MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE
by Michael Wolraich
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MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE by Michael Wolraich Order today at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop |
Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) raised the ire of protesters Thursday after telling a group of mostly women who confronted him in one of the Senate buildings that he would talk to them when they “grow up.”
Video of the incident ricocheted around social media Thursday night, the latest in a string of confrontations reflecting the heated emotions coursing through the Capitol amid the fight over Brett M. Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court nomination.
In the video, a group of protesters confronts Hatch, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee who has been front and center in the confirmation process, as he gets into an elevator in the Hart building. The video starts mid-confrontation, with the voice of a woman asking Hatch over a wall of staffers why he isn’t “brave enough” to talk to her and her group. Hatch waves his hand in midair.
“Don’t you wave your hand at me,” the woman says.
Hatch looks at her and says, “When you grow up, I’ll be glad to” talk to you. The comment incenses some of the protesters.
“How dare you talk to women that way?” one says.
Hatch waves at the group from the elevator as they continue yelling at him.
Kathy Beynette, the protester whose voice is the one predominantly heard in the video, said in an interview that she was deeply offended by Hatch’s remarks.
“I was like, ‘How dare you talk to a woman like this?’ ” she said. “ ‘When I grow up?’ No woman deserves to be talked to like that.”
She said the group had gone inside and stumbled upon Hatch and his retinue by happenstance. Still, she said she wanted to share her thoughts with him.
“I said in a very nice way, Senator Hatch, my dad — cause my dad would be his generation — my dad served in World War II and my son was a first responder on 9/11,” Beynette said.
Matt Whitlock, a spokesman for Hatch, noted that the video began midway through the encounter. He said that no one in the group that confronted them had identified themselves as sexual assault survivors and said that Hatch had told one woman who yelled “You made my life worse” that he apologized.
“In the last two weeks, Senator Hatch has had his private information shared online by a Democrat staffer during a hearing, putting him and his family in danger,” Whitlock said in a statement. “He has been screamed at and harassed by the very same protesters who tried to prevent confirmation hearings from even happening. Republicans have received every kind of death threat imaginable — all for supporting Judge Brett Kavanaugh. But Senator Hatch will not be intimidated.”
..........
Eli Rosenberg, WaPo last night
Comments
Just read your comment, aa, on treatment Collins was receiving prior to her comments on not being intimidated by groups "threatening" to fund her opponent if she voted yes (which I now am unable to locate). [As an aside, while I often feel as though you are far too harsh on, and off base with re to, "lefties", to the point of caricaturing them in notably un-nuanced ways, in that comment it seemed as though you were at greater pains than usual to try to avoid being overly broad brush in that way.]
I posted this WaPo story on the Hatch interaction before I saw your Collins comment, deliberately including almost all of the article so as to make sure Hatch's view of this matter got full play. (The headline was one that he and his staff must have cringed upon seeing.) After reading your comment on Collins' earlier experience, I'm especially glad I did.
These issues--of what is civility?, Is civility BS? Is civility a tool used solely by powerful people to avoid uncomfortable or unwanted, but sometimes socially necessary, conflict? Are there situations in which civility can justifiably be foregone?, etc.--were also discussed in re to the Red Hen incident as I'm sure you recall.
One could do worse than use these three incidents as examples to ground discussion about what should be considered acceptable advocacy conduct and what should not be. For good measure, one could add the shouting directed at Ted Cruz recently while he was dining in a DC restaurant for good measure.
by AmericanDreamer on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 12:38pm
I just meant about personal threats, I think those are counter-productive, especially when made to like: aides answering phones. (If you go up the chain with the personal threats, you might have the authorities to deal with, so it's cowardly to do it to the minions not so protected.) The opposing social media and partisan media picks right up on that kind of thing immediately when they hear about it and plays it, and many times successfully labelling everyone on that side as a bunch of crazy yahoos. Then nobody listens to anything.
by artappraiser on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 12:50pm
I tend to agree. Where it gets a bit grey for me is when advocates confront public officials or fellow citizens FTF in circumstances where there is a forseeable risk that such a situation could get out of hand and escalate into violence. Civil disobedience efforts during earlier civil rights advocacy involved attempts to try to ensure that participants would very deliberately act in ways intended to be seen as not physically threatening harm to others, and would not respond violently to taunts or unprovoked violence initiated against them.
I think perhaps a majority of people do not involve themselves in political advocacy of any sort, let alone any physical form of advocacy such as a march or demonstration, let alone the much tinier minority still who engage in intentional FTF confrontational advocacy.
by AmericanDreamer on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 1:25pm
Maintaining civility is more than required. Deploying hostile signs ,for example is uncivil but OK . Violence or its threat marks the no-go point. Not because it's counter productive ; because it's bad.
by Flavius on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 8:46pm
video from Politico, so without paywall:
by artappraiser on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 12:41pm
Thank you.
by AmericanDreamer on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 12:44pm
FWIW, one different kinda "protest" went on this morning:
by artappraiser on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 1:11pm
a veiled threat of a kind:
by artappraiser on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 3:39pm
More on Murkowski:
by artappraiser on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 4:20pm
She gets it. Clearly the unenlightened, badly out of touch old white men in her party railroading this nominee through do not.
by AmericanDreamer on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 4:32pm
Ah but I think Collins more than gets it, too. Most of her speech nearly an hour of legal references to supposedly prove how Kavanaugh has been incorrectly smeared as being prejudiced on issues of interest to women, point by point by point talking about his philosophy and rulings, including abortion. (And blaming that smearing happened because we've hit partisan rock bottom on confirmation process now, ala Senator Graham). She actually said that after studying Kavanaugh's record, she believes he will be an important bridge on the Supreme Court and cause fewer 5-4 decisions. As if she thought to go to another on the short list would be a step down.
