Ruth Marcus picks up the cudgel left by Anita Hill’s earlier rebuttal to the memoirs of Clarence Thomas and tries to score a few points in today’s Washington Post. Claiming that “Clarence Thomas is no victim”, Marcus underscores her belief in Hill’s version of events. She points to what she sees as corroborating evidence in the testimony of three witnesses to the Judiciary Committee hearing, claiming that Thomas deliberately omitted evidence from his account (via Bench Memos):
First, Hill did not wait 10 years to complain about his behavior. Susan Hoerchner, a Yale Law School classmate of Hill’s, described how she complained of sexual harassment while working for Thomas, saying the EEOC chairman had “repeatedly asked her out . . . but wouldn’t seem to take ‘no’ for an answer.” Ellen Wells, a friend, said Hill had come to her, “deeply troubled and very depressed,” with complaints about Thomas’s inappropriate behavior. John Carr, a lawyer, said that Hill, in tears, confided that “her boss was making sexual advances toward her.” American University law professor Joel Paul said Hill had told him in 1987 that she had left the EEOC because she had been sexually harassed by her supervisor.
Marcus is being disingenuous in this passage. She waited 10 years before taking action, which seems very strange indeed for someone who claimed to have been so traumatized. That was the objection to her wait for complaint — and that time did damage to any intention of seeking the truth, because as any lawyer will know, waiting 10 years to take testimony or depositions makes them much less reliable, not more so.
Besides, Marcus leaves out some testimony herself. For instance, J.C. Alvarez flew back to Washington to testify a second time in front of the panel, because she could not believe her eyes and ears when Hill testified. Alvarez, who worked in the same office at the same time, had a few choice words for the panel:
No, Senators, I cannot stand by and watch a group of thugs beat up and rob a man of his money any more than I could have stayed in Chicago and stood by and watched you beat up an innocent man and rob him blind. Not of his money. That would have been too easy. You could pay that back. No, you have robbed a man of his name, his character, and his reputation.
And what is amazing to me is that you didn’t do it in a dark alley and you didn’t do it in the dark of night. You did it in broad daylight, in front of all America, on television, for the whole world
to see. Yes, Senators, I am witnessing a crime in progress and I cannot just look the other way.
Alvarez had more to say about her recollection of Anita Hill and Clarence Thomas:
On Friday, she played the role of a meek, innocent, shy Baptist girl from the South who was a victim of this big, bad man.
I don’t know who she was trying to kid. Because the Anita Hill that I knew and worked with was nothing like that. She was a very hard, tough woman. She was opinionated. She was arrogant. She was a relentless debater. And she was the kind of woman who always made you feel like she was not going to be messed with, like she was not going to take anything from anyone.
Somehow Marcus failed to mention this testimony in her recollections of her coverage as a journalist. Nor does she recall the fact that Ted Kennedy tried to shut down the panel of witnesses on which Alvarez sat just after her scathing opening remarks. It led to an argument that lasted several minutes. When Alvarez got the opportunity to continue, she told them she knew what sexual harassment was, and how it made her feel about the men who conducted it:
You see, I, too, have experienced sexual harassment in the past. I have been physically accosted by a man in an elevator who I rebuffed. I was trapped in a xerox room by a man who I refused to date. Obviously, it is an issue I have experienced, I understand, and I take very seriously.
But having lived through it myself, I find Anita Hill’s behavior inconsistent with these charges. I can assure you that when I come into town, the last thing I want to do is call either of these two men up and say hello or see if they want to get together. To be honest with you, I can hardly remember their names, but I can assure you that I would never try and even maintain a cordial relationship with either one of them. Women who have really been harassed would agree, if the allegations were true, you put as much distance as you can between yourself and that other person.
What’s more, you don’t follow them to the next job—especially, if you are a black female, Yale Law School graduate. Let’s face it, out in the corporate sector, companies are fighting for women with those kinds of credentials.
Alvarez said this about Thomas:
The Clarence Thomas I knew and worked with was also not who Anita Hill alleges. Everyone who knows Clarence, knows that he is a very proud and dignified man. With his immediate staff, he was very warm and friendly, sort of like a friend or a father. You could talk with him about your problems, go to him for advice, but, like a father, he commanded and he demanded respect. He demanded professionalism and performance, and he was very strict about that.
