The Democrats and their allies in the media have spent the last few weeks laying the groundwork to destroy the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. First, they tried to say the process was “illegitimate” because Republicans held up Merrick Garland. When that didn’t work, they brought forth an uncorroborated decades-old allegation of sexual assault.
In the weeks leading up to a potential testimony from Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, the media have attempted to intimidate the jury of Republican senators as they brought up the “specter” of what happened during the Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill hearings of 1991. ABC’s Terry Moran reminded them how “they were blasted for their cluelessness and insensitivity” back then.
Liberal correspondents and hosts hectored Republicans just to give up already, as the likes of NBC’s Meet the Press host Chuck Todd declared that even if Kavanaugh was confirmed he would have an “asterisk” by his legacy. Todd predicted: “it wouldn’t surprise me if he chose to withdraw and chose to back down.” MSNBC political analyst Donny Deutsch flat out declared: “I believe Kavanaugh is dead at this point.”
Hollywood celebrities also weighed in, with actress Sarah Silverman claiming Kavanaugh’s confirmation is “going to affect every vulnerable person in America negatively until the day he dies, until the Devil comes to collect his soul.” Ex-Netflix host and lefty comic Chelsea Handler tweeted: “Just gearing up to spend a quiet Sunday night watching Fox News where rapists are rewarded with the benefit of the doubt.”
So even before any testimony has been heard, the liberal media have determined that Kavanaugh is guilty.
The following is a look at some of the most egregious attacks on Kavanaugh and Senate Republicans (so far).
Just Pack It In Kavanaugh, You’re “Cooked”
“I definitely think [Kavanaugh’s confirmation is] in trouble. I think nothing would surprise me, including him, by the end of the week, if Judge Kavanaugh decides he doesn’t want to go through this, it isn’t worth it, he doesn’t want to – maybe he can win but he doesn’t want an asterisk – I mean, it wouldn’t surprise me if he chose to withdraw and chose to back down.”
— NBC’s Meet the Press host Chuck Todd on NBC’s Today, September 18.
“[Donald Trump] has to face the political reality. Is he incapable? Bob Woodward says in his book he’s incapable of facing reality. The reality is, as I see it right now, probably, this nomination is cooked...Is he willing to accept that when the time comes and withdraw it or not? Does he have that ability to face reality?”
— Host Chris Matthews on MSNBC’s Hardball, September 17.
“I believe Kavanaugh is dead at this point. I would be shocked if he was ever a Supreme Court justice.”
— Advertising executive and MSNBC contributor Donny Deutsch on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, September 17.
Dems Justified In “Playing Dirty”
“[American Conservative Union chair] Matt Schlapp, last night, I noticed on Twitter saying Republicans don’t do this to Democrats. They absolutely do. Think back to Merrick Garland. He clearly wasn’t given a fair shot. Are Democrats playing dirty? And if they are, is it justified, since Mitch McConnell set the dirty table and won?”
— Host Stephanie Ruhle on MSNBC Live, September 24.
Icky Implication
“Members of the girls’ basketball teams he’s coached sat in the front rows behind him at his Senate confirmation hearing. But Ford’s charge shattered Kavanaugh’s carefully crafted tableau, calling into doubt the image he projected. The row of young girls, legs bare in their private-school skirts, looked different now.”
— Correspondent Molly Ball in a September 20 Time article.
Comparing Confirmation of Kavanaugh to Assault
“So even though Dr Ford is saying please stop, slow down, I’m not comfortable with the way this is going, the GOP is gonna plow through, ignore her telling them to stop and just take what they think is rightfully theirs?”
— September 21 tweet by MSNBC’s All In host Chris Hayes.
It’s Reagan’s Fault?
“Many people interviewed said they understood why Dr. Blasey might have stayed silent in 1982 – the days of Reagan conservatism, a decade before there were many women in Congress. The #MeToo era, they recognized, had made it easier to come forward.”
— New York Times writer Kate Zernike in front page September 22 article “Swing Districts Support Her, But Gingerly.”
