Mind Trapped by: Supreme court nominations and sexual assault accusations

[mican333]

Is that evidence to you of attempted rape?

What do you mean counters his defense.. are you going to hold him to remembering where he was 37 years ago.. and if he can't answer with the certainty desire.. then he is guilty!?

I think it's more of an issue that if he's lying about more mundane aspects of his past, like his heavy drinking as a younger man and partying on weeknights, his denial regarding more serious transgressions are not particularly credible.

I mean a guy that lies about partying on weekdays will definitely lie about sexually assaulting someone at one of those parties.


And to address a point you made elsewhere, the notion that Ford was paid to lie is absurd. I'm not saying that the notion of a person being paid to lie is absurd but it is absurd to suggest that Ford is such a person. And I'm not referring to her character (although there is nothing about her that does suggest she would do that), but that the scenario where she was paid to lie about Kavanaugh seems incredibly far-fetched to the point of absurdity.

Let me back this up with two facts.

1. She told her therapist about the assault six years ago.
2. When she heard Kavanaugh was a POTENTIAL nominee, she sent a letter with the accusation so that was the first time she raised an objection to him being on the SCOTUS.

So let's start with #2. If her letter had achieved the desired results at the time, he would have been removed from the list of candidates and another judge would be the one who would be facing confirmation. So if there was someone who payed her to make a false accusation, that person's motivation could not have been to sink Trump's pick for SCOTUS because it simply would have removed ONE of the persons on his short list and not effected any other of the potential nominees. The person would have to have been targeting Kavanaugh specifically since it's desired effect would have only harmed his nomination prospects but no one else's.

And then he would have had to pay her to lie to her therapist six years prior so there would be some kind of back-up when it was time to move forward (and if that was the case, then she certainly would have named him directly in the notes) to thwart his SCOTUS nomination as if the payer knew that that day would one day come. And if K was indeed the target, it would stand to reason that the accusation card would have been played before now. Unless the payer knew that K would eventually be nominated for SCOTUS, he would have tried to target him earlier and ruin his chance at some other position.

So the notion that Ford's accusation is part of a plot from someone with a lot money to ruin K's chances at being on the SCOTUS is an absurd notion. I think the scenario where K was mean to Ford in High School and she devised a revenge plot all on her own is significantly more credible than a moneyed interest conspiring with her to sink K's nomination (not to suggest that it's particularly credible).

------------------------------

But the long and short of it, and this is addressing the whole thread and not just MT, is that going by the standard of preponderance of evidence, Ford has a much stronger case than Kavanaugh. There is a significant amount of evidence that she is being truthful and accurate (primarily the therapist visit six years prior) and any notion that her motivation is something other than a sincere concern that the man who assaulted her could be a SCOTUS judge doesn't rise much above the evidence level of "well, it's possible". Kavanaugh, on the other hand, has apparently lied during the process numerous times (such as not partying on weekdays and what the terms in his yearbook mean, like "boof") and while that does not mean that he's lying about anything in particular, such as claiming to not have committed the assault, his word is not as credible as Ford's.

And please remember that what's going on is essentially a job interview and BY FAR the primary concern is that candidate for the seat is the best man for the job. If we think we can get someone better to take the position, then the current candidate should be rejected. So while I maintain the preponderance of the evidence shows that he did commit the assault, if we want to "split the difference" and say the odds are 50/50 that he did it, then unless we want to put a man on the court who may have committed sexual assault as a teenager (and such an action means that one is not a suitable candidate), then we should reject Kavanaugh.

And if one wants to say that it might not be fair to him to not give him the position because there's likewise a 50/50 chance that he didn't do it and therefore we might be rejecting someone who might have done nothing wrong, I can't say that it's not fair. But again, the primary concern is finding the right man for the job, not being as fair as possible to all of the candidates. As an analogy, it might not be fair to refuse to hire a babysitter who never molested any children because you are under the impression that there's a 50/50 chance that he did molest a child, but since your concern is for the safety of your children, you are perfectly justified in turning down that babysitter even though it might be unfair to that person. The exact same principle applies here.

So it seems pretty clear to me, short of evidence being found that indicates that he is being falsely accused, that his nomination should be rejected.

[MindTrap028]

The assertion that judge k is lying because he got a detail of 37 years ago wrong.. is asinine. You seriously expect anyone to remember he was drinking on a weekend or on Thursday night.. or ANY specific day.. is absoulitly a ridiculously standard to hold anyone too. I consider this asinine assertion to be support for my point that any investigation is likely to turn up false information or misremembering that will incriminate judge k. .. there you have it. He didn't 100% recall every night he drank in highschool so people conclude that he is lying.

[CowboyX]

The assertion that judge k is lying because he got a detail of 37 years ago wrong.. is asinine. You seriously expect anyone to remember he was drinking on a weekend or on Thursday night.. or ANY specific day.. is absoulitly a ridiculously standard to hold anyone too. I consider this asinine assertion to be support for my point that any investigation is likely to turn up false information or misremembering that will incriminate judge k. .. there you have it. He didn't 100% recall every night he drank in highschool so people conclude that he is lying.

I don't think I said that. But it was a point in the defense he made when introducing the calendars as evidence - namely that the calendars have him out of town nearly every weekend of the summer and it must have taken place on the weekend because they all worked or whatever during the week.

[Personally, I doubt that he worked.]

Yes, he mentioned mowing lawns and yes that's work but I don't see any work schedule per se on them - "Johnson's lawn" on friday, etc. for example. So even that is dubious. Definitely no work schedule of any kind on there from any regular job, which you would think would be there if he had it. I'm certain it would have been produced.

