A reader remarks on some information concerning Professor Ford’s actions in the Kavanaugh nomination fiasco:
Except it wasn’t last minute. I heard Ford testify that she called the WH when she heard Kavanaugh was even on the list of candidates. They ignored her. She called again after his nomination. They tried to suppress it. Then she went public. Conspiracy? Guess we’re just paranoid. Or. Women don’t matter to Republicans? Surely no evidence of that…
I remember running across this yesterday, although I misrember where. Still being a working dude and not having a natural appetite for politics nor meetings, I’ve only seen scattered bits of the testimony; my Arts Editor has seen far more than I. Perhaps she’ll comment.
This testimony does increase Ford’s credibility, although, donning my conservative conspiracy theorist hat, it could have all been planned as a way to discredit Kavanaugh the moment his name appeared on the list of Federalist Society sponsored possibilities. I’m not a conservative conspiracy theorist, however, so I’ll just go with increasing the credibility of an academic, who, trained[1] in the intricacies of psychology, can give credible explanations for the impacts of the incident on her memory and behaviors.
Back to the original topic, I’m still fatigued, and now that the final vote has been delayed for a week while the FBI conducts an investigation[2], I suppose my fatigue will increase. But I can’t help but notice how the Republicans’ nuts are caught in a walnut cracker[3], and, worse, it’s of their own making.
By refusing to demand the White House release all material relevant to the nomination, hiding behind the rubric of Executive Privilege, the GOP members of the Judiciary Committee have politicized the nomination process. Some may proclaim that these nominations are always political fights, but, ideally, the legislative branch is a co-equal and independent branch of American government, and thus should have a neutral beginning position to the question of whether a nominee to SCOTUS is qualified or not. Making such an evaluation should require the acquisition and evaluation of all relevant materials. By not demanding that material, these Republicans have marked themselves as partisans, putting party over country. Incidentally, this is a view that an apparently large number of Americans already have of the GOP, and they might do well not to reinforce such a perception of base dishonor.
They, as most of us know, also initially rejected the Democrat’s request of an FBI investigation into the matter of Ford’s allegations, another mark of partisanship. Their dislike of putting Kavanaugh completely on the stage, rather than to just have his head and one hand projecting from stage left, is disappointing and suspicious.
Furthermore, Kavanaugh himself has politicized the process, as sane conservative voices have emphasized, by sitting down with the least fair and balanced major news network, Fox News, for a rebuttal interview, and then indulging in a outburst in yesterday’s committee interview that can be best considered to be the output of a partisan hack (see the same link).
In the end, the GOP’s desperate need to seat Kavanaugh, to not see President Trump defeated, forced them to accept a new FBI investigation as the price of Senator Flake’s vote, and, worse, endure an entire week of their brand being further damaged. Their flip-flop looks bad to base, independents, and liberals alike.
I have to wonder how they’ll respond during this week. I noted they’ve already emphasized the supposed limits on the investigation. If the FBI comes back with substantive positive results, they may try to suggest the FBI exceeded those limits, combine that with their sustained attacks on their former favorite institution over the last year, and use that to invalidate the very results they’ve purportedly solicited. But would they then ram his nomination over the finish line? The mid-terms, which may result in a change of who leads the Senate, looms like a smoking volcano over a village of alarmed people. And even if the more extremist members of the GOP succeeds in smearing the FBI investigation, that doesn’t guarantee their more moderate members will play along. Senators Collins, Murkowski, Flake, and perhaps even Corker may choose to accept a substantive report at face value and vote against Kavanaugh. I am not aware of any reports of defection among the Democratic Senators, so if two of these Senators voted against, the issue would be dead. Indeed, if those two told their colleagues of their final determination, we might see a number of Republican Senators suddenly throw Kavanaugh under the bus. But this is all speculative; I don’t expect the FBI to come up with any substantive findings, and they are restricted to Professor Ford’s allegations; my understanding is that investigation of allegations from other accusers are off-limits.
Long time readers will know that I prefer to add the acronym IJ to references to Associate Justice Gorsuch, as in Justice Gorsuch, IJ, which stands for Illegitimate Justice, and I think that Judge Kavanaugh may acquire the same permanent caveat if his backers achieve victory. My suspicion is, in the event of his ascension to Associate Justice Kavanaugh, the old and venerable word Pyrrhic may re-enter the American conversation.
1 I feel a little odd saying trained in the intricacies of psychology, as it’s really apparent that we’re barely started on understanding one of the most difficult of topics. Remember the astronomer’s remark that the intricacies of the physical processes of a star are as nothing to the biological processes of a frog? Well, the intricacies of the human brain, intellect, emotions, and kaboodle are the next step on that progression.
2 But our President has assured us that the Federal Bureau of Investigation doesn’t, you know, conduct investigations. So what’s up with this?
3 Perhaps this is unnecessarily graphic. I tried to find a pic to accompany note #1, above, and discovered “star frog” returns descriptions of a wrestling move called the Five Star Frog Splash. Be glad I didn’t go looking for a pic to accompany this note.
