Kavanaugh faces uncertain future after woman accuser breaks silence, Republicans worry in private about midterms

We may be in a grey area when it comes to what’s next for the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court.
After the allegations against Kavanaugh made by Christine Ford, the White House says it won’t yank the nomination and may even gird for battle. A spokesman for Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, says aides are working to set up additional calls with Kavanaugh and Ford “ahead of Thursday’s scheduled vote.”
In other words, GOP leaders aren’t backing down from a committee vote on Kavanaugh Thursday and an effort to confirm him on the Senate floor by the middle of next week.
Here’s the problem:
Multiple Republicans that they want to slow the process until they thoroughly addressed Ford’s charge and not just blindly charged ahead with the confirmation.
“I’m uncomfortable moving forward with a yes vote until we hear from (Ford),” said Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., a member of the Judiciary Committee. Fellow Judiciary Committee member Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., also urged caution. But Graham wasn’t in favor of a pause.
“If the committee is to hear from Ms. Ford, it should be done immediately so the process can continue as scheduled,” said Graham. “If Ms. Ford wishes to provide information to the committee, I would gladly listen to what she has to say and compare that against all other information we have received about Judge Kavanaugh.”
Multiple Democrats demanded the committee to bring the confirmation process to a screeching halt.
“Sen. Grassley must postpone the vote until, at the very minimum, these serious and credible allegations are thoroughly investigated,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. “To railroad a vote now would be an insult of the women of America.”
What happens now is unclear. It’s unknown if Ford is willing to appear in person or just how thorough senators need to be with her allegation. But it wouldn’t take much to throw things off kilter for those hoping for a quick confirmation. Plus, there’s risk for the GOP if it fails to take Ford’s allegations seriously or account for what she has to say. We’re in the Me Too era now. Republicans ignore Ford at their own peril less than two months before the midterm elections. GOPers know they could face a backlash at the polls if they misplay their hand.
The Judiciary Committee is split nearly-evenly between Republicans and Democrats: 11 GOPers. 10 Democrats. Flake already wants to tap the brakes. But frankly, a committee vote doesn’t mean much. Let’s say Grassley marches ahead regardless. Would Flake and other Republicans vote in opposition in committee to Kavanaugh’s nomination? Possibly. But that means very little for the actual confirmation.
Consider this:
It’s not written anywhere in the Constitution or the Senate rules that Supreme Court nominees require a successful committee vote before heading to the floor. On October 6, 1987, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 9-5 against a favorable recommendation for Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork. The committee then voted 9-5 to send Bork’s nomination to the floor with an unfavorable recommendation.
The full Senate later followed the committee lead, rebuffing Bork, 58-42. Bork became only the 11^th High Court nominee rejected by the Senate in the history of the republic.
In 1991, the Senate Judiciary Committee deadlocked 7-7 to send the nomination of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas to the floor with a favorable recommendation. The committee then voted 13-1 give Thomas no recommendation.
The Senate later voted to confirm Thomas, 52-48.
One can see how Kavanaugh could struggle to receive a favorable or even no recommendation from the Judiciary Committee with just a one vote GOP advantage.
So why do committees even bother with a recommendation? Not all senators sit on each committee. Senators take into account the disposition of committees who adjudicate nominees for a panoply of positions, ranging from the Supreme Court to ambassadors to Assistant Undersecretaries for Insular Affairs. Committee positions on nominees holds a lot of sway with senators.
But properly hearing from Ford may consume time. That’s why, nestled in the back of everyone’s mind, is what unfolded in 1991 with Thomas and Anita Hill.
In late September, 1991, the Judiciary Committee concluded its hearings with Thomas and sent his nomination onto the floor, without recommendation. That’s when allegations surfaced from Hill. She accused Thomas of sexual harassment when they worked at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).
After much consternation, the Judiciary Committee re-opened the hearings and invited Hill to testify in a dramatic, public session. The panel heard again from Thomas and other witnesses. Thomas famously characterized the hearings “a high-tech lynching.”
History may not repeat itself. But as the author John le Carre wrote, “Tomorrow was created yesterday…and the day before yesterday, too.”
Those pushing for a quick, painless confirmation of Kavanaugh know that what happened with Thomas’s confirmation could be a problem. In fact, those hearings constitute what was really the first chapter in the Me Too movement. Republicans are wary of being portrayed as indifferent to Ford’s assertion.
The allegations made against Kavanaugh are unfolding in an eerily similar fashion to the way Hill leveled charges against Thomas: between the end of the hearings and a floor vote. The Kavanaugh accusations even hit at nearly the identical points on the calendar.
The committee vote could be the least the GOP and Kavanaugh’s worries.
Republicans hold a narrow 51-49 advantage in the Senate. Most Republicans are on the record as supporting Kavanaugh. But the nominee doesn’t have the votes on the floor to score confirmation yet. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, has not announced her position on Kavanaugh, but fellow moderate Sen. Lisa Murkowski told CNN that she is open to the delay.
“If there are more questions that need to be asked and answered, then I think it would be appropriate for that time,” she said.
Collins just spent an hour on the phone with Kavanaugh Friday. It was a follow-up to questions the Maine Republican had after sifting through the nominee’s documents.
The call was scheduled prior to information arising about Ford. Collins discussed the accusations with Kavanaugh on Friday.
The office of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Sunday there were no changes to the schedule regarding Kavanaugh. So, if things go as planned – even if Kavanaugh scores an unfavorable rating by the committee or no recommendation at all, the Senate GOP brass hopes to hold a procedural vote to break a filibuster on the nomination around Monday, September 24.
The confirmation vote on the floor would presumably hit around Wednesday, September 26.
It’s not clear yet of Christine Ford’s charges could stall or derail Kavanaugh’s nomination. But the Senate now floats in a grey area. It’s a little bit like what happened when Anita Hill came forth in 1991. And with the midterms around the corner, Republicans worry privately about missteps with Kavanaugh and Ford could reverberate at the ballot box.