By the looks of it he was into improving himself and getting ready for football and college. I think I saw three Ivy League interview appointments for that month. Plenty of time for "blowing off steam" or behaving like a jackass.

______

So what about "boofing", the "devil's triangle", and "FFFF"?

[MindTrap028]

I love the referance to perponderance if evidence.. because we have zero evidence of any crime. Zero evidence the event actually occurred. The only evidence we have is evidence that she made the claim in the past, which is in this thread being taken as evidence of a crime.. which is ridiculously.
If 37 years ago she had made a police report with the same evidence as given today. It would have been dismissed. Sure it would be on his record but no background check would have taken it serious. Then fast forward to today, she tells everyone that the "new evidence " is that she told her counselor about it.. it would be laughed out of any court. Not because the standard of court is so high.. bit that it isn't actually evidence of a crime. So the only thing this woman has going for her case is the theatrical appearance of it all. To say that repeating the claim over the years substantiates the claim is foolish and dangerous precident. Her only evidence is.. but I have said it in the past... Which the defence could oy offer.. and I denied it in the past.. but he wasn't given the opportunity.
The appeal to preponderance of evidence is laughable and ridiculous as presented and ignores any standard of evidence relevant to establishing a crime. Fact is there are two out right denials vs 1 evedenceless accusation. The preponderance of that evidence goes against the accuser.

---------- Post added at 07:37 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:31 AM ----------

@ cowboy.... What about those terms? Do you think any person as intelligent as judge k, would write down a term referancing a crime? As to his business.. is there any chance he had a separate account for that stuff? Like a separate calendar? The problem with appealing to 37 years ago is that you have no basis for demanding a complete record of the defendant.. it is unreasonable. And again your point supports my assertion that ANY evidence in anbinvestigation is going to be more likely to incriminate the defendant.
Here you have said he can't prove work this he must be lying or it didn't happen. This he had opportunity to do the crime.

[mican333]

I love the referance to perponderance if evidence.. because we have zero evidence of any crime. Zero evidence the event actually occurred. The only evidence we have is evidence that she made the claim in the past, which is in this thread being taken as evidence of a crime.. which is ridiculously.

Again, this is not a criminal trial so you are once again erroneously applying the standard of a criminal trial to what is essentially a job interview.

If, in a job interview, someone makes a credible claim that the prospect has committed actions in the past that would disqualify him from being acceptable for the job, then the proper standard regarding the claim to abide by is preponderance of evidence.

For reasons I believe I have covered already, Ford is more credible than Kavanaugh (there is ample evidence to show that she's not lying and the odds that she's mistaken are slim while it looks like he's lied during the confirmation hearing) so assuming our primary goal is to make sure we have an acceptable person fill the position, he should be rejected.

[CowboyX]

[/COLOR]@ cowboy.... What about those terms? Do you think any person as intelligent as judge k, would write down a term referancing a crime? As to his business.. is there any chance he had a separate account for that stuff? Like a separate calendar? The problem with appealing to 37 years ago is that you have no basis for demanding a complete record of the defendant.. it is unreasonable. And again your point supports my assertion that ANY evidence in anbinvestigation is going to be more likely to incriminate the defendant.
Here you have said he can't prove work this he must be lying or it didn't happen. This he had opportunity to do the crime.

I think a young man might stupidly write things down especially if enmeshed in that type of "no means yes" culture. Only to later try and dismiss them. And he was a known frat boy party animal in college as reported by his classmates. It doesn't have to reference a crime, only his demeanor which is opposite to that which he claims.

Additionally, Ford was able to correctly identify 4 of the 6 people at that party - coincidence?

He certainly had opportunity. What I am saying is that his claim that he was away every weekend and didn't have an opportunity is weak at best.

There would also be work records if he had a regular job, but he hasn't claimed that. He said he had a "business of sorts" mowing lawns. That's believable. How many lawns?

---------- Post added at 12:43 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:01 AM ----------

He lied about ever attending a party similar to that described by Ford, in fact he was at just such a party on the 1st.

He lied when he said all of the witnesses at the party said it didn't happen. Keiser said she believes Ford. PJ said he has no knowledge of the incident - not that it didn't happen.

He lied about not being a big partier - "treasure of the keg city club" in his Yale yearbook. He has three sexual assault allegations against him, all involve alcohol.

[MindTrap028]

On what grounds do you say she correctly identified 4 of 6. She is the only one that claims to be there. She didn't name anyone in 2012.. so no you have no evidence to say she is correct.

Also showering that he was at A party, does nothing to support her claim because she never identified Which party. If the process is for her to make a vague claim and then for judge K to justify every specific day in a 2 year range..
That is ridiculous yet.. here we are and that is exactly what he is being held to.
He doesn't have to prove anything. She had 100% burden and have not met it with anything.

As to work record.. so what? Why does he have to show you anything? He isn't accused of being anywhere specific at any specific time. So no work record will matter, as it can always be some other day. Maybe it was actually a we'd party? Maybe it was in 81 instead of 82.
This is the problem with a vague claim it can not be rebutted by its nature.
Also a big partier at Yale =\= big partier in highschool. I know that after 37 years .. 2 to 6 years isn't that big of a deal.. but when you are claiming a crime or specific. Event.. it does.. it is called context and without a specific charge one can not reasonablyyknow the context.

Your casting such things as lies on his part is hackery and character assination at it's worst.
Because there are no facts an evidence to support her claims, youare only left with vaguly discrediting his denial.. which is not sufficient to establish any crime took place.

