Youth, Privilege, Preppies and the Kavanaugh Conundrum
RAINN (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network)
is the nation's largest anti-sexual violence organization. There is no
current statute of limitation for the offenses Kavanaugh is accused of
in Maryland today, but there could have been depending on when they occurred in the past.
Initially, it was suggested a simple way to depoliticize the battle
over the nomination of political appointees or anyone for that matter
would be for accusers to file a complaint with their local police, in
the case of Brett Kavanaugh would have been the Maryland Police.
It is possible that in the course of investigations those that may have
direct personal knowledge of the affairs and now have have daughters, granddaughters or their male counterparts would realize they have to speak up if they want to effect real changes in society.
The Kavanaugh nomination is moving to closure, at least as to whether
or not he will be elevated to the Supreme Court, and it appears certain
that depending on the outcome of the midterms and 2020 elections, he
could be in for a continuing rough ride.
However there is a far greater
lesson from the entire affair, and that is our own personal behavior.
Kavanaugh's and Blasey Ford's year books as well as their personal
conduct among their peers, even though it was 36 years ago provide an
important lesson in todays hyper partisan and wired world. What you
do at any time in your life, as a young person, teen or adult can be dredged
up and used to manipulate and threaten you.
The Heads of Christine Blasey-Ford's and Brett Kavanaugh's schools among others warned parents in 1990 that "excessive drinking and sexual license are common" at unsupervised weekend parties and may cause numerous problems.
All the lawyers involved in the Kavanaugh nomination understood
accusations have to be proven which is why the one side that lacked
corroborating evidence and the other side that was afraid there might
be some preferred to replace a court of law with the court of public
opinion. Their example confirms none of us need rely on the
courts any longer, saving us billions in legal fees. All we have
to do now is get a soapbox.
"Every
step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and
struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated
individuals.” - Martin Luther King Jr..
CHRISTINE
BLASEY FORD AND THE PRIVILEGED GIRLS OF HOLTON-ARMS
The Holton-Arms yearbooks
were erased from the web. They were recovered in the link. Hard copies surely can be found, but even the
small number of marginally redacted pages in the link give an idea of
the way some girls from the wealthy, all girls enclave spent at least some of their extracurricular activities.
Several quotes
from pages the yearbooks point to their interest in boys, partying and
excessive drinking, although not all girls would be involved.
- “Other seniors preferred to expand their horizons
and date younger men, usually sophomores, who could bring the vitality
and
freshness of innocence to a relationship.”
- "loss of
consciousness is often an integral part of
the party scene."
The
idea of an all girls school is that the girls can focus strictly on
their educational pursuits without having to compete with boys in a
school setting. This separation does not adequately prepare them for the
challenges of dealing with boys in a sexually charged and alcohol and
drug fueled party environment outside the protective walls of
Holton-Arms.
The thousands of postings of images and videos of spring break on YouTube show young women and men engaged in
behavior that certainly will expose them to untoward situations. Anyone
who has participated in these type of alcohol and drug infused events
is well aware that people can get so drunk or stoned they don't
remember anything
about what has taken place. It's a problem, and I would have to guess
is magnified with girls who are somewhat more sheltered than those
with deal with it every day. It has the potential to be dangerous
no matter
where it happens. When self control is gone its gone.
Being in these situations does not
excuse bad behavior, but it looks like telling our teens they should not
binge drink and
behave the way they are doing in the huge number of Spring Break posts on YouTube
and documented in Holton-Arms' and Georgetown Prep's yearbooks does not
work. Did it ever work for us when we were that age no matter what economic strata of society we were in?
It is clear as
parents we should be pointing out to our children the damage they can
do to themselves, their friends, and their futures if they participate
in these activities. Hormones, libido, drugs and booze are an
extremely damaging combination if you want to maintain full control of your life.
If nothing else, the entire tale of the Kavanaugh appointment to the
Supreme Court is instructive on the dangers of
mixing them together. Not only does it potentially expose them to loss of self
respect, confidence, and a part of their life they can never recover,
the chatter about it among their peers, now social media can
destroy them forever.
Taking it one step further, when their
behavior gets mixed up in their career path there are so many ways for
their conduct to be dragged through the mud and politicized, permanent
damage to their futures and those around them can occur. One unintended
consequence of someone supporting Kavanaugh or Christine
Blasey Ford is the fallout from friends if they do. If they support Ford,
there is a significant number of people that will brand them as liars and troublemakers for ruining a person's life. If they support Kavanaugh then the opposite side of the partisan divide will make their lives hell. It is a no win situation.
If there is any beneficial takeaway from this its simply to make notes
of behavior that may end up being a problem and share the information
with others. Remember the Comey notes from his conversations with
Trump. The notes are self serving but they may be extremely
valuable in the future to protect yourself. Its unfortunate we
live in that kind of world today, but doing so may make it extremely
dangerous for scofflaws to behave badly, especially when enough of them
get caught to make bad behavior impermissible.
When we look at it strictly from the perspective of Christine
Blasey Ford, something extremely unsettling allegedly happened to her.
That damage is not easily repaired if it ever can be. Worse yet, it
would appear she may have had a beer and was in harms way, and because of the
state of the world, people may not be willing to defend her.
Another problem is the fact that without corroborating evidence,
she cannot press charges against her assailant due to lack of evidence and
the passage of time. Even in Maryland where there is apparently
no statute of limitations she still will need something better than
hearsay evidence. Perhaps some people who were there will be willing to put the truth above their careers.
