Kavanaugh’s Accuser is Credible. Will it Matter?

When the tape of Donald Trump with Billy Bush hit the airwaves, Trump dismissed it all as "locker room talk" and waved off the reality that he is a serial molester of more than a dozen and a half women who have called him out.  Now, we have Brett Kavanaugh - did Trump select him not only for his views that make a occupant of the White House a near king or also because of his anti-women views? - who, if his accuser is to be believed, views sexual assault as an instance of "boys will be boys."  More frighteningly, so do almost a dozen male Republican members of the U.S. Senate.  Sadly, it is all part and parcel of the hyper "macho" mentality of far too many straight males who feel that abusive behavior towards women - and gays - somehow proves their masculinity.  Columns in both the New York Times and the Washington Post (naturally, authored by women) look at this pathetic state of affairs and the toxicity of Trump/Kavanaugh masculinity and Republican enabling of the reprehensible.  First, excerpts from the Times piece: 

Obviously, I believe Christine Blasey Ford, the psychology professor who says that Brett Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her in high school while his friend Mark Judge watched and, at moments, egged him on. I believe her when she says that Kavanaugh, who she says was drunk, held her down, covered her mouth when she tried to scream, and ground against her while attempting to pull her clothes off. I believe her when she says this incident haunted her all her life.

There’s rarely hard evidence in a case like this, but Blasey — the surname she prefers to use publicly — has done everything possible to substantiate her claim. Speaking to The Washington Post, she produced notes from a therapist she saw in 2012, whom she’d told about being attacked by students “from an elitist boys’ school” who grew up to become “high-ranking members of society in Washington.” According to her husband, that year she identified Kavanaugh to him by name. When Kavanaugh appeared on a shortlist of potential Supreme Court picks — but before his nomination had been announced — Blasey contacted both The Post and her member of Congress, Anna G. Eshoo of California. By all indications, she wanted to head his nomination off without being forced into the spotlight.

Blasey passed a polygraph administered by a former F.B.I. agent. The utility of polygraphs is dubious, but her willingness to take one is evidence of her sincerity. According to Axios, some Republicans wanted to call on Blasey to testify publicly, assuming she’d decline. But on Monday morning, Blasey’s lawyer, Debra Katz, said that her client is willing to appear before Congress.

Kavanaugh denies the allegation unequivocally; on Monday he said he’s willing to rebut it before the Senate Judiciary Committee. (Judge, who wrote a memoir of his teenage alcoholism, has veered between denying the incident and saying he doesn’t recall it.) But it’s a sign of how credible Blasey seems that, since this story broke, much of the public debate has been less about whether her accusations are true than whether they are relevant.

Some conservatives — though not just conservatives — insist that it is unfair to judge a middle-aged man for things he did as a kid. . . . Such arguments would be more convincing if people on the right weren’t so selective in their indulgence. Donald Trump called for the death penalty for the Central Park Five, who were 14 to 16 years old when they were arrested. (They’ve since been proven innocent.) Children are regularly put on sex offender registries, sometimes for their entire lives, for conduct less serious than what Kavanaugh is accused of.

[T]his is no longer just about what Kavanaugh might have done 36 years ago. We need to determine, as best we can, if he’s lying now. . . . . Senators should also demand that Kavanaugh’s old friend Judge, who grew up to become a right-wing writer, testify, though Kavanaugh would surely prefer other character witnesses.

Anyone Trump nominates is going to threaten Roe v. Wade. Kavanaugh would at least make plain the power dynamics behind forced pregnancy. We would lose Roe because a president who boasted of sexual assault, elected against the wishes of the majority of female voters, was able to give a lifetime Supreme Court appointment to an ex-frat boy credibly accused of attempted rape. Kavanaugh, helped by an all-male Republican caucus on the Judiciary Committee, would join Clarence Thomas, whose confirmation hearing helped make the phrase “sexual harassment” a household term. They and three other men would likely vote against the court’s three women. The brute imposition of patriarchy would be undeniable.

If the Kavanaugh nomination goes forward, it’s because Trump and his allies believe that a certain class of men accused of sexual assault deserve impunity. The question now is whether any Republican senators believe otherwise.

All, very much on point in my opinion.  The column in the Post while satirical, is also very much on point.  Here are highlights:

“If somebody can be brought down by accusations like this, then you, me, every man certainly should be worried.” — A lawyer close to the White House, speaking to Politico.

If, apparently, a single alleged assault at a single party decades ago is to be frowned upon, then no man is safe, right?   . . . How are we going to fill our offices if this is the new rule? I bet you will say I cannot shout at women as they pass on the street before dragging them to a concrete bunker and then still expect to become governor! What next? I’m supposed to make sure everyone I have sex with is willing? If suddenly, as a country, we decide that violently attempting to assault someone is, like, bad, then that knocks out 98, maybe 99 percent of men, just going off the locker-room talk I’ve heard. . . . You’re telling me I am supposed to encounter dozens, hundreds, thousands of women in my life, some drunk and some sober and some with really good legs and just … not assault any of them?

I mean, it’s not as though they’re people, are they? At the moment of conception, yes, but then they come out Daughters, not people! They grow into objects; some become Wives or Mothers, others Hags or Crones. Then they die! If they were people, we would not expect dominion over their bodies, surely; if they were people, we would not feel entitled to their smiles. If they were people, I could read a novel with a female protagonist and not be instantly confused and alarmed.

No. They are an unintelligible something else. . . . . It would just be too terrible if they were people. Then you could not harm them with impunity. Then if you made a mistake (Boys will be boys), you would have harmed a person. Then something else would be at stake in addition to your career, and that cannot be.

