For Some Sad Men Among Us
Once even David Allan Coe knew what it was to be lonely. There's hope for you yet. You know who you are.
Haga of the First Water
I wish I could remember where I read the suggestion -- Dad29 only hints at it -- but sometime around Friday I read someone who suggested that the Kavanaugh accuser would turn out to have had first made the accusation in a therapy session, many years after the fact. The idea is that 'recovered' (but actually false) memories in psychology work are a known issue, and this was likely enough to turn out to be one.
Now it may be that the accusation is true, although both of the people she names as having been there deny that it or anything like it ever happened. But the psychotherapy-created-memory idea doesn't sound implausible to me given the facts. For one thing, it did in fact first come up in a therapy session in 2012, when she and her husband were having trouble and she needed a way to try to right that ship. But also:
(UPDATE: Paragraph removed due to inaccurate source. I regret the error.)
I wouldn't be surprised to learn that this was in fact the truth. Kavanaugh has passed six FBI background checks, none of which turned up anything like this; there's no pattern of behavior, as you'd expect if this accusation were true. But that doesn't mean she is lying, not in the strict sense. She is quite possibly telling the truth as she believes she understands it.
Defenders might say that a good reason for being unstable is having suffered a rape attempt in your young adulthood, and perhaps that's fair. In the end, both hypotheses are possible. We just have to decide which one is more plausible. Or maybe not even that; a 17 year old's bad behavior, even if proven at law rather than being alleged after the statute of limitations had passed seven times over, would normally be sealed in juvenile records just because we wouldn't want it to prevent them from reforming and living a responsible life as an adult. By all indications, he has led a responsible life as an adult. Maybe we don't have to decide what is true about the one allegation from 35 years ago to know the right way to proceed now.
All of that involves taking this accusation seriously. It leads us to the same place we would get to if we didn't take it seriously at all, as well we might not given the way the Democratic leadership sat on the thing for a month until they could raise it at the last minute to cause chaos. I'm open to the idea that we shouldn't given them an inch given how they've behaved; but a lot more is at stake than punishing Sen. Feinstein for her perfidy. I'm willing to take the matter seriously. All the same, I think that absent any new evidence or additional accusers, the course is clear.
Now it may be that the accusation is true, although both of the people she names as having been there deny that it or anything like it ever happened. But the psychotherapy-created-memory idea doesn't sound implausible to me given the facts. For one thing, it did in fact first come up in a therapy session in 2012, when she and her husband were having trouble and she needed a way to try to right that ship. But also:
She did tell someone about this years before Kavanaugh was nominated — but never mentioned his name. She doesn’t remember where or even when exactly the incident happened, but she does remember the names of two other people who were allegedly there. (Neither responded to WaPo’s request for comments.) She passed a polygraph test administered by a former FBI agent but her own therapist had notes saying four boys were involved, not two, which Ford blames on a misunderstanding.All of that is explicable if the hypothesis is correct. The fuzziness on exactly where and when this happened arises from the fact that it never did happen, as does the fuzziness on just who was responsible or how many people were present at the time. But also the polygraph: she could readily pass one, per hypothesis, because she isn't lying. She's telling the truth of what she thinks she remembers.
(UPDATE: Paragraph removed due to inaccurate source. I regret the error.)
I wouldn't be surprised to learn that this was in fact the truth. Kavanaugh has passed six FBI background checks, none of which turned up anything like this; there's no pattern of behavior, as you'd expect if this accusation were true. But that doesn't mean she is lying, not in the strict sense. She is quite possibly telling the truth as she believes she understands it.
Defenders might say that a good reason for being unstable is having suffered a rape attempt in your young adulthood, and perhaps that's fair. In the end, both hypotheses are possible. We just have to decide which one is more plausible. Or maybe not even that; a 17 year old's bad behavior, even if proven at law rather than being alleged after the statute of limitations had passed seven times over, would normally be sealed in juvenile records just because we wouldn't want it to prevent them from reforming and living a responsible life as an adult. By all indications, he has led a responsible life as an adult. Maybe we don't have to decide what is true about the one allegation from 35 years ago to know the right way to proceed now.
