Enidigm
3660
The worrying over what Republican voters will do in anger if you win is the kind of mental attrition that makes me want to retire to the mountains.
Expect Northern Ireland style “troubles” when the Fed empowered by Republican majorities to go around cracking heads and forcing states to enforce anti-abortion laws once its been banned at the federal level, leading up to serious secession and independence movements in blue states.
Look at the FCC and Net Neutrality in California. Make no mistake, states rights are bunk. Republicans would love nothing more than to use the full power of the Federal authority to force blue states to enforce a nationwide ban on abortion, and they will not be content simply reverting this decision to local control. I fully expect women’s issues to be the wedge that splits the country.
I agree with this. Spoiler, they are going to vote fascist anyway. They are gone, they have committed morale suicide already , you cant kill your conscience twice. The only political calculus needed is how to motivate decent Americans to get out and vote. Just assume Republicans will always come out to vote for evil. Because they always do.
Frontline Narrator: He didn’t actually apologize.
(Seriously, I don’t think the words “sorry” or “apologize” are anywhere in there.)
Nezz
3664
No, he didn’t. He testified that he learned Ramirez was calling around, but he didn’t know why.
Kavanaugh did say the first he’d heard of the specific allegations made by Ramirez was within the last two weeks, yet there are witnesses claiming that they were contacted by Kavanaugh regarding those specific claims in July.
It may not rise to the level of the deliberate outright lying that establishes perjury, but it absolutely is at least evasive, vague, and misleading.
ShivaX
3666
Agreed. He wasn’t on trial. He was in a job interview. If you were interviewing him, you wouldn’t hire him after that.
This piece goes into detail on BK’s misleading testimony. After learning what perjury actually is, I don’t think any of these rise to the legal definition. However, as outlined by Wittes, it’s more probable than not that he did in fact assault Dr. Ford (and it sounds like Ramirez’s story is credible, but the WH blocked the FBI from talking to any of the possible corroborating witnesses.) That would be perjury, but it’s also probably impossible to prove. Nonetheless, again his Fox News fueled partisan screed is disqualifying regardless of these accusations. We also don’t know what’s in the documents the Republicans refused to release (but which will come to light if/when Democrats take control of either the House or Senate.)
“Beer. I liked beer. I like beer.”
Are saying I shouldn’t put that on my resume?
(Full disclosure: I do not in fact like beer.)
Edit:
How is it not perjury to claim that Renate Alumnius didn’t refer to sex, when that is a) the obvious interpretation, b) the interpretation she herself had when learning of it, and c) the interpretation that at least one other person who knew claims Kavanaugh himself was using (his little rhyme about getting laid by calling Renate)?
Similarly, there are people who claim he frequently drunk enough to black out, and he has several references to blacking out in his yearbook and his speech about the bus trip.
Also, this doesn’t discuss a bunch of his other outright lies like the meaning of FFFFF, Devil’s Triangle, and boof.
If the question is, “Could you convict him of perjury?” I think the answer is that we would a much more thorough investigation of these terms and circumstances than we got to know whether the evidence is there. But if the question is whether he probably lied or probably told the truth (which should be the question for someone considered for his position), it is almost certain that he lied about many things.
This is by no means certain. You only have to look at other conservative choices (Kennedy himself, Roberts, Souter!) to see that it doesn’t always produce the result they thought it would. Kavanaugh is manifestly a shit as well as a conservative. Maybe we’ll get someone who is only a conservative.
I don’t disagree with that, at all, but from reading about this during his initial confirmation hearings, perjury is a high bar to clear - the prosecutor has to prove that someone “willfully lied under oath” and that the lies had direct relevance to the testimony. IANAL though, I’m just erring on the side of caution here.
He’s a lawyer and a judge, so he knows how to mislead while probably not crossing the line to something that would result in a conviction for perjury. But you don’t confirm nominees who lie about material matters in their confirmation hearings. I don’t even think you confirm nominees who lie about things that aren’t material. If he lied about his age, I wouldn’t confirm him.
Aside from whatever level of evidence constitutes proof that these things meant something else to Kavanaugh himself (and if I was on a jury I would think that level was met by the combination of common sense interpretations and contemporary confirmation by people who knew him, unless he could produce evidence of his own claims), this bar is clearly met - he was asked direct questions and he gave answers that are clearly different from how he used these terms as a kid. There is no possibility that was an error or simply misleading, these responses we just flat out false and he knew it.
Clay
3673
The irony in all of this is if he had just been calm and respectful in his final hearing, we wouldn’t be where we are, lies or not.
Clay
3676
I wish John Roberts would call up McConnell and tell him to find somebody else.
The word at the moment is that they don’t have the votes. The supposedly uncommitted four will have to decide soon. I think Manchin won’t decide until he sees what the others do; he wants to vote yes but doesn’t want to be the deciding yes vote. I think Murkowski is a no. Which means it’s down to Concerned Duo of Flake and Collins. If one of them votes no, then ?Manchin is in a very tough spot.
Edit: Of course my math here sucks. Murkowski and one other no takes them to 49. If the other of the Flake / Collins pair votes yes, that’s 50, and Manchin is home free and will surely vote yes. So, really, we need all 3 Republicans to vote no.
He should just say “it’s the Jews!”