BRETT KAVANAUGH AND THE BINGE DRINKING PRIVILEGED BOYS OF GEORGETOWN PREP
Kavanaugh's
yearbook page is filled with cryptic messages that are personal to the
circle of friends he had. Without someone who knows exactly what
they mean decrypting them is anyone's guess. All kinds of speculation
and interesting characters will emerge to decode them, for whatever reasons can be inferred about their motives.
In the world of information we live in now, clearly its better to
keep this stuff to yourself or else be fully prepared to defend or
disclaim it. The Holton-Arms and Georgetown Prep yearbooks are
the much older equivalent of Facebook, except that Facebook and other social media are far more
accessible and accessible by all kinds of bad actors, including
employers, the government, people with an axe to grind, and on and
on. Forget their lies about site security and privacy, your information is not and never will be secure. Don't use the sites for anything.
Kavanaugh's television interview with his wife on Fox,
if nothing else shows skill in creating a hard to attack script leaving
few openings for questions and overturning the story. There are
however a lot of lingering questions that if ever answered fully could
undermine the credibility of the judge and the party nominating the
judge. Removal of a judge who lied is technically but not practically possible.
If the judge has been found to have lied at any time, or anyone in a position of
power and influence for that matter, different steps have to be
taken. Although removal may not happen, there are other options
longer term.
Nothing is final in a world in which everyone's lives matter. Even if
it comes out years later it is valuable from the perspective of
permanently damaging trust in the people and institutions responsible.
The damaged trust can be used to overturn the election of people
supporting this conduct, and longer turn to undermine the process used
to elect and protect these people in the first place.
When people in power and the institution they represent lose all
credibility they have to be removed. If they do not, we will end
up in a situation of living in a wholly corrupt state. You see that
time and again in the news in other countries in which the people are
poor, disadvantaged, corralled like animals in cultures in which they
are powerless. In the meantime the rich and powerful live
completely separate lives and are protected by corrupt and spineless
police and military forces who justify their behavior because they need
the pay.
UNANSWERED QUESTIONS ABOUT BRETT KAVANAUGH
The following people and organizations raise questions about
Kavanaugh, in addition to the allegations of participating in or being
witness to questionable sexual conduct against women. If he is
lying, or refusing to tell the truth about things then he should not sit on the bench.
Being part of
the close knit community at Georgetown Prep however does not
automatically make Kavanaugh guilty of participating any more than the
girls who detractors would like to accuse of being too drunk to
remember. Its worth it to give everyone the benefit of the doubt and dig deeper.
Kavanaugh's greatest sin may be rigid adherence to a particular philosophy others do not like and
wanting to fit in, from school to the Republican administrations he
served. Sometimes your loyal associations can tar you with the same brush.
Yale University - the DKE fraternity
DKE Brothers and sexual assault
Yale students found to be sexual assailants return to campus
Yale Women’s Center Board Members: Responding maturely to misogyny
The too old to prosecute excuse
Amnesty International - Human rights concerns and participation in the Bush Administration approval of the use of torture
ACLU - Originalist view of the Constitution, Roe v. Wade
Kavanaugh's role in George Bush's use of signing statements. "George Bush raised nearly 1,400 constitutional objections to roughly 1,000
provisions of statutes he was nonetheless signing into law. Some of
these signing statements complained that Congress’s requirements of
executive branch reports could interfere with the President’s
recommendations power, that Congress’s specifications of factors to be
considered in administrative decision making could interfere with the
President’s supervisory powers over the executive branch, and even that
statutory protections for military lawyers giving their superiors
independent legal advice could interfere with the President’s charge to
take care that the laws be faithfully executed."
Kavanaugh's possession and review of stolen Miranda documents.
The extent of Presidential Power - the Nixon Tapes
PARTISAN MEAT GRINDER
Blasey Ford did not go to the police or FBI
to investigate the matter, she went to a Democrat. She must be a
masochist or really naive. It is clear how that is turning out. The
Democrats outed Ford even when she asked not to be and are now using
her for their own political purposes. That's like being raped too. One
more
reason to never trust a politician. Any of them. If you are siding with
one side
because you don't like the other guys you are being as dumb as getting
blotto
drunk. The whole deal is a feeding frenzy. An additional problem is one
of combining historical abuse with current day revenge. The
passage of time is not kind to support from friends. Better to
address problems when they occur, no matter how hurt or embarrassed you
might feel. Drinking, even to excess, does not excuse abuse or a crime.
You
also have to ask yourself if it was your son or daughter being accused,
rightly or wrongly, would you want an automatic conviction in the court
of
partisan public opinion,
or something more just? Somewhere in all of this there has to be a way of getting out the truth
as respectfully as possible to
lessen the damage done to the victims while also not damaging the accused
if
the accusation is inaccurate or wrong for any reason
RELIGIONS' ROLE IN DAMAGING WOMEN
A
significant part of the problem of the treatment of women is religion. Women have throughout history been relegated by religions to second class status.
We allow religions to promote a view of women that they are less than
men and accept the idea that God will punish us if we challenge the
teachings. Let's wait and see if God shows up to punish all of the
perverts in the Catholic Church that are now being outed. My bet is she,
he, or it won't show up, won't strike them down with lightning bolts,
plagues or floods and the Pope will cook up a cover story like a
politician protecting his job.
Religious leaders are subject to no exceptions because they profess platitudes about goodness, kindness, God's love.