All of that involves taking this accusation seriously. It leads us to the same place we would get to if we didn't take it seriously at all, as well we might not given the way the Democratic leadership sat on the thing for a month until they could raise it at the last minute to cause chaos. I'm open to the idea that we shouldn't given them an inch given how they've behaved; but a lot more is at stake than punishing Sen. Feinstein for her perfidy. I'm willing to take the matter seriously. All the same, I think that absent any new evidence or additional accusers, the course is clear.
BB: Interview with Ms. Chelsea Clinton
The Bee gently mocks her latest. “I’m a devout Christian, but suggesting that I need to believe Christian things that would go against my political platform is the very definition of the war on women.”
The week in pictures
PS, Our little non-hurricane mostly passed through during the night. We had 4.2 inches yesterday, bringing our September total to 15-1/2. Not a problem here at Chez Tex, of course, where we have learned that weather continues to happen.
Haga Widely Available This Week
Placing the bottom line up top here: 6/ Bottom line, per source: “Amb. Haley had no choice in the location of the residence or what curtains were picked out that summer.” https://t.co/8trxACUQrD
— Rebeccah Heinrichs (@RLHeinrichs) September 14, 2018
This Better Not Be Haga
A mysterious letter semi-surfaces, occasioning a cryptic comment from a Senator, who passed it to the FBI, who passed it to the White House....
Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas) dismissed the controversy on Twitter.
“Let me get this straight: this is [a] statement about [a] secret letter regarding a secret matter and an unidentified person. Right."
The "Basic Instinct" Defense
As I remember the movie, Sharon Stone's character says she'd have to be an idiot to write a book about killing someone and then kill them in just that way. This perversely then serves as a defense against the charge.
Turns out real life works that way sometimes too.
Turns out real life works that way sometimes too.
Sanctuary
Pennsylvania is not the place I would have thought this would start, but there it is.
A bill introduced in the Pennsylvania House would prohibit enforcement of some federal gun control laws. Passage of this bill would take a big step toward making Pennsylvania a sanctuary state for gun owners.It's not like they're starting the pick-and-choose-the-laws-you'll-enforce "sanctuary" thing.
Rep. Daryl Metcalfe (R- Cranberry Township) introduced House Bill 357 (HB357) on Sept. 5, with 41 bipartisan cosponsors. Titled the “Right to Bear Arms Protection Act, the bill would declare any Federal law which attempts to register, restrict or ban a firearm, or to limit the size of a magazine of a firearm,
“unenforceable within the borders of this Commonwealth.” This restriction would apply to both federal and state agents....
The federal government relies heavily on state cooperation to implement and enforce almost all of its laws, regulations and acts – including gun control. By simply withdrawing this necessary cooperation, states and localities can nullify in effect many federal actions. As noted by the National Governor’s Association during the partial government shutdown of 2013, “states are partners with the federal government on most federal programs.”
Two-edged leaks
From RealClearInvestigations:
Another recent Times story that has raised eybrows is its Sept. 1 account of the FBI’s efforts to recruit Russian businessman Oleg Deripaska, an oligarch close to Putin, as an informant. Published just days after the release of documents showing that the DOJ’s Bruce Ohr was in close contact with Christopher Steele, who was employed by Deripaska’s London lawyer, the Times story reports that the FBI operation included Ohr and Steele. According to the Times, Deripaska was one among half a dozen Putin associates that the FBI attempted to recruit for the purpose of reporting on Moscow’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 election.
A congressional Republican source who spoke to RCI on the condition of anonymity is skeptical of the Times’ account. “The takeaway is that in trying to flip a Putin-allied oligarch, the FBI told Putin that they’re investigating his interference in the 2016 elections. That is not a good look. It looks like the story they’re trying to bury is that in the period leading up to the FBI’s using the dossier to get a warrant to spy on the Trump campaign, a senior DOJ official whose wife [Nellie Ohr] worked on the dossier is meeting with the author of the dossier, who works for a Putin ally.”
25%
AVI has some thoughts on this idea that a 25% share of a population is enough to move it. I'll just add this data point.
Do voters care about the Supreme Court?