[CowboyX]

On what grounds do you say she correctly identified 4 of 6. She is the only one that claims to be there. She didn't name anyone in 2012.. so no you have no evidence to say she is correct.

On his calendar - PJ...Squee - How would she know of such a meeting so specifically if she hadn't been there?

---------- Post added at 03:19 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:16 PM ----------

Also showering that he was at A party, does nothing to support her claim because she never identified Which party.

He said he was never at such a party...his calendar says otherwise.

---------- Post added at 03:20 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:19 PM ----------

As to work record.. so what? Why does he have to show you anything? He isn't accused of being anywhere specific at any specific time.

He claims to be somewhere at a specific time...out of town on the weekends when the parties were supposedly going on.

---------- Post added at 03:22 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:20 PM ----------

Also a big partier at Yale =\= big partier in highschool. I know that after 37 years .. 2 to 6 years isn't that big of a deal.. but when you are claiming a crime or specific. Event.. it does.. it is called context and without a specific charge one can not reasonablyyknow the context.

He claims to not be a big partier at either...more likely he was at both.

---------- Post added at 03:23 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:22 PM ----------

youare only left with vaguly discrediting his denial.. which is not sufficient to establish any crime took place.

Sure, he's a liar. Big stakes, therefore big motivation.

[MindTrap028]

Pj and squeeze.. doesn't sound anything like what she has claimed so far. What are you talking about here?

Judge K, never said he was never at parties.. so I don't know what you are saying he liked about that for. I would think that he claimed to be at parties because they partied on the weekend. Your just trying to make him sound like a liar. Also, him mis remembering is not lying and only an unreasonable judge of events would hold a person. To recalling g what weekend he partied 37 years ago.
-- claims to be out of town..
And how would him not getting that right make him a liar? What kind of memory do you expect this guy to have?

--- big stakes to lie
That is just begging the question and convicting him without evidence. 20% of woman involved in sexual assault cases are liars. I'll try to get the link to that. That number includes women who have physical injuries.

[CowboyX]

Pj and squeeze.. doesn't sound anything like what she has claimed so far. What are you talking about here?

Judge K, never said he was never at parties.. so I don't know what you are saying he liked about that for. I would think that he claimed to be at parties because they partied on the weekend. Your just trying to make him sound like a liar. Also, him mis remembering is not lying and only an unreasonable judge of events would hold a person. To recalling g what weekend he partied 37 years ago.
-- claims to be out of town..
And how would him not getting that right make him a liar? What kind of memory do you expect this guy to have?

--- big stakes to lie
That is just begging the question and convicting him without evidence. 20% of woman involved in sexual assault cases are liars. I'll try to get the link to that. That number includes women who have physical injuries.

Kavanaugh testified and surmised that the party probably would have been on the weekend because they worked during the week and then used his calendar to show he was out of town most weekends. That's been shown to be not true by his own evidence.

It's also begging the question to go into her motivation (money) as you did so I don't see a problem.

[MindTrap028]

No, it is begging to assume it to be the case. Which I did not. So you have mischaracteried or misunderstood my point about money being a possible motive.
My argument is not to assert that she lied, but to assert that the statement "why would she lie" is ignoring a basic human motivator that is also present in this case .. namely money.
Yet you are claiming that judge k lied when he said "probably" .. which is unfounded.

Could he have lied? Yes.. everyone could be lying
We simply don't know. The and 37 years later it is foolish to assert false memories are in fact lies. That is generally just people projecting their emotions on the situation that lacks any coberation evidence.

That is why I say the accusation is unfair to the innocent.
He can't offer an alibie even if he had one, because no date or location is named in the accusation.

[CowboyX]

No, it is begging to assume it to be the case. Which I did not. So you have mischaracteried or misunderstood my point about money being a possible motive.
My argument is not to assert that she lied, but to assert that the statement "why would she lie" is ignoring a basic human motivator that is also present in this case .. namely money.
Yet you are claiming that judge k lied when he said "probably" .. which is unfounded.

I don't think I did. I said he lied when he was never at a similar party.

He also made the claim that the party was probably on the weekend and that he was out of town most weekends. This is not a credible statement given his own evidence.

[MindTrap028]

It is however an irrelevant statement. Because if he was indeed out of town or at home. It doesn't mean that ONE weekend he partied and raped her.
Likewise.if he partied every night.. doesn't mean at the party she was raped at he was actually at home grounded or out of town.

It isn't about what claim sounds most creble, it is about if she can substantiates her claim with any evidence at all.. and she can't. So are we going to convict people with zero coberating evidence or not?
I say we shouldnt because that is a kangaroo court system where everyone is guilty until proven innocent.

Also what do you mean "similar" party. I never heard that claim.

[Ibelsd]

No, my approach to this is to look at what I know or have seen and make a tentative judgement based on that. I try not to claim anything for sure. I critique and challenge ideas folks put forth, and I put my own forward. What makes this one especially interesting is exactly the fact there is so much unknown. If we had a semen test or something its a slam dunk, not much to talk about but moral implications. But here, we are dealing with human memroy, 30+ years, drinking, and a lot more. The waters are super murky, that makes it perfect for speculation. And we all have to deal with situations like this, where two people have competing claims and you don't have a celar way to know the truth. How we deal with that, is fascinating to me.



My general impression with drinking is that it's good for not remembering things, but doesn't tend to lead to false memories. So it coulld scramble up her facts, but isn't likely to lead her to invent them. Certainly, it was a drinking party, so I'd assume she drank. I definately don't consider Fords memory an inviolate witness to the truth.



