Kavanaugh - Renate Alumnius

[NotreDame]

What does any of this even matter? We've had plenty of womanizing Presidents, why not womanizing Supreme Court Justices?

Well, in the past there were "plenty of womanizing President," but that is hardly a justification for allowing one today, or for excusing the existence of one today, and certainly not a justification for a nominee to the Court to also be a womanizer.

Of course, I suppose one could also legitimately ask when did the public become aware of the womanizing? For instance, President Kennedy's promiscuity, and his difficulty with keeping it in his pants, was not widely disseminated information, if disseminated at all, in the election of 1960. The point being, there was not disclosure to the wider public the presidential nominee was a womanizer prior to the election, and as a result, the electorate did not vet that acceptability of such a quality in determining the president.

There is not much justification for Brett's conduct, if true, on the basis prior Presidents were "womanizers."

 

[whatbogsends]

If we lived in Equestria I could fully support your point. However the world we actually live in is full of people only too willing to do whatever is necessary to take or destroy whatever someone else has often for no other reason than the sick sense of accomplishment they get from having done so.

I guess it's just miraculous that in my half century of life I haven't encountered these apparently abundant malicious people who are so eager to destroy someone out of the sick sense of accomplishment they get from having done so.

Are there some wackos out there? Sure, but from my experience, they're fairly easy to spot, and the existence of some whackos isn't a reason for me not to associate with women (be it social, at work, or otherwise) outside of the company of my wife.

Are you sure you live in the same world that I do?

 

[NotreDame]

It probably means that she's a sweet girl, you should buy her chocolate and flowers, and she wants to be home by 8 because she's a good girl who never does anything unbecoming of a lady!

That's the point, what the rhyme "probably means" is rather difficult to discern because of its ambiguous nature.

Clearly, however, ambiguity is no impediment for you. Why? Because with your partisan sword you can cut right through the ambiguity and discover the true, unambiguous, absolute meaning of the rhyme.

That's one heck of an accomplishment since you are not the author of the rhyme, were not present when the rhyme was composed, have not conversed with the author about the meaning of the rhyme, have not conversed with any of the boys associated with the girl and rhyme, but are still able to resolutely discern a singular meaning.

 

[SoldierOfTheKing]

Well, in the past there were "plenty of womanizing President," but that is hardly a justification for allowing one today, or for excusing the existence of one today, and certainly not a justification for a nominee to the Court to also be a womanizer.

Of course, I suppose one could also legitimately ask when did the public become aware of the womanizing? For instance, President Kennedy's promiscuity, and his difficulty with keeping it in his pants, was not widely disseminated information, if disseminated at all, in the election of 1960. The point being, there was not disclosure to the wider public the presidential nominee was a womanizer prior to the election, and as a result, the electorate did not vet that acceptability of such a quality in determining the president.

There is not much justification for Brett's conduct, if true, on the basis prior Presidents were "womanizers."

In earlier years the press was not keen to report on Presidents sex lives...

...and here in this thread, I see arguing over the meaning of a verse that Kavanaugh didn't event write.

 

[LoAmmi]

That's the point, what the rhyme "probably means" is rather difficult to discern because of its ambiguous nature.

Clearly, however, ambiguity is no impediment for you. Why? Because with your partisan sword you can cut right through the ambiguity and discover the true, unambiguous, absolute meaning of the rhyme.

That's one heck of an accomplishment since you are not the author of the rhyme, were not present when the rhyme was composed, have not conversed with the author about the meaning of the rhyme, have not conversed with any of the boys associated with the girl and rhyme, but are still able to resolutely discern a singular meaning.

If anybody I knew wrote that rhyme, I'd come to the same conclusion. It isn't partisan, it's my own judgment about what that means. I don't have to hold some kind of objective above-it-all attitude where because I don't have ABSOLUTE PROOF of something, I have to consider it ambiguous. I don't have absolute proof I'm not a brain in a jar being forced to experience this world in an experiment, but I'm not about to consider this world false because that is a possibility. I can draw my own conclusions based upon experience. I see it as identical to "for a good time call", and I would see it that way if it's these folks in high school or my best friend on Facebook.