Surprisingly enough, it seems they do:
“It’s really not a top-of-mind thing for people on the street,” said Barrett Kaiser, a Democratic strategist in Montana. “The guys sitting on the barstool right now are talking about the harvest and hunting season and could care less about inside baseball in Washington, D.C.”
A Democratic strategist in Indiana agreed. “I’m not sure people [were] watching hearings as intently,” said Robin Winston, former chairman of the Indiana Democratic Party. Both strategists said the final vote would likely play a role for voters, although probably not as a make-or-break issue.
Some of the polling in some of these states, however, suggests otherwise. A Trafalgar Group survey over the summer showed Manchin with a 29-point lead over Republican Patrick Morrisey -- as long as he voted for Kavanaugh. Conversely, the poll showed Manchin’s lead narrowing to only two percentage points if Manchin did not vote for Trump’s nominee.
A Wild 9/11 Anniversary
A section of headlines on Drudge from yesterday:
Be careful out there, ok?
UPDATE: Violent threats aimed at Sen. Collins and her staff.
Be careful out there, ok?
UPDATE: Violent threats aimed at Sen. Collins and her staff.
The Logan Act Is or Isn't A Thing?
After having used the Logan Act as a pretext for the whole Russia investigation, you'd think that our friends on the left would be more sensitive to actual violations of it.
National Emergencies at the Stately Speed of Bureaucracy
A new executive order:
Oh, no. No, the 90 days doesn't start until after the election.
The executive order, signed just two months ahead of the November's midterms elections, addresses not only interference with campaign and election infrastructure, but also propaganda efforts.So, you might ask, the election's in two months, but in three months we'll have an assessment of whether or not anyone is trying to interfere?
The order, which is considered a national emergency due to sanctions authority requirements, instructs the Office of National Intelligence and the intelligence community to conduct regular assessments about potential foreign interference in elections.
The process, according to Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and White House national security adviser John Bolton, would take a total of 90 days.
Oh, no. No, the 90 days doesn't start until after the election.
Following Election Day, the intelligence community would have 45 days to collect data and assess whether interference had occurred.Shouldn't we be doing this now, in the hope of preventing foreign interference in our elections?
At that point, the agencies would pass the findings to the Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security, where officials would have 45 days to make their assessment based on the intelligence information, and decide whether to pass sanctions on potential actors, countries, or institutions that participated in potential interference.
Not Looking Good By Comparison
It's a bad deal when the Catholic Church's sex scandals compare unfavorably to those of the Muslim Brotherhood's spiritual leader. Trying to get one's wife to wear a blindfold is downright tame. Swinging with the maid, well, isn't he entitled to another few wives anyway?
Meanwhile at the Vatican:
Meanwhile at the Vatican:
Satan is working to uncover the sins of bishops so that they will be visible and a cause of scandal, Pope Francis said during his homily at Mass on Tuesday.People might be scandalized by the uncovering of sins, but the real scandal is occasioned by the Church helping wicked priests to avoid accountability for the crimes.
“This is good to remember, in these times in which it seems that the Great Accuser has been unchained and is attacking bishops. True, we are all sinners, we bishops. He tries to uncover the sins, so they are visible, in order to scandalize the people. The Great Accuser, as he himself says to God in the first chapter of the Book of Job, 'roams the earth looking for someone to accuse'."
Rescorla
This story was re-posted because of yesterday's anniversary. If you want to revisit something inspiring, it's a good choice.
Lies and Chardonnay
Senator Kamala Harris, who like Senator Booker is using the recent Supreme Court confirmation hearings to grand-stand in pursuit of higher office, put out a deceptively edited video that she chose to describe as a "dog whistle." In fact, the claim she was deceptively trying to attribute to Judge Kavanaugh was merely used during his description of the plaintiff's claims; he was not endorsing their description, merely describing what they said was the issue. Politifact, not always a friend to the Republican party, reviewed Sen. Harris' claim and labeled it clearly false.
What do you do when you're caught in a lie? Apologize? Promise to do better?
Of course not. You call for supporting fire from someone with no ethical issues that would stop them from endorsing your lies.
