What's new

Supreme Court Justice Kennedy to Retire

Status
Not open for further replies.
The above is true. Thanks fish.

Also, like fish, I have never attempted to rape anyone. But I have had the very miserable experience of being accused of serious wrongdoing by a woman and having to clear my name. I think that those of you who say it's so important that we simply take women at their word are seriously underestimating how important the presumption of innocence has been to this country's legal code. As important as it is that women are empowered and that victims of rape are given the help they need, it would be a major step in the wrong direction for our country to assume that anyone is guilty of anything, simply because they have been accused.
I have been through that as well, at work. Went to court and everything (lawsuit filed by 2 women against the company and 4 managers including me). I cleared my name, as I did nothing, but it was one of the things that lead to me eventually leaving that job, which was not something I wanted in the long run. Who knows where I might be now. And it made things weird at work after that, even though I was exonerated. Like women made a point to have someone with them when they talked to me, and not just in an office or something, but even out on the floor. And I got a lot of sideways glances. It became very uncomfortable.

It makes me think of the story about perception, where you move into a new neighborhood, and you meet your next door neighbor. You ask him about the neighborhood and he says "oh all the neighbors are great, we are all great friends. And just ignore everything you hear about Randy at the end of the street being a child molester, they proved he didn't do it." So, what is Randy now? In your mind you immediately connect him to child molester. Will you ever be comfortable with your kids on the same block as Randy? Probably not, or at least not until you get to know Randy well yourself, and even then it will likely be in the back of your mind forever. Even though Randy might be a great guy and did nothing wrong, just the hint that he was tied to something so heinous changes our perception of Randy, and even though logically we understand there is nothing there to worry about, the idea will forever be in the back of our minds somewhere. And then if Randy should be caught doing something wrong later, not even connected to children, say in possession of drugs or something, you will hear people saying things like "yep, not surprised, remember the whole child molestation thing? he probably really did that too" even if is years down the road. It is human nature.
 
I get the presumption of innocence argument, and if this was a court of law I would 100% agree with you. When it comes to politics though, whether it's at the ballot box or regarding a political appointee, the same logic just doesn't apply. We make personal judgments about people's misdeeds all the time without proving their guilt 'beyond a reasonable doubt.'

Of course that doesn't mean that we should believe every allegation of any nature in all cases, but in this particular case there's enough smoke for any reasonable person to conclude that it's a good chance he's guilty.
That's not based only on the testimony and statements of his accusers, but also his own lack of honesty while being questioned.
You realize you basically just said that we shouldn't necessarily take every allegation as fact, but it is just fine if we do, right?
 
I have been through that as well, at work. Went to court and everything (lawsuit filed by 2 women against the company and 4 managers including me). I cleared my name, as I did nothing, but it was one of the things that lead to me eventually leaving that job, which was not something I wanted in the long run. Who knows where I might be now. And it made things weird at work after that, even though I was exonerated. Like women made a point to have someone with them when they talked to me, and not just in an office or something, but even out on the floor. And I got a lot of sideways glances. It became very uncomfortable.

It makes me think of the story about perception, where you move into a new neighborhood, and you meet your next door neighbor. You ask him about the neighborhood and he says "oh all the neighbors are great, we are all great friends. And just ignore everything you hear about Randy at the end of the street being a child molester, they proved he didn't do it." So, what is Randy now? In your mind you immediately connect him to child molester. Will you ever be comfortable with your kids on the same block as Randy? Probably not, or at least not until you get to know Randy well yourself, and even then it will likely be in the back of your mind forever. Even though Randy might be a great guy and did nothing wrong, just the hint that he was tied to something so heinous changes our perception of Randy, and even though logically we understand there is nothing there to worry about, the idea will forever be in the back of our minds somewhere. And then if Randy should be caught doing something wrong later, not even connected to children, say in possession of drugs or something, you will hear people saying things like "yep, not surprised, remember the whole child molestation thing? he probably really did that too" even if is years down the road. It is human nature.

Were any of the other managers exonerated? Sorry that happened to you.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
You realize you basically just said that we shouldn't necessarily take every allegation as fact, but it is just fine if we do, right?
Nah.

It's not a indisputable fact that Trump cheated on his taxes for example, or that Hillary Clinton used her position at the State Department to enrich her foundation. But millions of people cast their votes with those allegations in mind, and no one was crowing about due process or presumption of innocence.
 
Last edited:
Were any of the other managers exonerated? Sorry that happened to you.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Thanks TJF.

