Kavanaugh hearing

[Brian Peacock]

Hmmm. Back to the 'all people lie' argument I see - the argument of last resort. Of the two, who appeared the least 'off their rocker' in last Thursdays hearing do you think: Mr Kavanaugh or Ms Ford? Now, if she's 'off her rocker' her family, friends, colleagues and the science community she's worked with for 30+ years might be able to shed some light on that. Perhaps you should research what her colleagues say about her, at the least, and then report back. So, are you going to apply your exacting conditional epistemology to Mr Kavaaugh or not, or does he get a free pass?

Well, all people do lie.

However, the argument I was making was that some allegations are false. And, that's not an argument of last resort - that's reality. Some allegations are false. Do you dispute that?

Nope.

Now you ask me who I found less believable?

No I didn't. You stated that Ms Ford could have been 'off her rocker' rather than give a unequivocal reply to the question about her being a mendacious, conspiratorial, lying shill - which was clearly the implication of the post I quoted. You've challenged her honesty, integrity, her ethics, and her sanity now. As you clearly consider these personal qualities important to an evaluation of her testimony I just wondered how you though Mr Kavanaugh did against that last measure: which one of them seemed more or less 'off their rocker' that the other one in last Thursday's hearing? You brought up the possibility of Ms Ford being 'off her rocker' and I'm asking you if it's possible that such a charge can be levelled against Mr Kavanaugh also.

... First - I was examining the nuts and bolts of her story. My posts here have not relied on who I thought delivered a more believable performance. My posts related to whose stories made sense and whose didn't. It doesn't matter how good Ford portrayed herself -- her facts don't add up.

Nonetheless, your posts here have been entirely focused on Ms Ford, offering reasons why you think she should not be believed. You even told us that she was making it all up, and I don't think that really squares with your self-declared disinterest in the believability (or otherwise) of her 'performance', not least when your focus is to discredit her testimony before the committee (as well as her person).

Some of Mr Kavanaugh's facts do not add up either, but you're not applying your exacting standards to his testimony, or even acknowledging the existence of certain discrepancies or inconsistencies, or that he clearly dodged some difficult question, in some cases by blatantly changing the subject, becoming disproportionately indignant, bursting into tears, and issuing provocative challenges to his interviewers.

At the moment it looks like you're only really interested in demonstrating the weakness of Ms Ford's character and intellect, and in doing so you ignore the fact that before the committee she was entirely forthcoming about what she couldn't remember and what information she couldn't provide. She even apologised to the committee for those shortcomings. In evaluating this a comparison of testimonies, the believability of each witnesses 'performance' as you put, is entirely appropriate given the circumstance, don't your think?

I don't have an "exacting" epistemology...

I used that term deliberately because it addresses something which you think is really important here - the truth. I don't think it is by any means a stretch to say that the ever-present concern of your posting on this matter has been the truth, or otherwise, of Ms Ford's testimony before the committee: was she telling the truth? I am not disputing that this is indeed an important, vital consideration - the primary consideration in fact, but not the only consideration.

But I was more specific than that - I referred to "your exacting conditional epistemology" for a reason, that being that the you seem to consider the truth of her testimony as resting on the questions which she could not answer, and as she can't remember certain details about the night in question (again, something she freely acknowledged) then her testimony before the committee is not merely to be treated as false, but it actually is false (she's making it up, etc etc).

This is fallacious for a few reasons: i) her admitted inability to remember certain details about the incident does not mean the incident did not take place, ii) her admitted inability to remember certain details about the incident does not mean that what she stated she actually does remember, "100%", is untrue, iii) that the central allegation about the incident--that she was physically subdued and sexually assaulted--is not dependent on what she has not remembered but on what she has, and iv) the strength of her testimony, and ultimately any assessment of it's veracity, the truth, does not rest entirely on her claims or her memories alone but also on Mr Kavanugh's responses to specific allegations, upon his testimony, claims, and stated memories before the committee.

Your comments stand in direct opposition to these points--indeed, you've rendered your assessment of her claims conditional on their antitheses--which is why I have upbraided you, and others, for focussing entirely on Ms Ford's character, intellect, presumed ethics and political affiliation, and for not acknowledging that her testimony was fully consistent with someone who might have been sexually assaulted as a 15 year old and only brought it to light many years later.

