Mojo Hand

Imagine, if he were born to a wealthy father, he might've become president.

Hopefully she's just slowplaying this until the budget deal is done and passed and then uses Mueller's testimony as a springboard for impeachment.

The palms, but not the fingertips. They're all clearly either touching or just millimeters away from it. Though, again, this doesn't matter to the larger point.

The credible allegations against Bush's groping go all the way back to 1992. It wasn't just an extremely old man thing. Yeah, I believe it about Franken. Especially after he didn't issue a denial saying "I would never and have never groped someone, on the rear or elsewhere," but rather said something like "I take a lot of pics with people, I don't remember." Grabbing women's asses is a thing that plenty of men think is playful and no big deal. Freaking Elie Wiesel did it to someone.

Sorry, I meant her plan for executive action. Looks like it is "investigate and release public findings," then maybe have HHS buy cheaper drugs from Canada to resell in America or license patents to lower-cost competitors.

The blood test was months before this. And her momentum now proves that it was the right move, as I argued at the time. She's maxed out the issue, taken her lumps, and there's nothing more to add unless there's a new document from her past that comes out showing that she did use it to get ahead. Trump yelling "why don't you take a DNA test if you really believe it" is political gold. Trump getting tripped up over the fraction she's proven to have is not. Plenty of candidates have weird or unpopular shit that will be used against them. Biden has a million. Kamala and Willie Brown. Trump won despite a ton of shit in his closet. The key is making it old news early and never backtracking again.

How is that meaningfully different from what she has been saying? 7-19-19 "Like most people, my brothers and I learned about who we are from our mom and our dad. My family's very important to me, and based on that, sometimes, decades ago, I identified that way. But nothing about the way I identified ever had anything to do with my academic career," Warren said. "Even so, I shouldn't have done it. I am not a person of color. I am not a citizen of a tribe, and I've apologized for any confusion over tribal sovereignty, tribal citizenship and any harm caused by that," she continued. 6-6-19 "As she has previously, Warren told reporters Wednesday that she grew up believing she had Native American ancestors. "This is our family story, and it's all consistent from that point in time," she said in response to a question about whether there are other documents that may show similar claims. "It's important to note I am not a tribal citizen," Warren said, "and I should have been more mindful of the distinction with tribal citizenship and tribal sovereignty." "Family stories are not the same as tribal citizenship," Warren said Wednesday, "and this is why I have apologized ... to Chief Baker, who was very gracious about it." **** But "nothing about my background ever had anything to do with any job I got in any place. It's been fully documented," Warren said, "and there's no evidence of any kind" that she was hired because of her claims."

I don't agree, but it doesn't really matter. He wasn't a few feet away, as the poster claimed. And he survived the pic alone.

Trump wasn't caught confessing to a priest or his lawyer. He was a reality show host trying to impress a second-rate entertainment reporter. I don't find Trump's excuse compelling, but his cult supporters don't think he was confessing on that tape. They think he was exaggerating for effect. And the process of rationalization they employ is exactly what you are doing with Franken. Because they like Trump and you like Franken, so you see similar things in a different light. The things that you are saying about the process only matter because he resigned. Trump didn't, nor did the leaders in Virginia, and they've had plenty of time to make their respective cases while still in office. Franken would have too. It was his choice not to stick it out.

Trump was just "joking" with "locker room talk," according to his defenders. Just like Franken was "joking" in the photo with Tweeden. Both have numerous other accusers. The difference in how you interpret it is how you feel about each of them beyond these accusations. Why do you and others keep claiming that his colleagues wouldn't entertain an investigation? An ethics investigation was opened. And I couldn't disagree more about the Republicans winning the Franken debacle. What exactly did they gain? Making the Dems look weak? Yeah, so weak that a historic blue wave swept over the House less than a year later, powered by women.

So you think Trump is innocent of the 17+ accusations by women who have not brought charges? The standard for proving something in court is much higher than the standard for making political judgments about our leaders. As it should be, when courts can deprive someone of their property, liberty, and even lives.

