The lightning rod in D.C. is attracting voracious electrical power for one purpose and one only: to dump Judge Roy Moore.
Quite a few readers have been waiting for my comments on this highly controversial and critical topic. However, I do not have a for-sure answer for the question on everyone’s mind, “Did he do it?” I will say this emphatically: if he DID sexually go-after these women when they were under-age, those were reprehensible acts committed by a much older man taking advantage of these women’s age and naiveté and he should pay a severe price. But there are many things to consider in this Alabama dilemma. Let’s look at a few:
- Did he really do it? Unfortunately for all who really want the truth, incidents like these that allegedly happened as long ago as 40 years very seldom leave an evidence trail. Eye witnesses — if there were any — over such a long period of time often forget specifics that would weigh into the narrative that could show whether or not the claims are true. Short of that, there is only word-of-mouth;
- Why did it take 30-40 years for some of these women to step forward? For those who would reply that their silence was for shame or fear of reprisal, I will agree that certainly these reasons often apply in these incidents. But it has been my experience that usually when a young girl is sexually assaulted in this fashion, someone knows and will reach out on behalf of the girl. No, that is not a certainty. But it is a likelihood. There must be another reason or other reasons for such a long delay;
- Why did these women not step up when this campaign began rather than waiting until just a few weeks before the runoff? I can better reconcile a wait on their part until after the primary. Some may have quietly hoped for Luther Strange defeat of Moore in the primary, and the Judge would have simply gone away. But if that was their reasoning, I would expect to have heard their cries against Moore to begin immediately following the primary;
- What do these women have to gain in implicating Moore like this? One possibility is to try clear their minds of the hurt such acts cause that sometimes result in irreparable emotional problems. Another possible reason is to do the right thing by keeping such a sexual predator from receiving a national platform that (if these alleged actions are true) no man should be given, and in doing so, stop him from further such travesties against others;
- Is there any other possibility for their stepping forward and doing so now? Don’t forget: Moore did not just launch his political career. He served politically in Alabama extensively and for many years. The 70 year old Alabama attorney served as Assistant District Attorney for Etowah County from 1977-1982. He served as Judge for the Sixteenth Circuit Court of Alabama from 1992-2000. Moore was elected to the position of Chief Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court in 2001, but was removed from his position in November 2003 by the Alabama Court of the Judiciary for refusing to remove a monument of the Ten Commandments commissioned by him from the Alabama Judicial Building, despite orders to do so by a federal court. Moore twice sought the Republican nomination for the governorship of Alabama (in 2006 and 2010), but lost in the primaries. Moore was again elected Chief Justice in 2013, but was suspended in May 2016, for directing probate judges to continue to enforce the state’s ban on same-sex marriage despite the fact that this had been deemed unconstitutional. The fact that during Judge Moore’s significant and lengthy political career, in which he was elected by Alabama voters several times, none of these or other women stepped forward with these or other complaints of sexual harassment. That bothers me. Each of these women were Alabama residents at the time of the alleged incidents. It seems they would have wanted to protect other Alabama girls from such a predator by exposing him. If they did not come forward before, why now?
- Might there be financial rewards in this for them? Most Americans would dismiss that as a possibility, until — Gloria Allred. Speaking of lightning rods, Allred is the self-appointed sexual harassment poster child for women. She’s an attorney. Attorneys as a rule do not work for free. I expect that regardless of the results of the Moore election, we will hear that lawsuits against Roy Moore are being filed. Why? Money.
What’s Going On?
What we are witnessing is the full-fledged legitimization of a new way to attack political opponents without needing the truth. Let’s face it: no one — except Roy Moore and these women — know factually whether he is guilty or not. And we must agree that in this nation of information there exists somewhere any evidence sufficient to convict a guilty politician — IF there was evidence in existence of these alleged acts — Democrats would have dumped it all into the national media feeding frenzy pond. They would have wall-papered the news with that evidence daily. But they no longer need evidence or facts. The Left has almost unilateral control of the entirety of the Nation’s media. And those in the media kill for such stories for three reasons only: to get a great and scandalous story which will dominate multiple news cycles so as to further their careers; to report as fact the most salacious stories possible to cause their newspaper sales, internet hits to skyrocket, or numbers of electronic viewers/listeners to spike as a result; money — ad sales that are based on those numbers to jump in direct relation. There is no story too juicy, no story too salacious, and no subject exempt to be a possible target of a story — factual or not — that will enhance these objectives.
“News” is no longer news. It is perpetually (in most cases) a narrative created by someone to enhance whatever cause or effect desired by that someone with no regard for the truth that may or may not be intrinsic in the story OR the way it is presented.
The other really sad fact about this is even though probably not a criminal matter, Roy Moore is guilty. Gone is any presumption of his innocence. He is guilty until/unless he proves his innocence. And in just the couple of weeks remaining before the election, IF he could possibly prove each of these is untrue, he has no time to do so. (That is another reason why the timing of these claims is suspicious) This further illustrates the conundrum I mentioned above: facts are no longer necessary to support claims. The Media and their specific narrative determine guilt or innocence.
It has gotten to this point: you can destroy a man’s life if you simply (in the presence of the appropriate people) ask that man this in a voice loud enough for all those people, “When did you stop beating your wife and kids?” In today’s climate, that man is immediately adjudicated to be guilty of felonies against his wife and children.
No matter what the Moore outcome, everybody loses. Even if he is innocent of all these charges, he has already lost. It is impossible to undo first impressions. Ever notice how a newspaper will print front-page above the fold a sexy, seedy story about a local dignitary? Ever notice than when they get the story wrong and are forced to print a retraction you’ll find it in fine print at the bottom of the page just before classified ads? What people hear and read first is almost always their belief of what is true.
Again I emphatically say: if Roy Moore is guilty of these acts, he should be shut out of any semblance of public life for the rest of his life. If he did not, he deserves nothing that he is going through today. And the voters in Alabama who are really the ONLY ones directly impacted by these actions are being lambasted with all this noise. They must make decisions about this that you and I do not: to vote for him next month as Senator or not.
In this and other incidents like this, the only winners here are the Media: more newspaper sales, higher tv and radio ratings, more ad money for newspapers, radio and televisions stations, and internet news sites. Everybody else loses….period.