If boys cannot be boys, then how can boys be men who rise to the highest offices in the land? If this stops being something you can get away with, then will anyone still be above the law?  Every man should be worried.

Sadly, the column highlights the mindset certainly of Trump and, now it seems far to many Senate Republicans.  It is a mindset that ought to disgust moral, decent people.  I hope women are paying attention and that they correctly direct their wrath at Republicans come the November midterm elections. 

RNC Finance Chair Resigns After Accusations of Decades of Sexual Misconduct

Trump and buddy Steve Wynn - two sexual predators?

With the dust not even settled over the Donald Trump/porn star affair - -one rumor even had Melania Trump moving out of the White House - the Republican Party has had yet another reminder that it has become the party of sexual impropriety even as the shrills among the Christofascists lecture others of how to live their lives even as their own and those of their "dear leader" are a train wreck by standards of normal decency.  In the latest example of Republican hypocrisy, involves now former RNC finance chair Steve Wynn who has resigned his post after a lengthy Wall Street Journal piece that details decades of sexual misconduct that rivals that of Harvey Weinstein.  While Republicans called upon Democrats to return contributions they received from Weinstein, the revelations about Wynn - a "friend" of Der Trumpenführer who seems to have emulated Trump's misconduct - , have been met with utter silence.   A piece in New York Magazine looks at the all to common GOP hypocrisy.  Here are excerpts:

When Harvey Weinstein was accused of decades of sexual misconduct in October, Republicans gleefully went on the attack. Weinstein was a prominent Democratic donor. How, they wondered, in high moral dudgeon, could liberal lawmakers live with themselves knowing that they’d profited from such ill-gotten gains?

Considering Weinstein’s limited role in Democratic politics — plus the inconvenient fact that a confessed sexual harasser of the Republican persuasion currently sits in the Oval Office — this was a transparently bad-faith argument from the beginning. But the GOP, as is its wont, pushed it vigorously enough to entice the usual doltish members of the mainstream media to take notice. And Democrats eventually did, too; many returned their donations from Weinstein.

Flash forward to Friday. In a long and thorough investigative piece, The Wall Street Journal reported that Las Vegas casino magnate and finance chair of the Republican National Committee, Steve Wynn, has been accused of sexual misconduct by many employees over the course of decades. The allegations are Weinstein-esque: They include Wynn forcing a manicurist to have sex with him, requesting sexual contact during massage sessions, and more.

The Republican response so far: almost total radio silence. Wynn did step down from his finance-chair position on Saturday afternoon, but under unclear circumstances.

Wynn, unlike Weinstein, is a serious power player on the political stage. . . . he has exerted considerable influence over Republican state-level races and national politics alike. . . . He has donated more than $2.5 million to the Republican Governors Association since 2012 and more than $200,000 to Republicans in 2017 alone. Just last week, as Democrats are happy to point out, Wynn and RNC chair Ronna Romney McDaniel hosted a fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago to celebrate the one-year anniversary of President Trump’s inauguration.

Will Republicans who demanded Democrats give back all of Harvey Weinstein’s money follow their own advice when it comes to actual insider Steve Wynn? The party’s silence on the story a full day after it broke is an indication that nobody should be holding their breath.

The entire story illustrates, once again, that warfare between the parties is asymmetric. Because the Democratic Party positions itself as an entity trying, however haltingly, to do the right thing, it is held to reasonably high standards by both its voters and society at large. Republicans, meanwhile, have waltzed so far down the path of moral degradation in recent years that they are no longer expected to maintain the appearance of propriety. Democrats (rightly) feel pressure to clean their house of sullied lawmakers from John Conyers to Al Franken; Republicans can grudgingly come to terms with the idea of an accused child molester in the Senate.

Because the GOP has adopted a mantra of shamelessness, it can continue to claim the virtuous high ground while simultaneously contradicting its own words at every turn.

[A]s Steve Wynn and his millions of dollars show, the [Democrat] party should reform itself on its own terms, not because Republicans pressure them to. The GOP forfeited that privilege a long time ago.

The GOP Is Now the Party of Predators

Republican elected officials continue to bloviate about the GOP being the party of "family values" - especially during election season - yet their actions send a very different message.  It would appear that the GOP now has no vlaues whatsoever other than perhaps to steal for the poor to give to the rich.  Indeed, sexual predators are perfectly acceptable be they in the White House or running for the U.S. Senate in Alabama.  Meanwhile, in order to protect their new führer (who increasingly appears to have perhaps committed treason), these same Republicans attack the FBI and depict it as some sort of  "secret police" for liberals that manufactures "fake news."  A growing majority of Americans find what is occurring to be repulsive, yet the Republicans continue to forge ahead alienating the rising generations of voters.  Perhaps they hope for their führer to impose a dictatorship so that securing a majority of votes will simply no longer matter.  It seems the only explanation for what otherwise would appear to be long term suicide as a political party.  My Republican ancestors would be appalled by it all.  A piece in New York Magazine looks at how predatory sexual behavior is now the latest thing to be normalized by the GOP.  Here are excerpts:

Even The Wall Street Journal editorial page, which sold its soul to Donald Trump after the election, said this morning that “you have to believe in magic to think this is going to end well for Republicans.” Anticipating the resignation of Al Franken, the editorial pleaded with its party, from Trump down, to disown Moore — if only because the departures of both Franken and John Conyers rendered moot the GOP’s main talking point to deflect any questions about the party’s embrace of Moore.