Even better proof she made a stage set for that female issue speech by making sure there were two women behind her on the teevee:
and for news junkies who pay attention to detail,more optics: this morning before her speech, sexual assault survivors were invited to her office to tell their stories:
I really believe that she thinks that.Kavanaugh will not hurt women's nor assault survivors' causes, she argued that all through her speech. And I believe she believes Kavanaugh has been incorrectly characterized. Make no mistake she is a believer that a conservative reading of the Constitution is best for all, this wasn't a cynical decision. Rather it was cynical on her side to worry about what swing vote sympathizers of #Metoo might think and try to ameliorate that and court them with these activities.
by artappraiser on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 5:24pm
Reuters just reposted this old story about Collins supporting Garland on Twitter's "Top News," with photo of the two of them, apparently to back up her argument that the process has gone to hell
Republican Collins' call for Garland hearings spurned
By Richard Cowan, April 5, 2016
by artappraiser on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 5:31pm
The headline should read:
Collins flaps jaw to no effect once again
by ocean-kat on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 5:41pm
How will there be less 5-4 decisions? All the decisions where Kennedy would vote with the conservatives Kavanaugh will vote with the conservatives. Most of the decisions where Kennedy would vote with the liberals Kavanaugh will vote with the conservatives. There will be the same amount of 5-4 decisions but less of the 5-4 decisions will be won by liberals. This is not some brilliant insight of mine. It's fucking obvious that will happen. You have to be a brain dead moron not to see that and Collins isn't a brain dead moron. She knows that will happen and she's lying about it.
It is possible she believes Kavanaugh won't over turn Roe. It's possible that she's right about that. It's more likely that Kavanaugh will vote to overturn Roe and Roberts will save it to protect the integrity of the court. The most likely scenario is Kavanaugh joins the most conservative jurists and Roberts becomes the "swing vote" on the court. But a much more conservative swing vote than Kennedy.
by ocean-kat on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 5:55pm
Seems like a mostly empty threat to me. The last time Murkowski was primaried and lost she ran a write in campaign and won.
by ocean-kat on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 4:39pm
Interesting live comments on Collins' speech:
by artappraiser on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 3:46pm
another interesting point from Lane on Collins:
by artappraiser on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 3:53pm
Goodness gracious. Swetnick and Avenatti have literally zero to do with Ford and little to do with how Kavanaugh handled himself. What a disappointment Sen. Collins turns out to be.
by AmericanDreamer on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 3:54pm
That has always been Collins role in the senate. To talk like a moderate, to build up democrats hopes, and to disappoint when it comes down to a vote.
by ocean-kat on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 4:02pm
Did you listen to her? I think the comparison with Lindsey Graham is apt. Her tone of voice when she talked about the gang rape accusation was considerably outraged. At the same time, she went out of her way to speak of total trust with Feinstein for bringing things up so late, and to express lots of sympathy for Ford. But did not defend any other Dem. It does appear to me that the GOP on the committee strongly believe some kind of dirty Dem business was going on here to smear Kavanaugh, but not from Feinstein or Ford, and are bitter about it. Just intuition, though.
by artappraiser on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 4:08pm
Nate Silver queried Avenatti directly:
I really didn't follow all the accusers and stories that closely--as personally, the temperament issue was of top importance to me--so I haven't a clue what Nate's going after here. Posting in case it's useful to someone else figuring out what's going on about anger with Avenatti.
by artappraiser on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 4:29pm
I think there's some Avenatti hate on the left (they hate it when someone wins or talks with certainty), so the chaos monkeys are stoking it. Imagine, Avenatti threatens to run for president - isn't that slot reserved for Bernie or Kamila or Ocasio or _ _ _ _?
by PeraclesPlease on Sat, 10/06/2018 - 5:11am
Peracles, Mainers might represent the ideal mix of independents who would indeed give second thought to Swetnick's accusations as well as Avenatti's "brashness". So, well calculated.
But what a cheap lie and gutless performance by Collins.
Worst of all, in quipping "Avenatti made me do it" she insulted the great laconic tradition among Mainers, which is not used in service of bold faced lies but in enduring rural wisdom---like, "You can't get there from here".
In any case, let's stick to Democratic candidates who, in a relentless media dominated world, can't deliver a line.
by Oxy Mora on Sat, 10/06/2018 - 10:40am
Mainers are going to be tortured with excessive political advertising about the 2020 Senate race:
Susan Collins announced support for Kavanaugh — causing site to fund future opponent to crash @ WaPo
by artappraiser on Sat, 10/06/2018 - 3:12pm
I don't believe Avenatti helped or hurt the process. He's just a story line republicans use to give themselves cover. If it was just about Avenatti they would have fully investigated Ramirez's claim and the twenty names she gave the FBI to support it.
by ocean-kat on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 4:56pm
On Manchin's yes vote announcement
Top Dem Super PAC Backs Away From Phil Bredesen for Backing Kavanaugh
Priorities USA also threatens Sen. Joe Manchin: Vote to confirm Trump’s pick and we won’t back you.
@ Daily Beat Oct. 5
by artappraiser on Fri, 10/05/2018 - 4:00pm