Yes, all were exonerated. What it came down to was there were 2 women who were on the verge of being fired for performance and attendance. We had recently had a sexual harassment case that was legit (an employee was fired for it, several women came forward, I was deeply involved in the investigation), so one of these 2 women (who were not tied to the other case) decided to take advantage of the heightened atmosphere around that other case and got her friend to "corroborate" her story. They tried to solicit other women to participate, supposedly hoping for a class action or something, or at least get other plaintiffs to strengthen their case or something. She found a slimeball lawyer who took the case and it ended up with 4 of us in the courtroom, and took months to resolve after several attempts at mediation did not work. Their story completely fell apart as the "evidence" they had supplied to their lawyer was shown to be false and fabricated or taken out of context, and each of us were shown to have physically not been present during some of the alleged interactions, the most supposedly damning of which they brought up in court, claiming they had forgotten since it was so traumatic. For example, her lawyer tried to present a timeline, but we were able to show that I was actually out of town during an incident that supposedly happened in my office, and in a training during another one. I was actually surprise it got to court, because I thought there was no way there was enough evidence for anyone to take it seriously, but they had done a decent job convincing everyone that where there is smoke, there must be fire. We had emails dragged into it, taken out of context, internal correspondence. They brought up past disciplinary actions I had given to employees working for me, including a few of her friends. When they tell you to be careful what you email at work, they are not joking around. They pulled stuff up that was 3 years old at the time, like where I had replied to a joke someone sent around that was somewhat off-color and I replied something like "ha ha that's funny", and supposedly that was evidence of my character, stuff like that. I can't remember how much time we spent just answering what we meant by this email or that email. They had a female supervisor who had been fired for having an inappropriate relationship with an employee working for her come in as a supposed witness, I don't know, character witness or something to discredit a couple of us. She just so happened to hate me and another one of the managers involved (she sucked and he and I did her job for her way too much, and I was somewhat vocal about it, plus I was involved in the investigation that got her fired). It was a hugely stressful farce that ended up changing the course of my career. I get worked up about it still when I think about it.
 
We assume people are guilty in pretty much every other scenario of eye witness though. When's the last time someone identified a thief as an eye witness and people doubted them.

Also I'm guessing whatever you did to some women was just that something to be accused of...
So if I claim that 36 years ago I saw you do something you would consider that valid evidence? (I don't know whether you were even alive then, so you might have a pretty good alibi, but what if I accuse you of something 36 years from now?)

I can't decode your last sentence, but I'll respond to what I think you must be asking. I was married to a woman for 19 years and we had children together. One day I discovered that she was having an affair with a man who I knew well. I became aware that this man and woman were moving my assets into other accounts and making numerous preparations for divorce. My discovery of their plans was very upsetting to them, apparently because they imagined this would be quite a clean process of taking over all of my posessions and custody of my children. This woman made it clear that she saw my future role as nothing but paying alimony and child support. When I told friends what was going on this woman was horrified to see her plan fall apart, so she told everyone that the real reason she was leaving me was that I had been physically abusive for years. No such thing ever happened. Not a single incident of any type. A little while later she called an Amber Alert on me. Shortly after I returned home with my daughter from coaching her soccer team cops started showing up. This woman started screaming louder and louder that I wasn't allowed to be in my own home. Her claim had no basis in fact, but that didn't matter. My children were bawling, and the cops, wanting to restore some sort of order, escorted me to my car with all of my neighbors watching in confusion. (Interesting that they didn't even suggest forcing her to leave since she was the one who created the situation.) You would have thought that calling an Amber Alert on someone when you know exactly where they are, and when they were doing something they were supposed to be doing might carry penalties, but my experience was that authorities did not care. They were just happy that they had recovered my daughter safe and sound, and eliminated me as a threat.

I think that abuse of anyone is a terrible thing, and the sort of abuse described by Dr. Ford is despicable, but we cannot simply take people's word for it when they make accusations. We have got to have proof. That's how our system works. And also, having gone through the court system for my divorce after all that I have described above, you would have a very difficult time convincing me that the courts are preferential in any way to men.

On the positive side, though, a friend who saw what I was going through (I have only described the tip of the iceberg) said, "Man, I'm jealous of you. Something amazing must be coming your way, because these things tend to even out." At the time I thought he was insane. Now I know that he was clairvoyant.
 
I feel very fortunate that nothing like that crap in the 2 posts above mine (log and joe) ever happened to me. That would suck bad. Sorry you guys had to go through that. I would go ape ****. Especially in joes situation. And then of course going ape **** would just make things worse and i would probably end up never seeing my kids again and probably be in prison.
Sounds like you did a good job of handling the situation. Both of you.
 
So Republican Senator Collins is making a speech explaining her intention to vote. It sounds like she's supporting Kavanaugh's confirmation and voicing her reasoning in doing so. The Republicans need only one more vote from Flake or one other Senator to get to a 50-50 tie, which I think would be broken by Mike Pence.
 
seems unless something extraordinary happens in the next 24 hours.


KAV is in!!!!!!! the saltmines will produce lots of salt this weekend
 
Thanks TJF.

