[Content Note: Sexual assault.]
Speaking of behavior that doesn't happen in a vacuum: A 49-year-old Florida man is facing a federal charge of abusive sexual contact after he groped a female passenger on a flight.
He later told authorities that the president "says it's okay to grab women by their private parts."
It is not okay.
None of this is okay.
Showing posts with label Today in Rape Culture. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Today in Rape Culture. Show all posts
The Trump Effect: It's "Okay to Grab Women"
Trump Trauma
[Content Note: Rape culture; misogyny.]
This is a very validating, if profoundly troubling piece by Mandy Velez at the Daily Beast: The Traumatizing Effect of the Trump Era on Women: 'It's Like a Form of Torture'.
According to mental health professionals, the last month has been a trying one for women's mental health.That is exactly what life feels like for me every day.
"Almost all the women are showing up [to sessions] during this time as much more disorganized, much more symptomatic," Christine Horner, a counselor based in Brooklyn, told The Daily Beast. "If they suffer from depression, or if they suffer from anxiety, [they're] struggling more with debilitating symptoms...signs that [they're] tapped psychologically."
...These reactions fall in line with an emotional roller coaster of a cycle that Horner and other mental health professionals have seen play out over the last two years.
...Patricia M. Raskin, a psychologist at Columbia University, chronicled the impact of Trump's appointment on a woman who had been sexually abused as a child. "As a victim of abuse, [one of my clients] had had a visceral reaction to Trump's candidacy, aware that he reminded her of inappropriate men she knew," she said.
And that was not unusual in her practice. "There was no female client who did not discuss," Raskin told The Daily Beast. "[And] it was not just Trump's election. It was Hillary's defeat and the misogyny around her campaign."
According to Margaret Edwards, program director of counseling and wellness services at the Women's Center at the University of Virginia, these responses are indeed part of a re-traumatization process. The victim-shaming that came with Kavanaugh's appointment has likely had a serious psychological impact.
"Lack of understanding, when exacerbated by general lack of respect and empathy for others, reignites the worst aspects of trauma for anyone who has ever experienced it," Edwards told The Daily Beast via email. "The physical suffering of a sexual assault pales in comparison to the feelings of being socially alone and rendered worthless and defective."
...[Horner said:] "The notion that, I think, no matter what you do, no matter how hard you cry, how loud you scream, nothing works — it's like a form of torture."
And there is no alternative — because giving up on urgently resisting this despicable regime and doing whatever I can to help other people, especially my fellow survivors, navigate and process this living nightmare would be a torture all its own.
Persisting is torture. It is also the only thing keeping me from complete collapse.
And I know as well as anyone and better than most that publicly talking about how much this hurts provides endless wank fodder for drooling sadists, because malice is the agenda. They want to hurt us, and they delight when their cruelty hits the mark.
But I'm not going to be silent about the effects of being a female survivor of sexual assault under an aggressively abusive, patriarchal regime. Silence is what they want, and I won't fucking give it to them.
The Lives of Women
[Content Note: Threat of sexual violence; abuse; misogyny.]
This morning, I read this Twitter moment in which a woman recounts her experience of being tricked and creeped-on and intimidated by a man who came to her house ostensibly to purchase an appliance.
It reminded me of the time a plumber came to my house and was thoroughly menacing, which I recounted in a thread:
This thread reminded me of the time a plumber kept trying to corner me in my bathroom, while I was showing him where the problem sink was. The flash of frustrated anger in his eyes when he realized there was a back door that I could slip through (and did).I knew I'd mentioned this story at Shakesville soon after it had happened, but that I had concealed the extent of it. I went back to find it: "He also stared at my boobs a lot, and commented on my tattoos. I smiled and I said thank you, and he used the excuse of trying to guess how old they were to stare at them a little longer. I made polite conversation, with my back to a closed door. Holding his gaze, like two people just happily chatting, I reached for the doorknob behind my back and held onto it, just in case."
Men often accuse women of jumping to the worst conclusions, but I kept trying to convince myself he was just "awkward" not creepy, even as he escalated. He complimented my tattoos, while leering at me. He kept talking about my hair. And then he started trying to corner me.
I honestly don't know what would have happened if there hadn't been another door in that bathroom, around a corner, which he hadn't yet seen. I could only get to it by allowing him to think he was cornering me, and it was terrifying.
After he was done with his work, he lingered in my kitchen, leaning on my counter, "doing paperwork." He kept looking around and finding things on which to comment, like the Hillary flyer on my fridge. (This was during the election.)
He talked shit about her. He liked Trump. He licked his lips. I tried to remain as jolly as fucking possible. By this point, my dog was at my side, just looking at him. He kept glancing at her. When I knew he was intimidated by her, I told him to wrap it up. "It's time to leave."
And when he finally left, I slumped in a heap, while the adrenaline drained from my body. I just sat on the floor in the entryway, with my dog lying across my lap, for a long time.
This, friends, was not the only bad/scary experience I've had with men coming to the house in a professional capacity while I'm home alone. It was just the most recent one.
This is something about which I would love to not have anxiety. But some number of men being inappropriate while in my home on a repair/delivery/maintenance job has made that impossible. Having dogs helps.
The "just in case" actually happened, but I ended the story there. Like Hannah Gadsby in Nanette, confessing she had minimized a story of an anti-gay assault to make it a palatable joke.
Perhaps part of me was trying to make the story more palatable, but mostly I was trying to avoid precisely the response I got on Twitter today: "I hope that you reported him."
Because I didn't.
And I felt ashamed about that.
So I made it sound like something less bad had happened to me, so no one would blame me for not reporting him.
But I know that I shouldn't feel bad about that. I've tried reporting abusive men before. It has never gone well.
I reported rape to the police and to school authorities and to adults who were meant to protect me, and nothing happened, except that it made my rapist vengeful. I reported sexual harassment to an employer, only to have the only female veep side with the women and get forced out of the firm. I reported abusive repairmen to their boss, only to have him tell me that I was being a real bitch. I reported online threats to my life to federal authorities and was told to go to local police who told me to go to federal authorities. I report (only extreme) abuse on social media and get told more times than not that it doesn't violate the terms of service.
Et cetera ad infinitum.
Today, I replied: "I did not. Because: 1. He kept talking about coming back to my house, which felt menacing. 2. I have learned from experience that reporting a man for being creepy/inappropriate doesn't result in any real consequences for him. It just pisses off a man who knows where you live. I know some people will get angry at me, reading that. I will advise you to redirect your ire where it actually belongs: The institutions that repeatedly protect men when women do try to report them and expose those women to retributive harm. See: The latest SCOTUS battle."
The truth is, I did have to turn that handle and walk through that door to get away from a plumber who was scaring me. And the truth is, I did not report him, because I was scared he would come back if I did, since I have learned that reporting puts me at more risk and does not diminish the risk for other women.
What I did was tell everyone I know locally not to use that plumbing service, and tell them to pass it on. The whisper network. Because official channels don't save us. So we have to save each other.
Anyway. Here is a thread to talk about the things that have happened to you, and the stories you haven't told, or minimized when you did tell them, because you were afraid. Afraid of being hurt, and then afraid of being shamed.
If you need to.
We Resist: Day 627
One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures (plus the occasional non-Republican who obliges us to resist their nonsense, too, like we don't have enough to worry about) is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.
So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.
Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.
* * *
Earlier today by me: Happy Indigenous Peoples' Day and How to Not Forget and So It Turns out That Trump Server Communicating with Russia Was a Big Deal After All (No Kidding).
Here are some more things in the news today...
[Content Note: Rape culture. Covers entire section.]
While many of us are resolving to not forget the fuckery that went down during the Kavanaugh confirmation, the fuckers responsible for it aren't letting anyone forget even if we wanted to.