 

[Sistrin]

I guess it's just miraculous...

This is most often the track liberals follow in arguing support for some specious charge, the denial that human nature is human nature.

Finding someone willing to lie, cheat, or steal in order to destroy someone else's life and/or career by whatever means necessary in order to advance or protect an agenda is as easy as finding air when you step outside. Guys like Pence know this. I know it. And now this simple truth is being illustrated for all the world to see.

Rape trains? Seriously, you guys actually believe this crap?

 

[NotreDame]

The poem is directed at an individual (presumably a man) finding himself without a date and without much time in which to find one. The author proposes that a call to Renate will provide a swift resolution to that predicament, though doesn't describe precisely how Renate will fix the situation.





No, I just took a couple Lit classes. And I can read.



That we don't know the precise meaning doesn't mean we can't narrow it down to a plausible range of meanings.

You've accurately summarized my conclusion, but not my justification for it. To be honest, I don't quite understand how you can misinterpret my justification that badly. Is it deliberate? Are you just overtaken with emotion?

I have another explanation, which is your justification has resulted in circularity so far. However, you seek to provide a justification, a poor one, which I will address below.

The poem is directed at an individual (presumably a man) finding himself without a date and without much time in which to find one. The author proposes that a call to Renate will provide a swift resolution to that predicament, though doesn't describe precisely how Renate will fix the situation.

Man, this is a tough one to solve. I'd rank the difficulty of possibly solving this one with some of the problem sets from high school Calculus.

Let's see, as you said, the rhyme is a person finds himself without a date and there is not much time remaining to find a date. So, place a call to Renate. Okay, that's the context, so how does a call to Renate fix the dilemma of a person needing a date but there is not much time remaining to find a date? I am gonna go out on a limb and guess since the rhyme is about needing a date, time is running out to find a date, then if one were to ask Renate on a date, she'd say yes, and the person is no longer dateless. Whew, that was tough. Who knew?

I justify my conclusion that this portrays Renate as a "cheap/easy" date because I struggle to explain the "how" of this poem in a manner that doesn't portray Renate as cheap and easy and also doesn't strain credulity.

Oh really? The notion Renate would say yes if asked on a date, thereby solving the dilemma of the dateless person, is a "struggle" for you to understand? Really?

I will also add, your "struggle" is hardly evidence your interpretation is correct. That simply is a nonsequitur.

I would argue that those would all fall under the banner of "cheap/easy".

Then you have a very liberal understanding of "cheap and easy." Your understanding of "cheap and easy" is so illogically elastic as to include two teens engaged in heavy French kissing for a protracted period of time, which is making out.

No, I just took a couple Lit classes. And I can read.

LOL. So, you took some classes where you possibly read Shakespeare, John Milton, Hemingway, perhaps Chaucer, but so what? You with millions of other people have read literature and taken literature classes. Big whoop.

That we don't know the precise meaning doesn't mean we can't narrow it down to a plausible range of meanings

Possibly some common ground, finally. There are several plausible meanings and there existence is owed to the ambiguity of the rhyme, which has been a point I have made repeatedly.[/QUOTE][/QUOTE]

 

[ToddNotTodd]

If high school locker room talk is the standard we are using to determine whether someone is qualified for a high political post nearly 40 years later, then we need to remove every single person from office because there is no one qualified.

I didn’t engage in “locker room talk” in high school. Neither did my friends.

Why?

Because we were good human beings.

 

[NotreDame]

If anybody I knew wrote that rhyme, I'd come to the same conclusion. It isn't partisan, it's my own judgment about what that means. I don't have to hold some kind of objective above-it-all attitude where because I don't have ABSOLUTE PROOF of something, I have to consider it ambiguous. I don't have absolute proof I'm not a brain in a jar being forced to experience this world in an experiment, but I'm not about to consider this world false because that is a possibility. I can draw my own conclusions based upon experience. I see it as identical to "for a good time call", and I would see it that way if it's these folks in high school or my best friend on Facebook.

If anybody I knew wrote that rhyme, I'd come to the same conclusion.

