Pierce: Ed Whelan's Batshit Theory Has Been Kicking Around in Right-Wing Circles for a While Now

[mcar]

Ed Whelan's Batshit Theory Has Been Kicking Around in Right-Wing Circles for a While Now
Senate Republicans can't get out of their own way on this matter.

BY CHARLES P. PIERCE
SEP 21, 2018

Around seven o'clock on Thursday night, the electric Twitter machine entered the red zone and never returned. A guy named Ed Whelan, the head of the Ethics and Public Policy Institute, a relic of the golden first era of wingnut welfare, posited that perhaps Dr. Christine Blasey Ford had been sexually assaulted as a young teenager, but that she had mistaken another Georgetown Prep student for Brett Kavanaugh when she was asked to identify her attacker.

Whelan named the person he speculated had been the actual attacker—Yes, I hear the OJ echoes, too—but we are not going to do that here because Whelan is a libelous gombeen and we are not. His evidence was a strange conglomeration of GPS data, hazy reproductions of yearbook photos, and the floor plans of another house that Whelan claimed better conformed to Ford's original account of the attack.

Now, to be clear, this notion had been kicking around the rightwing circles in which Kavanaugh has spent most of his career for a while now. The Washington Examiner wrote on Tuesday that Kavanaugh himself told Orrin Hatch that he thought Ford might be mistaken about who tried to rape her. Kathleen Parker of the Washington Post wrote an entire column speculating on the possibility. When Whelan's tweet storm broke, Ross Douthat of The New York Times vouched for Whelan's bona fides as a Very Serious Person. And then the roof fell in.

First, Ford, whose lawyers are still in negotiations with the Senate Judiciary Committee regarding her possible appearance before that body, categorically rejected the possibility that she was mistaken about who tried to rape her....

As the night went on, it was discovered—by Josh Marshall, I believe—that the guy Whelan had proposed as a possible Kavanaugh doppelgänger had been one of the people who signed a letter supporting his nomination and vouching for his estimable character. This was embarrassing enough, but then it became apparent that Whelan wasn't simply a rogue blogger on a spree. Again, from the Post:

Whelan has been involved in helping to advise Kavanaugh’s confirmation effort and is close friends with both Kavanaugh and Leonard Leo, the head of the Federalist Society who has been helping to spearhead the nomination. Kavanaugh and Whelan also worked together in the Bush administration.Kavanaugh and his allies have been privately discussing a defense that would not question whether an incident involving Ford happened, but instead would raise doubts that the attacker was Kavanaugh, according to a person familiar with the discussions.

If Kavanaugh played any role at all in concocting this fairy tale, not only should he not be confirmed as an associate justice of the Supreme Court, but also he probably should lose the job on the appeals bench that he already has. That would be the entire ballgame, not least because it would open up (again) the work that he did in a purely political capacity during the second Bush administration, which the Republicans on the Judiciary Committee and the White House have been fighting ferociously to bury. It would lead one to the inescapable conclusion that Kavanaugh is and always has been a conservative true-believer and that any of his attempts at pretending otherwise in his testimony were as fanciful as whistling fish.

The larger story is that the Senate Republicans—who, by not calling a committee vote on Thursday already now have delayed the confirmation, which they swore up and down they wouldn't do—can't get out of their own way on this matter now. Something is buried in those documents, or in the memory of witnesses, that is giving the majority party pause. Dr. Ford has them running scared, or the nominee does.

https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a23355738/ed-whelan-brett-kavanaugh-theory/

[malaise]

1. Must read

Get thee to the greatest page

[mcar]

2. It's pretty damning, isn't it?

[Hortensis]

16. OMG -- MUST READ. Kavanaugh and his allies privately discussing

a defense that would not question whether an incident involving Ford happened, but instead would raise doubts that the attacker was Kavanaugh, according to a person familiar with the discussions.

And here I thought Kavanaugh should be demanding a complete FBI investigation and the right to testify to the truth under oath to clear this unjust blemish.

Tick-tick-tick-tick-tick...

[malaise]

28. He will withdraw the minute she agrees

to show up.