Like I said, I know people who are afraid of flying. They often use it as an excuse to avoid things they don't want to to. When asked, she was clear she didn't want to go to Washington. Can you blame her? She came to realie that was not in the cards so she did what she had to. Seems perfectly reasonable. The counter theorry is that she's all part of a plot by the democrats. I'm sure they are happy to see as many delays as possilbe, and they may have encouraged this kind of thing, but that doesn't make her a liar personally which is what I think matters.



That isn't accurate from what I read. She had told the therapist about the attack, not who had done it and the therapist corroborates that.



She's been adamant about who was in the room so far as I've seen. Judge and Kavenaugh. At the party, she experessed she wasn't exactly sure other than it was a small party and she thinks she remembers at least some of the other guests.

Now, her friend who she thought was there but doesn't remember going or ever meeting Kavenaugh is a big blow to the reliability of her memory for sure. But it's also a mark agaisnt her lying since... it would be pretty bone headed to claim someone was there who you know wasn't. She didn't seem at all like an idiot (there are some who are of course).



That would not be too unusual for me, I have a pretty crappy memory myself for many things. Good for others, its just plain weird sometimes.



Franly, that makes sense to me. Why would she be looking over the receipts of people who were trying to help her out? It seems a strange thing to exect her to know. She contacted her representative about this and they sprang into action, activating the political machine to swoop in and support her. Clearly someone in all that paid for it, but who exactly, not sure how she would know or care to ask. They could just ask the guy, I saw him on a TV clip the other day.



Again, she likely didn't ask. I imagine it went down like: Democrats: Ford, a lot of folks will challenge what you say, we think it would be good for you to take a polygraph test, are you willing to do that? Ford: Yes OK I think I could do that. Democrats: Great, we will get that set up and let you know. Then she shows up, does the test, and that's that.



As normal as this whole thing which is to say no, but in the circumstance, yes. Any time you are about to make a claim against the rich and powerful, you damned well want a lawer. And I'm sure the democrats were more than happy to pay for it since her claim does them a great service in their political struggle.



Sure. Absolutely. Thogh, she's got other things going for her as well. And Kavenaugh has his own problems to deal with, most notibly his rep for heavy drinking and partying and the yearbook that shows his attitude about sex and partying during that time of his life. No one has anything iron clad going on there.



Why is grilling someone needed here? She answered a number of challenging questions. Kavenaugh also faced challenging questions. I thought they were both treated respectfully as witnesses. This was not a trial.



That is not true. Many people have backed up her story and believe in her testiomony. No one can directly corroborate it. That is often true for the victims of sexual assaults. Some have directly contridicted it.



I've probably met a lot of people I don't remember ever meeting. I've had people call be by name and I have no clue who they are. Memory kind of sucks that way. But there are hardly any people I remember meeting that I have in fact never met. That's pretty rare.

Memory can be totaly false, but... it is far more common that you forget something entirely than you invent events that didn't happen.

The problem here is you are going line by line here and offering an excuse why Ford's story has holes or why her story has been inconsistent. The point here is that there is absolutely nothing in her story which is corroborated. Believing her story isn't supporting her story. Not in any sort of legal or factual sense. My believing in a story about dragons isn't the same as supporting the truth that dragons exist. And no, no one has "backed up her story" in any meaningful way other than those people who have simply said they believe her. That is not the same. Sure, people forget whom they have met. The point here is that her friend and a supposed witness claims to have never met K. It is just another example of her story failing to be corroborated. Sure, the friend may have a million reasons why she cannot remember. That is not the point I am making. The point is whether there is anything which supports Ford's story. To date, nothing makes her story credible. She cannot place K at the party she claims the assault happened. She cannot place anyone at the party. She cannot even show a party occurred. She cannot recall a date, time or place of the party. This isn't accusing someone of assault at a time and place where it is provable that both people were at. This is nothing like a credible assault allegation. You take all sorts of allegations made in the news recently about celebrities. They may have happened a long time ago, but in all the credible allegations there was a time and place which could be corroborated. We don't even have that.

In terms of K's drinking.. ok. He admitted he drank in high school and college. He admitted he drank too much at times. He has been honest about it. There is some argument about whether he's ever blacked out. No one has offered any evidence that he has. In college, I knew people that blacked out every time they went out drinking. I know people who I never knew to black out. We all drank together and consumed lots of alcohol. It'd be impossible for me to claim one way or the other that any of them blacked out, except for the one guy who admitted it every morning. However, none of my friends, even the guy who constantly blacked out ever sexually assaulted anyone. The two just aren't equivalent. And to use that as some sort of evidence that he may have assaulted Ford and simply lost his memory of it is a cop out when nothing in her story checks out.

Even the house where she claims she was assaulted doesn't check out. There is no evidence K or his friends ever partied in that area where she claims it occurred. Her story isn't credible. She isn't credible. Let's not forget, she originally claimed this event occurred in the mid 80's. Then, it changed to the early 80's. Then, she pinpointed it to the summer of '82. Hmmm. How did she manage to do that. She offered some sort of convoluted story about her driver's license. But she does not remember how she got to the party or how she got home. Maybe she drove?

I'm just listening to both sides and even if we use the lowest standard of evidence, the preponderance of evidence, which is what we use for civil cases, her case does not hold up. Her story is far more likely to be false than true from what we know. Does that mean K didn't do it? I guess not. However, in the U.S. we don't allow accusations to stand against someone without some minimum threshold of evidence. Our justice system isn't based on belief. It is based on fact. It'd be a dangerous standard if we decided that assault cases needn't meet this level of proof. The alternative is that whoever is in power gets to decide whose story to believe and the accused is guilty or innocent based on whether their supporters are in power or not. That doesn't sound like a just world for anyone.