Hardly compelling but definitely informative. Of course, someone else could equally say the opposite.

It isn't partisan, it's my own judgment about what that means.

This is undoubtedly true but hardly the issue. The issue is whether your judgment is accurate as it relates to the poem. Simply, there is very little, to nothing, to indicate your judgment is accurate as it relates to the poem.

I don't have to hold some kind of objective above-it-all attitude

True. You are entitled to your approach of it must be this way because I believe it or want to believe it, or the entirely subjective approach of you believe it, therefore it is so!

ABSOLUTE PROOF

Which is not needed to firmly or confidently believe something is true, is factual, real, and I have made no such demand.

I can draw my own conclusions based upon experience.

You have experience in which someone wrote an ambiguous rhyme as the one above and you accurately deciphered the rhyme to one singular meaning?

I see it as identical to "for a good time call", and I would see it that way if it's these folks in high school or my best friend on Facebook

Yep, to be sure, the above is how you "see" the rhyme. How you perceive the rhyme is not at issue. The issue is whether your perception of the rhyme is the message the rhyme is communicating and the fact is, the content of the rhyme does not necessarily support your perception.

 

[LoAmmi]

Hardly compelling but definitely informative. Of course, someone else could equally say the opposite.



This is undoubtedly true but hardly the issue. The issue is whether your judgment is accurate as it relates to the poem. Simply, there is very little, to nothing, to indicate your judgment is accurate as it relates to the poem.



True. You are entitled to your approach of it must be this way because I believe it or want to believe it, or the entirely subjective approach of you believe it, therefore it is so!



Which is not needed to firmly or confidently believe something is true, is factual, real, and I have made no such demand.



You have experience in which someone wrote an ambiguous rhyme as the one above and you accurately deciphered the rhyme to one singular meaning?



Yep, to be sure, the above is how you "see" the rhyme. How you perceive the rhyme is not at issue. The issue is whether your perception of the rhyme is the message the rhyme is communicating and the fact is, the content of the rhyme does not necessarily support your perception.

I'm not in a courtroom. I'm not a jury determining someone's guilt. I can use whatever measure I want to determine how I perceive things.

 

[Ana the Ist]

You want to lock up a 16 year old girl for 15 years for being stupid and scared? Wow..

No...stupid and scared are completely understandable. Falsely accusing people of rape is a crime.

 

[LostMarbels]

Why do you leap from one extreme to another? The whole point about these cases are that they're usually very complicated and require careful handling and delicacy, not some heavy handed 'one size fits all' approach.

Does a 16 year old understand something is bad and there could be serious consequences? Quite possibly. Can a 16 year old actually comprehend the devastating impact a false accusation could have on an adult male, including the effect on their families, friends, career etc? Very likely not. That's without even touching on the extremely sensitive issues that often lead kids to making false accusations such as previous traumas or psychological issues.

None of that means we shouldn't care about the man. I'm a man, you think I want to face something like that, despite being completely innocent? But to protect men, doesn't mean we have to throw kids into prison for 15 years as some kind of supposed deterrent to others, despite the simple fact that kids are generally irresponsible anyway, and a deterrent like that wouldn't be likely to make any difference anyway.

Consequences for bad behaviour is one thing, but this medieval 'lock em up!' stuff just contributes to you already having the highest percentage of people on the planet incarcerated.

'Hypothetical' to prove how harmful false accusations are. Not real. Not even arguable because it is a hypothetical. Not trying to "protect men" as much as make a point how destructive one little lie can be to an innocent life.

When the situation is applied to an individual, that is even know to be innocent in the premise of the hypothetical, no one seems to care about the male. Immediate outcry ensues however when the same harsh conditions are applied to the girl in question, even if it is understood she is the perpetrator and lied.

Very few people ever care that a known innocent individual faces ruination. Why is this? Doesn't rape harm a life? Couldn't it be said a victim of sexual assault will live with it for the rest of their life? Use some logic here. Reason with me. How is that rape any different to an individual convicted of a rape they did not commit? Being an innocent person in prison... for 15 years. To be followed by 15 years of sexual offender probation. Going to be 48 by the time his sentence for a crime he did not commit is served. Lost his entire career. His entire life put on hold for 30 years. Then has to live with the stigma of 'sex offender' for the rest of his life.

