Brett Kavanaugh's Confirmation Hearing

[hope kelly]

3 minutes ago, AmazonGrace said:

 

This made me laugh so hard.

 

[fraurosena]

Seth Abramson has an interesting thread about Kavanaugh and Ford. 

 

[fraurosena]

Wowsers.

 

[hope kelly]

Just now, fraurosena said:

Wowsers.

 

Wow I didn't see that coming.

[AmazonGrace]

Kavanaugh and his wife will be on Fox today

The hearing on Thursday will be a sham:

 

[hope kelly]

what a POS Mitch MCconnell is. 

[fraurosena]

Dr. Blasey Ford wrote a letter to Grassley.

I am appalled at what she is going through privately, but am inspired by her resilience and willingness to testify under such harrowing circumstances. It saddens me that in all probability her request for respectful treatment will not be honored by Grassley, as his sole focus is to get Kavanaugh on the SC, no matter the cost.

[AuntK]

7 hours ago, SilverBeach said:

Supreme court appointments are for life. What's the rush? The whole damn process here is suspect.

I think the lifetime appointments of Supreme Court justices and other federal judges should be abolished. This is an old idea, like the Electoral College, that may have seemed necessary when the US culture was much different; there was no 24-hour news, lower literacy rates and fewer lawyers.  This country has more lawyers than ever, actually more than needed, but there are perhaps dozens of lawyers/judges who would be good candidates for this seat, certainly better than Kavanaugh!

It has been suggested that Justices serve 8-10 years, staggered terms, which would provide for greater diversity in opinions and points of view. 

Further, I think the confirmation process needs to be changed so that one party doesn't establish the rules and drive the proceeding to their desired result.  A requirement of a FULL FBI investigation, production of ALL documents, other than those determined by a bipartisan group to be a threat to national security. Irrelevant personal info in documents can be redacted, but only after review. This would be a START to an open and fair process, and, I believe,  an ending to the appointment of embarrassments like Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and, of course, Clarence Thomas, who asked his very first question during oral argument after TEN YEARS of sitting on the bench!

[fraurosena]

2 minutes ago, AuntK said:

Further, I think the confirmation process needs to be changed so that one party doesn't establish the rules and drive the proceeding to their desired result.  A requirement of a FULL FBI investigation, production of ALL documents, other than those determined by a bipartisan group to be a threat to national security. Irrelevant personal info in documents can be redacted, but only after review. This would be a START to an open and fair process, and, I believe,  an ending to the appointment of embarrassments like Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and, of course, Clarence Thomas, who asked his very first question during oral argument after TEN YEARS of sitting on the bench!

Yes! I cannot agree more. The whole system needs to be hauled into modern times. To get there, they should not only do what you suggest, but the whole process should also be taken out of political hands altogether. Let the JUDICIAL part of the trias politica nominate candidates for SCOTUS, using a merit based system. This would also entail any appointment to the Judiciary on any level may NOT be done by other entities in the trias politica. Only by merit can one get an appointment to the Judiciary, by the Judiciary. (Oversight of the Judiciary will continue to fall on the Legislative and Executive parts of the trias politica and vice versa).

This is the only way a true and democratic separation of powers can be ensured, and partisanship will be effectively nullified.

[AuntK]

4 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

The only reason I think Kavanagh might be innocent at this point is that if he did it he's a super mega idiot to invite the spotlight on himself. If he was just a quiet little small town judge somewhere with two roads and a farm he'd have gotten away with it.

He is exhibiting the same arrogance that he has had all his life; the same arrogance he had when he attacked Dr. Ford, knowing that he could get away with it. It's this elitism and arrogance that the old boys club has relied on for decades to protect them from any consequences for their "youthful indiscretions or lapses in judgment." 

He has been told, I am certain, by the troll, the turtle, among others, to just hang on, they will get through this. It's vitally important to the troll; Kavanaugh would be his "get out of jail free" card!

[fraurosena]

1 minute ago, AuntK said:

He has been told, I am certain, by the troll, the turtle, among others, to just hang on, they will get through this. It's vitally important to the troll; Kavanaugh would be his "get out of jail free" card!

Speaking of...

 

[AuntK]

Welp, there you go!

[fraurosena]

Does anyone else get a "the good wife" vibe from his wife? 

 

 

Ruh-roh...

 

 

[AmazonGrace]

Things that no good person ever said,  "My lifelong record of promoting dignity for women"

 

[AuntK]

Not to be too repetitive, but I think the one thing that this Kavanaugh debacle has exposed, as discussed up-thread, is that the country needs to immediately institute an entirely new process for judicial appointments. And the goal for this process would be to eliminate or minimize politics as much as possible, although knowing that politics will never be completely eliminated. 

But this will have to be a grassroots effort; I cannot see it going anywhere with the current climate in DC. 

I don't think Kavanaugh is going away, but he needs to realize that if he does get the appointment,  he is forever tainted, even more so than Clarence Thomas. That should be enough for any reasonable person to step away, but from what I've read about Kavanaugh,  he is far from reasonable and his political beliefs are so far outside the norm it's scary!

[GreyhoundFan]

3 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

Things that no good person ever said,  "My lifelong record of promoting dignity for women"

Something the good old boys don't understand is that actions speak louder than words.

[JenniferJuniper]

Things are going downhill fast for this pig.

Avenatti is going on Rachel soon.  Now we're talking gang rapes.

In retrospect, we should have figured Trump would find a vile rapist to push on to the Court to ensure Mueller can't subpoena him. 

 

[AmazonGrace]

His lawyer says it refers to a kiss, she denies it.

Video thread: 

 He claims he couldn't have gangraped anyone because he was a virgin and says the Ramirez thing can't be true because it would have been the talk of the campus. (It was, that's how Farrow and Mayer found out)

 

[AmazonGrace]

Maybe he lied to his wife that he was a virgin and has to go with it now

 

[AmazonGrace]

Avenatti says whatever he's talking about is corroborated by several people

 

[AmazonGrace]

I'm sure it's just a coincidence 

 

[AmazonGrace]

If his SC nomination falls through he can run for president. https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2018/09/25/politics/brett-kavanaugh-supreme-court-interview/index.html

[fraurosena]

Seth Abramson's takedown of Kavanaugh's Faux interview:

(thread)

[fraurosena]

The GOP is not giving the assurances she's asked for, so it's still not certain if Dr. Blasey Ford will testify on Thursday. 

 

[formergothardite]

They do not want her to testify. They can't come out of it looking good. The last thing they want going into the midterms are videos of them questioning a woman about sexual assault. They want to claim they gave her the chance and she wouldn't testify therefore she couldn't be telling the truth.