This is just a sitting U.S. senator making a joke about how they didn't have the alcohol most enjoyed by an alleged sexual predator on hand to celebrate the confirmation of that alleged predator to the Supreme Court. https://t.co/luswWCTCsh
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) October 7, 2018
Meanwhile, as these wrecks of humanity toast Kavanaugh's confirmation to the nation's highest court while simultaneously still whining that his life has been "shattered," Christine Blasey Ford still can't even go home, because she's still being threatened.
Kate Riga at TPM: Blasey Ford Lawyers: She's 'Horrified' at Trump's Mockery, Receiving 'Unending' Threats. "Lawyers for professor Christine Blasey Ford gave some insight into how their client has fared in the days since her harrowing testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, saying that she is 'horrified' at the jokes [Donald] Trump has made at her expense and that she and her family have not yet been able to move home due to 'unending threats.' 'Her family has been through a lot,' attorney Debra Katz told MSNBC's Kasie Hunt. 'They are not living at home. It's going to be quite some time before they're able to live at home. The threats have been unending. It's deplorable. It's been very frightening.'"
And Trump continues to pour gas on the flames, calling the allegations against Kavanaugh a Democratic hoax: "Trump once again reiterated his support for Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh Monday, while railing against alleged discussions about impeaching the recently confirmed nominee. 'Now they're thinking about impeaching a brilliant jurist, a man that did nothing wrong, a man that was caught up in a hoax that was set up by the Democrats,' Trump told reporters. He later called the alleged impeachment movement 'an insult to the American people,' and claimed that the 'dishonesty' and 'charade' from the Democrats would hurt them in the midterm elections. 'It was all made up, it was fabricated, and it's a disgrace,' Trump concluded. 'And I think it's really gonna show you something come November 6th.'"
That the Democrats overreached in trying to prevent Kavanaugh's confirmation is a major Republican talking point ahead of the midterms. McConnell and Trump have been pushing this shit constantly.
McConnell was banging on about this before the vote, and now he's banging on about it after the vote. That the confirmation supposedly fired up the GOP base is a big talking point he wants to get out there.
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) October 6, 2018
See also:
Stephanie Griffith at Think Progress: Trump Says His Attacks on Christine Blasey Ford Helped Get Kavanaugh Confirmed.
Ed Pilkington at the Guardian: Republicans Say Bitter Kavanaugh Fight Energizing Base as Collins Defends Vote.
Chas Danner at NYMag: McConnell Says Kavanaugh Outrage Will 'Blow Over' — and GOP Takeover of Courts Will Continue.
From Danner's piece:
"Harassing members at their homes, crowding the halls with people acting horribly, the effort to humiliate us really helped me unify my conference," McConnell told the New York Times. "So I want to thank these clowns for all the help they provided."So, that's just the Senate Republican leader calling protesting survivors and our allies "clowns" in the midst of an argument that our resistance is unifying conservatives behind Trump, which sure doesn't make a whole lot of sense, given that Kavanaugh is aggressively unpopular, even among Republicans.
This nonsensical talking point is, I fear, what they are planning to use to explain an otherwise unexplainable midterm win.
We know already that our elections are indubitably unfair: Gerrymandering, voter suppression, felon disenfranchisement, voter ID laws, dark money, corrupt media, unreliable voting machines, social media meddling, and so on.
The only question is whether there will be straight-up interference on election day, from foreign or domestic parties. And it seems incredibly unlikely that there wouldn't be, given that our president and his governing party have shown zero interest in holding accountable anyone who interferes to their benefit.
I am going to vote. I really hope it matters, and fear that it won't.
* * *
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is traveling with President Trump on AF1 down to Orlando for Trump’s speech to the International Association of Chiefs of Police later today — this time two weeks ago things were ... different
— Laura Jarrett (@LauraAJarrett) October 8, 2018
[CN: Climate change] Coral Davenport at the New York Times: Major Climate Report Describes a Strong Risk of Crisis as Early as 2040. "A landmark report from the United Nations' scientific panel on climate change paints a far more dire picture of the immediate consequences of climate change than previously thought and says that avoiding the damage requires transforming the world economy at a speed and scale that has 'no documented historic precedent.' The report, issued on Monday by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a group of scientists convened by the United Nations to guide world leaders, describes a world of worsening food shortages and wildfires, and a mass die-off of coral reefs as soon as 2040 — a period well within the lifetime of much of the global population."
JUST IN: Hope Hicks to become Fox chief communications officerhttps://t.co/FkmabRrbEZ pic.twitter.com/pMKvohidri
— The Hill (@thehill) October 8, 2018
Jane Perlez at the New York Times: Mike Pompeo and His Chinese Counterpart Trade Harsh Words.
In unusually blunt language to an American secretary of state, China's foreign minister accused the United States on Monday of interfering in its internal affairs and of harming his nation's interests on the question of Taiwan.[CN: Police brutality; shooting; racism; death]
In a face-to-face exchange with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, the foreign minister, Wang Yi, chided the Trump administration for "ceaselessly elevating" trade tensions and "casting a shadow" over relations between the two countries.
Mr. Pompeo, who sat across the table from Mr. Wang at the start of talks in Beijing, said in a tart response that the United States had a "fundamental disagreement" on the issues that China raised.
The sharp tit-for-tat stripped away the customary veneer of diplomatic niceties during public remarks. It came days after Washington laid down a tough new China policy announced by Vice President Mike Pence, who declared in a speech that the United States would "not stand down."
"A police department in small town in Ohio has hired the officer who killed 12-year-old Tamir Rice... Bellaire police Chief Richard Flanagan [said] of his decision to hire Loehmann: 'He was never charged. It’s over and done with.'" Rage seethe boil. https://t.co/vNzJvZEizf
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) October 8, 2018
[CN: Sexual violence; murder] Luke Barnes at ThinkProgress: Bulgarian Investigative Journalist Viktoria Marinova Found Brutally Murdered in Ruse. "A popular Bulgarian journalist, who reported on alleged corruption involving European Union funds, has been brutally raped and murdered in the town of Ruse, on the border with Romania. The body of Viktoria Marinova, 30, was discovered in a park next to the River Danube on Saturday. According to the European Federation of Journalists Marinova had been beaten and strangled, and the attack was so vicious that she wasn't able to be identified until Sunday night." My god. My condolences to her family, friends, and colleagues. Fucking hell.
What have you been reading that we need to resist today?
How to Not Forget
[Content Note: Rape culture.]
Over the last weeks and months and years, survivors of sexual trauma have been telling our stories in the hopes of breaking open the silence around sexual violence and revealing the vast scope of the rape culture to those with the luxury of ignorance.
This is not the first time that survivors, predominantly women, have spoken out en masse about sexual harassment and sexual assault. To the contrary, survivors tell our stories publicly in a terrible cycle, recountings of our pain obliged by the denial and apologia around every new allegation against famous men, or a student athlete gang rape making the national news, or another conservative legislator saying something gross about rape, or a judge giving a paltry sentence to a sadist whose defense attorneys assure us he's a good boy who just made a mistake.
Over and over, we tell our stories, hoping this will be the time that sparks a seismic, lasting change.
But eventually, inevitably, we are told to "get over it," by the people who have been made uncomfortable by the sickening ubiquity of our stories and want to get back, as swiftly as possible, to the comfort of never doing a goddamn thing about the unfathomable scope of the harm that other people suffer.
Institutional forgetting is one of the rape culture's most reliable defenses.
Which is why I am heartened to have encountered this message everywhere the past few days, in the wake of Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation to the Supreme Court: We won't forget.
It is filled with meaning, that phrase of only three words. Surely, we shouldn't forget any of it — we should remember with lasting gratitude the heroics shown by Dr. Christine Blasey Ford and the other people who came forward, at steep personal cost, to share what they knew of Kavanaugh's many abuses; and we should forever remember the courage and strength of an overwhelming number of survivors who shared their stories in the futile hope of persuading indecent people to decency.