A person's life does not deserve to be destroyed due to an uncorroborated allegation from any time period let alone from 35 years ago. This is not a precedent I would feel comfortable with going forward.

[MindTrap028]

The problem with her changing dates.. is which ones are we to believe? The first one where it was late 80s.. and judge k was in another state? Or the one where it was mid 80s and she was out of state.. or finally the summer of 82 which is finally made when she has a Target and lots of lawyers to coach her. .. I mean it isn't like she was rushed to make any of the claims.

[Ibelsd]

On his calendar - PJ...Squee - How would she know of such a meeting so specifically if she hadn't been there?

Because she didn't. You are leaving out the entire list of people noted on the calendar, one of which was a guy she was dating during that time. It'd have been odd if the one person she couldn't remember was her boyfriend. I'm sure you'll overlook this minor detail and come up with some sort of excuse. That's the whole point of this thread and this case. In order to believe Ford, you have to fill in a lot of blanks where she cannot and you have to overlook all sorts of inconsistencies in her story. This whole thing is like those UFO stories where someone in the middle of nowhere gets a picture of some odd lights in the sky and then does some mental gymnastics to arrive at the conclusion that it must've been aliens. Then, when you show that person the evidence and explain what they really saw, the imagination kicks into overdrive and they cling to their pathetic story anyhow.

It is really simple. Did she or is she able to name a date, time, and place of this party? No? Ok.. Is her story supported by anyone else. Can someone else back up her story saying that they were there? No? Ok.. Did she tell someone around the time it occurred which would make it more likely than not that something happened? No? Ok... That's it folks. Case closed. The other stuff, calendars and underage drinking, is just a distraction. It does not matter. He could have blacked out every day and his calendar can say PARTY every night. Her story, the story that matters, cannot be even remotely corroborated. Not in the slightest. It is just a story and whether it is a figment of her imagination, a paid smear, or just a night she cannot fully forget nor remember is irrelevant. K has denied it ever happened and there is NOTHING which contradicts his story.

[MindTrap028]

@ ibelsd. Why does that bare minimum idea of Justice feel like pulling teeth?

[MindTrap028]

@Mican

Sorry I was not able to respond to your post 52 more directly. Was responding from my phone for last few days so couldn't quote.

They will turn up different facts because they will be looking for different facts. The police seek facts that will help them prosecute the suspect and are not interested in finding facts that will help prove the person is innocent.

I don't see how you can support this. Basically your suggesting that police investigations don't exonerate innocent people. But they clearly do, by catching a guilty person they exonerate everyone.
Also, the investigation into Judge K would be very much like a regular criminal investigation, namely because it is the same organization doing the job.
They are not applying different training to the job at hand, they are trained in a specific way to investigate, and there simply is no reason to think the distinction you are trying to make actually exists.

so unless you can show how an investigation is substantively different in this kind of case, then any other.. I see no reason to accept your assertion that it is different.

And you not being aware of the difference between Democrats and prosecutors does not mean that there are no differences. If you want to argue that the two are essentially the same, it is your burden to support that. Using your lack of knowledge of the difference to support that there is no difference would be engaging in the argument from ignorance fallacy.

I said they were the same because a prosictuers motivation is to convinct whoever is in front of him.
The dems appear to have very much the same motivation, and thus they are not going to persue quetioning different than a prosicuter would.

Yes, I do think he will be treated differently. Since the situation will be different in many ways and the Democrats are not police men, they will treat him differently. That might not be the answer you want from me but when asked a question that I choose to answer, I can only answer it as honestly as I can and that is indeed what I think.

And btw, what I said is not a claim but just an answer to your question. If you are going to take the position that they are the same, the burden is yours to support that they are before I have any burden to support the opposing position.

I get it.. thanks for answering.
I think it is wrong to compare the dems as police, as they are more like prosecutors. Police don't prosecute crimes.. they investigate them.
The comparison is not perfect..

"More likely" than what, though? If hypothetically, they talk to someone who back then knew he was not at the party, is the person more likely to mistakenly place him at the party due to the passage of time than accurately remember that he was not there? I don't think so and if that is your argument, then you will need to support that before I will accept that argument.

And that principle works the other way. Maybe he was at the party and someone mis-remembers that he wasn't there and says he wasn't there when he was. So the flaw in memory can just as easily work for him as against him.

Right, so the more likely applies several ways.
1) 37 years later people in general are more likely to remeber wrong. (shouldn't be an argument)
2) In regards to incriminating Judge K, people are more likely to remeber wrong and thus incriminate him then 37 years ago.
This has aleady occured on several levels. 1) we have an example of someone who mis-remebered him at a party, then recanting. (which is the only way we will "know" they mis-remebered) this was damaging to him. 2) along the lines of my supported links for why you don't talk to police, Judge K himself is more likely to incriminate himself.
We can see that he did this in his testimoney by the line of argument that Cowboy has offered, namely, he did not 100% account for the evidence, thus he is al liar, and thus he probably raped this woman. That incriminated him to some extent, and maybe on it's own created a situation where he is ruled out for the position, because his mistake will be viewed as purgery.
so he is more likely to purger himself by his faulty memory.
3) The totality of witness. If 100 people remeber correctly that he was not at a party, and 1 remembers him at the party, that is incriminating to him. When it comes to hostile judges like the dems, they will not listen to the 100, but will count the 1, and this will hurt him.