In other words, while the truth about the incident might be unknowble in an absolute sense, we should be looking to assess it (as a judgement must be formed) on where Ms Ford and Mr kavanaugh's testimonies intersect without overburdening one party with the responsibility for proving/disproving the claims of the other.

To continue...

... But, again, that's a non sequitur. Ford's story falls on its own, and without any reference to Kavanaugh, and for the reasons I stated. And, I have not relied on public opinion or popularity - her story falls apart because her different versions can't be true.

Indeed, the incident, if it happened, happened in only one way - causally speaking - though surely, her and Mr Kavanaugh's under-oath testimony should be our primary focus? But while you don't provide much context for your comments about the inconsistencies in the timings you also fail to acknowledge that some of Mr Kavanaugh's statements to the committee are inconsistent within that context also - that his 'story' fails on it's own.

As I said, given the intervening 36 years an assessment of the matter lies at the intersection of both of their testimonies, and if one is going to oblige a party to recall certain details with pinpoint clarity then one must not excuse the other from that same obligation. This is why I asked if you though Mr Kavanaugh should get a free pass?

[pErvinalia]

I'm stuck at the claim "all people lie". Do they? I know the person who made that claim has a penchant for it. But everyone..?

[Brian Peacock]

I'm wondering why the FBI agents investigating Ms Ford's claims will not be speaking to Ms Ford. Is it because if they gather a statement from Ms Ford then they'll have to gather one from Mr Kavanaugh too, and given the FBI's powers it might be harder for him to dodge questions from an FBI investigator than from a senate committee?

[Tero]

They will do neither, as of now.

I looked up her broad description

I grew up in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. I attended the Holton-Arms School in Bethesda, Maryland, from 1980 to 1984. Holton-Arms is an all-girls school that opened in 1901. During my time at the school, girls at Holton-Arms frequently met and became friendly with boys from all-boys schools in the area, including Landon School, Georgetown Prep, Gonzaga High School, country clubs, and other places where kids and their families socialized. This is how I met Brett Kavanaugh, the boy who sexually assaulted me.

In my freshman and sophomore school years, when I was 14 and 15 years old, my group of friends intersected with Brett and his friends for a short period of time. I had been friendly with a classmate of Brett's for a short time during my freshman year, and it was through that connection that I attended a number of parties that Brett also attended. We did not know each other well, but I knew him and he knew me. In the summer of 1982, like most summers, I spent almost every day at the Columbia Country Club in Chevy Chase, Maryland swimming and practicing diving.

One evening that summer, after a day of swimming at the club, I attended a small gathering at a house in the Chevy Chase/Bethesda area. There were four boys I remember being there: Brett Kavanaugh, Mark Judge, P.J. Smyth, and one other boy whose name I cannot recall. I remember my friend Leland Ingham attending.

https://www.npr.org/2018/09/26/65194111 ... te-hearing

That should not be an impossible nut for FBI to crack. The host and house may be hard. I know how rich kids partied, I ended up at a house somewhere just once during my high school years. Nothing much happened as they had not managed beer. We played loud music. There were girls but the gathering only had one actual couple. But if I was to remember back, I only remember two street names from the entire suburb. One was easy as it was the name of my high school. I only remember that the kid was hosting an exchange student at my party, and I had been called as I knew the exchange student. No idea who the host was and I only can visualize the exchange student, not his name. The host dude played some kind of fancy organ that had all kinds of bells and whistles.

Based on this info (and if I gave my name and high school), would you figure out the street and house of that party?

[Tero]

The details of such events, mine 45 years ago, can be tricky. Here, nothing happened that was any significance. Yet, I still remember it as the sole house party. These were all good kids as we say. But I can’t remember if the girl I was interested in was there. These were exactly the people she hung out with. I only ever got to talk to her at a class and occasionally in school. I think this was also because they had an exchange student in her family. And worst of all, her mom was my guidance counselor.

The problems of teens.