But it is directed, in this moment, primarily at the justice, the president who nominated him, and the senators who protected and voted for him.
We won't forget what you did.
It is a battle cry. It is the solemn vow of people who want to believe their votes still matter. It is a threat and a promise.
Some of the people saying it actually mean it.
They will remember the names of the senators who cast their votes for Kavanaugh, like Arya Stark remembers the names of the people who must die at her hand. They will remember them with a burning fury that fuels their commitment to the monumental task of removing these purveyors of malice from power, and simultaneously threatens to engulf them and reduce their own selves to ashes in the process.
I know what that feels like. I'm someone who decided not to forget a very long time ago.
There is a cost to not forgetting.
I don't say that as a discouragement, but as a warning. So that anyone new to not forgetting can make the necessary preparations.
So that you never, ever, let a moment pass in which you can do self-care. So that you never let slide by an opportunity to do whatever thing makes you feel incandescent joy. So that you resolve, right now, if you haven't before, to allow other people to care for you, to help carry your burden, to love you.
You're going to need them. Because there is a cost to not forgetting.
My best friend calls me the Lint Trap, because I remember everything. (Except for all the things I don't.) My memory is legendary among my friends, who celebrate like lotto winners when they remember something I don't, which always makes me laugh, because I have no control over and did not earn my strange ability to recall 20-year-old conversations nearly verbatim.
It is a gift. And it is a curse. And it is the thing that keeps me connected to the people about whom I write.
I have, in the fourteen years since I started this space, written a lot about people who have been victimized by sexual violence. There are 1,158 entries filed under the Today in Rape Culture label, and I only started using labels in 2009. I have written about a lot of survivors.
Most of the time, I'm writing about people I don't know. Sometimes, I don't even know their names, depending on whether the nature of the crime, or their age, or their continued peril, compels the press — or just me — to protect their anonymity.
I think of them often. I carry their stories with me, right alongside my own.
Very occasionally, I am contacted by the people about whom I've written, or members of their immediate family. It has, so far, always been to thank me for amplifying their stories; for taking up space, unequivocally, in solidarity with them. Sometimes they give me updates that make me grin and sometimes they give me updates that make me weep.
I cry a lot doing this work. It would be easier to forget.
But I want to remember them. And I do.
Not forgetting is always hard, but I will tell you this: It is easier to sustain not forgetting because you fiercely love survivors than because you hate politicians and judges.
Everyone who decides to not forget comes to that decision for a different reason. For me, doing this work is the only way I can give a reason to the things that happened to me — which I have to do, because I can't bear for them to have happened for no reason at all.
That doesn't mean I don't hate politicians and judges who treat survivors with sneering contempt. I do. I hate them with the fiery passion of ten thousand suns. I just love myself and my fellow survivors even more.
That sustains me. Find something that sustains you, too; that nourishes you in way vengeance alone cannot. You're going to need it.
Not forgetting lasts a very long time.
After Sham FBI Investigation, GOP Moves Ahead with Kavanaugh Nomination
[Content Note: Rape culture.]
The FBI has completed its background report on its investigation of allegations against Brett Kavanaugh and handed over said report to the White House, despite having failed to interview dozens of potential witnesses to Kavanaugh's alleged sexual assaults, including Christine Blasey Ford.
If it wasn't already evident that the investigation was a sham with no purpose other than providing Republicans with the ability to say the allegations had not been corroborated, the fact that the investigation into a sexual assault allegation didn't include an interview with the primary eyewitness should leave no doubt.
It's only because of sinister rape culture narratives about women being vengeful liars who routinely invent allegations of sexual assault that it isn't considered absurd in the extreme that an alleged crime could be investigated without even talking to the victim.
Naturally, the White House immediately announced that it "has found no corroboration of the allegations of sexual misconduct against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh after examining interview reports from the FBI's latest probe into the judge's background."
Raj Shah, spokesman for the White House, said in a statement early Thursday morning: "The White House has received the Federal Bureau of Investigation's supplemental background investigation into Judge Kavanaugh, and it is being transmitted to the Senate."And Republican Senate leadership naturally agrees: Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has already "filed cloture on the Kavanaugh nomination, setting up a Friday cloture vote and a final confirmation vote 30 hours later."
He added that senators "have been given ample time to review this seventh background investigation." Mr. Shah continued: "With this additional information, the White House is fully confident the Senate will vote to confirm Judge Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court."
If Senate Republicans do confirm Brett Kavanaugh, it will be in spite of his poor temperament and overt partisanship; in spite of multiple allegations of sexual assault; in spite of assertions that he lied under oath to the Senate during his nomination hearings; in spite of multiple religious organizations, including the National Council of Churches and the Benedictine Sisters of Baltimore, protesting his confirmation; in spite of more than 1,000 law professors signing a letter stating that the Senate should not confirm him; and in spite of only 33 percent of Americans supporting Kavanaugh's confirmation.
If they confirm him, despite all of that, Republicans will be communicating more loudly than ever previously that they are totally fucking done with even the appearance of democratic leadership.
I'll just quickly observe once again that the Republican Party continues to behave as though they will never have to be accountable to voters ever again. And they're doing it 34 days before the midterms.
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) October 3, 2018
And like deplorable cultists cheered Donald Trump as he publicly mocked Christine Blasey Ford, they will cheer when Kavanaugh is confirmed to the Supreme Court, after countless survivors told our stories and pleaded with Republicans not to empower an abuser.
This has been a protracted display of dominance; their revenge on uppity women. Yes, they want Kavanaugh because he will be their lackey on the Supreme Court, but they also want to see through his nomination despite all the reasons to replace him because to confirm him now will be a magnificent act of malice.
And, as I am obliged to observe with terrifying frequency, malice is the animating centerpiece of the Republican agenda. Or, as Adam Serwer put it at the Atlantic: The Cruelty Is the Point.
Whether Kavanaugh will be a good jurist, or even as corrupt a jurist as they expect him to be, is wholly beside the point now. Now, the objective is exclusively about winning while delivering as much pain as possible to their opponents.
Malice animates them. They are sadists. Harm is the point.
No wonder they fancy Kavanaugh.
We Resist: Day 622
One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures (plus the occasional non-Republican who obliges us to resist their nonsense, too, like we don't have enough to worry about) is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.
So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.
Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.
* * *
Earlier today by me: Trump Mocks Christine Blasey Ford at Rally to Uproarious Laughter from Deplorable Crowd and Gross Human Rights Violations at Immigration Jail and Trump Regime Terminates Iran Treaty.
Here are some more things in the news today...
I have really been trying to be selective in terms of the news regarding the Kavanaugh nomination that I share, for both my own well-being and yours. This item, however, is something of which we all need to be aware. [Content Note: Rape culture; victim-blaming; slut-shaming] Elise Viebeck at the Washington Post: Republicans on Senate Panel Release Explicit Statement about Kavanaugh Accuser's Sex Life.
In an unprecedented move, Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday released an explicit statement that purports to describe the sexual preferences of a woman who has accused Supreme Court nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh of misconduct.It is absolutely outrageous that Republicans would release a letter like this from anyone with whom Swetnick had a relationship, as though every woman who has survived sexual assault tells every man with whom she's subsequently involved, but the fact that they released this horseshit based on the experiences of a man who claims to have dated her for a "couple of weeks" is enraging.
The statement, which was circulated to the hundreds of journalists on the Judiciary Committee's press list, was from Dennis Ketterer, a former Democratic congressional candidate and television meteorologist who said he was involved in a brief relationship with Kavanaugh accuser Julie Swetnick in 1993.
Swetnick said last week in an affidavit that Kavanaugh was present at a house party in 1982 where she alleges she was the victim of a gang rape, a claim he vehemently denies.
