The Kavanaugh nomination has brought out the worst in politics and people. Both sides so quickly went to their respective corners that neither really wants the truth. Progressives are ready to accept Christine Blasey Ford’s allegations at face value. Conservatives are ready to dismiss them out of hand. So, yeah, in this episode, it’s both sides.
So let me go through some of my thoughts over the past ugly week. The accusations Dr. Ford made certainly sound credible. That might not mean they are true but it does mean they need to be investigated. The rush to dismiss them by conservatives like Erick Erickson exposes them to be as disingenuous as people who rush to believe any accusations against conservative nominees.
Reading Brett Kavanaugh’s high school yearbook entry brought back a flood of memories from my all-boys high school in Northern Virginia in the early 1980s. I know exactly what type of guy Kavanaugh was in high school. He was a Big Man on Campus who was also a big partier and wanted everyone to know it. His status came with a sense of entitlement that oozes through his senior profile. That profile made Ford’s claims that much more plausible, even if it didn’t offer any evidence of guilt.
A lot of the guys I knew who fit that profile turned out to be good fathers and family men. That doesn’t negate who they were and what they did as high school and college students. It just raises the question of whether they should be held accountable for actions they took when they were much less mature. In the midst of the #MeToo movement, the answer for many, if not most, people is “yes.”
Don’t feel sorry for Kavanaugh. He’s not some mild mannered judge dedicated to the law. He’s a hardcore partisan who is a veteran of numerous Capitol Hill battles. He was part of the take-no-prisoners investigation of Ken Starr that scarred several innocent people along the way. Kavanaugh didn’t feel sorry for them.
He’s also got some of the most hard-nosed politicos in Washington defending him. They’ve gone so far as to publicly accuse another man of assaulting Ford, calling the whole episode a case of mistaken identity. Kavanaugh has known these people for decades. I have a hard time believing he knew nothing.
As for Ford, I don’t know whether she’s telling the truth or not. While her story sounds credible, I learned as an investigator in child neglect and abuse cases that people lie, sometimes for no apparent reason. Some people also have faulty memories and 35 years is a long time. I don’t see an obvious motive for her lying, but I also don’t know her and we haven’t heard from her. Some people just make stuff up and some people seem to develop memories from suggestions. I don’t know if that’s who she is or not.
The Republicans are getting on the wrong side of the #MeToo movement and the hearings illustrate the GOP’s problem with women. Every GOP member of the judicial committee is a white man. As the country becomes more diverse, the GOP is becoming more homogenous. They’ve already lost virtually every minority group in the nation. Now, they’re at risk of losing white women, too.
I was surprised that Trump didn’t nominate a woman to fill Kennedy’s seat. Conservatives on the court would sure benefit from having a woman on their side. Nominating Kavanaugh in the wake of Gorsuch just reinforced the GOP stereotype as being tone deaf on gender matters.
The implications for the midterms are huge. If Kavanaugh is confirmed, expect the Democratic base to be even more motivated. Anger does that. If he’s defeated, they’ll also probably be feeling their oats so don’t expect it to dampen their enthusiasm any.
As for Republicans, defeating Kavanaugh will have one of two reactions. Either the Trump base will show up in droves, believing Democrats robbed them of a Supreme Court race, or they’ll stay home believing Republicans in Congress don’t have the backbone to do what they’ve promised. I tend to believe a loss will fire them up, negating the Blue Wave somewhat.
Finally, Democrats and progressives who think stopping Kavanaugh will stop a conservative justice from filling Kennedy’s seat are living in la-la land. If it’s not Kavanaugh, it will be somebody every bit as conservative. If they can’t get him through before they election, they’ll appoint somebody in the lame duck Congress, but there’s no way Mitch McConnell is going to let Democrats have a say in shaping the judicial philosophy of the next justice.
Neither side is motivated by right or wrong. They’re motivated by win or loss. Neither side wants truth. They want to score points. We’re seeing the results of hyper-partisanship meeting a post-fact world, or at least one where “alternative facts” are entertained. The political battlefield will be littered with casualties before this episode is over.
Thomas Mills is the founder and publisher of PoliticsNC.com. Before beginning PoliticsNC, Thomas spent twenty years as a political and public affairs consultant. Learn more >
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