But while the Democrats’ resignations have now ripped away that moral fig leaf, there’s zero chance the GOP will ditch Moore. Sure, some Republicans in Washington, including Mitch McConnell, have denounced Moore. But many of them have previously disowned Trump on multiple occasions — including, most pertinently, after the release of the Access Hollywood tape — only to fold soon after. The RNC’s renewed funding of Moore’s campaign tells you all you need to know about the Vichy Republicans. That’s an action that speaks louder than words. The GOP wants to add another vote to its slender Senate majority and will swallow anything required to get it.

The Party of Lincoln is now the Party of Predators. Maybe it always was: Do recall the histories of such GOP congressional leaders as Denny Hastert and Mark Foley. It should also be noted that a tolerance for sexual predation may be well on its way to becoming a majority plank among the GOP rank and file. While a new Quinnipiac poll finds that 77 percent of Democrats believe elected officials should resign in the face of multiple sexual harassment accusations, only 51 percent of Republicans do.

Moore has the wholehearted support of the Republican president, and if he is elected on Tuesday in Alabama (the likely outcome, I’d guess), the Senate will seat him no matter the posturing to the contrary. Among Republican elites, the only naysayers to Trump are either out of power (Mitt Romney) or not likely to face another election. In that latter category, even John McCain violated his professed principles about deficits and a “regular” legislative process to sign on to the tax bill that extravagantly rewards Republican donors. He and his colleagues will shed crocodile tears about the new sexual miscreant in the Senate chamber all the way to the bank. 

The piece goes on to say this about the sexual predator-in-chief:

Donald Trump formally recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital yesterday, upending nearly 70 years of U.S. policy. Critics of the decision include the Pope, some of the most powerful U.S. allies, and, reportedly, Rex Tillerson and James Mattis. What does Trump gain here?

Trump’s most incendiary presidential actions are generally prompted by one or all of three underlying motives: (1) to pander to the one third of the country that is his unfailingly loyal base; (2) to distract from the Mueller investigation and all its attendant story lines; (3) to enable the kleptocratic enrichment of himself, his family, and Trump business enterprises. At the very least (1) and (2) are at work here.

Trump’s most incendiary presidential actions are generally prompted by one or all of three underlying motives: (1) to pander to the one third of the country that is his unfailingly loyal base; (2) to distract from the Mueller investigation and all its attendant story lines; (3) to enable the kleptocratic enrichment of himself, his family, and Trump business enterprises. At the very least (1) and (2) are at work here.

[A] major component of the Trump base, the Evangelical right, led by its in-house representative Mike Pence, was the driver here. Evangelical Christians want to ensure that Jews remain in power in Jerusalem as a step toward the Second Coming. They see the provocative move of the American embassy as furthering that goal (which may prove to be far from the case). It tells you all you need to know about these lovely people that they clamor for an American embassy in Jerusalem, but back at home remain silent when Trump calls the alt-right stormtroopers of Charlottesville “very fine people” after they’ve chanted that “Jews will not replace us.”

Of course the announcement of the embassy move would fall on the day that Donald Trump Jr. was stonewalling investigators behind closed doors at the House Intelligence Committee.

Much was made by Republicans, not without reason, when Bill Clinton went on television to announce the American bombing of Sudan and Afghanistan at the height of the Lewinsky scandal. But how puny that Wag the Dog moment looks now when we have a president who thinks nothing of engulfing the world in war and environmental calamity to save himself from potential legal culpability on multiple fronts, from obstruction of justice and collusion with Russia to sexual assault.

As a former Republican, I truly do not comprehend how outwardly decent people remain Republicans given the hideousness of today's GOP. 

George Will: Roy Moore and His Evangelical Supporters Are an Embarrassment

Elect Doug Jones on December 12, 2017

Like many conservative columnists, George Will largely lost favor with me when he became largely an apologist for failed Republican Party policies and a cheerleader for reprehensible Republicans and Christian extremists.  It took Donald Trump, and now Roy Moore, to seemingly finally wake Will up to the ugliness he has been helping to support.  I guess, it's better to wake up late to reality as opposed to never like so many in the Republican Party base, but so much damage could have been avoided had people like George Will had ceased to be enablers years ago.   In his latest column, Will goes after Roy Moore and his evangelical Christian supporters and makes the case why Democrat Doug Jones should win the Alabama special election next month.  Here are column highlights:

But for the bomb, the four would be in their 60s, probably grandmothers. Three were 14 and one was 11 in 1963 when the blast killed them in the 16th Street Baptist Church, which is four blocks from the law office of Doug Jones, who then was 9.

He was born in May 1954, 13 days before the U.S. Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education school desegregation decision. . . . . As a second-year law student, Jones cut classes to attend the 1977 trial of one of the church bombers, Robert “Dynamite Bob” Chambliss. In 2001 and 2002, as U.S. attorney, Jones successfully prosecuted two other bombers. Was there resentment about this protracted pursuit of justice? No, he says as he nurses with tea a voice raspy from campaigning, because after 9/11 intervened, punishing domestic terrorism was not controversial.

Moore campaigns almost entirely on social issues — National Football League protests, the transgender menace — and the wild liberalism of Jones, a law-and-order prosecutor and deer and turkey hunter who says he has “a safe full of guns.” Jones’s grandfathers were members of the mineworkers’ and steelworkers’ unions. . . .

Evangelical Christians who embrace Moore are serving the public good by making ridiculous their pose as uniquely moral Americans, and by revealing their leaders to be especially grotesque specimens of the vanity — vanity about virtue — that is curdling politics. Another public benefit from the Moore spectacle is the embarrassment of national Republicans. Their party having made the star of the “Access Hollywood” tape president, they now are horrified that Moore might become 1 percent of the Senate. Actually, this scofflaw, twice removed from Alabama’s Supreme Court, once for disobeying a U.S. Supreme Court ruling, is a suitable sidekick for the president who pardoned Joe Arpaio, Arizona’s criminal former sheriff. Even after Donald Trump conceded that Barack Obama was born in the United States, Moore continued rejecting such squishiness.