I hope that the Democrats realize that President Trump's vulnerabilities are his refusal to show proper respect for others, and his penchant for being completely careless about the truth. Trump wins in spite of these qualities, not because of them. He wins because he is the only candidate on the field who is on the side of ordinary people, rather than a card-carrying member of an elite that despises ordinary people. That is why he gets as much of a pass as he does for the things that people hate about his manner. If Democrats could be on the side of the people, honestly and respectfully, they'd clean up.
Instead, Democrats seem to have decided that deception and disrespect are Trump's sources of strength. They have gone beyond carelessness about the truth, and seek to surpass him by direct and intentional lies.
What do you do when you're caught in a lie? Apologize? Promise to do better?
Of course not. You call for supporting fire from someone with no ethical issues that would stop them from endorsing your lies.
I hope that the Democrats realize that President Trump's vulnerabilities are his refusal to show proper respect for others, and his penchant for being completely careless about the truth. Trump wins in spite of these qualities, not because of them. He wins because he is the only candidate on the field who is on the side of ordinary people, rather than a card-carrying member of an elite that despises ordinary people. That is why he gets as much of a pass as he does for the things that people hate about his manner. If Democrats could be on the side of the people, honestly and respectfully, they'd clean up.
Instead, Democrats seem to have decided that deception and disrespect are Trump's sources of strength. They have gone beyond carelessness about the truth, and seek to surpass him by direct and intentional lies.
Madison and Mob Rule
A pretty good piece. You may not agree precisely with his description of the problem set, but his solutions include some ideas that we all believe in -- especially Federalism and constitutional education, i.e., civics.
Federalism, meanwhile, remains a core part of the solution. However, I've become convinced that we also need a way to create a distinction between urban and rural that has constitutional force. It seems that we have two modes of life here that are fundamentally incompatible, not only in their desires but in their needs. Ensuring that the cities can't impose their will on the countryside, and vice versa, might lower the temperature a lot.
To combat the power of factions, the Founders believed the people had to be educated about the structures of government in particular. “A popular Government, without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy; or, perhaps both,” Madison wrote in 1822, supporting the Kentucky legislature’s “Plan of Education embracing every class of Citizens.” In urging Congress to create a national university in 1796, George Washington said: “A primary object of such a national institution should be the education of our youth in the science of government.”Well, at least 'overturning them via constant re-litigation.' Stability is helpful, but a bad decision needs to be addressed. Understanding the constitutional mechanisms allows us to do that in a way that is more likely to be accepted as legitimate.
The civics half of the educational equation is crucial. Recent studies have suggested that higher education can polarize citizens rather than ensuring the rule of reason: Highly educated liberals become more liberal, and highly educated conservatives more conservative. At the same time, the National Assessment of Educational Progress has found that citizens, whether liberal or conservative, who are educated about constitutional checks on direct democracy, such as an independent judiciary, are more likely to express trust in the courts and less likely to call for judicial impeachment or for overturning unpopular Supreme Court decisions.
Federalism, meanwhile, remains a core part of the solution. However, I've become convinced that we also need a way to create a distinction between urban and rural that has constitutional force. It seems that we have two modes of life here that are fundamentally incompatible, not only in their desires but in their needs. Ensuring that the cities can't impose their will on the countryside, and vice versa, might lower the temperature a lot.
The Mustache Isn't Playing
National Security Adviser John Bolton threatens to arrest any International Criminal Court judges who try American soldiers for actions in Afghanistan. As a power move, that's the kind of thing that the kids today call "alpha" or "baller." It's certainly the sort of thing that a dominant power would do. And it is true, as Bolton says, that the ICC isn't accountable to Americans or really to anyone: it's the kind of unelected international elites that the Trump administration was elected to oppose. Americans have a right to be tried by a jury of their peers, not by strangers and foreigners but by their fellow citizens.
That said, I have not been impressed lately by our system's success at holding its members to account. If we're going to be credible here, we need to do a good job of ensuring that we uphold our own rules and laws. The military justice system as I've observed it probably does this better than the rest of our so-called justice systems, to be fair.
That said, I have not been impressed lately by our system's success at holding its members to account. If we're going to be credible here, we need to do a good job of ensuring that we uphold our own rules and laws. The military justice system as I've observed it probably does this better than the rest of our so-called justice systems, to be fair.
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