In his statement, Ketterer said Swetnick once told him that she sometimes enjoyed group sex with multiple men and had first engaged in it during high school. Ketterer said the remark "derailed" their relationship, which he described as involving "physical contact" but no intercourse.
Ketterer said Swetnick "never said anything about being sexually assaulted, raped, gang-raped, or having sex against her will" and "never mentioned Brett Kavanaugh in any capacity." He described their relationship as lasting for a "couple of weeks."
Remember this shit, too, when dipshits demand to know why it is that women don't report. FUCK EVERYTHING.
And while we're on the subject of Senate Republicans being rape apologist, victim-blaming shitwheels...
Remember when people were pinning hopes on Lindsey Graham that he was going to "stop Trump" w/ John McCain, and I was like: Uh, I guess you're new here, but Lindsey Graham is trash. And then people shouted at me that I was a dumb cunt who didn't appreciate allies when I saw them? https://t.co/LqrgL2Cg9L
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) October 3, 2018
Breathtaking. Meanwhile...
Leigh Ann Caldwell and Heidi Przybyla at NBC News: FBI Has Not Contacted Dozens of Potential Sources in Kavanaugh Investigation. "More than 40 people with potential information into the sexual misconduct allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh have not been contacted by the FBI, according to multiple sources that include friends of both the nominee and his accusers. The bureau is expected to wrap up its expanded background investigation as early as Wednesday into two allegations against Kavanaugh — one from Christine Blasey Ford and the other from Deborah Ramirez. But sources close to the investigation, as well as a number of people who know those involved, say the FBI has not contacted dozens of potential corroborators or character witnesses."
A sham investigation. And it should have been obvious that it would be, from the moment that asshole Jeff Flake called for it.
* * *
[CN: Rape culture; trauma; misogyny] Mara Gordon at NPR: Sexual Assault and Harassment May Have Lasting Health Repercussions for Women.
The trauma of sexual assault or harassment is not only hard to forget; it may also leave lasting effects on a woman's health. This finding of a study published Wednesday adds support to a growing body of evidence suggesting the link.Right now, the way that we're addressing this issue is by tasking (predominantly) women who are themselves frequently survivors of sexual assault and/or harassment with trying to solve the problem, exposing themselves to more abuse, and thus making ourselves sicker and sicker as we try to encourage our culture to get well. That isn't working. It's also aggressively cruel.
In the study of roughly 300 middle-aged women, an experience of sexual assault was associated with anxiety, depression, and poor sleep. A history of workplace sexual harassment was also associated with poor sleep, and with an increased risk of developing high blood pressure.
"These are experiences that [a woman] could have had long ago ... and it can have this long arm of influence throughout a woman's life," says Rebecca Thurston, lead author of the study, and a research psychologist and director of the Women's Behavioral Health Laboratory at the University of Pittsburgh.
..."These [traumatic experiences] are clearly critical things that happen to people early on, that have these really long lasting effects," says Susan Mason, an assistant professor of epidemiology at the University of Minnesota who studies the effects of trauma. "These really shape people's life trajectories."
..."Sexual assault and sexual abuse are much more common than people think," Thurston says. These are "key toxic stressors for women."
While researchers weren't surprised that sexual assault and harassment seemed to be related to the development of mood disorders and poor sleep, they were impressed by the strength of the association.
"These should be urgent public health priorities," Mason says. "How do we address the fundamental ways that our social structure affects health?"
* * *
[CN: War on agency] Summer Ballentine at the AP: Missouri Down to 1 Abortion Clinic Amid Legal Battle. "Missouri is down to one clinic providing abortions Wednesday, after the only other clinic in the state that performs the procedure failed to adhere to new state requirements. Federal appeals court judges ruled last month that Missouri can enforce a requirement that doctors must have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals before they can perform abortions. The judges issued a mandate Monday for that rule to officially take effect. ...Women seeking abortions [must now] go to Planned Parenthood's St. Louis clinic — which is now the only facility in Missouri where abortions can be performed — or travel to neighboring states." That is the very definition of an undue burden.
"The family applied for FEMA assistance but were denied. Like many families in Puerto Rico, they couldn’t find the necessary papers needed to prove the home was theirs: It was passed down through the family through generations." https://t.co/GFn0f6l2Wi
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) October 3, 2018
[CN: Class warfare] Tami Luhby at CNN Money: Getting Health Insurance Through Work Now Costs Nearly $20,000. "Employers and workers together are spending close to $20,000 for family health insurance coverage in 2018, according to a new Kaiser Family Foundation report. Although premiums have increased fairly modestly in recent years, the growth has far outpaced workers' raises over time. The average family premium has increased 55% since 2008, twice as fast as workers' wages and three times as fast as inflation, Kaiser's Employer Health Benefits Survey found. Companies pick up most of the tab, shelling out $14,100 a year, on average. Still, workers have to pay an average of $5,550, up 65% from a decade ago. For single coverage, total premiums have reached $6,900, on average, up 47% from 2008. Workers contribute roughly $1,200 a year. Deductibles also continue to burn a deeper hole in workers' pockets. The average deductible now stands at $1,350, up 212% since 2008. That's eight times faster than wage growth."
[CN: Toxic water] Kat Lonsdorf at NPR: 'You Just Don't Touch That Tap Water Unless Absolutely Necessary'. "Aleigha Sloan can't remember ever drinking a glass of water from the tap at her home. That is 'absolutely dangerous,' the 17-year-old says, wrinkling her nose and making a face at the thought. 'You just don't touch that tap water unless absolutely necessary. I mean, like showers and things — you have to do what you have to do. But other than that, no,' she says. 'I don't know anybody that does.' ...Americans across the country, from Maynard's home in rural Appalachia to urban areas like Flint, Mich., or Compton, Calif., are facing a lack of clean, reliable drinking water. At the heart of the problem is a water system in crisis: aging, crumbling infrastructure and a lack of funds to pay for upgrading it."
If Trump really wanted to "Make America Great Again," he could start with a plan to make sure every resident of this nation had reliable access to clean drinking water. That he never even mentions this subject is a pretty good indicator that he has no interest in improving anything for the lives of average Americans, in case literally everything else he does hadn't already tipped his hand.
What have you been reading that we need to resist today?
Trump Mocks Christine Blasey Ford at Rally to Uproarious Laughter from Deplorable Crowd
[Content Note: Rape culture.]
Last night, at yet another Make America Clap for Me Again rally in Mississippi, Donald Trump went on an extended riff mocking Christine Blasey Ford, who has accused Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault. After ridiculing her, he went on to accuse all of the women who have alleged abuse by Kavanaugh of leaving his life "in tatters," calling them "evil people."
During this protracted attack on a survivor, the crowd roared with laughter.
Below, a video of the the President of the United States, himself a confessed sexual assaulter, publicly mocking a survivor of sexual assault and mischaracterizing her testimony while his deplorable cultists laugh.
WATCH: President Trump mocks Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, who has accused Trump's Supreme Court pick Judge Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct, during rally in Mississippi. https://t.co/pZfWN8IFMV pic.twitter.com/81YEs8oXr5
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) October 3, 2018
Trump, standing at a podium in front of a crowd, says: What he's going through— [mocks Ford] "Thirty-six years ago, this happened. I had one beer." Right? "I had one beer." Well, you think it was— "Nope! It was one beer." Oh good. How did you get home? "I don't remember." How'd you get there? "I don't remember." Where is the place? "I don't remember." [crowd begins laughing] How many years ago was it? "I don't know. I don't know." [crowd cheers and applauds] "I don't know. I don't know!" What neighborhood was it in? "I don't know." Where's the house? "I don't know." Upstairs? Downstairs? Where was it? "I don't know. But I had one beer! That's the only thing I remember." [laughter and cheers] And a man's life is in tatters. A man's life is shattered. His wife is shattered. His daughters, who are beautiful and incredible young kids— They destroy people; they wanna destroy people. These are really evil people.Ford does recall when the incident happened, and that it was in an upstairs room. He is deliberately misrepresenting her testimony in order to bolster his narrative that she is a liar who made up the entire thing, rather than a credible witness who understandably remembers some details and not others from an attack made on her three decades earlier.