It has been 21 years since a Democratic Senate candidate won even 40 percent of Alabama’s vote. It has, however, been even longer — not since the George Wallace era — that the state’s identity has been hostage to a politician who assumes that Alabamians are eager to live down to hostile caricatures of them.

Nothing about Moore’s political, financial or glandular history will shake his base, unless the credible accusations of serial pursuit of underage girls are suddenly overshadowed by something his voters consider serious, such as taking sides in the Alabama-Auburn game. Jones’s hopes rest with traditional white Democrats (scarce), Republicans capable of chagrin (scarcer) and African Americans. They are 27 percent of this state in which “civil rights tourism” (the 16th Street church, Selma’s Edmund Pettus Bridge, Martin Luther King Jr.’s Montgomery church, and more) is economically important.

This month, Virginia’s African Americans turned out for Gov.-elect Ralph Northam, a Democrat who, like Jones, invited voters to take a walk on the mild side. Approximately a quarter of Alabamians live in the metropolitan area of Birmingham, which has had an African American mayor since 1979.

Next month’s election will occur during many distractions, midway between Thanksgiving and Christmas and, more important, 10 days after Armageddon — the SEC championship game. Perhaps an Alabama victory would make the state hanker for a senator worthy of its football team. If so: Roll Tide.

The GOP/Christofascist Double Standard on Roy Moore

Moore with Christofascist, Mat Staver

As regular readers know, I view both today's Republican Party and its Christofascist base to be irredeemably morally bankrupt.  Lying is the new norm combined with hypocrisy that knows no limits. I'm not saying that progressives and Democrats are angels, but in the grand scheme of things "conservatives" have become the champions of misogyny who apply one standard to themselves - one where anything goes and no lie is too disgusting - and a totally different one to their political opponents or simply those who demand moral decency in political candidates.  The roiling Roy Moore sex scandal personifies this double standard (have you noticed that it seems 9 out of 10 times it is the Republicans/right wing pastors caught up in sex scandals?).  A column in the Washington Post looks at this reality.  Here are excerpts:

Trump’s conveniently flexible standard on accusations — and he is not alone — boils down to: If the accuser points a finger at a Democrat — Bill Clinton, Harvey Weinstein — her word is to be trusted, automatically. If she complains about a Republican, Trump’s otherwise dormant devotion to due process kicks in. How can claims from “many years ago” be allowed to “destroy a person’s life”? Some answers: Because they are entirely credible. Because the girl, now a woman, has no conceivable ax to grind — she is a longtime Republican, a Trump voter even — and nothing to gain from coming forward. Because three other women related similar, although less disturbing stories, underscoring Moore’s interest in younger girls.

Because the presumption of innocence, while essential in the legal realm, does not mean the elimination of common sense outside it. (Thank you, Mitt Romney, for saying that.) The willing suspension of disbelief has its limits, or should.

Unless, that is, you are a politician dealing with a story you wish would go away. Then you turn instinctively to if-then-ism. “If these allegations are true . . .” said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), leading — or not — his prove-it caucus. Disappointingly, among them were women senators who ought to know better. “

The correct response came from Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), who — without hedging — termed the allegations “deeply disturbing and disqualifying” and called on Moore to withdraw. It is better, sure, than the jaw-dropping alternative: so-what-ism, remarkably flagrant among Alabamians in response to the Moore report. “Much ado about nothing,” State Auditor Jim Zeigler told the Washington Examiner. Joseph did it with Mary, he observed. Except, um, minor theological point here — did he? 32-year-old Moore could put a 14-year-old girl’s hand on his erect penis and touch her over her bra and underpants. Trump could shoot someone in the middle of Fifth Avenue. It would not deter their supporters. Okay, at least we know where you’re coming from. Your moral parameters are clear in their absence. One last strategy — blame the messenger — has come into play here, deployed by Moore and supporters such as former Trump adviser Stephen K. Bannon. “The Bezos Amazon Washington Post that dropped that dime on Donald Trump is the same Bezos Amazon Washington Post that dropped the dime this afternoon on Judge Roy Moore,” Bannon said, referring to Post owner and Amazon chief executive Jeffrey P. Bezos and the “Access Hollywood” tape. “Now is that a coincidence?”

No, it’s not. Good reporting breeds good reporting. . . . Blaming the messenger is always easier than hearing an unwelcome message. It does not make that message any less true.

Why Evangelicals Will Stand By Roy Moore

Once again the political area is posing a moral test for Evangelical Christians, the same group that bears responsibility for putting Donald Trump, a self-professed sexual predator.  This time, the test revolves around GOP senatorial candidate Roy Moore in Alabama.  Moore who has made a career out of Bible thumping and spreading hatred against gays, non-Christians and minorities now faces accusations by four (4) women that he engaged in sexual molestation.  One accuser was 14 years old at the time while Moore was in his 30's.  The Alabama of 30+ years ago when I lived in Mobile would not have stood for such a candidate.  But that was before the rise of the Christofascists who now control the Republican Party in Alabama. A piece in the Washington Post looks at why the evangelicals who continue to support Trump will support the repulsive Roy Moore.  Here are excerpts:

Roy Moore won the Republican nomination for the Senate seat in Alabama this year on the strength of his long-standing advocacy for hard-right conservative and evangelical values.

Twice elected chief justice of Alabama’s Supreme Court, he left that role both times on behalf of his religious beliefs. In 2003, he was removed from office for refusing to take a monument of the Ten Commandments out of a state building. In 2016, he was suspended for refusing to uphold the Supreme Court’s decision on same-sex marriages.