Nancy Fitch, who also worked in the same office at the same time and with Thomas for nine years, had this to say about Anita Hill and Clarence Thomas:
There is no way Clarence Thomas—CT—would callously venally hurt someone. A smart man, concerned about making a contribution to this country as a public official, recognizing the gravity and weightiness of his responsibilities and public trust, a role model and mentor who would, by his life and work, show the possibilities in America for all citizens given opportunity, well, would a person such as this, Judge Clarence Thomas would never ever make a parallel career in harassment, ask that it not be revealed and expect to have and keep his real career. And I know he did no such thing.
He is a dignified, reserved, deliberative, conscientious man of great conscience, and I am proud to be at his defense.
Diane Holt worked closely with Anita Hill at the DoE and EEOC as his personal secretary for six years. She developed a friendly relationship with Hill, and never heard a word about harassment:
Both Ms. Hill and I were excited about the prospect of transferring to the EEOC. We even discussed the greater potential for individual growth at this larger agency. We discussed and expressed excitement that we would be at the right hand of the individual who would run this agency.
When we arrived at the EEOC, because we knew no one else there, Professor Hill and I quickly developed a professional relationship, a professional friendship, often having lunch together. At no time did Professor Hill intimate, not even in the most subtle of ways, that Judge Thomas was asking her out or subjecting her to the crude, abusive conversations that have been described. Nor did I ever discern any discomfort, when Professor Hill was in Judge Thomas’ presence.
Additionally, I never heard anyone at any time make any reference to any inappropriate conduct in relation to Clarence Thomas.
Now let’s go to the record of another Post journalist, written at the time of the confirmation hearings. Juan Williams had reported on the EEOC and Department of Education during the tenure of Thomas, and had written extensively on his work in government. As it turns out, Williams asked Hill to comment on Thomas before the hearings, and got a very different answer (emphases mine):
But that fair process and the intense questioning Thomas faced in front of the committee for over a week were not enough for members of the staffs of Sens. Edward M. Kennedy and Howard Metzenbaum. In addition to calls to me and to people at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, they were pressing a former EEOC employee, University of Oklahoma law professor Anita Hill, for negative information about Thomas. Thomas had hired Hill for two jobs in Washington.
Hill said the Senate staffers who calied her were specifically interested in talking about rumors involving sexual harassment. She had no credible evidence of Thomas’s involvement in any sexual harassment, but she was prompted to say he had asked her out and mentioned pornographic movies to her. She rejected him as a jerk, but said she never felt her job was threatened by him, he never touched her, and she followed him to subsequent jobs and even had him write references for her.
Hill never filed any complaint agahst Thomas; she never mentioned the problem to reporters for The Post during extensive interviews this summer after the nomination, and even in her statement to the FBI never charged Thomas with sexual harassment but “talked about [his] behavior.”
It’s clear that Kennedy and Metzenbaum and their staffs created this smear, just as Thomas says in his book, in order to get him to withdraw his name from contention. Not only did they seek out Hill, they coached her what to say and when to say it. The woman who called Thomas several times between her departure from the EEOC and his marriage in 1987 had nothing to say to Post reporters when first asked about Thomas’ nomination.
These are other items of evidence that Marcus omits from her review of the Thomas case. As a journalist, shouldn’t she be interested in all of the evidence? Shouldn’t she ask herself the same question that Alan Simpson asked Judge Susan Hoerchner, a completely hearsay witness, at the end of her testimony?
So, here is, this foul, foul stack of stench, justifiably offensive in any category, that she was offended, justifiably, embarrassed, justifiably, and that she was repelled, justifiably. And I ask you why, then, after she left his power, after she left his presence, after she left his influence and his domination or whatever it was that gave her fear—and call it fear or revulsion or repulsion—why did she twice after that visit personally with him in Tulsa, OK, had dinner with him in the presence of others, had breakfast with him in the presence of others, rode to the airport alone with him in the presence of no one, and we have 11 phone calls initiated by her from 1984 through the date of Clarence Thomas’ marriage to Ginni Lamp, and then it all ended and not a single contact came forward.