And, despite the fact that his party could still confirm Kavanaugh at any time, and, even if they don't, he will still be an extremely powerful judge, Trump framed Kavanaugh as a man whose life has been ruined by evil, lying bitches. This, too, is a misrepresentation. But it's one Trump needs to make in order to convince his cultists to not listen to survivors. To distrust women and protect men.
He warned the crowd that men will be fired from their jobs and bellowed, "Think of your husbands! Think of your sons!"
And laugh at Christine Blasey Ford.
I Write Letters
[Content Note: Rape culture.]
Dear Men Who Are Incessantly Whining That Holding Men Accountable for Sexual Harassment and Assault Is Making Life Too Difficult and Scary for Men:
I will make a deal with you.
I will start giving a single tiny fuck about your trembling fear of being falsely accused at any moment by a hysterical lying woman, who inexplicably wants to shove herself into the meat grinder of making a rape allegation, when you start caring, even a little, that women spend our lives vacillatingly suspended somewhere between conscious and subterranean terror by the ever-present threat of actually being sexually assaulted — and, further, that we are tasked with the aggressively unfair and genuinely impossible role of preventing said threat by obsessively following ever-changing and often contradictory rules we have no input in conceiving or enforcing, which are structured to govern and control every aspect of our existence, including what we wear; how we wear it; how we carry ourselves; where we walk; when we walk there; with whom we walk; whom we trust; what we do; where we do it; with whom we do it; what we drink; how much we drink; if we take drugs; what kind of drugs we take; making sure to monitor our drinks so no one can slip us drugs; whether we make eye contact; whether we smile; whether we respond to overtures; whether we rebuff overtures; the tone in which we reject advances; the facial expressions we use; being alone; being with a stranger; being in a group; being in a group of strangers; being out after dark; being in unfamiliar areas; whether we're carrying something; how we carry it; what kind of shoes we're wearing in case we have to run; what kind of purse we carry; what we carry in that purse; what jewelry we wear; what time it is; what street it is; what environment it is; whether we cross the street when we are being followed by a man we don't know; making sure we cross the street without suggesting we're "profiling" him and thus grievously insulting him with our inability to magically discern whether he's a danger to us; not taking any shit from our teachers, bosses, boyfriends, husbands, upstairs neighbors, mail carriers, police we called for help, judges determining our future, senators, president, random dudes on the bus, but also not doing anything that threatens the manhood of our teachers, bosses, boyfriends, husbands, upstairs neighbors, mail carriers, police we called for help, judges determining our future, senators, president, random dudes on the bus; how many people we sleep with; what kind of people we sleep with; who our friends are; to whom we give our number; what we post on social media; to whom we send private images; who's around when the delivery guy comes; getting an apartment where we can see who's at the door before they can see us; checking before we open the door to the delivery guy; owning a dog or a dog-sound-making machine; getting a roommate; taking self-defense; always being alert always paying attention always watching our back always being aware of our surroundings and never letting our guards down for a moment lest we be sexually assaulted and if we are and didn't follow all the rules it's our own fault.
And, on top of all of that (which is, regrettably, hardly a comprehensive compendium), we are meant to understand that it's an immense and unreasonable imposition on men to ask them to engage in sexual assault prevention by not sexually assaulting people.
Once you start caring about all that, then I'll care about your fee-fees.
J/k. I won't. I will never give an infinitesimal fuck that you feel squirmy because men who have done terrible things to women are being publicly exposed as the abusive sadists that they are, even in the event that you profess to care about the oppressive lives women are obliged to lead because of shitwheels like you.
I guess I'm the cunt you always said I was after all.
I'm good with that.
Contemptuously,
Liss
Joe Biden Is Not the Man for This Moment
[Content Note: Sexual harassment; rape culture.]
Joe Biden was never my favorite politician, to put it politely.
Apart from his history of plagiarism, his fondness for misogynist and racist "jokes" and propensity for "gaffes" that sound a lot like bigotry, his record of well-representing Delaware as a sanctuary for credit card companies, and the last year of "I woulda won" bullshit, he's got a permanent stain from his disgraceful performance during the Clarence Thomas nomination, when he was shitty to Anita Hill and refused to call three other witnesses who were prepared to make their own allegations against Thomas.
Today, Alexander Burns and Jonathan Martin at the New York Times ask: "Biden Is Preparing for 2020. Can He Overcome the Hill-Thomas Hearings?"
"Can he?" The real question is should he (no), and perhaps an even bigger question is why the media is already so inclined to help him "overcome" that dreadful history, only so they can tank him with it in the general election, if he gets there.
I wish I thought Biden were smart enough to know that's exactly what would happen, but I don't think he is. Or rather, I think his ego overwhelms whatever smarts he's got.
Which, among a number of other reasons, makes him categorically not the man for this moment.
The Sham Investigation to Give Republicans Cover
[Content Note: Rape culture.]
On Friday, after Republican Senator Jeff Flake stood in front of cameras and made an expression that vaguely resembled human compassion and then called for an FBI investigation into the allegations against Brett Kavanaugh, I tweeted: Please let us not pretend that Jeff Flake was motivated by anything but the optics, which are marginally improved by calling for a sham investigation of a man whose alleged abuse is but one of many reasons that he is unqualified to serve on the Supreme Court.
Naturally, I was accused of being ungrateful, uncharitable, a bitch. And, just as predictably, I was also right.
The investigation is not designed to uncover truth or seek justice; it is designed to give cover to Republicans who want to be able to cast a vote for Kavanaugh and justify it by saying that no credible allegations were corroborated by a federal investigation.
They want to be able to say that there's no "proof" that Kavanaugh ever harmed any women, and they're banking on the fact that most people are eminently willing to discount the eyewitness testimony of victims in sexual assault cases, in a way they would never discount eyewitness testimony provided by victims in other crimes, because of the pernicious narrative that lying women routinely invent rape allegations.
So, the investigation is a sham.
Mike DeBonis and Josh Dawsey at the Washington Post report: Fight over Kavanaugh Intensifies Amid Confusion over Limits of FBI Sexual Assault Investigation.
The FBI investigation meant to defuse the explosive conflict over Supreme Court nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh sparked a new round of partisan combat Sunday, as the White House appeared to retain sharp limits on the probe even as [Donald] Trump and Republican officials publicly suggested otherwise.On Saturday, Trump tweeted: "NBC News incorrectly reported (as usual) that I was limiting the FBI investigation of Judge Kavanaugh, and witnesses, only to certain people. Actually, I want them to interview whoever they deem appropriate, at their discretion. Please correct your reporting!"
Two Trump administration officials said Sunday that the White House had not placed any limits on the FBI investigation into claims of sexual assault leveled against Kavanaugh but was also opposed to a "fishing expedition" that could take a broader look at Kavanaugh's credibility and behavior.
...Amid the confusion, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (Calif.), the top Democrat on the committee, wrote to McGahn and FBI Director Christopher A. Wray on Sunday asking for a copy of any "written directive" sent to investigators.
Other Democrats warned over the weekend against too many limits on the purview of the investigation.
"They ought to be doing multiple investigations at the same time," Sen. Christopher A. Coons (D-Del.), a Judiciary Committee member, said in an MSNBC interview Saturday. "There are multiple allegations currently in front of the committee, and I think it is not hard to figure out the universe of witnesses. It is not 500. It may not be 50. But it has to be more than five."
...The squabbling added to the swirl of public confusion over the parameters of the FBI inquiry and who is setting them. The order to the FBI was signed by Trump but has not been made public. White House officials have sought to lay responsibility for the details on either the Senate or the FBI.
