Sunday, September 16, 2018
1. Check out this video of Bill Maher, this weekend, telling Democrats how they have to more directly confront Trump and the Republican Party:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bi5OPJ98laE - As is his style, Maher uses some naughty words.
2. PDFs to download:
A. What we learned from the Democratic primary - Newsday, By Yancey Roy (September 15, 2018)
B.The Progressive Playbook: How These Candidates Pulled Off Their Upsets - Newsday - By Astead W. Herndon and Kevin Roose (Sept. 15, 2018)
C. Make Voting Easier in New York - Editorial, NY Times (September 13, 2018)
D. The Path to Becoming an Underpaid, Underappreciated and Absolutely Necessary Election Poll Worker, NY Times, By Spenser Mestel
- Sept. 6, 2018
E. Democrats Struggle for the Soul of the Party, Newsday, By Emily Ngo (September 14, 2018)
3. The Kavenaugh Nomination
A. Senator Susan Collins, Republican of Maine, was, early on, considered a possible vote to prevent the the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to be a Justice of the Supreme Court. Alas, she eventually came around to joining her fellow Republicans in support of the nomination. Someone has come up with a novel idea.
In substance, they are telling Senator Collins: "We are stating a fund for the collection of campaign contributions to whomever your opponent is when you next face election. If you vote in favor of the Kavanaugh confirmation, we will give the funds to your opponent. If you vote against Judge Kavanuagh's confirmation we will return the funds to the contributors."
They are using a web-funding organization called "Crowdpac". Here is an article about Crowdpac - "Activists raised $1 million to defeat Susan Collins if she votes for Kavanaugh. She says it’s bribery". You can visit the Crowdpad site if you wish to consider making a contribution to this novel effort. At this writing, they have raise $1,344,59, toward a goal of $1,500,000. https://www.crowdpac.com/campaigns/387413/either-sen-collins-votes-no-on-kavanaugh-or-we-fund-her-future-opponent
B. On another point, this writer is of the view that the Democrats have made a serious error in circulating information about a claim that Vaughan attempted to rape a fellow high school student 30 years ago. If he alleged victim has refused to come forward, it is unequivocally wrong to besmirch the candidate's reputation in this way. I suspect the Democrats realized that, during the confirmation hearing, and held it back, at that time. This is, at best, pure uncorroborated hearsay. It merited a confidential investigation. If there was any indication of merit to the claim, perhaps it merited a fairly framed question at the hearing. However, without more, a clear denial should have closed the matter. When Democrats use this kind of claim, in the way they now have, they undercut their general credibility and become more like Trump and his acolytes. Kavanaugh should not be confirmed because his judicial view is dead wrong as to major substantive and procedural issues of the past century.
Since posting this message, the alleged victim has taken the step of disclosing her identity and additional details.
Click Here To See Full Article
This disclosure is important. Apparently she revealed the incident to her therapist in 2012, well before the present nomination. Also, it appears that she has revealed the names of to other men who were at the party, but not present at the alleged assault. It also appears that Kavanaugh and his friend DID revel in drink during their high school years and the friend has a drinking problem as an adult. In addition, she has agreed to be interviewed by the FBI. Making a false statement to the FBI is a felony under 18 USC 2001. In addition, if she testifies before congress, she will be subject to a charge of perjury.
HJB
[Opinions expressed in Talking Points and in reader comments to Talking Points are the opinions of their authors and not necessarily of the Rockville Centre Democratic Club or its officers and directors]
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