Think that might be damaging? Maybe a tiny bit traumatic?

 

[Kentonio]

'Hypothetical' to prove how harmful false accusations are. Not real. Not even arguable because it is a hypothetical. Not trying to "protect men" as much as make a point how destructive one little lie can be to an innocent life.

When the situation is applied to an individual, that is even know to be innocent in the premise of the hypothetical, no one seems to care about the male. Immediate outcry ensues however when the same harsh conditions are applied to the girl in question, even if it is understood she is the perpetrator and lied.

Very few people ever care that a known innocent individual faces ruination. Why is this? Doesn't rape harm a life? Couldn't it be said a victim of sexual assault will live with it for the rest of their life? Use some logic here. Reason with me. How is that rape any different to an individual convicted of a rape they did not commit? Being an innocent person in prison... for 15 years. To be followed by 15 years of sexual offender probation. Going to be 48 by the time his sentence for a crime he did not commit is served. Lost his entire career. His entire life put on hold for 30 years. Then has to live with the stigma of 'sex offender' for the rest of his life.

Think that might be damaging? Maybe a tiny bit traumatic?

You're arguing against a strawman. There are VERY few people who don't feel enormous sympathy for people falsely accused (much less incarcerated). One of my main objections to the US justice system is how often people are convicted based on whether they can afford a decent lawyer or not, and on their social and racial profile rather than the facts of the case. Those are things that all need major improvement, and absolutely none of them are helped by just getting more vindictive towards the extremely rare number of women who falsely accuse men of rape. It happens incredibly infrequently, yet its one of those things that get people raging about it.

 

[Ana the Ist]

Not entirely, but I'd be more willing to overlook it.

Ok...

What I was getting at with the sports analogy is that our childhoods aren't entirely irrelevant, particularly in fields that have extremely competitive job markets. Yes, football players do tend to get away with certain things, and that's not good - but they don't get away with skipping practice or losing games. They are held accountable as adults for at least some things they did as kids.

We aren't talking about job-related performance issues though. The reasoning is that character issues can disqualify a person from a career. We aren't, for example, talking about his history of taking 1 hour lunch breaks that actually lasted 75 minutes. That would be a job related issue.

He's denying the ones related to sexual misconduct. I'm not sure whether or not he's denying the excessive partying - I didn't think he was, but his Fox interview has me wondering if he's heading in that direction.

I didn't realize that "excessive partying" was something he's being accused of. Are some people claiming that his desire to have fun in high school and college would somehow affect his ability to be a judge?

What I meant was expressing regret over partying too much. Maybe it's just me, but I'm kind of embarrassed when I wind up spending the night shivering on the floor of a friend's bathroom or when I wake up in the morning and realize I probably shouldn't have driven home the night before.

Is that the sort of thing that needs addressed? It's not as if anyone is claiming that he does this stuff nowadays, are they?

It's more than just "wealth". It's a lifetime of privilege and (at least as far as I perceive) non-accountability informing decisions that will impact the least of us.

Ahhh....so "wealth privilege" is the issue? What makes you think he's never been "accountable" for his actions? Should our judges only have "humble" beginnings?

Or are you trying to say that "white privilege" is the issue in a roundabout way?

 

[Ana the Ist]

I'm married. I also have plenty of female friends, or wives of husbands that i'm 100% comfortable being alone with, without having any fear whatsoever of any impropriety, allegation, or what have you arise from it. Why? Because when my friends become married, I become friends with their wives and we all treat each other with respect. Conversely, my wife has male friends, and husbands of her friends that I (and she) are 100% comfortable with her being alone with, for exactly the same reasons.

I find it very peculiar when a married man claims the can't be alone with women for fear of allegations of impropriety arising.

Ehhh...I can understand it. If you've ever been the subject of false accusations or witnessed what happens to a man who has, it's not difficult to understand why someone might want to avoid that. It's not as if everyone is reasonable enough to consider both sides of the situation. In general, people tend to believe the accuser regardless of what evidence exists or what reputation the accused has.