Yes, all were exonerated. What it came down to was there were 2 women who were on the verge of being fired for performance and attendance. We had recently had a sexual harassment case that was legit (an employee was fired for it, several women came forward, I was deeply involved in the investigation), so one of these 2 women (who were not tied to the other case) decided to take advantage of the heightened atmosphere around that other case and got her friend to "corroborate" her story. They tried to solicit other women to participate, supposedly hoping for a class action or something, or at least get other plaintiffs to strengthen their case or something. She found a slimeball lawyer who took the case and it ended up with 4 of us in the courtroom, and took months to resolve after several attempts at mediation did not work. Their story completely fell apart as the "evidence" they had supplied to their lawyer was shown to be false and fabricated or taken out of context, and each of us were shown to have physically not been present during some of the alleged interactions, the most supposedly damning of which they brought up in court, claiming they had forgotten since it was so traumatic. For example, her lawyer tried to present a timeline, but we were able to show that I was actually out of town during an incident that supposedly happened in my office, and in a training during another one. I was actually surprise it got to court, because I thought there was no way there was enough evidence for anyone to take it seriously, but they had done a decent job convincing everyone that where there is smoke, there must be fire. We had emails dragged into it, taken out of context, internal correspondence. They brought up past disciplinary actions I had given to employees working for me, including a few of her friends. When they tell you to be careful what you email at work, they are not joking around. They pulled stuff up that was 3 years old at the time, like where I had replied to a joke someone sent around that was somewhat off-color and I replied something like "ha ha that's funny", and supposedly that was evidence of my character, stuff like that. I can't remember how much time we spent just answering what we meant by this email or that email. They had a female supervisor who had been fired for having an inappropriate relationship with an employee working for her come in as a supposed witness, I don't know, character witness or something to discredit a couple of us. She just so happened to hate me and another one of the managers involved (she sucked and he and I did her job for her way too much, and I was somewhat vocal about it, plus I was involved in the investigation that got her fired). It was a hugely stressful farce that ended up changing the course of my career. I get worked up about it still when I think about it.

So if I claim that 36 years ago I saw you do something you would consider that valid evidence? (I don't know whether you were even alive then, so you might have a pretty good alibi, but what if I accuse you of something 36 years from now?)

I can't decode your last sentence, but I'll respond to what I think you must be asking. I was married to a woman for 19 years and we had children together. One day I discovered that she was having an affair with a man who I knew well. I became aware that this man and woman were moving my assets into other accounts and making numerous preparations for divorce. My discovery of their plans was very upsetting to them, apparently because they imagined this would be quite a clean process of taking over all of my posessions and custody of my children. This woman made it clear that she saw my future role as nothing but paying alimony and child support. When I told friends what was going on this woman was horrified to see her plan fall apart, so she told everyone that the real reason she was leaving me was that I had been physically abusive for years. No such thing ever happened. Not a single incident of any type. A little while later she called an Amber Alert on me. Shortly after I returned home with my daughter from coaching her soccer team cops started showing up. This woman started screaming louder and louder that I wasn't allowed to be in my own home. Her claim had no basis in fact, but that didn't matter. My children were bawling, and the cops, wanting to restore some sort of order, escorted me to my car with all of my neighbors watching in confusion. (Interesting that they didn't even suggest forcing her to leave since she was the one who created the situation.) You would have thought that calling an Amber Alert on someone when you know exactly where they are, and when they were doing something they were supposed to be doing might carry penalties, but my experience was that authorities did not care. They were just happy that they had recovered my daughter safe and sound, and eliminated me as a threat.

I think that abuse of anyone is a terrible thing, and the sort of abuse described by Dr. Ford is despicable, but we cannot simply take people's word for it when they make accusations. We have got to have proof. That's how our system works. And also, having gone through the court system for my divorce after all that I have described above, you would have a very difficult time convincing me that the courts are preferential in any way to men.

On the positive side, though, a friend who saw what I was going through (I have only described the tip of the iceberg) said, "Man, I'm jealous of you. Something amazing must be coming your way, because these things tend to even out." At the time I thought he was insane. Now I know that he was clairvoyant.

Thanks for sharing.

Little off subject, and I hate to make this sound like I’m bashing the ME TOO movement, and believe me I’ve heard lots of stories of women being sexually asulted then shunned for reporting right away. I believe women should be heard and not written off as a wacko but I’ve noticed some of these women involved in ME TOO getting out of control with due process, or wanting less of it, but I can see lots of men being attacked in the way Joe and Log described. Am I being over dramatic. I support the ME TOO movement but feel they need to be more responsible and maybe widen their views to include and support good Men and Women, if that makes any sense.

Thought?
 
Right, well I was hoping you had a mind of your own but this confirms your status as sheep for Dems. Good luck with that.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Kind of a smug attitude there. From my experience those who get involved, supporting or volunteering on behalf of candidates or political parties are not sheep or pawns; more often than not they are thoughtful and committed citizens.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Red
One would think the reason I feel this way is pretty obvious given my posts in this thread.
why?

FACT - KAVANAUGH is INNOCENT. this is not your communist/socialist utopia like national socialist germany, cuba, china, venezuela or ussr. where you are guilty when the government officials think you are guilty
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top