So in all ways concivable, it is morelikely that mis-remembering him will hurt him, and any mis-remebering that helps him will not be counted, or not be able to outweigh the incrimination.
Case in point is the accusers own memory. She first recalled that it occured in the late 80's.. Well guess what, that exhonerats him completly, because he wasn't around. She then remebered that it was the mid 80's, and that exhonerated him because they weren't around together.
then she finally settled on 82, for no stated reason.
The two instances that exhonerate him are not even considered. He is without a doubt, harmed more by the one instance than the other 2 which help him.

More likely than what, though? Given what you were responding to, you seem to be implying that if Bob had information that would help exonerate K, he is more likely to mis-remember the event and portray it in a way that supports his guilt. As an example, let's say Bob and K went bowling the night of the alleged event (which would be providing him an alibi), he is more likely to remember him mis-remember him being at the party in question and therefore, due to a flaw in memory, give testimony that incriminates than exonerates. I find this notion very unlikely.

And if you mean something else, then please be specific of what two things you are referring to where A is more likely than B.

I think I have addressed all your concern about clarity above.

But again, more likely than what? When you say "more likely" you NEED to add "more likely than (whatever you need to say to finish the thought). Short of that, your argument is too vague to address.

For the record, I don't think a competent investigation looking into an innocent man is more likely to turn up someone who will mistakenly incriminate someone than turn up factual information that will exonerate him. I'm not saying that it's impossible that they will find false incrimination evidence but I don't think that it will be more plentiful than accurate information that helps him.

It isn't about the plentifulness of the evidence. It is about the effect incriminating evidence has. It far outweighs any evidence that helps a person.
see the 100 who remeber he wasn't there.. vs the 1 that mis-remebers him there.

This point is compounded by the nature of what level of evidence will "hurt" him. Basically him at any party is portrayed as incriminating, and taken that way by the dems.

Please support this assertion.

I actually don't really know what you are talking about and the fact that I don't know means that it's probably not common knowledge and therefore probably doesn't really factor into anything. I mean if I hear "She made a claim and then retracted it", I would ignore the claim so it certainly would not cause me to think that he's more likely to be guilty than if the claim had never been made at all.

But anyway, I can't consider this supported until you explain further.

I'm pretty sure I linked it earlier in the thread.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/sup...cident-n911111

Basically a woman came out early in the process, and said "this happened". She later had to walk that back.. but it was considered "coberation" at the time when dems were pushing this as a valid claim.

A note on why this may not be "common knowlege".. It was easy to google find when this thread was on page 1, but I had to really search to find a link to anything about this walk back now.
So... yea.

Yes, you have missed a possibility.

4) there is no smoking gun proving that he's innocent but more evidence is found that supports that he's innocent than evidence that is found that supports that he's guilty, which improves his odds of being considered innocent and confirmed.

And if he is indeed innocent, I would say #4 or #2 (nothing relevant is found either way) are the most likely options. They are certainly more likely than competent investigators somehow getting the investigation so wrong that they somehow bring back more incorrect evidence that makes him look guilty than evidence that exonerates him.

Thanks, i think I addressed this above. Because it isn't about how much evidence, but the weight of the evidence.
100 people say "i never saw you murder anyone", and one guy says "i saw him murder someone". The 100 will not matter.
It's just how things work, and the basics of my objection.

I don't know about "wrong" but you have not supported that investigators bringing more evidence that exonerates him than condemns him is going to be twisted in such a way that it ends up causing him more harm than good. Even if Democrats do spin the evidence to his detriment, the Republicans likewise will be able to use the evidence to justify their votes and there will be less reason for fence-sitters to not confidently vote for K as the fear of backlash will decrease. Remember, Republicans have the majority and assuming things shake out along party lines, the only way K will not get seated is if a couple of Republicans flip and bringing forward evidence that, when observed objectively and without spin, points to his innocence, the odds of someone flipping decreases. They can say with more confidence "the new evidence convinced me that he did not do it so I voted for him".

So evidence that points to his innocence will indeed help him.

First of all, if this woman is in fact mis-remebering.. then the harm done to him is imeasurable even if he gets on the court.
So this line you have doesn't make much sense, as though he will have suffered no loss if he is in the end exhonerated. His house has been vandalized, his good name tarnished, and he will forever be connected to this IF HE IS INNOCENT.
Him benig innocent doesn't change him suffering loss in the process, and the more people make mistakes the worse it is for him.

Also, the idea that anything they can find will "exhonerate him".. is pretty low. I mean him being exhonorated is them finding nothing, and they will no doubt find something that will be twisted against him.. Such as his year books and calander which had every negative connotation implied against him.

And if it's your position that the answer is "none", please support that position.

I think you have the burden of proof here backwards. It is your assertion that they are different. So you have to support it.
A question the police would ask that this investigation won't.. is basically all I can think of to support your assertion for a distinction in application.
It is one thing to show a distinction in motivation, but if it works out the same.. then your point disapears.
you are free of course to support the assertion of distinction. (I do not this is the second time this has come up in this post)

Again, I'm unaware of any mistake that will have a detrimental effect on his prospects.

There was of course the "mistake" of the dem's sitting on this for 6 weeks till the last minute. So there is at least that.
Then there is the "mistake" linked above where somone claimed that it did indeed happen, and was taken early in the process as cooperation of the events.
Which added credibility and hurt judge K.



..
Final note, your conclusion seems to hinge on a "more this than that" sort of weight, and that is not what I have been talking about.

[mican333]

I don't see how you can support this. Basically your suggesting that police investigations don't exonerate innocent people.