High Time We Found a Man Guilty
“Yes, presumption of innocence is a standard and something we need to do, but part of the problem is that we’ve also said, ‘we presume in these cases that the woman in most cases the woman is lying.’ So, instead of saying, let’s presume she is telling the truth and we have a presumption of innocence, what do we do?...Part of the problem when we get to a ‘he said, she said,’ is almost every single time in a ‘he said, she said,’ case the default position is ‘he’ wins.”
— Chief political analyst Matthew Dowd on ABC’s This Week, September 23.
“Brave” Republicans Need to Stand Up Against Kavanaugh
“Obviously with [Sen, Bob] Corker and [Sen. Jeff] Flake, they’ve been the brave ones. They’re retiring. [Sen. Susan] Collins and [Sen. Lisa] Murkowski obviously with an extra sensitivity to women. It might be a matter of time, particularly if you connect the dots to Manafort turning and you’re really feel the noose tightening around Trump. That some other Republicans may start to act brave. Just simple selfish interests.”
— Advertising executive and MSNBC contributor Donny Deutsch on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, September 17.
Remember How We Shamed You In 1991, We’ll Do It Again
“I think that the Republicans, despite all the changes that have happened in the generations since those [Clarence Thomas] hearings, are still going to go in with a strategy to save this nomination at all costs. And if that means destroying, destroying Dr. Ford, I hate to even think about it, but I think it’s going to be the same kind of political circus that we saw back in 1991. That’s what worries me.”
— Former New York Times Executive Editor and author of anti-Clarence Thomas book Strange Justice Jill Abramson on CNN’s New Day, September 18.
“The specter of what happened in those explosive [Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill] hearings back in 1991 is looming over Washington right now. Republicans remember how they were blasted for their cluelessness and insensitivity.”
— Correspondent Terry Moran on ABC’s Good Morning America, September 19.
Co-host Gayle King: ‘You look at that video and it makes you wince. You look at Anita Hill’s face and the questions she had to take and had to answer, is this a case of deja-vu all over again?”
New York Times writer Jodi Kantor: “Well, here we are almost a year after the Me Too movement caught fire in the world and it feels like we’re returning to the original ground zero of these Supreme Court hearings. And the question to watch for in the next week is this a repeat of the Anita Hill dynamic? Which, by the way neither side wants. The Republican senators don't want to look like clueless and insensitive men, grilling a woman. They may end up that way anyway.”
— CBS This Morning, September 21.
What About The Truth?
“For 5,000 years, women have been treated as property, for centuries, by institutions – including the Catholic Church, which I’m the member of, they have been treated as second-class citizens. Women didn’t get the right to vote in this country until 1920 even though they were told in the 1780s that all men are created equal in this. Women have dealt with this for hundreds and hundreds of years, and the question is, will they be believed when they actively accuse a powerful man?”
— Chief political analyst Matthew Dowd on ABC’s This Week, September 23.
Message to Old Republican White Men: We’re Watching You
— Advertising executive and MSNBC contributor Donny Deutsch on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, September 21.
“Let’s face it, on the GOP side, you have older white men, only, interviewing this woman. I think that, that is an optic that the GOP has to be very careful about.”
— ABC’s The View co-host Sunny Hostin on ABC’s Good Morning America, September 18.
“If Ford does agree to testify, she and Judge Kavanaugh would be the only witnesses, fielding questions from 10 Democrats and 11 Republicans. All of the Republicans, men.”
— Correspondent Mary Bruce on ABC’s World News Tonight, September 18.
GOP Faces Extinction
“In these theories of evolution, we talk about what happened to the dinosaurs. They were yesterday’s animal, and they got to be extinct. If the Republican Party isn’t careful, that’s what’s going to happen to them because they may be able to push through the Kavanaugh – railroad through the Kavanaugh nomination with what’s known on the Hill as the old boys, the older white men who have the power. But this can’t last because America’s changing.”
— Former CBS Evening News anchor Dan Rather on CNN Tonight with Don Lemon, September 24.