What's more as experts are saying she can still file charges and the Con's tweet is a direct challenge. If she files charges this is over - he's out.

[Hortensis]

31. Guessing you're right. :) Just wish America had demanded

investigation of the serious and provable charges already presented in the hearing so she didn't have to put herself through this.

Fingers crossed. They're desperate, and no rule or principle will stop them, only not enough votes.

[malaise]

32. The real problem is how is this mess cleaned up in the long term

The rule of law is under siege

[Hortensis]

34. Yes. :( But these very attacks, on not just the rule of law

but on the rules and on the mores too amorphous to be codified as rules, are already creating a backlash of commitment to restoring and strengthening them. They didn't create themselves, after all, people did, and institutional memory is a very real thing. Their strength is that they're based on principles most feel in their bones to be both right morally and practically necessary to functioning of a democracy.

You're so right though that, inevitably tragically for many, what these archconservatives have managed to have written into law and the right wing extremists ensconced on the bench at every level are going to take a long time to clean up. The very stability of our systems will protect them.

All assuming they don't manage to steal the elections on November 6 and we get control. Congress, courts, the 2020 census and reapportionment. Scary days.

[malaise]

35. +1,000 but if they don't give a FF about the rule of law,

norms, conventions and precedents don't have a chance. They have to be stopped.
Dems better wake up and fight back.

[Hortensis]

37. Yes. But we need more than Dems. We are a majority

but lost in 2016 anyway. We need a strong majority that can withstand structural problems, vote suppression, election theft, and fecklessness and stupidity.

Let's face it, some registered as Democrats are actually negative numbers, not voting or voting to defeat us as what they see as a matter of principle. After everything that's happened, those can't look past their disagreements with mainstream Democrats to become frightened or enraged about what the right's doing. Strange, but they're somehow wired to only resist the Democratic majority. Even putting children in cages or threatening repeal of all civil rights laws somehow doesn't distract for more than a moment. We need to accept those are not going to change, also that it's nothing new with them.

Also that some minority Democrats are strong conservatives, especially some of the men, loyal to their group, not to liberal goals. And they're nothing new.

We have to offset those losses with liberals, Democrat or otherwise, who share our goals but assumed it'd all be okay if they didn't vote. Including some of those 4 out of 5 young adults who didn't vote at all. But feckless complacency on the left is nothing new. It's out biggest weakness.

Which IMO brings us to those moderate conservatives we really, really need to rejoin us in opposing extremism from both right and left. Our ability to come together to achieve common goals was the key to our nation's stability. When we and they were divided, and they disastrously united with the far right to stop liberalism, we all fell. That's what was new.

[Fred Sanders]

12. Whelan should get ahead of this ruining his reputation forever by offering a million dollars to

Citizen Ford for her extra security details needs due to this fucking "error".


Will all the folks clinging to this "theory" before now apologize as well??

[madaboutharry]

3. Kavanaugh has always been in the center of a dirty cabal

of right wing zealots who believe that the end justifies the means.

The Constitution and democracy have no meaning to these people.

[mcar]

4. +1000!

[Hortensis]

18. +1000. THIS.

Oh, not exactly the center in the past, but certainly a member. I strongly suspect Scalia was also.

[Guilded Lilly]

5. More (much more) to this than meets the eye. Deceit runs marrow deep.

[ProudLib72]

6. Hannity was involved in recruiting the woman responsible for Franken's ouster

Now we have this asshole Whelan involved in discrediting Dr. Ford. There are a surprising number of behind the scenes people doing all sorts of maneuvering. I just hope we can expose them all for the nefarious little shits they are.

[Fred Sanders]

13. Franken's thoughtful and calm resignation preserved our right to be right on historical sexual

assaults and the MeToo movement.

Whelan will not resign his lucrative RW perch spouting specualtion like parrot poop. Thee is the huge difference....ethics! True ethics, not just the name you print on your letterhead!

Republican hypocrisy is in plain sight now. And they know it, as do all women.

Thank you, Al.

