it’s a tremendously difficult part of the law where you rarely get open and shut cases. In terms of using something for political gain, it’s “wonderful” as well, because not only are the evidence hard to suss out, but it’s emotionally charged and most people aren’t conditioned to remember how the evidence are to be processed.

The main thing I can say for sure here is that a few Democratic Senators (e.g. Feinstein) and journalists need to lose their jobs over this, but won’t, sad to say.

If this all proves to be true, it will show that alcohol can really mess up a life!

My most memorable experience when being called for jury duty involved the attorney pointing to the defendant during jury selection and asking us, “Is he guilty?” Is he Innocent?” Or “Do you need more information?” Most responded that they needed more information. The correct answer according to the law was “Innocent” until he can be proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

Feinstein (D) has been the one pushing Ford forward into the spotlight. Apparently, Feinstein said this afternoon, “[Ford] is a woman that has been, I think, profoundly impacted, on this..I can’t say that everything is truthful. I don’t know.”

Ok, if Feinstein is backing off, it appears that the invitation for Ford to testify will not be accepted. The GOP leadership called their bluff, and it appears Ford is going to fold.

“One witness shall not rise up against a man for any iniquity, or for any sin, in any sin that he sinneth: at the mouth of two witnesses, or at the mouth of three witnesses, shall the matter be established.” Dt. 19:15

…has come to the defense of Kavanaugh:

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/in-fast-moving-events-kavanaugh…

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/09/brett-kavanaugh-democrat-accusat…

….but that second witness wrote a book about drunken fornication in high school. There is wiggle room between that and rape, but we’re not talking about a super pristine witness.

Correction: the link provided indicates that a third witness—Kavanaugh, Judge, and P.J. Smith are the witnesses—has come forward to deny (a) knowledge of such a party and (b) any behavior such as was alleged by Ford. These three were all named by Ford as witnesses.

Regarding Ford’s account, yes, it is just one witness, and yes, there is nothing between the alleged events and six years back, and that’s why “he said/she said” cases rarely go anywhere—a big problem for sexual abuse allegations that for obvious reasons mostly happen in private. We might see this as something of a “trial balloon” to see if anything else came up, like the claims earlier this year about Bill Hybels or the early complaints against Larry Nassar.

Since no one else has come forward, Kavanaugh is looking pretty solid here. The question, though, is whether many Senators will use the allegations as an excuse to do what they’d wanted to do from the start.

I see the MSM found Anita Hill for interviews.

The Clarence Thomas hearings are worth remembering. After seeing good men intimidated into retreating from a barrage of unproven accusations, he had the chutzpah to just say “Prove it!!”

At this point, with three witnesses saying “no” and one saying “yes”, but passing a polygraph, columnist Kathleen Parker has one possible solution; someone else who looked like Kavanaugh. In my experience, I’ve had a number of times where I mistook one person for another while completely sober, whereas Ford concedes she was plastered at the time.

And since Dianne Feinstein has herself admitted that she does not know whether Ford’s accusations are true, I think it’s a possibility that, were the Democrats honest, they’d have to admit as well. The evidence so far—three witnesses, refusal to show up at hearing, etc..—are trending from “insufficient evidence to indict” to “probably false” at this point.

It’s also instructive to remember the Anita Hill case. There was he said/she said, and no corroborating evidence on either side. However, some of Hill’s accusations were quite similar to those of a case that Hill had access to in one of her jobs, and one of her chief character witnesses told of hearing about harassment at a point prior to her having met Hill. The left forgets very quickly how close Hill’s case was to completely imploding.

They had “Spartacus” Booker, and Harris, who is supposed to be the female Obama, make fools of themselves on national television. That failed, so they went back to their playbook, and decided that a sex scandal would wipe “The Kav” out.

But, they couldn’t find anything in his adult life, so they had to go all the way back to his teenage years to find an alleged incident. Maybe, as one of the articles suggested, they hoped other “victims” would come out of the woodwork, with more recent allegations.

Alas, no one has, and they have ended up looking foolish.

They appear to have been counting on the upcoming election to turn the power over to them, but the 2016 polls showed Clinton winning, so maybe they should not be so confident. The Trump voters from 2016 may turn out in force again.

p.s. Beto in TX has raised more money than Cruz, but most of that from out of state, from those who cannot vote in TX!

p.p.s Clinton was the heir apparent during the Obama years, and the Dems had no one else “in the wings.” No one has risen to the top since 2016, so I think they’re going to have a hard time bringing someone forward to challenge Trump in 2020.

p.p.p.s And I’m a non-citizen so I don’t have a vote!