No, I'm saying that when the police are investigating a suspect, they are not particularly interested in finding evidence that might exonerate the person they are investigating.

Also, the investigation into Judge K would be very much like a regular criminal investigation, namely because it is the same organization doing the job.
They are not applying different training to the job at hand, they are trained in a specific way to investigate, and there simply is no reason to think the distinction you are trying to make actually exists.

There is a difference between doing an investigation to help convict a particular suspect and doing an investigation to find out the unbiased truth of the matter, regardless of whether the facts point to confirmation or innocence.

Different goals will yield different results. That is the difference.

I said they were the same because a prosictuers motivation is to convinct whoever is in front of him.
The dems appear to have very much the same motivation, and thus they are not going to persue quetioning different than a prosicuter would.

I disagree. I think in terms of the alleged assault, they are seeking to learn the truth of the matter and if the evidence strongly suggested that K didn't do it, they would back off. Now, you may disagree and think that they would try to make him look guilty even if they sincerely thought he was not but if that is your position, you will need to support it.

Otherwise we will have to agree to disagree on this point.

Right, so the more likely applies several ways.
1) 37 years later people in general are more likely to remeber wrong. (shouldn't be an argument)
2) In regards to incriminating Judge K, people are more likely to remeber wrong and thus incriminate him then 37 years ago.

Again, MORE LIKELY THAN WHAT?

This has aleady occured on several levels. 1) we have an example of someone who mis-remebered him at a party, then recanting. (which is the only way we will "know" they mis-remebered) this was damaging to him.

In what way? I've been paying attention to the situation and I NEVER heard this brought up in some way that harmed him or helped Ford.

It sounds to me like it was discarded and didn't figure into the results either way. If I'm wrong, please support that it made a difference.

2) along the lines of my supported links for why you don't talk to police, Judge K himself is more likely to incriminate himself.
We can see that he did this in his testimoney by the line of argument that Cowboy has offered, namely, he did not 100% account for the evidence, thus he is al liar, and thus he probably raped this woman. That incriminated him to some extent, and maybe on it's own created a situation where he is ruled out for the position, because his mistake will be viewed as purgery.
so he is more likely to purger himself by his faulty memory.

I'm not going to read other posts find out what you are talking about so if you want to introduce this in our debate, you will need to fill me in. But I'm not sure that this is relevant.

For one, we are discussing an FBI investigation, not his testimony in the Senate. Secondly, the debate is about how it would harm an INNOCENT man and it's not an accepted premise that K did not commit the assault so even if he does get tripped up, it might be because he's guilty and tripped himself up while trying to lie about it and therefore it's not an example of an innocent man being unfairly disadvantaged.

3) The totality of witness. If 100 people remeber correctly that he was not at a party, and 1 remembers him at the party, that is incriminating to him. When it comes to hostile judges like the dems, they will not listen to the 100, but will count the 1, and this will hurt him.

But that doesn't really matter, does it? The Dems are all going to vote against him anyway so them taking evidence and using it to justify voting against him will make no effective difference at all. They are already at 100% and can't go any higher.

The only way Kavanaugh will lose is if a few Republicans flip and vote against him. So if the FBI comes back with 100 to 1 evidence in favor of K, then the prospect of some Republicans flipping decreases (since they aren't going to focus on that 1 that's against him) and K is more likely to win.

You seem to be arguing as if the Dems are in charge. They are not. So again, if the evidence, viewed objectively, helps K more than it hurts him, it will increase his chances of winning the seat.

So in all ways concivable, it is morelikely that mis-remembering him will hurt him, and any mis-remebering that helps him will not be counted, or not be able to outweigh the incrimination.
Case in point is the accusers own memory. She first recalled that it occured in the late 80's.. Well guess what, that exhonerats him completly, because he wasn't around. She then remebered that it was the mid 80's, and that exhonerated him because they weren't around together.
then she finally settled on 82, for no stated reason.
The two instances that exhonerate him are not even considered. He is without a doubt, harmed more by the one instance than the other 2 which help him.

As far as I can tell it had absolutely no effect either way. I never even heard of it being brought up against him. And again, I've been paying quite a bit of attention.

I mean we are so far in the process now, we don't need to engage in hypotheticals on how something will damage him. If it didn't actually damage him by now, then it's not damaging.

It isn't about the plentifulness of the evidence. It is about the effect incriminating evidence has. It far outweighs any evidence that helps a person.
see the 100 who remeber he wasn't there.. vs the 1 that mis-remebers him there.

This point is compounded by the nature of what level of evidence will "hurt" him. Basically him at any party is portrayed as incriminating, and taken that way by the dems.

I see no evidence to support that him being at a party is considered incriminating by the Democrats.

I'm pretty sure I linked it earlier in the thread.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/sup...cident-n911111

Basically a woman came out early in the process, and said "this happened". She later had to walk that back.. but it was considered "coberation" at the time when dems were pushing this as a valid claim.

A note on why this may not be "common knowlege".. It was easy to google find when this thread was on page 1, but I had to really search to find a link to anything about this walk back now.
So... yea.

As far as I can tell, it had zero effect on the proceedings. So while this may have happened, it cannot be argued that it particularly harmed K. If you are going to argue that it did (has some kind of effect on whether he will get the seat), please support.

Thanks, i think I addressed this above. Because it isn't about how much evidence, but the weight of the evidence.
100 people say "i never saw you murder anyone", and one guy says "i saw him murder someone". The 100 will not matter.
It's just how things work, and the basics of my objection.

