This exchange sums up the Kavanaugh argument for me. I was stopped and was asked:
“How come Obama gets a pass for smoking pot in college and Kavanaugh is made out to be so bad for doing things that we all might have done?”
Me: “What we all might have done? I never got pass-out drunk and tried to rape anyone.”
“It’s his word against hers and I believe him. Besides, we all have skeletons in our closets. Who can possibly pass this kind of scrutiny?”
“I can. I hope you can. We all did stupid things. Obama admitted he smoked pot. That’s not the same as attempted rape.”
“According to her! If that really happened why did she wait 36 years?”
“Maybe because she wanted to forget it. And maybe she had– until her assailant was nominated for the SUPREME COURT! But, let’s say she is just a liar. Who for some reason wanted to see herself mocked by a president and chastised all over Fox News. Let’s say it was all an unfair hoax to smear Kavanaugh. Why did he then lie under oath?
“Lied about what? Who hasn’t gotten a little drunk?”
“That’s the point! He said he never had! He said he NEVER did anything violent or passed out when drinking, yet person after person is saying: ‘Uh…Brett….you were an angry black-out drinker.”
“So what are you saying?
“I’m saying perjury is not a good habit for a SUPREME COURT JUSTICE.”
I went on:
“What is this REALLY about? It’s about politics. It’s about Roe v Wade and Republicans are putting a justice in the Supreme Court who will tip the scales to rescind. And it is about Democrats trying to keep the Supreme Court from being a conservative-activist court that will reverse it and other hard won issues of rights. Hey…the left doesn’t lose when Kavanaugh is confirmed. The left had already lost. We lost when we lost the majority in Congress and the White House two years ago. We lost because Grassley became Chairman of the Judicial Committee and blocked the hearing of a legitimate Obama nominee.
I wasn’t quite finished:
But we all lose if women’s rights are set back 45 years. Our daughters lose if toxic masculinity is dismissed as ‘boys being boys.’ If the privileges of men in our society supercede the voices of our sisters, wives and daughters, we all lose. All the left side of this coin can hope for is a voter backlash; for a Blue Wave that will swing America back toward the social justice we’ve been fighting for all along.”
Gary out.
