Forceful and passionate
Kavanaugh wants us to know that last Thursday he “was there as a son, husband and dad.” Really? He wasn’t nominated to the Supreme Court “as a son, husband and dad.” We don’t give a fuck about his family life (except possibly as more or less reason to think he’s simply an asshole), that’s not what he’s there for.
He makes this weird claim in the Wall Street Journal (well hey at least it’s not Breitbart).
He starts by telling us how proud he was to be at the White House with his wife and daughters to accept the nomination.
My mom, Martha—one of the first women to serve as a Maryland prosecutor and trial judge, and my inspiration to become a lawyer—sat in the audience with my dad, Ed.
Can we not stop with this folksy crap already? What’s wrong with calling them his mother and father? And skipping the first names? We’re not at a church picnic. It’s a wonder he didn’t refer to his little woman and kiddies.
Then he says a lot about how not partisan he is.
After all those meetings and after my initial hearing concluded, I was subjected to wrongful and sometimes vicious allegations. My time in high school and college, more than 30 years ago, has been ridiculously distorted. My wife and daughters have faced vile and violent threats.
Against that backdrop, I testified before the Judiciary Committee last Thursday to defend my family, my good name and my lifetime of public service. My hearing testimony was forceful and passionate. That is because I forcefully and passionately denied the allegation against me. At times, my testimony—both in my opening statement and in response to questions—reflected my overwhelming frustration at being wrongly accused, without corroboration, of horrible conduct completely contrary to my record and character. My statement and answers also reflected my deep distress at the unfairness of how this allegation has been handled.
Well now wait a second. What does he mean by “my record”” What constitutes a record? It depends on who is compiling the record, doesn’t it. A substantial number of people have come forward to tell us about Kavanaugh’s record as a belligerent drunk and bully.
I was very emotional last Thursday, more so than I have ever been. I might have been too emotional at times. I know that my tone was sharp, and I said a few things I should not have said. I hope everyone can understand that I was there as a son, husband and dad. I testified with five people foremost in my mind: my mom, my dad, my wife, and most of all my daughters.
Well I for one cannot understand it, because this isn’t about his family, it’s about what he’s going to do to us.
I wonder if Kavanaugh would be disconcerted at all if his older daughter got into Radcliffe and then weeks before she was to start classes discovered she was pregnant…and she didn’t want to stay pregnant. I wonder if he would try to insist that she should delay Radcliffe for a year so that she could have the baby and give it up for adoption.
He says if he’s confirmed he’ll keep an open mind. I don’t believe him.
One way or another, the Kav Confirmation will be distinct, in that, rain hail or shine, it will leave about a third of Americans severely pissed off. Either women will feel they have been dismissed unfairly, or Trump-supporting men will.
Ideally, a SCOTUS appointment on a normal day would be passed over by readers of the papers on their way from the breaking news on the front page (latest natural disaster etc) to the sports on the back. But not with this one. Rain hail or shine. Kav has a good chance to go down as the Great Pisser-Offer.
With his own acronym: GPO.
And right on cue:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/oct/05/people-worry-metoo-has-gone-too-far-it-has-not-gone-far-enough
Bullshit. He testified with only one person foremost in his mind, and it doesn’t take a genius to know who that was.
But he knew he was going to say a lot of those things in advance of actually saying them because they were in his prepared statement, and as for the rest, he knew full well he shouldn’t be saying them but said them anyway.
Besides, saying ‘I said a few things I should not have said’ is just stating the fucking obvious, just as ‘I know I killed a few people I shouldn’t have killed’. If that was meant as an attempt to apologise – to the court, to Trump, to the GOP, but certainly not to Dr. Ford, it was a piss poor attempt. He’d might as well have finished that sentence with ‘…but so what? It worked, didn’t it?’
The BBC is reporting that over 300 people, mainly women, have been arrested at protests at the Supreme Court. Because of course they have.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/world-us-canada-45754771
Omar, a young colleague of mine was saying last year at this time that #MeToo had gone too far. Yes, you guessed it – that young colleague was male, and he had just recently explained to me what it was really like to be a woman in the 80s, and what it was really like to be a woman now. Because, as a young man who was born in 1992, he is the ultimate expert about what it was like to be a woman in the 80s. And now. (He followed up by announcing in a union meeting that Black Lives Matter had gone too far. Why, yes, he is white. Why do you ask?)
He then took up residence leaning against the bookcase in my office so he could try to “persuade” me that women’s brains must work differently than men’s because they have all those different hormones bathing the brain. How could that not lead to difference? And by difference, he met softer, more feminine, more emotional, less rational – in short, less thinky. More of an estrogen vibe, y’know what I mean?
He doesn’t like Kavanaugh. But people like him, moderates that lean left but complain constantly about Hillary (while accepting the things they are complaining about in other, male persons) and don’t vote because they can’t stomach Hillary (e-mails, of course, not females), are a significant part of the problem. They allow these things to happen. They may even secretly encourage them, while moaning about the negative possibilities for their own precious existence if the new court makes it harder for their girlfriend to get an abortion, or allows creationism into the schools, or something like that. They never recognize their own complicity in the Trump devolution (I refuse to call it a revolution, since it is all about maintaining rich white male privilege and that is reactionary, not revolutionary).
iknklast,
A number of possible responses come to mind in your situation.
1. Think of a gentle nickname for him. eg Mr Morethinky; Dr Deepthinky; Prof Abysmalthinky.
2. Think of a not so gentle one, say more scatalogical.
3. Get hold of an Islamic prayer mat, and salaam as he goes by: whenever, or as necessary.
4. A combination or permutation of the above.
Hope this helps. ;-)
Gee, Omar, I was thinking of filling up his office with crickets. Then I remembered. He’s an entomologist. He’d see it as a love offering.
Inklast,
I’d tell him to fuck off. Just possibly, that is why I work alone.