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Energy Secy Perry asserts Russia, U.S., Saudi Arabia can compensate for oil fall

U.S. Secretary of Energy Rick Perry gestures as he speaks to Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak during their talks in Moscow, Russia, Thursday, Sept. 13, 2018. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko)

Energy Secretary Rick Perry said the U.S., Russia, and Saudi Arabia can make up for the shortage in Iranian oil exports.
In a recent interview on Friday Perry said he felt comfortable with the outlook for global crude output, and oil prices.
This comes after the Trump administration announced they will slap sanctions on Iran, a nation that has already cut supply to two year lows.
The secretary also cited improving relations between Saudi Arabia and neighboring Kuwait as another reason to be optimistic.

“They are working towards a solution on  Kuwaiti and Saudi border with some contested area there. It’s about half a million barrels a day. So, part of that – my understanding – is being addressed as we speak. They are working towards a solution in the not too distant future.” Rick Perry, White House energy secretary

Perry also called out the European Union, saying it needs to separate itself from dependence on Russian energy supplies.
U.S. sanctions are scheduled to take place on Iran in November.

Texas Board of Education votes to remove Hillary Clinton from history curriculum

Then-Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton gestures as she speaks at a campaign rally on Nov. 2, 2016, in Tempe, Ariz.

The Texas Board of Education moves to take Hillary Clinton out of the history curriculum in the state’s public schools.

Then-Democratic presidential candidate Hillary

The board’s action came after a work group of volunteers recommended the move.
The change is considered part of an effort to streamline the curriculum and the group estimates the change will save teachers 30 minutes of instruction time.
 The board will conduct a final vote on the changes in November.

Retired admiral who criticized Trump leaves Pentagon board

William McRaven, a former U.S. Navy admiral, criticized President trump in a recent Washington Post op-ed article.  (Associated Press)

A retired Navy admiral who oversaw the raid that killed Usama bin Laden has resigned from a Defense Department advisory board, after criticizing President Trump's decision to revoke a former CIA director's security clearance.
William McRaven, former head of U.S. Special Operations Command, left the Defense Innovation Board (DIB) on Aug. 20, Lt. Col. Michelle Baldanza, a Pentagon spokeswoman, said.
That was four days after he wrote in the Washington Post that Trump's actions revoking former CIA Director John Brennan's security clearance "embarrassed us in the eyes of our children, humiliated us on the world stage and, worst of all, divided us as a nation."
McRaven's op-ed carried the headline, "Revoke my security clearance, too, Mr. President."
Trump revoked Brennan's clearance last month, saying he felt he had to do something about the "rigged" Russian election interference probe.
The DIB, on which McRaven served, was created during the Obama administration by then-Defense Secretary Ash Carter. Its members include technology executives and others who are mostly from outside the military, such as Alphabet CEO Eric Schmidt, author and physicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson and journalist Walter Isaacson.
Political donations by the panel's members lean overwhelmingly liberal, with some $2.4 million contributed to Democrats and political action committees that support them, versus about $236,000 for Republican candidates, DefenseNews reported.