On Thursday afternoon, The Washington Post published a story detailing allegations from four women who say they were pursued by Moore when they were teenagers and he was in his 30s. One, Leigh Corfman, described how Moore had initiated sexual contact with her when she was 14 and he 18 years older.

Republicans on Capitol Hill — many of whom supported Strange in the primary, it’s important to note — quickly called for Moore to drop out of the Senate race, a move that seems unlikely. 

Recent history, though, suggests that he might not lose substantial evangelical support. That recent history is Donald Trump. . . . . The result for Trump? He won more support from evangelical voters than any Republican since the question of religious identification began being asked.

 

Nearly half of Trump’s support — 46 percent — identified as white evangelical Protestant. . . . More than any other religious group, evangelicals said that someone who acts immorally in their personal lives can still serve morally in office.

 

Moore’s political background is predicated on engaging in the sort of fights that evangelical voters would like to see fought.  Moore is aware of this.

The allegations against Moore are decades old and, for those interested in dismissing them, dismissible as pitting his word against the women’s. It seems unlikely, then, that evangelical voters would, at this point, reject his candidacy, especially with Moore denying the charges as fervently as he is.

If Donald Trump — a one-time New York Democrat on his third wife with little connection to religious faith before his political run — can keep the support of the evangelical community, it seems unlikely that a conservative Alabama judge who lost his job in defense of the Ten Commandments is at much risk of seeing that support evaporate.

As I have noted many times before, given evangelical support of Trump, Moore and other morally bankrupt politicians,  when I meet anyone who announces themselves as an evangelical or fundamentalist Christian, the first thing that crosses my mind is that they must be (i) liars and hypocrites, (ii) modern day Pharisees, and (iii) morally bankrupt and not decent and moral individuals. 

GOP "Moderate" Ed Gillespie Thinks Virginia Needs an HB2-Style Bathroom Bill

The myth that "moderate" Republicans still exist is just that, a myth.  The base of the Republican Party has become so extreme that no moderate in the traditional sense of the word can secure nomination to run for office.  A case in point is GOP gubernatorial candidate, Ed Gillespie.  On the same day that I was receiving an "Outstanding Virginian" award from Equality Virginia,at the Amherst County GOP Dinner, the  leading “moderate” GOP gubernatorial candidate, Ed Gillespie, parroted the Christofascist scare tactic against the transgender community and argued that Virginia needs a "bathroom bill" like North Carolina's heinous HB2 (which also repealed non-discrimination protections for gays and other minorities).  According to Gillespie, such bills seek to stop recognition of gender identity which he described as follows: 

"It's about compelling teenage girls to share locker room showers with teenage boys. It’s about compelling teenage girls to have to stay in a hotel with a teenage boy on an overnight band trip. And the fact is, we have to make clear, that we are going to protect our children from that. We are not going to allow for that to happen.”

In short, according to Gillespie, letting transgender people use the restroom or other public services aligned with their gender identity will somehow lead to sexual assaults.   Never mind, the fact that there are ZERO reported instances of sexual impropriety on the part of transgender individuals in restrooms.  Of course, the same cannot be said for numerous GOP elected officials at all levels of elected office.   Here are highlights from GayRVA on Gillespie's foul statements:

The Amherst County GOP Dinner this past weekend played host to the state’s three GOP gubernatorial candidates and while scientifically inaccurate answers could be expected from the two trailing candidates, the leading “moderate,” Ed Gillespie, shared a similarly base-less scare tactic against the trans community.

“This isn’t about bathrooms alone,” Gillespie (top image) said in a video sent to GayRVA when asked about how Virginia should handle bathroom use by transgender people in relation to North Carolina’s HB2.

Gillespie’s parroted arguments continue the conservative right’s mantra on inclusive bathroom laws; that letting trans people use the restroom or other public services aligned with their gender identity will some how lead to sexual assaults.

If you look at the history of the topic, you’ll actually find more GOP law makers have been arrested for sexual misconduct in restrooms than trans people.

Similar attempts to legislate restrooms in Virginia over the last few GA sessions have failed before they got out of committee – a sign which might point to state leadership realizing the hot-button issue isn’t worth tainting the Commonwealth’s reputation over. And then there’s the economic impact, like in North Carolina where the state has already lost hundreds of millions and is set to lose even more despite their half-assed attempt to repeal the law.

But there’s another argument that, should a Republican win the state’s executive seat, such a law would sail through the House and Senate and find its way to a more willing Governor’s desk. Gillespie has just exposed himself as that – a mean spirited bully who puts fear and rhetoric ahead of the lives and businesses a Governor is suppose to protect.

Meanwhile, on the Democratic side, both primary candidates Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam and former Roanoke Congressman Tom Perriello have promised to veto any anti-LGBTQ legislation that reaches their desk including laws that limit bathroom use.

GOP In Panic Mode As Outrage with Trump Soars

My youngest daughter - a Millennial voter - shared this photo on Facebook.  Thankfully, some Millenniasl "get it."

Part of me cannot help but laugh as many in the GOP go into complete panic mode as Friday's release of a tape of Donald Trump's misogynist comments on women goes viral.  I mean, WTF did they think they were getting with Trump?  The man has a decades long history of bigotry and anti-women misogyny. Why the feigned surprise?  Why are Republican woman just now waking up to the reality of who and what Donald Trump is and will always be?  As a former Republican who resigned from the party over the party's refusal to recognize the concept of the separation of church and state not to mention the racism always just under the surface with many Republicans, I relish that the GOP's chickens are coming home to roost.  A piece in Politico look at the panic gripping the GOP.  Here are excerpts:

The Republican Party was in a state of turmoil on Friday night over revelations that Donald Trump once bragged in explicit terms about sexually harassing women, driving GOP leaders to denounce their nominee and even prompting calls that he leave the presidential ticket.