Because you say so? A few posts ago, I presented numerous scenarios of hypothetical evidence that would help him, such as someone saying that she had a grudge against him, so you can't say that the only "innocent" evidence they may find would be so weak that it could not make a positive difference in his situation.

First of all, if this woman is in fact mis-remebering.. then the harm done to him is imeasurable even if he gets on the court.
So this line you have doesn't make much sense, as though he will have suffered no loss if he is in the end exhonerated. His house has been vandalized, his good name tarnished, and he will forever be connected to this IF HE IS INNOCENT.
Him benig innocent doesn't change him suffering loss in the process, and the more people make mistakes the worse it is for him.

But that does not rebut my argument.

And of course if he's innocent, a false accusation is unfair to him. And likewise if he's guilty, all of the bad things Ford had to go through in order to get some level of justice is unfair to her. So one cannot say that the process has been more unfair to him than to her unless one is going to forward the premise that he indeed did not do what he is accused of. And such a claim does need support before it is accepted.

Really, this focus on the fairness of an investigation IF he's innocent is not really the main issue here. It's just what you've been arguing so I've been rebutting it. How fair the process is to him IF he's innocent is really a minor issue (and no more important than the fairness to Ford if he did it) compared to the primary one.

The primary concern is to find the best candidate for the SCOTUS that we can and if there's good reason to think that he did it, even if we can't be completely sure, then he should not get the seat. Yes, that would be unfair to him if he's innocent but again, there is a much, much, much more important consideration here - one that may have a tremendous effect on all of our lives for decades to come.

As an analogy, it's fair to say that one of a parent's primary duties is to protect his child. So if the parent hired what seems to be really good babysitter and then hears a credible accusation of child molestation (someone claims in all seriousness that they were molested by him as a child), the parent would be justified in not hiring that babysitter. And it would indeed be unfair to the sitter if the accusation is false but since the parent's duty is to protect his child, it's still the right decision. And to bring it back to Kavanaugh, I do think that just a mere accusation should not sink him but by any logical view of Ford's claims and actions, the claim is very credible (I personally put the odds that she's telling the truth at about 99% but will grant you 50/50 for debate's sake if we don't want to debate the odds). But it seems pretty obvious that her claim must be taken seriously and if one thinks that someone who committed sexual assault as a teenager is someone who SHOULD NOT be on the SCOTUS, then one should not want to take the very significant risk of doing just that.

Also, the idea that anything they can find will "exhonerate him".. is pretty low. I mean him being exhonorated is them finding nothing, and they will no doubt find something that will be twisted against him.. Such as his year books and calander which had every negative connotation implied against him.

But again, unless we accept the premise that he's innocent, these things did not necessarily harm an innocent man.

It's not beyond the realm of possibility that they harmed him because he's guilty. And some of the stuff likely harmed him because he lied about it (such as what the things in his yearbook meant).

I think you have the burden of proof here backwards. It is your assertion that they are different. So you have to support it.
A question the police would ask that this investigation won't.. is basically all I can think of to support your assertion for a distinction in application.
It is one thing to show a distinction in motivation, but if it works out the same.. then your point disapears.
you are free of course to support the assertion of distinction. (I do not this is the second time this has come up in this post)

A difference in investigative motive will result in different questions being asked.'

If you want to learn A, you ask questions that will help you learn A.
If you want to learn B, you ask questions that will help you learn B.

Since A =/= B, the questions will not be the same either.

There was of course the "mistake" of the dem's sitting on this for 6 weeks till the last minute. So there is at least that.

I'm not sure it was a mistake, since it either could have been an appropriate response of a calculated attack.

Then there is the "mistake" linked above where somone claimed that it did indeed happen, and was taken early in the process as cooperation of the events.
Which added credibility and hurt judge K.

I see no evidence of tangible harm that it cause him. I've never heard anyone anywhere use that against him.

[CowboyX]

It is however an irrelevant statement. Because if he was indeed out of town or at home. It doesn't mean that ONE weekend he partied and raped her.
Likewise.if he partied every night.. doesn't mean at the party she was raped at he was actually at home grounded or out of town.

It isn't about what claim sounds most creble, it is about if she can substantiates her claim with any evidence at all.. and she can't. So are we going to convict people with zero coberating evidence or not?
I say we shouldnt because that is a kangaroo court system where everyone is guilty until proven innocent.

Also what do you mean "similar" party. I never heard that claim.

I'm not thinking about conviction.

He aid he wasn't at any party that resembled what Dr. Ford described, yet he was.

---------- Post added at 10:30 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:29 PM ----------

The problem with her changing dates.. is which ones are we to believe? The first one where it was late 80s.. and judge k was in another state? Or the one where it was mid 80s and she was out of state.. or finally the summer of 82 which is finally made when she has a Target and lots of lawyers to coach her. .. I mean it isn't like she was rushed to make any of the claims.

Then get the records from the Safeway...oh, blocked by the White House, nevermind.

---------- Post added at 10:40 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:30 PM ----------

Because she didn't. You are leaving out the entire list of people noted on the calendar, one of which was a guy she was dating during that time. It'd have been odd if the one person she couldn't remember was her boyfriend.

Nope, Mark and Brett were already ********* when she got there so the party had already been going on. Doesn't mean people weren't coming and going. Maybe her boyfriend was there then left before she got there. I haven't been through it that thoroughly. Maybe we should. Who all was there?

---------- Post added at 10:40 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:40 PM ----------

@ ibelsd. Why does that bare minimum idea of Justice feel like pulling teeth?

Are we talking about justice? For who? Can't he sue for defamation?