No, the investigation was opened. It didn't finish because Franken chose to resign. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/11/30/senate-ethics-committee-launches-its-investigation-al-franken/911503001/

I hear you, but "prosecution via a media feeding frenzy" is just politics. Were you not calling for Trump to bow out after the Access Hollywood tape broke, or at minimum saying that it should be a factor in whether people vote for him, even without a trial? Political decisions aren't "prosecution." Franken isn't in jail. He's just a private citizen now. Nobody has a right to be a leader in government. The governor of Puerto Rico is on the ropes right now for offensive jokes and comments he said in private. That's politics. Kirsten Gillibrand is getting frozen out by Dems for the mere "crime" of siding against Franken, while Kamala Harris is riding high even though she came out against Franken the same day. That's politics too. Public perception, impact on elections, credibility in attacking Trump's sexual predation — all of it matters when you're in politics. It's what you sign up for, and Franken played the same game until he was in the barrel. Franken politically botched his public response, and the political result was the pressure to resign. He still could have resisted that — like Trump, or all of the leaders of Virginia right now — but didn't for whatever reason, maybe even honorable ones. But them's the breaks. Maybe you think politics should be different, but I don't think it can be. In a democracy, it all eventually boils down to voters and public opinion, and people love salacious stories and villains and heroes and downfalls and comebacks. This is just human nature playing out on a big stage. And I think it's a good thing — especially right now — that for one party, unwanted groping and kissing creates such a huge political problem.

Well, the "crime" was grabbing asses and kissing women on the mouth. The article pretty much confirms he did that, and was generally a pretty handsy and mouthy guy. So I guess you can judge for yourself whether that's fitting behavior for a US Senator. I think the process argument is misguided because he resigned. He wasn't investigated or punished because he chose to leave. He botched his response from the start. That's more a political mistake than anything else, but it doesn't set much of a precedent from an investigatory standpoint.

You may be misremembering the pic, but his fingers were either touching her chest or millimeters away; it wasn't a few feet. Regardless, he survived the picture, as even this article points out. It was the stream of groping and kissing allegations that followed that brought him down. As for whether they really occurred, well, there's no reason to doubt the credibility of the accusers. But things would have been different had Franken come out and categorically said "I've never groped or tried to kiss any woman in the way described." Instead it was things like, "I take a lot of pictures, I can't remember this one." It was pretty clear from his response that he actually did the things alleged, but just felt that he had an innocent or playful intent behind it. That's not good enough for me.

What exactly is her plan? I didn't see one connected to that tweet.

It's extremely smart of her to do this. The Dems need to take on Trump on his biggest strength, which is the perception that he deserves credit for the economy he inherited. This is a great way to do so. Plus, if a crash happens before the election, she'll seem brilliant for calling it. If it happens after she's president, she's laying the groundwork for it being Trump's fault. If it doesn't happen after she's president, she gets to say she stopped it.

Reading that piece reminds me of the hoops Dems used to jump through to justify Bill Clinton's behavior. There's nothing there that we didn't already know; it's just his side of the story, which is that he's a great guy who was innocently doing all of these things out of humor or cluelessness. Plus an extended attack on one of his alleged victims, none of which undermines her account of how she felt. It's all "Hey, she seemed to be going along with it all in good fun," which is the defense in virtually all situations of sexual harassment. The tiny part addressing the other 7 alleged victims — which is really what brought him down — is diced up to minimize their impact. Only two were after he became Senator! And that's explainable by him being innocently over-physical, because he's just a big ol' galoot! Three more were when he was a radio host ... just a big misunderstanding, and besides he's not as bad as Kavanaugh and Trump! I can't even tell if the writer addresses the other two, it's so unclear by this point. If anything, this piece confirms that Dems were right to push him out. I don't care that his motivation probably wasn't sexual gratification, which is the subtext of the piece. Nor do I care that women have long had to put up with being groped and kissed by gross men under the "old rules," as the article calls them. It's inappropriate and below the standard we should require for our Senators — most of whom have not faced similar allegations even though they lived under the "old rules" as well. It's not fair that there are some politicians still in office who have done worse. But the way to improve things is by continuing to go after them, not lowering our standards to conform to the worst.

If voters care about authenticity, why are we governed by countless phonies?

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How so?

Imagine how sad your life must be to be as obsessed with the Clintons as onboard.

Sorry you can't defend your opinions, snowflake.