 

[LostMarbels]

I'm married. I also have plenty of female friends, or wives of husbands that i'm 100% comfortable being alone with, without having any fear whatsoever of any impropriety, allegation, or what have you arise from it. Why? Because when my friends become married, I become friends with their wives and we all treat each other with respect. Conversely, my wife has male friends, and husbands of her friends that I (and she) are 100% comfortable with her being alone with, for exactly the same reasons.

I find it very peculiar when a married man claims the can't be alone with women for fear of allegations of impropriety arising.

Simply put, and not as a slight, but as an Atheist you might not understand the nonsecular reasoning. Abstaining from even the appearance of impropriety is a Christian ideal found in 1st Thessalonians. Avoiding the appearance of evil, or abstaining from every form of evil, means to live in God's light by the power of the Holy Spirit. We "take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them" (Ephesians 5:11). We do not worry about the perceptions of others but about the integrity of our own walk with Christ. When we avoid every kind of evil, we “make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires”. So I do not expect you to agree with it, but it is done out of respect, and integrity; not fear of committing something.

 

[iluvatar5150]

We aren't talking about job-related performance issues though. The reasoning is that character issues can disqualify a person from a career. We aren't, for example, talking about his history of taking 1 hour lunch breaks that actually lasted 75 minutes. That would be a job related issue.

The reasoning is that different careers are more impacted by character than others. Some careers, like athletics, have very strong objective, quantifiable standards of performance that don't have a high correlation to a person's moral character beyond, say, a person's ability to exercise discipline relevant to the tasks of their job. Others, like being a judge or politician, have somewhat more subjective measures of performance and also place a certain amount of trust in the person to do what's right. I'm not going to say that good character doesn't matter to being a good football player, but it matters less than it does to being a good judge/politician/etc. I mean, Aaron Hernandez was a good football player....

I didn't realize that "excessive partying" was something he's being accused of. Are some people claiming that his desire to have fun in high school and college would somehow affect his ability to be a judge?

No, they're saying his actions towards women affect his ability.

Is that the sort of thing that needs addressed? It's not as if anyone is claiming that he does this stuff nowadays, are they?

This is my way of judging his level of forthrightness. Is he saying "I never did anything bad" or is he saying "I partied too much, but I never did <that stuff>". It seems that his tune now is the latter, but my impression of things (which I'll concede is possibly incorrect) is that his earlier statements skewed towards the former.

Brett Kavanaugh Regrets Some Choices in High School, but Again Denies Sexual Assault

Ahhh....so "wealth privilege" is the issue? What makes you think he's never been "accountable" for his actions?

It's partly assumption on my part, but partly also a lack of evidence that he's faced any repercussions at all for his behavior (and I've looked for it) - either the partying or the questionable answers in his confirmation hearings, and now for the alleged behavior towards women.

Or are you trying to say that "white privilege" is the issue in a roundabout way?

Nope.

 

[eleos1954]

He's being considered for the Supreme Court. He is not under criminal investigation. The character of a potential Justice is fair game for Senators to use when making their determination.

so far the character issue hasn't been "proven" .... does it need to be? or do we go on the accusations of others? and if so ..... until when?

 

[NotreDame]

In earlier years the press was not keen to report on Presidents sex lives...

...and here in this thread, I see arguing over the meaning of a verse that Kavanaugh didn't event write.

I’m with ya regarding the rhyme...reminds me of the tale of Rumplestulskin, specifically the girl who could “spin” straw into gold. Here, people are spinning an ambiguous rhyme into the anthem of the all male Player’s Club, kickin it to ol’ school Snoop and drinking gin juice as they regal stories of their conquests of the opposite sex.

 

[NotreDame]

I'm not in a courtroom. I'm not a jury determining someone's guilt. I can use whatever measure I want to determine how I perceive things.

Yep, but that ignores the notion your measure isn’t rational, or reasonable, outside the judging standards of a court of law. It’s about the measure making sense and the measures you expressed simply do not make sense when seeking to find the truth, to discover facts, discern what is real, what isn’t, to know what is true of our reality, etcetera.