Dan Gainor: Some 'journalists' happy to pitch in on last-ditch hit job on Kavanaugh

The Supreme Court nomination seems like a new season of “House of Cards,” with many in the media helping write the script.
It’s had everything it needed to be a hit: lies about what nominee Brett Kavanaugh said; journalists thrilled by a self-aggrandizing senator who was lying and fantasizing he was “Spartacus”; another senator who promoted a phony video of the testimony; hundreds of radical protesters intent on shutting down the hearing and even attempts to threaten or possibly bribe a senator into voting him down. Now there’s a last-second allegation from … high school.
The accusation was Democrat Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s First-Monday-in-October surprise. It pushed a claim “from a woman who accused Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct when they were both in high school,” according to The New Yorker. Kavanaugh turned 53 in February. That means the claim is about 35 years old.
The attacks were so bad that even MSNBC Anchor Joe Scarborough skewered Democrats, complaining that “this is why a lot of people just don’t get involved in public service.”
Vox, HuffPost and CNN brought up comparisons to Anita Hill, who charged Justice Clarence Thomas with harassment during his nomination. Vox emphasized “The striking parallels between Brett Kavanaugh and Clarence Thomas.” Of course, what’s also implied is that Kavanaugh will be approved, just as Thomas was.

The broadcast stories didn’t explain that the letter was dropped just before a weekend and as a huge storm was hitting — strange if Democrats actually believed in the allegations and wanted them to get attention.

ABC’s Chief Political Analyst Matthew Dowd was quick to assign blanket guilt. “I don’t know if the allegations against kavanaugh [sic] are true, but keep in mind every high profile man accused of sexual abuse denies it and has released a list of women saying they are a good guy.  And each one turned out to be an abuser,” he tweeted.
Teen Vogue columnist Lauren Duca used her Twitter feed to bash Kavanaugh at least 11 times in two days, along with whining about the “white supremacist patriarchy.” She retweeted a call for him to withdraw, saying, “Extremely f--- this #StopKavanaugh.” (Dashes added by yours truly.)
Feinstein’s stunt didn’t resonate with everyone. ABC hit the timing hard, with “World News Tonight” Anchor David Muir asking, “and why was the letter just now revealed?” Chief Foreign Correspondent Terry Moran stressed, almost incredulously, that Feinstein had received the letter “back in July” and “two months after she received it.”
NBC also noted the odd timing, with “Nightly News” Anchor Lester Holt noting it was “less than a week now until a key vote.” The story added that Feinstein was given the letter “weeks ago.” The broadcast stories didn’t explain that the letter was dropped just before a weekend and as a huge storm was hitting — strange if Democrats actually believed in the allegations and wanted them to get attention.
2. More or Les: CBS has now lost three of its most powerful figures in a downward spiral of #MeToo allegations.
This week saw the ouster of the man Vanity Fair described as “legendary longtime” C.E.O. Les Moonves plus the executive producer of CBS’ “60 Minutes” and former chairman of CBS News Jeff Fager. This follows the firing of anchor Charlie Rose “in the wake of eight women accusing him of sexual harassment and unwanted advances,” explained NBC News.
Moonves lost his job after The New Yorker’s Ronan Farrow dropped another devastating #MeToo report. The story was horrifying — 12 women accusing Moonves of sexual harassment, as well as “claims that Moonves forced them to perform oral sex on him, that he exposed himself to them without their consent, and that he used physical violence and intimidation against them.”

Politico’s Chief Political Correspondent Tim Alberta called it “a stupid unforced error—handing Trump yet more ammunition to delegitimize all the objective, airtight, fact-based reporting out there.”

