So we are at the part where everyone rolls their eyes and disbelieves Brett Kavanaugh’s denials. His defenders minimize the offense. His detractors think this will sink him. And women become more and more outraged while the WH chooses to ignore the gathering storm.
They don’t want to attack Dr Ford, Kavanaugh’s accuser so they attack Diane Feinstein and the timing and the unfairness of it all (to them).
Daily Beast:
Team Trump: If We Ditch Kavanaugh, We’re Signing Our Own ‘Death Warrant’
It’s Judge Kavanaugh or bust.
“A withdrawal would be disastrous for Trump,” one pro-Trump political operative who worked on the president’s 2016 campaign said. “You take away the whole ‘We’re sick of winning’ message. That’s a huge, marquee, top-line loss.”
That is not consensus, though. For example:
John Aravosis/AmericaBlog:
Why demanding an FBI investigation is a smart move.
First, if you lie to the FBI, you’re in serious trouble.
It’s one thing for Ford to claim, and Kavanaugh and his high school friend Mark Judge to deny, the attempted rape in dueling statements issued to the press. It’s quite another to lie to the FBI, as Trump’s former campaign staff has discovered.
And for those who argue that lying to Congress is also a crime, when is the last time you saw someone prosecuted for lying to Congress? Perjury before a congressional committee follows an entirely different process than lying to the FBI. It’s arcane, bureaucratic, and rarely used. For all intent and purposes, Ford, Kavanaugh and Judge can lie to their heart’s content to Congress, with impunity. The same can’t be said of lying to the FBI.
By involving the FBI, the legal stakes are raised significantly for all involved, and thus we are more likely to get the truth from all of them.
Gabe Sherman/Vanity Fair:
“CUT BAIT”: AS THE KAVANAUGH NIGHTMARE ESCALATES, TRUMP IS GRIPPED WITH UNCERTAINTY AS IVANKA SUGGESTS CUTTING THE JUDGE LOOSE
According to sources, several factors are at play. White House advisers are worried that more damaging information about Kavanaugh could come out. Two sources told me the White House has heard rumors that Ford’s account will be verified by women who say she told it to them contemporaneously. People worry, without apparent evidence, of another Ronan Farrow bomb dropping. One source says Ivanka Trump has told her father to “cut bait” and drop Kavanaugh…
But the threat of losing the House and Senate seems to have helped convince Trump not to go scorched-earth on Ford. If Trump antagonizes women voters, it could increase the odds Republicans would lose both houses in Congress. “Trump knows the Senate is not looking good,” an outside adviser said. “It’s all about the impeachment, he knows it’s coming.”
But the threat of losing the House and Senate seems to have helped convince Trump not to go scorched-earth on Ford. If Trump antagonizes women voters, it could increase the odds Republicans would lose both houses in Congress. “Trump knows the Senate is not looking good,” an outside adviser said. “It’s all about the impeachment, he knows it’s coming.”
Scott Lemieux/The Week:
Why on Earth is the GOP standing by Kavanaugh?
So why not pursue this course? In addition to possible political miscalculation, there's the reality of negative polarization. Even if the ultimate policy results would be similar, Kavanaugh stepping aside would still be perceived by many Republicans as a "win" for Democrats. And Trump, to put it mildly, is not wont to concede error.
But there's another issue at play here. As Vox's Matt Yglesias observes, Trump has effectively made the entire Republican Party complicit in his corruption and misconduct. If being credibly accused of attempted sexual assault as a teenager is disqualifying for a Supreme Court seat, then what does that say about Trump's fitness to be president? He has, after all, been credibly accused himself of sexual assault, and openly boasted about his tendency to grope women. Congressional Republicans who have not merely accepted Trump as the leader of their party but actively shielded him from any accountability are going to have a hard time holding any Republican to any standard of behavior.
This doesn't mean Kavanaugh's confirmation is inevitable, but it explains why Republicans seem initially unwilling to back off, despite it probably being in their political interests to do so.
The Senators and consultant class aren’t so keen on the circus:
So keep in mind that what Trump wants and what Mitch McConnell wants (to keep his majority) are divergent. If Kavanaugh does get pulled, McConnell will be the one, not Trump.