But while Trump and his senior aides huddled to strategize next steps, many Republicans felt paralyzed -- stuck with a candidate few ever wholeheartedly embraced with only 31 days left until Election Day.

Utah Rep. Jason Chaffetz withdrew his endorsement, saying: "I’m out. I can no longer in good conscience endorse this person for president. It is some of the most abhorrent and offensive comments that you can possibly imagine."

Even Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus, who has emerged as a trusted Trump ally and adviser, scolded in scorching terms: "No woman should ever be described in these terms or talked about in this manner. Ever.”

The party's past nominees were unflinching in their condemnation.

“Hitting on married women? Condoning assault? Such vile degradations demean our wives and daughters and corrupt America's face to the world,” Mitt Romney, the party’s last GOP presidential nominee, wrote on Twitter. And Arizona Sen. John McCain, the 2008 nominee, said Trump could have no excuse: "No woman should ever be victimized by this kind of inappropriate behavior. He alone bears the burden of his conduct and alone should suffer the consequences.”

Even within Trump’s own campaign, there was an overriding sense of doom. One aide expressed doubt that the GOP nominee, who has successfully weathered a number of scandals, would be able to ride the current firestorm.

There's "absolutely no excuse to ever talk about women in such a crude and demeaning way," Trump’s Texas chair, Dan Patrick, was quoted as saying.

As the hours passed, some Republicans began to call for Trump to step aside, leaving the presidential race to vice presidential nominee Mike Pence. Rob Engstrom, the Chamber of Commerce’s national political director, was the first to call for Trump to quit, followed by Rep. Mike Coffman, former N.Y. Gov. George Pataki, Virginia Rep. Barbara Comstock and Nebraska Sen. Ben Sasse.

Utah Sen. Mike Lee said: “You are the distraction... I respectfully ask you, with all due respect, to step aside.”

At least one of the party’s top fundraisers declared that major GOP donors were “looking to fund an effort to back someone else as the Republican nominee”, and there were vague suggestions that the party brass might be looking into its options “in case” Trump isn’t the nominee.

But the party’s officials swiftly and aggressively rejected those suggestions. And one of its elite election lawyers argued convincingly that the logistical hurdles to replacing Trump made it next to impossible. 

Again, why the shock and surprise?  They have known who Trump is for years.  All of these vapors and conniption fits are the height of hypocrisy.  As for Republican women, another piece in Politico looks at those who are belatedly pulled their heads from out of their asses.  Here are highlights:

Republican women are abandoning Donald Trump in an historic repudiation of their party’s nominee, a devastating development for the GOP candidate's chances one month before Election Day.

Trump’s lewd, sexually aggressive comments about women, revealed in a 2005 audio recording that became public Friday, have prompted large-scale defections, from female Republican senators to conservative activists in the swing states. That dynamic further jeopardizes his chances with women voters, including white, married voters who typically back Republicans. After nearly two years of listening to Trump denigrate women — including Fox News host Megyn Kelly, Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina, Heidi Cruz and former Miss Universe Alicia Machado — Republican women have had enough.

A mass desertion by white, married women would effectively torpedo Trump’s chances of defeating Hillary Clinton. That demographic has been a core part of every Republican nominee’s constituency this century — Mitt Romney and John McCain won 53 percent of married women, and still lost the election — meaning that Trump, who struggles far more with party unity than previous nominees have, has even less room for error. But he is already losing badly with women overall, and Friday’s bombshell threatens to set him back further with women of all marital statuses.

High-profile Republican women over the weekend made clear that they have zero interest in helping Trump regain his footing, instead offering cover to other lawmakers looking to abandon Trump.

“I wanted to be able to support my party’s nominee, chosen by the people, because I feel strongly that we need a change in direction for our country,” said New Hampshire Sen. Kelly Ayotte, who is in a competitive re-election fight in a key swing state. “However, I’m a mom and an American first, and I cannot and will not support a candidate for president who brags about degrading and assaulting women.”

One particularly notable defection: Nebraska Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.), who is perhaps Trump's most prominent female defender in the Senate.

"The comments made by Mr. Trump were disgusting and totally unacceptable under any circumstance," she tweeted. "It would be wise for him to step aside and allow Mike Pence to serve as our party's nominee."

Condoleezza Rice, who served as secretary of state under George W. Bush, posted on Facebook, "Enough! Donald Trump should not be President. He should withdraw."

And Fiorina, once a target of Trump’s trash talk — “look at that face! Would anyone vote for that?” he mocked during the primary — released a statement Saturday asking the Republican National Committee to replace Trump with Pence.

Again, why the shock and feigned horror?  The Donald Trump revealed in the tape on Friday id the same Donald Trump who has always existed.  Closing your eyes to the real Trump doesn't makr thr real Trump any different.  Thankfully, this revelation of the true Trump came out before the election and not afterwards.   

Former Local Republican Party Chair Arrested for Aggravated Child Molestation

As Christofascist extremist continue to harass shoppers at Target and Republicans continue to prostitute themselves to the "godly folk" by continuing to push anti-LGBT legislation, a story out of Georgia again reminds us that the real threat to children and women is Republican elected and party officials. The former chairman of the Cobb County Republican Party was arrested yesterday and charged with child molestation.  The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has details.  Before engaging in anti-transgender hysteria, the GOP needs to clean its own putrid house.  Here are story highlights: 

The former chairman of the Cobb County Republican Party was arrested Friday morning and charged with child molestation. 