But that contradicted the directive the FBI had actually received: "The president's Saturday tweet also sparked confusion in the FBI, which had previously been told to conduct only a limited investigation of particular allegations, a person familiar with the matter said. It was unclear Sunday whether there had been more communications between the White House and the FBI clarifying what agents should look into."
In typical fashion, Trump is publicly tweeting one thing, while something else entirely different (and far more sinister) is going on behind the scenes.
And Jeff Flake was called a hero for days, for orchestrating this horseshit.
This has been another terrible edition of Cassandras Who Aren't Inclined to Extend Good Faith to Known Liars Being Shouted at by Very Important Media People Who Remain Dangerously Credulous, Only for the Cassandras to Be Proven Right Again.
Gilead of Republicans Stand by Their Man, Kavanaugh
[Content Note: Sexual assault.]
The first thing to do is eradicate from our collective sense of right and wrong the notion that if Republicans only knew some men were rapists they would actually care.
Republicans control 2.5, and soon to be 3, out of 3 branches of the U.S. government. They can do what they want. And so, they will. Yes, we — women in particular — are angry and will instigate a backlash. Republicans and their president curiously do not seem concerned about this.
The second thing to understand is that Brett Kavanaugh's spittle-flecked, sobbing testimony looked a lot like tears of frustrated, entitled rage — a rage that many people who aren't men and/or who aren't white know quite well.
 |
| Credible default human is very credible. |
That "misconception" alone, in a society that didn't hate women and in which actual competence mattered, would disqualify him from sitting on our nation's highest court. Yet, here we are. The people who hold power in our nation do hate women, and it's looking more and more like the number one question asked of their job applicants is "How much?"
(And if you're still saying Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 election because she didn't visit Wisconsin, you've lost the fucking plot).
Much of Kavanaugh's display was familiar precisely because it fits the pattern of fragile conservative white man, much like the white men who run the Republican party and who consistently rig systems in their own favor, who simply cannot fathom having his birthright questioned. As he continued to toot his own horn, it were as though he simultaneously kept being reminded that, no, many people don't see him as a good man, not at all, and it kept making him more and more vehemently angry. So angry, in fact, that he could at times barely form words, as he poked his tongue into his cheek instead, furrowed his brow, condescended to Democratic female senators, and fought back rage-tears instead.
And that was his behavior ostensibly sober, during a job interview, in public.
For those who are purportedly, admittedly ignorant of rape culture, such as conservative elite David French, they would do well to look at Kavanaugh's obvious anger to begin to understand why survivors of rape and assault often react the way they do and in ways that don't seem "logical" to other white men.
Finally, understand that Dr. Christine Blasey Ford's testimony was heroic, regardless of outcome. And, so is our continued resistance.
Dr. Ford went into all of this in spite of the multitudes of rape culture, misogynistic narratives pervading our society. That women lie and men are automatically credible, for instance. That an elite white Christian family man could not possibly be a predator, for another. That conservative men protect, or even give a single fuck about, women.
I will never not be in awe of women and all that we endure.
Kavanaugh Is Republicans' Revenge on Uppity Women
Today, despite the fact that even the American Bar Association is now urging a delay, the Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee will reportedly press forward with their scheduled vote on Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court confirmation, which, presuming they vote him out of committee, will be followed by procedural votes Saturday and Monday, then by a final vote on Tuesday in the full Senate.
It's vanishingly unlikely that Kavanaugh's nomination won't pass out of committee for a full Senate vote, since there isn't a single Republican woman on the Senate Judiciary Committee who might be moved to decency by some residual humanity awakened by the primal fear of violent men.
And Kavanaugh's nomination "could still be considered by the full Senate with an unfavorable recommendation by the committee," if Republican Senate leadership decides to ignore that recommendation.
There is, of course, still a miniscule chance that Kavanaugh won't get the votes during the full Senate vote, since Republican Senators Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski are mildly squirming at the optics of voting for an accused sex predator who flipped his shit when asked to address the allegations against him.
I have seen it posited, however, that Democratic Senator and colossal turd Joe Manchin will vote with the Republicans to give cover to Collins and Murkowski, leaving Mike Pence to cast the tiebreaking vote, which he'll no doubt do while jizzing in his pants.
It is revoltingly appropriate that the Republican Senate majority is fixing to ram through Kavanaugh's confirmation in contravention of the will of a majority of the people, given that they've stood in firm opposition to consent in every sense, every step of the way.
This was always going to be bad. And it is.
That Kavanaugh remains on the precipice of being confirmed — even after being accused of multiple sexual assaults and using the time he was given to rebut the charges to put on a shocking performance making it abundantly clear that he is comprehensively incapable of being an impartial jurist — bodes poorly for the future of the Supreme Court and the nation's troubling trajectory.
Every day of Trump's presidency brings another gust of ominous wind, and, if Kavanaugh is indeed confirmed as we have every reason to expect that he will be, the thundering storm of which those winds whispered will be upon us. And there won't be an umbrella in sight.
The 2016 election was a referendum on how this nation values women. Every day of Trump's presidency has given sadists opportunity to cheer for abject cruelty. And the Kavanaugh nomination was an unbearable intersection of that misogyny and public malice — a spectacle designed to force women to demonstrate raw vulnerability, so that fetid ghouls whose organizing principle is denying agency to marginalized people could feverishly thrash in the theater of our pain.
Senator Kirsten Gillibrand said: "Any senator who votes to confirm Judge Kavanaugh after Dr. Ford's testimony is telling our country exactly this: The experiences of women don't matter. Their trauma doesn't matter. Their stories and their voices don't matter."
That is correct. And that is not incidental. It is entirely the point.
The Republicans could have cut Kavanaugh loose at any point. There is no shortage of conservative judges with an equal willingness to be the Trump Regime's lackey on the Supreme Court. But this is a display of dominance — the threatening act of a party consolidating its power behind a confessed abuser; who feel distressingly free to ignore voters' will; who are behaving as though they won't have to be beholden to voters ever again.
Who want to make it perfectly clear to women, even as women abandon their party, that we have no value to them. That men who have harmed us will be richly rewarded, empowered to cast the deciding vote on our autonomy.
Brett Kavanaugh is Republicans' revenge on uppity women, who have dared to resist them, dared to march, dared to run for office, dared to speak, dared to shout, dared to be angry, dared to demand equality, dared to report, dared to testify, dared to survive.
But we will keep surviving. Even now.
#resist
Kavanaugh Open Thread
Today, the Senate Judiciary Committee will hear testimony from Professor Christine Blasey Ford regarding her allegations that Brett Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her, and Kavanaugh will also give his testimony. No other witnesses will be allowed to tell their stories during the proceedings, because the Republicans are rape apologist shitwheels.
I am not going to be watching or live-tweeting the hearing, because I am just totally tapped out. So here is an open thread for discussion.
If you need a livestream, the hearing will stream on C-SPAN here and on PBS here.
We Resist: Day 615
One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures (plus the occasional non-Republican who obliges us to resist their nonsense, too, like we don't have enough to worry about) is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.
So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.
Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.
* * *
Earlier today by me: Kavanaugh Was a Republican Inevitability and Rosenstein Has His Job for Now — Until Trump Needs to Deploy a Major Distraction and Trump Continues to Brazenly Set the Stage to Declare Elections Illegitimate.
Here are some more things in the news today...
[Content Note: Descriptions of sexual assault; rape apologia. Covers entire section.]
Joanna Walters at the Guardian: Brett Kavanaugh: Third Woman Accuses Supreme Court Nominee of Sexual Misconduct.
