I am heading for the locker rooms myself to take a shower.
I am coated with something.

I think the old salt is right.
They should have asked Judge Judy to pilot the ship.

There is the irony of intention but if this is truly a "calculated political hit",  it could be investigated just like the one Kavanaugh participated in. Why is there not more confidence displayed in the truth coming to light?
In its stead, there are only apocalyptic pronouncements regarding the demise of the Republic as we know it.

Taking the G.O.P. at their own word, the deep state is kicking their private parts like some kind of chicken franchise set on fire by a meth manufacturer. And there is nothing they can do to defend themselves.

TPM is reporting Flake will fall in line.

Kav is a done deal, anyone who understands Republicans would not be surprised. They are out to enshrine their plutocrat supporters with the backstop of the SCOTUS, while playing to their theocracy seeking, authoritarian loving racist Base. Without that Base and that campaign cash, they have no power.

The GOP would confirm him even if he failed polygraphs, even if the FBI investigated and found some likelihood he did what was reported by Ford.

One quibble on this: I doubt that GOP senators think of what they are doing as politically suicidal.  High risk, yes.  But they knew they were in a dicey political situation as is because of Trump, the typical loss of seats for the in party in mid-term elections, and the deep unpopularity of their agenda which some of their constituents who voted for them--helpfully for their purposes and engineered over decades--remain ignorant of.  (Many of them like the sound of small government.  But if and when that comes to pass, few of them will be happy about what that turns out to look like in practice.  Decades-long lying about what the government does by the GOP and its right-wing, anti government allies has left many with badly skewed and factually incorrect perceptions.)  

All their already high-risk options became higher risk when Kavanaugh became the nominee. 

But they have won so many elections they had no business winning that they see no reason to concede that they are electoral toast.  No matter what transpires.  Their confidence in their ability to create the alternative reality--and also the realities resulting from gerrymandering, voter suppression, and Russian interference on their behalf--they need to gain and hold power is vast. 

Theoretically, individual GOP senators could decide to distance themselves from their base and move towards the center.  But I think many of them are a lot more terrified of doing that than they are of doing what they need to do to keep their base.  For them that would be a giant leap into the unknown and they have no idea whether or how they could win elections with a different coalition shifted somewhat towards the center.  So they are committed to doing what they need to do to hold their base.  But their base's expectations and demands have been shifting in increasingly extreme directions in recent decades, and now more so by Trump.  (I'm oversimplifying.  The dynamics vary by state, as well as due to other factors.) 

Another quibble:  They can't afford to not give a shit about Trump's fortunes.  Because even if many of them despise him and view him as bad for the party, if he goes down, many of them are at risk of going down as well.  Such is the cult status Trump occupies among many GOP voters now. 

If Pence were to become president he would never generate the allegiance Trump does.  He just doesn't have the personality for it.  Pence can't do the act Trump does.  But that is the act necessary to have a chance at producing a GOP win in a presidential election at this point.  They have to polarize and get a higher proportion of their ordinary folks potential voter pool furious and eager to flip off the liberals they've been prompted and helped to hate.  That is both the negative and the positive motivation for them to vote.      

It is hazardous for them to be with Trump, in many states.  But near-term it is also hazardous for them to be without him.  That is one of their quandaries. 

Kasich, Rubio, and Romney and Jeb think, or thought, they could win while rhetorically and symbolically moving away from the extremists in the party.  Well, that didn't work in 2016.  If anything, the Trump-supporting GOP crowd may have become even more so the constituency any wannabe GOP presidential nominee needs to have a chance at the nomination.  For the time being, at least, Trump's behavior has altered the expectations and also the observable reality of what sort of approach can get someone elected--and may be necessary to get a Republican elected president at this time.          

I have no problem identifying with a tribe. I reject tribalism. I think that tribes can actually work together

————  

What is a tribe? Tribalism? Per Merriam-Webster:

Tribe: a group of people that includes many families and relatives who have the same language, customs and beliefs; a group of persons having a common character, occupation or interest.

Tribalism: loyalty to a tribe or other social group especially when combined with strong negative feelings for people outside the group.

We all belong to at least one tribe. Yes: Outside of our immediate family, even loners and introverts (and gamers) are a loose confederation of the like-minded.

Other than family ties, tribalism in the West tends to be ideological and/or social. If you think about all the people you know, they likely identify with their religious or spiritual affiliation (or lack thereof), political, occupational, or social group (s)-or any combination of the aforementioned

—————

https://www.statesman.com/news/local/guest-column-tribes-and-tribalism-t...

I have pointed out the origins and meaning of identity politics 

https://newrepublic.com/article/144739/liberals-get-wrong-identity-politics. It’s not my definition, it’s the definition.

My problem with Fukuyama is that his argument is a “both (all) sides do it argument. Wingnuts behave badly because they are prodded by Identity Politics on the Left. I point out the decades long history of white supremacy promoted by the GOP. Fukuyama sees a slide to identity politics on the Right. He seems to have missed the ever present white supremacy.

I belong to a tribe willing to work with other tribes.

You might appreciate this.  The woman who cuts my hair is an Iranian immigrant and now long time US ciitizen.  We had a while back talked a little about the 1953 coup in her native country that was carried out by the precursor to the CIA.

While she was cutting my hair last weekend, I mentioned that I had recently seen a 2010 documentary I liked called "American Coup" about those events and we talked a bit more.  I offered that I had known a little about that coup before seeing the documentary but learned a lot more from it, and that I doubted many Americans had any awareness or interest in that history despite its critical importance to understanding the modern Middle East.

And that I thought that the US government owed the people of Iran a long overdue apology for our government's role in those events.

Well.  I was taken aback by her reaction.  She was absolutely blown away that some US citizen knew and cared about any of this.  She was really and truly touçhed.  She cuts the hair of some powerful people and she said no one from this country had ever said this to her. Of course I do not speak for our government or our people.  But the fact that someone from this country said that to her meant a great deal to her.  I was really moved that the exchange had that impact on her.

According to the documentary Truman formed the precursor to the CIA as a central place in the federal government that would collect and analyze information about other countries.  He was opposed and vetoed the Iran coup proposal.  He wrote a NYT op ed in the 1960s saying that having an agency that would play the role the CIA was playing was not something he ever intended or supported.

According to the documentary Eisenhower was persuaded over his initial reservations to allow the coup, with Teddy Roosevelt's grandson Kermit playing the key role in executing it in Iran.

It set a precedent and served as a template of sorts for the role the CIA would come to play in the internal affairs of many other countries in the decades that followed.

In the context of our day's headlines some might wonder whether white male privilege piled on top of US hubris at that time had a role in the sort of foreign policy the US conducted during the Cold War and at times since then.

He's especially good on these matters because he knows just what to look for.  He knew that it was significant, as well as dramatic, to air last night the footage focused on Flake during Coons' committee speech.  

Yah, even an artistic know-nothing like me can see why.

Now there there is a human who has the rapt attention of some other humans.