Joseph Russell Dendy, 71, was arrested at his West Cobb home and charged with aggravated child molestation and child molestation, both felonies. He was being held at the Cobb jail without bond early Friday afternoon.

Dendy allegedly molested two boys, ages 4 and 12, during separate incidents inside his Creekview Court home, his arrest warrant says. One victim, who is now 20, told police he was molested in 2007 or 2008, when he was 12 or 13 years old. A second victim said Dendy molested him in December 2011, according to police.

An arrest warrant was issued for Dendy late Thursday, and deputies went to his home and arrested him at 9 a.m. Friday, booking records showed.

Dendy served two, two-year terms as leader of the Cobb GOP and was succeeded last year by his vice chair, Rose Wing.

Dennis Hastert Sentenced to 15 Months in Prison Despite GOP Clemency Appeals

Dennis Hastert pictured at right

As noted recently, Republicans at both the state and federal level have sought tom demonize transgender individuals as would be sexual predators seeking to molest women and young girls in restroom facilities even as they have appealed to a federal judge to be lenient on admitted sexual molester Dennis Hastert, former GOP Speaker of the House - a man who was once second in line for the presidency in the event of the death or incapacity of the president and vice president of the United States.   Thankfully, the judge ignored these hypocrisy filled calls for leniency and Hastert was sentenced to 1 5 months in prison.  In truth, he should have been sentenced to at least a five year prison term, especially since he admitted to his sexual molestation of one of his students.  Here are highlights from The New Civil Rights Movement: 

Dennis Hastert has just been sentenced in a hush money case involving his past sexual molestation of teenaged boys while he was a wrestling coach decades ago. A federal judge, calling the former Republican Speaker of the House a "serial child molester," sentenced him to two years of supervised release and 15 months jail time – not for his actions of sexual abuse, but for evading bank reporting requirements and making false statements to federal authorities.

In sentencing Hastert, Judge Thomas M. Durkin of the Northern District of Illinois also said the former Speaker should participate in a sex offender treatment program, CNN reports.

"I'm deeply ashamed to be standing before you here today," Hastert said in court during his sentencing. "I know I'm here because I mistreated some of my athletes as a coach." 

The court received dozens of letters of support from former [GOP] colleagues of Hastert, including one from Tom Delay, the former Senate Majority Leader who is now an anti-gay Christian activist.

"He is a good man that loves the Lord," DeLay wrote to the judge. "He gets his integrity and values from Him. He doesn't deserve what he is going through. I ask that you consider the man that is before you and give him leniency where you can."

Right Wing Watch reports that "days after the Supreme Court delivered its landmark marriage equality decision, DeLay claimed that he knew of 'a secret memo coming out of the Justice Department' that would legalize '12 new perversions,' including 'having sexual with little boys.'" 

 Sadly, I suspect that Hastert is but the tip of the ice berg when it comes to anti-LGBT Republicans who are either serial adulterers, seeking gay sex "on the down low" ore sexually molesting minors.  Hypocrisy and disingenuous lies are now a hallmark of today's GOP. 

Republicans Rush to Defend A Sexual Predator

Dennis Hastert - sexual predator

As a former Republican I still find it difficult at times to grasp just how filled with hypocrisy the Republican Party has become.   Democrats are far from perfect, but on the hypocrisy scale they are rank beginners.  Among the latest examples of the moral bankruptcy of the GOP is the rush by prominent Republicans to support sexual predator Dennis Hastert who molested at least four (4) students during his years as a high school wrestling coach.  "Family values" seemingly mean nothing beyond opposing LGBT rights and the right of women to have control of their own bodies.  A piece in Salon looks at the GOP cavalcade of hypocrisy.  Here are highlights:

On Wednesday, former Republican U.S. House speaker Dennis Hastert will be sentenced for his part in an elaborate hush money scheme to cover up his years long molestation of teenage boys while he was a Illinois high school wrestling coach from 1965 until 1981. But if his fellow Republicans have their way — he won’t see a minute of prison time.

According to federal prosecutors, Hastert “made payments to a man who was sexually abused at age 14 by Hastert when he was the boy’s wrestling coach. Prosecutors said the abuse also involved ‘other minors,’ and included touching their genitals or engaging in oral sex.” Court filings in Hastert’s case highlighted “private one-on-one encounters in an empty locker room and a motel room with minors that violated the special trust between those young boys and their coach.”

The Republican firebrand is charged with lying to FBI investigators about a tax-evading scheme to pay $3.5 million to keep at least one former student quiet about the abuse before falsely accusing the man of trying to extort him. Hastert pleaded guilty to illegally structuring $900,000 used as hush money to the one individual, a violation of banking laws. Prosecutors are now seeking the harshest possible penalty, asking that the 74-year-old Hastert be sentenced to six months in prison while his attorneys are asking for probation. A former wrestler who said Hastert abused him decades ago is expected to speak at Hastert’s sentencing hearing on Wednesday.

Still, the longest serving Republican House Speaker in American history has prominent Republican friends rushing to publicly back him even as he’s accused of being a serial child molester.

A list of the names of people who wrote to support Hastert was made public in court Friday, complete with over 40 letters of support for Hastert from the likes of former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and the head wresting coach of the University of Chicago. Hastert’s defense team said he had received more than 60 letters of support for Hastert in recent months, but nearly 20 writers did not want their letters made public or had requested their letters be “withdrawn” from consideration after disturbing details of Hastert’s pedophilia emerged. (The Chicago Tribune published all of the letters released, and they may be found here):

Hastert’s supporters included a handful of former national and state politicians as well as local leaders, board members, police officers and others from his home base in rural Kendall County.

“We all have our flaws, but Dennis Hastert has very few,” DeLay wrote in his defense of Hastert. “He is a good man that loves the Lord.”