“Odds” Are “Smarmy” Kavanaugh Is Guilty
“One big loser in the Kavanaugh situation is the cult of savvy – the tendency among some journos to sneer at anyone trying to stand in the way of what's supposed to be an unstoppable train. Whatever eventually happens, Kavanaugh was clearly a smarmy, smirking, entitled and mercenary guy; the odds that he had some kind of skeleton in his closet were pretty good. Oh, and let’s not forget all the savvy Democratic legal careerists who thought they could win points by talking about how great their good friend Brett was. Their cynicism should not be forgotten.”
— September 17 tweets from New York Times columnist Paul Krugman.
Guilty Until Proven Innocent
“This is what I grew up with, that men are supposed to protect you from these predatory males. And they are not doing that! And on the contrary, these people in Congress right now on that Senate Judiciary Committee, these white men, old by the way, are not protecting women. They are protecting a man who is probably guilty. If you’re not, Judge Kavanaugh, take the lie detector test. Prove it the way she did and the way Anita Hill did that they were not lying. Let’s see that from you. Or are you a coward?”
— Co-host Joy Behar on ABC’s The View, September 19.
Throw GOP Senators Off Committee!
“What has been really disconcerting to me is not only this President saying those things even before she’s testified. It’s Lindsey Graham saying whatever she says won’t change my vote. It’s Mitch McConnell saying things. Mitch McConnell is saying, “In the very near future, Judge Kavanaugh will be on the United States Supreme Court.” He said that over the weekend. You know – if you have a jury trial and you have a juror that says, “I don’t care what the star witness says, that won’t change my vote,” that juror gets thrown off the jury. Why are these senators still on the Judiciary Committee? That’s absurd to me.”
— Co-host Sunny Hostin on ABC’s The View, September 24.
Kavanaugh Shouldn’t Even Be There Because Republicans Stole Elections
“He [Brett Kavanaugh] shouldn’t even be having this hearing because he shouldn’t be up for the Supreme Court because it should be Merrick Garland and if we didn’t have the Electoral College – okay – Al Gore would have appointed the two that [George W.] Bush appointed. And if we didn’t have the Electoral College....Hillary would be president. The Supreme Court would be a liberal court. That would reflect the people. That’s not what we have....Before 2000 – you know – the Supreme Court more or less reflected the makeup of the people’s politics. Now because they steal elections – partly with the help of the Constitution....now it doesn’t.”
— Host Bill Maher on HBO’s Real Time, September 21.
Kavanaugh’s Deal with the Devil
“[The Trump administration] is going to get to confirm Kavanaugh and that will give every anti-choice Republican a giant boner. This is a position for life, y’all. They want to push it through, and if it goes through, it’s going to affect every vulnerable person in America negatively until the day he dies, until the Devil comes to collect his soul.”
— Actress/comedian Sarah Silverman on her Hulu show I Love You America, September 6.
Dystopian TV Show About Oppressed Women Come to Life
“We’re all in big trouble, at the moment, anyway. I nearly wore a white wimple [Medieval-era female headdress] because I thought this was a little bit Handmaid’s Tale. I thought perhaps I’d wear a napkin or something just because of Brett Kavanaugh, you know, just because it was so terrible when that happened. I’m so sorry. Oh God, it’s so terrible, let’s talk about something else.”
— Actress Emma Thompson on CBS’s Late Show with Stephen Colbert, September 6.
Trial By Twitter
“Just gearing up to spend a quiet Sunday night watching Fox News where rapists are rewarded with the benefit of the doubt, men are believed over women, rapists over victims of assault. This is making America great again?”
— September 23 tweet by comedian and former Netflix host Chelsea Handler.
“Our republic shudders and teeters, as an illegitimate president appoints scoundrels to our highest court, while sacking dedicated civil servants – all in plain sight. He creates new crises to distract from ones of his own doing. Be prepared, America. These are the moments feared.”
— September 24 tweet by actor George Takei.