Perhaps the best piece I have read on this:
Caitlin Flanagan/Atlantic:
I Believe Her
When I was in high school, I faced my own Brett Kavanaugh.
But if Ford’s story is true, Brett Kavanaugh never apologized. He never tried to make amends, never took responsibility for what he did. In my case, the near-rape—as awful as it was at the time and in its immediate aftermath—didn’t cause any lasting damage. But by Ford’s account, Kavanaugh’s acts did cause lasting damage, and he has done nothing at all to try to make that right. And that is why the mistake of a 17-year-old kid still matters. The least we should do is put this confirmation on hold until we can learn more about what happened. If it’s not true, Kavanaugh should be confirmed without a cloud of suspicion. If it is true, we’ll have to decide whether you get to attack a girl, show no remorse, and eventually become a Supreme Court justice. My own inclination is: No.
Perhaps the worst piece I have read on this:
Lance Morrow/WSJ:
A Spectral Witness Materializes
The passage of time sometimes causes people to forget, sometimes to invent or embellish.
Susannah Sheldon, aged about 18, testified that the defendant Sarah Good’s apparition—not the actual Sarah Good, but her spirit, her specter—“most violently pulled down my head behind a chest and tied my hands together with a whale band and almost choked me to death.” Other witnesses blamed Good for the mysterious deaths of cows or for causing a broom to fly up into an apple tree.
The judge, William Stoughton, admitted this nonsense into evidence. Hysterical fantasies had real consequences: Sarah Good and four other defendants were hanged on July 19, 1692.
It’s a witch hunt, you see. Not too subtle.
Perhaps the most interesting:
Various authors/Politico:
What Should the Senate Do With Brett Kavanaugh?
Under the rules of the Judicial Conference governing the behavior of federal judges, misconduct includes “conduct occurring outside the performance of official duties if the conduct might have a prejudicial effect on the administration of the business of the courts, including a substantial and widespread lowering of public confidence in the courts among reasonable people.” If substantiated, this allegation meets that test. Little could have worse impact on the “public confidence in the courts”—assuming women to be part of the “public”—than allowing someone who has been credibly accused of an incident Ford’s therapist’s notes describe as a “rape attempt” to decide cases.
Professor Ford need not file a complaint to initiate this investigation. Under the Judicial Conference procedures, the chief judge of the D.C. Circuit can “identify” a complaint based on media reports.
And guess who the chief judge is? Karma’s a bitch.
NON-SCOTUS NEWS
As for the Trump declassification effort, April F Doss/twitter:
Last night’s White House press statement about releasing unredacted information on the Russia investigation was a doozy. Only 139 words, but an awful lot to unpack, with lots of reasons to be concerned. I’ll try to walk through them here.
First, what does the WH say they’re going to do? 1) Release info from a few pages of the 4th Carter Page FISA; 2&3) Release never-before-seen info from FBI interviews in the RU investigation; and 4) Release unredacted text messages from specific individuals at FBI and DOJ.
All four raise the spectre of creating a false narrative thru selective release of cherry-picked info, and risk damaging vital natsec interests and govt norms in the process. However, they raise these issues in slightly different ways, so it helps to break this mish-mash down.
KC Star:
GOP stalwart Nancy Kassebaum picks Democrat Laura Kelly over Kris Kobach
Nancy Kassebaum, who represented Kansas for three terms in the U.S. Senate, said Tuesday she will support Democratic State Sen. Laura Kelly’s campaign.
Kassebaum joins former GOP governor Bill Graves, who announced earlier this month that he would also be supporting Kelly.
“I’m a Republican, but that doesn’t mean you walk lock step always with the party,” she said.
Kobach says she’s a has-been, pretending to be a real Republican. Wikipedia says: She is the daughter of Alf Landon, who was Governor of Kansas from 1933 to 1937 and the 1936 Republican nominee for president, and the widow of former Senator and diplomat Howard Baker.
Good luck with that line, Kobach.
I will just end with this:
I agree. And I believe Dr. Ford.