CBS awaits the results of an internal investigation it said will be kept private. “[W]e must have transparency,” demanded “CBS This Morning” co-host Gayle King, in response.
Moonves’ departure put Fager’s job in jeopardy. The New York Times said: “It would be hard to overstate Mr. Fager’s power inside CBS’s news division, where he succeeded the legendary producer Don Hewitt in overseeing ‘60 Minutes.’” The paper credited Moonves as having “collected 76 Emmy Awards and 13 Peabody Awards”
Fager also had sexual misconduct allegations against him and then he got fired for sending threatening texts to a CBS reporter. National Correspondent Jericka Duncan went on air soon after Fager’s firing and said she had asked him to comment on allegations that “he groped or touched CBS employees at company parties.”
Fager was incensed and sent her texts that appeared to threaten her job. “If you repeat these false accusations without any of your own reporting to back them up, you will be held responsible for harming me,’” went one text.
With his firing, Fager became the second CBS employee in a row to have the Fred Friendly First Amendment Award rescinded, according to the Times.
3. More Shady Journalism: Journalists pretend almost daily that there is no such thing as “fake news.” And then the New York Times and its State Department Correspondent Gardiner Harris do something so egregious that even liberals would have to call it fake news.
Harris took a story about expensive curtains ordered by the Obama administration for the UN ambassador’s residence and turned it into a hit job on Trump’s UN Ambassador Nikki Haley.
Several Times reporters retweeted it, each with their own little narrative. Investigative Reporter Eric Lipton wrote in a now-deleted tweet that, “Nikki Haley’s View of New York Is Priceless.” Vogue picked the story up only to modify it later. Rolling Stone still hadn’t fixed its story as of Saturday morning.
Track the story in NewsDiffs. It was originally headlined: “Nikki Haley’s View of New York Is Priceless. Her Curtains? $52,701.” Then it became “State Department Spent $52,701 on Curtains for Nikki Haley’s Residence” more than 14 hours later.
But, by that time, the story was widely mocked on Twitter because even the original story itself admitted that the curtains had been ordered by the Obama administration, though it buried that detail in paragraph six. The Daily Beast’s Matt Lewis summed it up nicely. “Every time someone in the MSM does something like this (and it happens a LOT), they lend credence to the 'fake news' narrative…”
Conservatives were joined by liberals and major media figures blasting the Times. The Washington Post headlined: “New York Times wrongs Nikki Haley with curtain headline.” Another story followed: “New York Times backtracks on a tale about some expensive curtains.”
Post Media Reporter Paul Farhi embarrassed the biased author a bit: “Reached by phone on Friday, the reporter of the Times story, Gardiner Harris, hung up without comment. He did not respond to follow-up messages.”
The Times caved to the pressure and added a 97-word “Editor’s Note.” It wasn’t an apology. It did explain the extent of the problem. “The article should not have focused on Ms. Haley, nor should a picture of her have been used,” it explained.
CNN Anchor Jake Tapper spent six tweets to fact check “the false meme bopping around about @nikkihaley’s $52,701 curtains,” though he effectively disproved it in his first. Politico’s Chief Political Correspondent Tim Alberta called it “a stupid unforced error—handing Trump yet more ammunition to delegitimize all the objective, airtight, fact-based reporting out there.”

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'Last Lockdown' statues part of gun-control group's plan to change minds in pro-gun districts

Tucker: The ideological gap between the leaders of America's most powerful corporations and the Democratic Party is minimal. The Left is colluding with big companies to roll back the Second Amendment. On Youtube, Google has banned the posting of videos that link to gun sellers, or that simply promote the purchase of guns and accessories. #Tucker
Statues depicting people terrified by gun violence represent the latest effort by a gun-control group and its allies to win support for their cause, according to reports.
The statues, created with 3-D printers, are to be "strategically placed in 10 notoriously pro-gun rights districts," the San Francisco Chronicle reported, while paired with demonstrations led by student organizers.
The targeted locations are in Parkland, Fla.; Las Vegas; Denver; Minneapolis; Irvine, Calif., Milwaukee; Houston; Sarasota, Fla.; Spokane, Wash.; and Philadelphia, according to the website of Giffords Courage, a gun-control group.
The statues were designed with help from Manuel Oliver, an artist who lost his son, Joaquin, 17, in the mass shooting last February at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla.
One design in the project, callled "The Last Loockdown," shows a terrified girl huddled underneath a desk, the Washington Post reported.
"I know my son -- he was a cool dude -- and I know he would think this statue is a really powerful way to get our message across," Oliver told the paper.
The statues are part of a nationwide voter registration drive to urge voters to elect candidates who back gun-control measures, the report said.
Giffords Courage is teaming up with the student leaders, the paper reported, citing the organization's news release.
"I am proud of [young people] for making it clear to the gun lobby and the NRA that we will no longer tolerate a world where politicians vote against the public safety of the communities they represent," Gabrielle Giffords, co-founder of Giffords Courage, said, according to the Chronicle.
Giffords, a former congresswoman from Arizona, survived an assassination attempt in 2011.
Sean Leonard, a Texas advertising director, and his partner Dan Crumine were the "masterminds" behind the plans and also designed the statues along with Oliver, the Chronicle reported.

“That’s what art does, it stops people, makes them think. It connects with people in a more powerful way than trying to talk them into it."
- Manuel Oliver, artist and Parkland shooting victim's father

The statues, made of bronze, have graffitti scratched onto their surface, with gun-control messages and information about registering to vote.
Oliver said the statues have the goal of “showing in one stark image what gun violence has come to in America,” according to the paper.
“That’s what art does, it stops people, makes them think. It connects with people in a more powerful way than trying to talk them into it,” Oliver told the Post.
Amy Lieu is a news editor and reporter for Fox News.