“He doesn’t deserve what he is going through,” the Texas Republican who served as majority leader under Hastert in the early 2000s and who ran into his own legal problems argued. “I ask that you consider the man that is before you and give him leniency where you can.”

In addition to DeLay, Hastert’s former Republican colleagues Reps. Thomas Ewing, David Dreier, Porter Goss and John Doolittle also petitioned the court on his behalf.

“Denny Hastert and I were as close as brothers, sharing our goals, ambitions, and our family life, both the ups and the downs,” Ewing wrote, noting that they lived together in Washington D.C. and Springfield, Illinois. “I know him as a man of faith, integrity and honesty. He was an extremely hard worker, always willing to extend a helping hand to others.

As the New York Times reported over last week, Hastert’s work on Capitol Hill allowed him the cover to keep secret his decades long abuse of boys . . .

Tyrone Fahner, a former Illinois attorney general, called Hastert “a kind, strong, principled, and unselfish man,” and asked the court “to permit him to live the rest of his life in freedom with his family and friends, and all those who love and admire him.”

Shortly after Hastert was indicted on federal charges in 2015, Politico dug through the former speaker’s archive and found he kept a file in his office titled “Homosexuals” that reportedly was “filled with policy statements from social conservative groups like the Traditional Values Coalition and the Family Research Council that criticized same-sex marriage and Clinton administration efforts to prevent discrimination against gays and lesbians” and included a rambling 1996 National Review column, “Pedophilia Chic,” warning of  “hip” and “sophisticated” liberal media outlets who give “pedophiles a place at the table” and put in a “good word for Nambla.”

Let's be clear: Hastert deserves to get far more than the maximum sentence.  Indeed, 20 years to life sounds about right to me. The man is a monster.  Moreover, while he was covering up his own past criminal behavior and molestation of minors, Hastert was doing all in his power to back anti-LGBT laws.  As for references to Hastert being "a man of faith," please get me a vomit bag.  A man of faith would NEVER have molested youths the way Hastert did. Lock him up!!

Dennis Hastert Demonized Gays While He Was the True Predator

Dennis Hastert is the poster boy for all of the anti-gay Republicans who demonize and strive to stigmatize gays even as they seek gay sex on the down low or, in the case of Hastert, molest under aged boys.  Indeed, the pattern is so consistent, that the "godly folk" - if they had any brains (admittedly, a very big if) - ought to start immediately questioning Republicans who jump on the anti-gay bandwagon.   A piece by Michelangelo Signorile at Huffington Post looks at the utter hypocrisy of Hastert - and by extension other GOP homophobes.  Here are column excerpts:

No, it wasn’t African-American young men of the ‘90s — supposedly feral, “fatherless” and “godless” urban youth hell-bent on murder and mayhem — who were “super-predators,” a myth since exposed and which was created by the Princeton political science professor John DiIulio (who later became George W. Bush’s first director of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives) based on junk science.

The same twisted ideas that led to the “super-predator” myth, which we’ve seen raised and debunked again during the current Democratic primary race amid discussion of the 1994 crime bill, have been used by anti-LGBT religious conservatives to argue against marriage equality. They promoted the notion that gays would destroy “traditional marriage,” which supposedly would contribute to a breakdown in the family, causing deviant and dangerous consequences.

Some of those arguments against marriage equality were informed by a similarly debunked myth that gay men are likely to be sexual predators, the lie perpetuated by anti-LGBT hate mongers for decades, using junk science to exploit and further rampant homophobia in society in same the way the “super-predator” myth used it to exploit and further racism.

Meanwhile, the true example of a “super-predator” appears to have been former GOP House Speaker Dennis Hastert, a man who prosecutors now say molested at least 4 boys, including a 14-year-old and one who years later took his own life.

Worse yet, through the years, as he covered up the sexual assaults he committed as a wrestling coach back in Yorkville, Illinois, Hastert pushed policies and positions as a House member and as the Speaker of a far-right GOP majority from 1999 to 2007 that demonized gays in part by portraying gay men as sexual predators.

[As] a Politico report last year . . .  revealed that Hastert had a file in his office labeled “Homosexuals,” which included the sexual predator smear against gay men:

The records show that Hastert’s office kept a legislative file titled “Homosexuals,” filled with policy statements from social conservative groups like the Traditional Values Coalition and the Family Research Council that criticized same-sex marriage and Clinton administration efforts to prevent discrimination against gays and lesbians. The file also includes a 1996 Weekly Standard article, “Pedophilia Chic” that warned that “revisionist suggestions about pedophilia” were being embraced by the left.

The scurrilous Weekly Standard piece raged on about teens supposedly being lured into sex by adult gay men. The Family Research Council, whose statements filled Hastert’s “Homosexuals” file, has perpetuated the lie that gays are more likely to engage in sexual assault against boys — among the defamatory claims that earned it the label of “hate group“ by the Southern Poverty law Center — and its leader, Tony Perkins, has called pedophilia “a homosexual problem.”

The Hastert story is revolting on so many levels. He sexually assaulted boys who trusted him as their wrestling coach, scarring them for life. And while he covered it up over a period of decades, he also assaulted an entire minority group that was under a barrage of attacks from religious conservatives, continually denying them civil rights and demonizing them and pummeling gay people over and over again, with bill after bill, informed by lie after lie. If there’s a true definition of a super-predator, Dennis Hastert is it.

If there is a Hell, Hastert should have a special reserved seat - along with all the predator Catholic priests and the Popes, cardinals, bishops and others who covered up for them and aided and abetted their molestation of children and minors.  They are all cut from the same hypocrisy filled cloth.