A third woman has come forward to accuse Donald Trump's Supreme Court pick, Brett Kavanaugh, of sexual misconduct, according to a statement published on Wednesday by her lawyer Michael Avenatti.Kate Riga at TPM: As Accusations Mount, Three More Yalies Retract Support from Kavanaugh. "Yale Law School graduates Kent Sinclair, Douglas Rutzen, and Mark Osler, all of whom previously signed a letter attesting to Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's virtue, are now pushing for an investigation into the accusations against him, according to a Tuesday Washington Post report. ...Two of his peers during his undergrad time at Yale, Louisa Garry and Dino Ewing, withdrew their names Monday from a statement of support that ran in the New Yorker article detailing Deborah Ramirez's accusation of sexual misconduct." Which, of course, means that their support was based on nothing but Boys' Club bullshit in the first place.
Avenatti tweeted a declaration made in the name of Julie Swetnick, a resident of Washington D.C., which said she had met Kavanaugh and his school friend Mark Judge in the early 1980s and attended the same parties.
The declaration said she had "observed Brett Kavanaugh drink excessively at these parties and engage in abusive and physically aggressive behaviour towards girls, including pressing girls against him without their consent, 'grinding' against girls, and attempting to remove or shift girls clothing to expose private body parts."
Swetnick said she was at parties where Kavanaugh and his friend Judge were involved in situations that resulted in women being gang raped.
She wrote: "I witnessed efforts by Mark Judge, Brett Kavanaugh, and others to cause girls to become inebriated and disoriented so they could then be 'gang raped' in a side room or bedroom by a 'train' of numerous boys…"
..."In approximately 1982, I became the victim of one of these 'gang' or 'train' rapes where Mark Judge and Brett Kavanaugh were present. Shortly after the incident, I shared what had transpired with at least two other people. During this incident, I was incapacitated without my consent and unable to fight off boys raping me. I believe I was drugged using Quaaludes or something similar placed in what I was drinking."
Elham Khatami at ThinkProgress: Republicans Have Already Ensured That Thursday's Kavanaugh Hearing Will Be a Sham. "Senate Judiciary Committee Republicans announced Tuesday evening that the panel should be prepared to vote on the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh for Supreme Court on Friday, just one day after he and his accuser Dr. Christine Blasey Ford will testify before the committee regarding allegations that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her in high school. ...The intention of the hearings, for Republicans, is not to determine the facts of the case, but to assuage the few senators who could be swing votes on the nomination: potentially Sens. Jeff Flake, Susan Collins, and Lisa Murkowski. Just two Republican senators voting against him would be enough to derail Kavanaugh's nomination."
Mary Ann Georgantopoulos at BuzzFeed: Four People Told the Senate That Christine Blasey Ford Told Them She Was Sexually Assaulted in High School. At that link, way at the bottom of the piece, are images of Kavanaugh's calendar from that period, which a number of his defenders are using to "prove" he couldn't have assaulted Ford, because the party wasn't noted on his calendar. Let me just say this about that despicable defense...
The guy who raped me in high school was a student athlete and part of a group of boys, many of whom were also student athletes, who passed around a secret notebook called "The Log," in which they documented many of their various "conquests," including everything from video game high scores to girls (because we were things to be defeated, just like a record high score on Centipede). There was stuff about parties and drinking and drug use, etc. It was basically a shared journal of their high school years.
One of the pieces of evidence that I took to authorities (to be duly ignored), after a friend of mine who was a jock got his hands on "The Log" for me, was a poem entitled "Raping [Then Last Name]." (Which I've briefly mentioned previously.) It was written by another kid who was telling the story that the guy who raped me told him, like he was fucking Homer or something.
Anyway. The point is that my rape was recorded in "The Log." But the other girl I know he raped, because she told me, was not mentioned. That doesn't mean shit. It sure doesn't mean she wasn't raped. No more than something that Brett Kavanaugh left off his calendar in 1982.
(All of this is so triggering. I hate this. I hate remembering this stuff, and I hate thinking about it constantly, and I hate having to read about Kavanaugh's high school rape rampage, and I hate every single disgusting member of the Republican Party who has obliged us to navigate this garbage. And I take up space in solidarity with my fellow survivors who are having a tough time at the moment, too.)
* * *
Natasha Bertrand at the Atlantic: A Supreme Court Case Could Liberate Trump to Pardon His Associates.
A key Republican senator has quietly weighed in on an upcoming Supreme Court case that could have important consequences for Special Counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation.Another reason Republicans want to get Kavanaugh confirmed as swiftly as possible.
The Utah lawmaker Orrin Hatch, who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, filed a 44-page amicus brief earlier this month in Gamble v. United States, a case that will consider whether the dual-sovereignty doctrine should be put to rest. The 150-year-old exception to the Fifth Amendment's double-jeopardy clause allows state and federal courts to prosecute the same person for the same criminal offense.
According to the brief he filed on September 11, Hatch believes the doctrine should be overturned. "The extensive federalization of criminal law has rendered ineffective the federalist underpinnings of the dual sovereignty doctrine," his brief reads. "And its persistence impairs full realization of the Double Jeopardy Clause's liberty protections."
Within the context of the Mueller probe, legal observers have seen the dual-sovereignty doctrine as a check on [Donald] Trump's power: It could discourage him from trying to shut down the Mueller investigation or pardon anyone caught up in the probe, because the pardon wouldn't be applied to state charges.
Under settled law, if Trump were to pardon his former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, for example — he was convicted last month in federal court on eight counts of tax and bank fraud — both New York and Virginia state prosecutors could still charge him for any crimes that violated their respective laws. (Both states have a double-jeopardy law that bars secondary state prosecutions for committing "the same act," but there are important exceptions, as the Fordham University School of Law professor Jed Shugerman has noted.) If the dual-sovereignty doctrine were tossed, as Hatch wants, then Trump's pardon could theoretically protect Manafort from state action.
Betsy Woodruff and Erin Banco at the Daily Beast: Revealed: What Erik Prince and Moscow's Money Man Discussed in That Infamous Seychelles Meeting. "Joint U.S.-Russian raids to kill top terrorists. Teamwork between an American government agency and a sanctioned Russian fund. Moscow pouring money into the Midwest. These are just a few of the ideas the head of a Russian sovereign wealth fund touched on during his meeting with former Blackwater head Erik Prince in the Seychelles, just weeks before [Donald] Trump's inauguration, according to a memo exclusively reviewed by The Daily Beast. The meeting between Prince, an influential Trump ally, and Kirill Dmitriev, the CEO of the sanctioned fund, took place on Jan. 11, 2017, at the Four Seasons Hotel in a bar overlooking the Indian Ocean."
[CN: Video may autoplay at link] As I've noted before, Trump pretty clearly sees Venezuela as a resource he wants to exploit and control, and Mike Pence has been tasked with the Venezuela beat — so this item by Jason Lemon at Newsweek has my antennae tingling: "Pence issued a strong warning to Venezuela on Tuesday after it stationed troops along the border of Colombia in a move seen as highly provocative by Bogotá and Washington. Citing news reports of the military buildup, Pence called the decision from Caracas 'an obvious effort at intimidation' as he spoke at the U.N. General Assembly in New York. 'Let me be clear: The United States of America will always stand with our allies for their security,' Pence said, in a stern statement directed at the government of embattled Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. 'The Maduro regime would do well not to test the resolve of the President of the United States or the American people in this regard,' he added."
[CN: Nativism] Adolfo Flores at BuzzFeed: The Secretary of Homeland Security Said There Was "No Policy of Separating Families." A Memo Proves There Was. "A memo signed by Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen contradicts statements she made at the height of the family separation crisis last spring that the administration did not have a policy of separating children from parents. Nielsen signed off on the option to prosecute all adults who crossed the border illegally, including those with kids, knowing it would lead to family separations. ...'DHS could also permissibly direct the separation of parents or legal guardians and minors held in immigration detention so that the parent or legal guardian can be prosecuted,' the memo said."
