By Edwin Cooney
I suspect that for most Americans, the nature of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s upcoming appearance before the United States Senate Judiciary Committee will be that of sociopolitical revenge. After all, the very nature of American politics has been pretty dirty historically. Today, as Winston Churchill might well assert, American politics has gone from dirty to downright squalid. I’m hopeful that we’re all about to be pleasantly surprised! Whether I’m right or wrong in this hope, the only way out of this 21st Century squalor is to think our way out of it. I’ll try and help here. We have within the latest sensational political crisis one of the main keys for our deliverance from this culture war that has gone on far too long.
We have two American citizens about to approach the United States Senate Judiciary Committee who appear to find themselves in locked cross purposes. One is a distinguished federal judge who holds pristine legal and politically ideological credentials which are more than sufficient for him to occupy a seat on the highest court in the land. His purpose is to be appointed to that seat.
The other is a highly intelligent, scientifically-oriented professional woman who claims that way back when they were very young, she was sexually assaulted and abused by this man of high judicial accomplishment and stellar integrity. Exactly what her purpose is in bringing to the public’s attention the above unfortunate incident is yet to be explained by her. The question before the Senate Judiciary Committee as well as that which faces a very judgmental American public is whether what did (or didn’t) happen approximately 36 years ago is yesterday or today’s issue!
Since Judge Kavanaugh emphatically denies the charges, his dilemma is that he can’t possibly disprove them unless he can demonstrate that he was somewhere else on the occasion of the alleged sexual assault. His accuser, Christine Blasey Ford, is equally unlikely to scientifically prove her accusation against Judge Kavanaugh. Therefore, in the absence of proof (certainly beyond a reasonable doubt), neither the American people nor the distinguished members of the United States Senate will have anything but the manner in which Dr. Blasey Ford and Judge Kavanaugh present their cases on which to make a judgment about the veracity of the charges or of the denial.
It recently has become a progressive practice to weigh the sins of youth and the sins of adults on different scales. In 1982 when this incident apparently occurred, both Dr. Blasey Ford and Mr. Kavanaugh were minors prone to the indiscretions of youth. Neither their compulsions nor their actions were sufficiently adult. Accordingly, on the surface, it seems to me that the adult Kavanaugh ought to be the Kavanaugh that’s relevant to our national judgment except for one factor. That factor is Dr. Blasey Ford’s purpose for bringing her painful past to our attention.
If her sole purpose is to damage Judge Kavanaugh then shame on her. If her purpose is to dramatize the victimhood of women by perhaps going so far as to publicly forgive Judge Kavanaugh for his youthful indiscretion, she may well have taken the first step in the humanization of 21st Century American politics even as she testifies as to the veracity of her charges.
It’s possible, as we study history, to discover an aggressor and a victim behind every crisis in American history. In 1776, King George the Third was the aggressor and we colonists were his victims. Throughout the civil strife of the 1840s, 50s, and 60s, the slave owners were the aggressors (if you were to ask the abolitionists) and free men and women were the victims. If you had asked the Confederates, the abolitionists and the federal government were the aggressors and those who believed in states’ rights were the victims. When I was growing up, liberals, for the most part, held the higher hand of morality (especially on the civil rights issue) because both discrimination and racism were (and still is) immoral. Not until the Vietnam War and the Watergate eras did the personal morality of the President of the United States and his fellow politicians become the focus of questions of intense debate.
Since the resignation of President Nixon and the advent of President Bill Clinton, political leaders and commentators make every controversial issue primarily a moral issue. Americans are in continuous doubt about the very humanity of our national leadership. Accordingly, today Conservatives who once condemned the lack of morality in Bill Clinton’s White House see little relevance in what clearly appears to be immoral in President Trump’s White House.
Thus we come to the Kavanaugh/Blasey Ford crisis. One of the ironies here is that back in 1991 when Clarence Thomas’s and Anita Hill’s involvement became an issue, that issue was a question of adult behavior. It seems to have been far more relevant than the behavior of youths. Not too long ago, a United States Senator was forced to resign due to behavior considerably less objectionable than that of young Kavanaugh or the adult Justice Thomas.
What we need to realize is that the very fabric of truth, believability, as well as integrity, have become weakened not because they are no longer valuable, but because they have become mere tools of persuasion for the sake of immediate political one-upmanship.
Women are understandably angry over the ways in which they’ve been taken advantage of by the males in their lives. Nevertheless, since they’ll always have to live with them, their challenge is to master all men in such a way that at all times commands their respect.
Dr. Blasey Ford’s challenge before the United States Senate even as she puts him on notice that she remembers that awful night (whether or not he does) is to master the man with whom she has a conflict with so that the end result is for her own healing.
The political correctness or political moral self-righteousness must come to a screeching halt! No matter what you believe or in whom you believe, be it ideological politics or your religious faith, you’ll never enable it to prevail by belittling or destroying the reputations or sensibilities of others.
Here’s a brief example of what I mean. President Woodrow Wilson was absolutely right about the need for the establishment of the League of Nations in the wake of World War One. However, once he allowed the League of Nations to become a moral difference between himself and the GOP-controlled United States Senate, he lost his fight and the casualties and deaths of World War Two were almost inevitable. In other words, Wilson allowed his dislike and jealousy of Republican Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, Sr. of Massachusetts to destroy his dream as well as the very lives of millions during the war and the holocaust that were to come twenty-five years later.
With that lesson and that spirit in mind, may the meeting of the United States Senate Judiciary Committee please come to order!
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY
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