[Zoonart]

14. Al Franken INVITED a full investigation and was DENIED one.

[Fred Sanders]

21. Yes, but Not my point at all.

[Hortensis]

19. Far more of them than imagined. Archconservative/

libertarian centimillionaire/billionaires have been identifying young people of their sort for decades, schooling them in their ideology through programs they fund in most universities, and then moving them into positions of influence in government, private industry, military. Since some of the very wealthy are very religious also, I'm guessing their product occupy many executive positions in religious institutions also.

Right now we strongly suspect Kavanaugh and/or Judge blabbed to friends, likely to be conservatives of their own general type who are years later keeping quiet out of support. Notably, some from that expensive DC-area boy's school are probably just the kind who've been infiltrated into positions of influence. Like Kavanaugh himself. Only subpoenas and threats of prison for perjury are liable to shake the truth out of some of those.

[NBachers]

23. You're right about the recruitment- I'm watching it happen right now with the son of my friend.

He's being pursued by a political activist to start a Freedom of Speech group on his campus- a small linchpin school that feeds into the trades, engineering, and world trade fields. He's quite impressed that this guy's been after him.

If he joins up, he'll be taken on a trip where he visits with Ron Paul himself. As he puts it, it's not a politically-affiliated group; it's just to make sure that all people are welcome to speak and have their opinions heard, to help foster campus dialog.

I think we can all read between the lines, and see what they're really trying to promote. Fortunately, my friend is more interested in hitting the books, and doesn't want the distraction.

[Hortensis]

33. Wow. Flattering, yes. Hope he continues to ignore the lure.

It's not just the ideology appealing, of course, but eventually the understanding that this is a sponsored path to professional success and even wealth and power.

[NBachers]

38. "They Live"

?width=1920&height=1080&fit=bounds

[Hortensis]

39. And the sunglasses are permanently "out of stock."

[leftynyc]

7. His lawyer must have contacted

him and told him he was asking for a defamation suit because he's apologized on twitter. Not gonna help him at all.

[mcar]

10. Not at all

I hope Whelan loses his shirt.

[NBachers]

24. Yeah, put all the bombast out there, and then post a retro-apology in the classifieds.

Last edited Fri Sep 21, 2018, 02:33 PM - Edit history (1)

Once he puts the picture into the feeble, propaganda-softened brains, it'll stay there and fester. There's no taking it back after the rot-spores have been injected. It's their favorite tactic- it doesn't matter whether it's truth or not- put the picture in front of 'em, and it registers unequivocally.

[leftynyc]

30. All the other guy needs to do

to prove defamation is collect every single website or segment on fox that pushed that theory. He'll win in a walk.

[irresistable]

8. game over....Kavanaugh will not want to be asked about this.

[Zoonart]

15. I think this is game over too.

[nolabear]

9. I hope there's some outrage left for this monster.

[dalton99a]

11. Kick

[jmbar2]

17. Learned a new word today - Gombeen

The Irish do have a way with words!

A Gombeen man is a pejorative Hiberno-English term used in Ireland for a shady, small-time "wheeler-dealer" businessman or politician who is always looking to make a quick profit, often at someone else's expense or through the acceptance of bribes. Its origin is the Irish word "gaimbín", meaning monetary interest.

Wikipedia

[NBachers]

26. I wondered about that too. Thanks for elucidating us.

[northoftheborder]

36. Is that word capitalized? I want to use it in Scrabble if it isn't.!

Heh.

[mountain grammy]

20. Oh wow the republican head of an ethics institute, itself an oxymoron,

Has an ethic and apologizes. The world will end tomorrow..

[Fred Sanders]

27. And he is the fucking HEAD! The whole think tank should slink away in shame...if they had ethics.

[dlk]

22. What this Demonstrates is the Lengths the Patriarchy Will Go Toward Protecting One Of its Own

Until more men make an effort to be part of the solution, this will only continue and escalate.

[Achilleaze]

25. republicans colluding against the truth

same as it ever was...

[Leghorn21]

29. K&R, mcar!

Now ain’t this some shit here?!?

WOW