[CN: War on agency] James Arkin at Politico: GOP Ground Game Focuses on Abortion to Turn Out Base. "The issue is getting a fraction of the attention of [Donald] Trump, health care, and immigration. But Republican and anti-abortion groups have made it a major part of their ground game: Organizers for Susan B. Anthony List, an anti-abortion group, ran a series of events in red states in August and early September and have had more than 500 canvassers knock on doors at more than 1.6 million homes in Ohio, Florida, Missouri, Indiana, West Virginia, and North Dakota. ...Even as national Democrats organize like never before around threats to abortion rights and Trump's judicial picks, Republicans looking at the narrow, more conservative Senate map see a different picture that they believe tilts toward them on this key issue. 'It is very clear that there is a sizable pro-life base that can deliver victories on the margins,' said Marjorie Dannenfelser, the president of Susan B. Anthony List."
Farai Mutsaka at the AP: Zimbabwe's Leader Says He Offers Trump Land for Golf Course. "Zimbabwe's leader says he is willing to offer land to [Donald] Trump to build a golf course in a national park teeming with wildlife. President Emmerson Mnangagwa was speaking to a New York investors' forum ahead of his first address to a United Nations annual gathering of world leaders this week. Mnangagwa said he made the offer to Trump staffers earlier this year at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland, pitching land in the tourist town of Victoria Falls." JFC.
* * *
Mike Fomil, Gabe Gutierrez, and Elizabeth Chuck at NBC News: After Florence, South Carolinians Brace for Record Flooding. "They survived Hurricane Florence's powerful wind and driving rain, but now residents in coastal South Carolina are wondering how they will make it through the historic floods that are forecast as a result of the swollen rivers that the storm left behind. ...Earlier in the week, county officials urged nearly 8,000 Georgetown residents to evacuate ahead of a 'record event' of up to 10 feet of flooding, the Associated Press said."
Amanda Morris at NPR: Florence Floodwaters Total Thousands of Cars, Stranding Locals. "Coupled with the cost of the damage to her house and loss of almost all her personal belongings, [Ashley Simpson] said she will need to move to a smaller home with cheaper rent in order to buy a new car. Everything she owns was trashed, but still, Simpson considers herself one of the lucky ones. 'I know a lot of people that don't have the means that I do to replace their cars,' she said. Without the money, some residents will be left waiting for a ride, surrounded by cars that won't take them anywhere."
Nicole Lafond at TPM: FEMA Chief Brock Long Spent $151,000 Of Taxpayers' Money on Unofficial Travel. "Brock Long, the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, spent more than $150,000 of government funds for personal travel on trips to and from his home in North Carolina on the weekends and during a family vacation to Hawaii, the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday. ...During his frequent trips from Washington, D.C. to North Carolina and back, Long also had an aide accompany him and used taxpayer funds to put the staffer up in a hotel while he spent time with family."
What have you been reading that we need to resist today?
Kavanaugh Was a Republican Inevitability
[Content Note: Sexual assault; rape culture; misogyny.]
I have previously noted that the 2016 election was a referendum on how this nation values women. Donald Trump's presidency has subsequently become a series of horrendous reminders that the people running the joint don't value women at all, except as targets or apologists for their vast abuse.
The Kavanaugh nomination is another painful interlude, with a specific message about how female survivors are valued. Or not, as the case clearly is.
Brett Kavanaugh has now been publicly accused by multiple women of sexual assault, but the Republicans refuse to abandon him, because they're drawing a line in the sand. They won't be held accountable by a bunch of abused women and their allies.
We say #BelieveSurvivors, and they say: "Fuck no."
Besides, belief is altogether irrelevant to them, anyhow. Whatever they may say publicly to discredit Kavanaugh's accusers, they might well "believe" them — in private, as they strategize defenses, or deep in their heart of dark hearts. The more important issue, for them, is that even if Kavanaugh did the things of which he's accused, it doesn't matter.
That's what it means to use a Supreme Court nomination as another referendum on how we value women.
And, just like Donald Trump was not an anomaly but an inevitability of Republican politics, so, too, is Brett Kavanaugh.
As I have observed many, many times in this space over the last 14 years, the Republican Party does not have a solid history of taking sexual assault seriously, to put it mildly.
There was that time House Republicans tried to redefine rape so that it was only "real" rape if it involved force. Then there was the time that Senate Republicans blocked votes on military sexual assault legislation. There was that other time New York state Republicans blocked a proposal to eliminate the statute of limitations on child sexual abuse. And let's not forget that time when Georgia state Republicans didn't want to consider a proposal on rape kits and accused the Democratic sponsor of "politicizing" the issue to get votes.
There was that time former GOP Senator and two-time presidential candidate Rick Santorum said that pregnant rape victims should make the best out of a bad situation. And that time former GOP Senate candidate Todd Akin argued that pregnancy from rape is really rare, because "If it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down." And that time Akin also accused women of lying about rape. And that time GOP Senate candidate Richard Mourdock said that getting pregnant from rape is god's plan. And all the times Republicans have told women how to avoid getting ourselves raped, as if it's our responsibility to stop rapists rather than predators' responsibility to not rape people.
There's Joe Walsh. And John Koster. And Phil Gingrey. And Thomas Corbin. And Jonathan Stickland. And Roy Moore. And Blake Farenthold. Just the tip of the iceberg of Republican politicians who have said stupid shit about sexual assault and/or been accused of sexual assault themselves.
And then there's the current Republican president, whose opening salvo in his campaign was to call undocumented Mexican immigrants rapists; who compared trade deficits to rape — twice; who is himself a confessed serial sex abuser; and whose Secretary of Education has rewritten campus assault guidlines to favor predators.
This is hardly a comprehensive list. The litany of examples of Republicans blocking legislation that would address sexual assault or support survivors, and of Republicans saying inappropriate things about rape and/or its victims, is interminable. And intolerable.
They want to win this battle, because it's the culmination of a protracted war, which they have been waging against survivors for a very long time.
Anyone who is surprised at their bloody-minded defense of an accused predator hasn't been paying attention.
But we should all be deeply appalled. And keep making lots of noise in unyielding protest.
A Tale of Two Senators
[Content Note: Rape culture.]
Christine Blasey Ford has requested an FBI investigation of her allegation against Brett Kavanaugh before she gives testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee. This is a calculated move, and a smart one.
I support #ChristineBlaseyFord's decision to call for a FBI investigation of #Kavanaugh. Like so many survivors, she understands that she is likely to not be believed, especially in the face of a wealthy white man who's a Supreme Court nominee.
— PrestonMitchum (@PrestonMitchum) September 19, 2018
The Republican majority on the Judiciary Committee offered to hold a quickie hearing on Monday. It was an obvious bid to give the most technical appearance of caring about her allegation while also sweeping it under the rug as swiftly as possible before confirming Kavanaugh. Ford has now complicated that cynical strategy, even as her life has been turned absolutely upside down by coming forward.
She has more integrity and bravery than the entire lot of fucking traitorous cowards in the Republican Party.
Naturally, the Democrats are standing with Ford, while the Republicans continue to be disgusting ghouls.
The stark difference between the Democratic response and the Republican response could not be more perfectly encapsulated than in the juxtaposition between the words of Republican Senator Lindsey Graham and Democratic Senator Mazie Hirono.
Lindsey Graham: "This has been a drive-by shooting when it comes to Kavanaugh. ...I'll listen to the lady, but we're going to bring this to a close."
Mazie Hirono: "I just want to say to the men of this country: Just shut up and step up. Do the right thing for a change. Not only do women like Dr. Ford, who bravely comes forward, need to be heard, but they need to be believed. They need to be believed. We cannot continue the victimization and the smearing of someone like Dr. Ford. We have to create an environment where women can come forward and be heard and be listened to. I want to thank Dr. Ford. I commend her courage. I believe her."
I believe her, too.
