BY JOHN SHAFFER How does one tell when someone is lying? Here is as good a way as any: Someone probably is lying when he tells a story and provides the names of several people who (our someone claims) will confirm that story – and – (here comes the main point) not one of them confirms the story; we will go one step further, when every one of them denies that the story took place at all. That situation is precisely what we have in the story of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford. Now, everyone in America, it seems, who favors abortion, or wants to preserve Roe v. Wade, or despises Donald Trump, or who says “Conservatives need not apply” to a Supreme Court vacancy, also believes Christine Blasey Ford. Why (besides the four reasons given in the previous sentence?) Probably because they know in their hearts that there are hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of victims of sexual abuse, and Dr. Ford has become a stand-in for everyone of them. Sure, those folks don’t care that her story may be uncorroborated; or it may be politically motivated; it, full of internal contradictions, may be inconsistent with itself to say nothing of inconsistent with the behavior of the accused; or may be untrue, but they don’t care, because Dr. Ford is the poster person for the victim, and thus Judge Kavanaugh represents the brutal abuser, and being able to prove it is no concern, because, according to at least two US Senators, Judge Kavanaugh does not possess the presumption of innocence. Well, we are pretty sure that Senator Schumer and Senator Coons haven’t learned that the law books or the Constitution actually say the opposite; and we know they have been pretty quick to forgive and excuse criminals who have committed crimes far more violent, far more often, and far more recent that those Judge Kavanaugh is accused of.
BY JOHN SHAFFER The Democrats on the US Senate Judiciary committee would like Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh to answer questions about an incident that a woman claims took place back in 1982, she thinks, but maybe another year; it took place in Montgomery County, Maryland, she is sure, but she doesn’t know the date, the place, the occasion, or – apparently, the number of people in the room at the time, for her lawyer has already told a different story than the accuser related in her letter that, through the office of Rep. Anna Eshoo ended up in the hands of Sen. Diane Feinstein. And “DiFi” has plenty of questions she wants answered. Of course, when the Senator had Mr. Kavanaugh under her questioning earlier this month, she did not ask those questions, and in fact spoke nary a word about the letter, which she has possessed since July. Then, it seems, would have been the proper time to ask questions, but never let it be said that the modern Democrat party wastes a lot of time doing the proper thing anymore.
No, the end justifies the means, and because they strongly fear that as Justice, Mr. Kavanaugh might overturn the Roe v. Wade decision, they will stop at nothing to keep him from the court. And their ethics are so variable that they believe that an accusation from 36 years ago when (if it took place at all – more on that later) both the principals were minors, is disqualifying for Mr. Kavanaugh – and yet the while-they-are-adults-and holding-public-office sexual exploits of Bill Clinton, Chris Dodd, Ted Kennedy, Robert Menendez and Keith Ellison, for example, raise barely a ripple of concern. After all, “it’s just sex,” unless you’re a Republican, and then nothing can save you – even if the incident didn’t take place at all. BY JOHN SHAFFER It’s been a busy couple of weeks. Two American icons, Aretha Franklin and Sen. John McCain, passed away. Sadly, the memories of two great people were pushed a bit to the backseat at their funerals, because some of the living rather put greater emphasis on attacking President Trump than they did memorializing the departed. Senator McCain’s family issued its own public rejection for his funeral, pointedly letting the world know that President Trump was not welcome. Now the President and the Senator did not have much good to say about each other, and each made some flip remarks about the other that used never to be said (at least in public). It being a free country, the Senator’s family was well within its rights, and we can sympathize with their reaction, because there is no doubt that as a candidate and as President, Mr. Trump said some nasty things about the Senator; things that never should have been said. That being the case, it is a bit incongruous for someone such as Senator McCain being so upset at President Trump for his crude, coarse, intolerant manner that his funeral exhibited the same kind of intolerance, but that’s what makes the world go around. As the epigram has it, if you don’t go to someone’s funeral, don’t expect them to go to yours.
At least Senator McCain had a valid reason for disliking, and excluding, President Trump – the other funeral of a prominent person, that of Aretha Franklin, was pretty much as firmly anti-Trump, even though Mr. Trump never attacked or criticized or ridiculed Ms. Franklin. She, or the people who staged her funeral, like so many others, did not care for his attitude or his policies or his style, and, like so many others, they weren’t shy about letting the whole world know. Some years from now, folks may look at the videos of the two funerals and cringe at their political aspects, and wonder why folks had so little respect for the departed that they wanted to show their little respect for the President rather than celebrating the lives of the great people who had passed on. It is worthy of note that the final memory people will have of Senator McCain and of Aretha Franklin will be their intense dislike of the President of the United States instead of a positive celebration of respectively, their lives as a Navy veteran, an heroic prisoner of war and a dediciated US Senator; or as a widely-admired singer. Let us not let the worldly interfere with the eternal. |
Local ColumnistsFind articles by date or topic through quick links below. Categories
All
Archives
March 2020
|