[Hermit]

Dear oh dear. Having looked into this thread for the first time in in a bit over two days, I discovered that I am more than 200 posts behind. No way was I going to read all that, so I sampled just a few of them, skipping many pages entirely. Going by what I did read, I am certain that I did not miss anything. Almost a quarter of the posts were authored by Coito Two doing his usual thing of playing his favourite game of pretending to be a lawyer, and being very good at doing what shysters are being paid for: pretending to dig out the truth and twisting whatever there might be of it out of all recognition. Then Brian Peacock counters with well argued objections, which are evaded or gish galloped with walls of texts of more distortions. It's all so predictable.

Someone ought to give Coito the alias of Punch and arrange a gig in Judge Judy for him where he can play at being a defence attorney (or a prosecutor, depending on which part he prefers in each case). The production can then be renamed the The Punch and Judy show.

[pErvinalia]

The reason why I haven't taken a position in this is that it's all too much "he said, she said..". Ford seems too sketchy on the details, so it's hard to get at the truth of the matter. I would say that Kavanaugh's response pegs him as of unsuitable temperament for the job, but we all know how political SC appointments are, so the Repubs are going to back him no matter what. And Trumpites don't seem to care about the suitability of anyone, as long as they are "sticking it to the libruls". The US seems in a bad place politically at the moment. Far far too partisan to maintain functional democratic processes. Seriously, the union needs to be split up. Can't see any other way out of the shambles that is US politics at the moment.

[pErvinalia]

Wut? Who cares what you think?

I can tell by the quality of the posts you make, that you don't care what anyone thinks of them.

Ironic coming from you. They guy who studiously avoids answering questions and just posts inane rhetorical questions in response to everything (when not outright trolling).

[Tero]

Dear oh dear. Having looked into this thread for the first time in in a bit over two days, I discovered that I am more than 200 posts behind. No way was I going to read all that, so I sampled just a few of them, skipping many pages entirely. Going by what I did read, I am certain that I did not miss anything. Almost a quarter of the posts were authored by Coito Two doing his usual thing of playing his favourite game of pretending to be a lawyer, and being very good at doing what shysters are being paid for: pretending to dig out the truth and twisting whatever there might be of it out of all recognition. Then Brian Peacock counters with well argued objections, which are evaded or gish galloped with walls of texts of more distortions. It's all so predictable.

Someone ought to give Coito the alias of Punch and arrange a gig in Judge Judy for him where he can play at being a defence attorney (or a prosecutor, depending on which part he prefers in each case). The production can then be renamed the The Punch and Judy show.

I accused 42 of the same lawyer talk. In particular, mentioning some Ford item, tben some more ridiculous gang rape by that one bimbo etc etc. Then lumping it all together as trash.

What is the logic term for lumping together items to "dilute" one item in the list for the jury?

[Brian Peacock]

... The US seems in a bad place politically at the moment. Far far too partisan to maintain functional democratic processes. Seriously, the union needs to be split up. Can't see any other way out of the shambles that is US politics at the moment.

A Southern withdrawal from the union in the manner of the UKs Brexit might work.

They can call it Sexit.

[pErvinalia]

[Tero]

CNN

Senators will start reading the FBI's investigation summaries on Brett Kavanaugh at 8 a.m. ET Thursday, Senate sources said.

Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley will read the summaries first, followed by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the committee.

Sources said the Senate may physically receive the investigation summaries Wednesday night, but the reading starts Thursday morning.

[pErvinalia]

Crazy that they expect the FBI to come up with much in that short a time. You'd think they'd need at least a few weeks to a month to do anything useful.

[pErvinalia]

The real question is, would a person like Ford actually just make up this whole story for partisan purposes? Coming from the sane part of the world, I'd have to say "no way". But this is Merka, after all. Is it actually possible that a person of her status would make up a story to stop a SC appointment? What do the reasonable yanks say to this? I'm sure 42 thinks it's possible, but he's hyper-partisan and thinks someone's choice of breakfast cereal is a partisan decision...

[Seabass]

Crazy that they expect the FBI to come up with much in that short a time. You'd think they'd need at least a few weeks to a month to do anything useful.

Not crazy. Deliberate.

---

Another one.