4486

I’d give it the same weight I give the letter for Kavanaugh, which is to say none. Hell the story out today is a number of women who signed the Kavanaugh letter didn’t even know what it was about. Politico or some other org could only get two of the women to say they still stood by Kavanaugh, though the vast majority it sounded like wouldn’t talk to them.

4487

Character references for political figures are utterly useless.

You could get a million people to say Donald Trump is holier than Jesus and the most handsome man to have ever lived and do it easily.

4488

Anybody here want to sign my character reference form? I need 1000 signatures in an hour, tell your friends.

4489

They’re not going to know whether or not this occurred.

In the age of MeToo, these things need to be investigated.

We had decades of not believing anyone who came forward, shaming, blaming the victims and excusing vile behavior. We’re pushing that behind us. 200 girls, 10 girls, it’s not the number of people that matter. The fact is, right now, women have enough support to be able to come forward when they could do so years ago, or just a few years even.

4490

I can speak from personal experience a bit here. I was a juvenile offender (no, I’m not going into details) and my record was expunged. I went through quite a bit of correctional stuff in the process of earning that expunging, but I’ve never thought for a second that any of that somehow erased what I did. I’ll never run for any kind of political office because those mistakes are still in my past, record or no.

Now, I personally am much more concerned about the shady stuff Kavenaugh did in association with the Bush White House than what he did as a teenager. But I have no problem with him being held accountable for those teenager failures, because he’s chosen to step into a public arena where such things matter. Just as I’d expect my own past to catch up to me if I chose to enter such an arena.

4491

No one said anything remotely like that on this forum. I’m pretty sure you know that.

If someone had spoken to you this way, you would have raised hell.

-Tom

4492

Same here. When I was 16, me and a friend were walking down the street late one night checking for unlocked cars. When we found one, we took cassette tapes, junk out of the glove box, a jar of vitamins, even one of those tools that puts price tags on store items. When a cop car comes up – someone had heard us laughing and cutting up, so he called the police – we were all, like, uh, yeah, this stuff was already ours, officer.

I spent the night in jail, was charged with felony theft, and was on probation for a year. I’ve never had it come back to haunt me because it was expunged from my record. But I freely admit that I shouldn’t pass muster if I get nominated to be one of the highest adjudicators of US law.

-Tom, convicted felon

4493

I think there are a lot of things going on this case, that folks are glossing over.

Let’s just start with the assumption that the story from the professor is true.

But if true, what is the crime? Certainly not rape, since no rape occurred. But is it even attempted rape? On some level, yes. Now, bear in mind here, I am very close with someone who suffered from an actual rape. So, I am absolutely not in the mind to minimize such things. But at the same time, what she went through and what Kavanaugh is accused of, is not remotely the same.

Kavanaugh, again assuming it happened, was as described as the accuser, almost blackout drunk. Now, this does not excuse it of course. But it does make it VERY different from the act that a rapist takes, when he/she consciously chooses to commit such a crime. Alcohol interferes with our ability to act rationally, and our ability to perceive what is going on. And while I never tried to molest anyone while I was really drunk, I absolutely DID do profoundly stupid things while drunk.

And then the issue of the alcohol itself comes up. As an adult, getting blackout drunk and doing bad stuff would be itself indicative of a major problem and lack of judgement. But as a 17 year old kid? A lot of us, if not most of us, got way too drunk when we were young, largely because we didn’t understand how booze worked, and how it affected us. This isn’t indicative of a permanent failure in judgement, it was indicative of inexperience.

I don’t like to be in the position of defending this stuff, but I can see a path which isn’t “He’s a rapist”.

I can see a guy who got way too drunk when he was 17, because lots of us did that, because we were dumb kids and didn’t know our limits when it came to alcohol.

And once you are in that situation, where you are on the edge of consciousness due to alcohol, your actions are not representative of who you are as a person. That is not to say that you hold no responsibility for them. You can’t just get drunk and do whatever you want and then say, “Sorry dudes! Drunk!”

And if you had a repeated pattern of such behavior, then that too would mean something more. But just one case? Where you got blackout drunk as a kid, and then did a horrible thing? I don’t know whether that really represents some meaningful introspection into who someone is.

4494
4495

Me three, though no charges were involved. But suffice to say I did a very stupid and insensitive and trust-breaking thing that hurt some people badly and is unfortunate enough I don’t like talking about it 15+ years later. Not even illegal, I think, but that feels like a pretty paltry defense.

In any case, I acknowledge I did it, that it came out, and that if it ever came out widely, it’d tank any kind of attempt at, say, political office i was hunting for, unless I was running as a Republican. So I accept that I did a dumb, insensitive, shitty thing as a young man, and don’t, for instance, strive to become a Supreme Court Justice.

C’est le vie. I’d have been a partisan hack anyway, and probably forced everyone to get gay married.

4496

We could also start with his version of events: This never happened, and he wasn’t even at that party. Your “it’s not a particularly terrible crime” defense is not relevant when the defendant says, under oath, that it never happened at all. You can’t plead in the alternative like that here.

If he was in that room with that girl, he’s perjured himself, and he’s done (this presumes that his testimony on Monday will match the statement he released). We don’t need to decide exactly how culpable his behavior was.

4497

Well, it’s also possible that it could have happened, and he didn’t remember, because that happens to some folks with large amounts of alcohol consumption.

And to be clear:

This isn’t the defense. That’s not what my post was about.

We’re talking about whether such a thing means that you can draw an important inference about a person’s character.

4498

I was pretty much with you up until there. I think the loss of inhibition does reveal a person’s true character, or what they’re capable of deep inside.

This whole story has me remembering an embarrassing incident during my freshman year of college where I drank a couple of screwdrivers (first time I’d had vodka) and wanted to tell the girl I completely adored how I really felt about her. She had gone from the party room next door into Roy’s bedroom and locked the door so I knocked but she didn’t answer so I walked outside, went to the window, opened it, crawled inside, then climbed on to the bed next to her… and cuddled. Told her I loved her until the end of time. I thought she was asleep. A week later she told me she’d been awake which was pretty embarrassing. And kind of annoying. Like, why not say something if you’re awake? I was making an ass of myself.

She’s gay now.

Anyway, point is, I look back at that as alcohol revealing exactly who I was deep down: a little, sensitive, virgin boy who wouldn’t dream of defiling a girl he loved with so much as an impure thought.

I wouldn’t say early, inexperienced drunkenness changes your nature so much as reveals it.

That there are countless guys who would have done the same thing Blasey describes Kavanaugh doing to her while drunk at that young age, well… that just sounds like all the #metoo behavior we’re seeing all over the damn place. Especially among creative types and men who seek power.

4499

Damn, the only thing in my past making me totally unelectable is my open atheism. Well, that’s my present too, but if Republicans tracked down some of my snarkier comments on the infidels.org forum it would raise quite the kerfuffle.

4500

Eh, but you weren’t really blackout drunk. There’s a difference between drunk and DRUNK.

Normal drunk is a reduction of inhibitions. Hard core drunk is a significant impairment of your cognitive function. Your brain isn’t working right.

4501

Okay, but I don’t think any additional amount of alcohol would have made me gropey or rapey.

4502

It’s called “sexual assault”.

This sounds suspiciously like, “Who among us might sexually assault someone if they got drunk enough?”

Not me.

4503

I see magnet has opted for the ‘holier-than-thou’ approach.

4504

Let’s call it holier-than-Kavanaugh.

I mean seriously:

I might do a lot of stupid stuff when drunk, eventually to collapse in a pile of vomit. But that’s not stupid. It’s reprehensible.

In vino veritas.

4505

Come on, magnet, read the post.