It all adds up to a deliberate character assassination campaign. If one looks at all of the evidence, as Marcus insists, one cannot come to any other conclusion. Only when people cherry-pick for hearsay testimony and one witness who had an axe to grind against Thomas for firing her can one believe Hill’s version of events.
Excellent work Captain.
If there were only some meager measure of checks and balances at the MSM outlets, they could potentially aspire to the quality and thoroughness of the journalism produced by top notch bloggers on the net, present company included.
But then, comparing a mediocre journalist from the MSM to the cream of net journalists is like bringing a knife to a gunfight.
Here is what I believe:
The fact that Anita Hill followed Clarence Thomas to a different proves beyond a shred of a doubt that her allegations are completely false.
I would be willing to question my beliefs in the following circumstance: Can an expert in harassment lawsuits provide documented evidence of similar behavior in cases that resulted in harassment convictions or damage awards? In other words, can we find a substantial number of successful harassment cases that involved the victim following the harassing boss to a new employer after harassment had started? Is there even one such case?
The anatomy of a smear
I just got done reading this devastating rebuttal Captain Ed wrote in response to Ruth Marcus’ hit piece on Justice Clarence Thomas in today’s WaPo.
Unsurprisingly, Marcus – who wrote last year that she believed we needed less “manlin…
Anita Hill was a blunt tool in Senator Ted Kennedy’s and Senator Howard Metzenbaum’s efforts to “bork” Justice Thomas.
The irony is how petty, trivial, and archaic Hill’s accusations against Thomas (pubic hairs on cokes and off-color jokes???) seem today when contrasted with the accusations of non-consensual sexual harassment– and worse- made against Bill Clinton. Clinton’s entire cabinet embarrassed themselves publicly defending his sexual misconduct. The Democrat Party, together with Larry Flynt, united to successfully persuade Americans that Clinton’s behavior while in various public offices was “private”, and “just about sex”.
Having desensitized public opinion about Clinton’s sexual misconduct in various high offices, the Democrats reaped what they sowed in the form of Arnold (“To all the women I have offended”) Schwartzenegger. Their attacks on him for alleged abuse of women just didn’t stick.
We can thank our Democrat counterparts, and the hypocritical pseudo-feminists at NOW, for making sexual misconduct irrelevant in candidates for public office. Then again, there’s Larry Craig, who proves that the old double standard can occasionally be effective– against Republicans only.
I remember from the hearings that when Anita Hill complained to friends about a NAMELESS superior at work giving her a rough time, although they tried to portray that was Clarence Thomas, it turned out that it was in fact a couple of years BEFORE she ever went to work for him.
It was also discovered later that the reason she was chosen for the job is because she had complained to friends about a superior BUT HAD NEVER NAMED THE PERSON.
This plan was put together by her MARRIED WHITE LOVER she met regularly at an apartment for the weekends about every other weekend, in Washington DC, who worked for the elderly Senator who was sitting on the left of Kennedy as the audience views the podium, a Metzenbaum or something, who co-chaired the inquisitions. And co-ordinated the Anita Hill testimony with the KENNEDY STAFF. He thought of it when he realized she had n ever actually NAMED her harrassing supervisor to anyone she had complained about him to.
I specifically remember someone pulling out the date from her friend’s journal and questioning both her and Anita about the harrassment and it being almost ONE YEAR BEFORE she transferred to working inthe office with Clarence Thomas. This friend had brought the journal to prove that Anita had made the complaint YEARS BEFORE, as she claimed, because they were able to establish the journal was NOT a recent manufactured piece of fake evidence.
AND that the office staff of Clarence Thomas remembered Anita making continual barbs in the office about Clarence being an “Uncle Tom” with his “WHITE (TROPHY) WIFE”.
This came out with the fact that she had been a card-carrying DEMOCRAT for many years – CONTRARY TO HER TESTIMONY before the inquisition, as well.
I don’t think the facts about the affair Anita Hill was having with a married Senate staffer came out until about a year after the hearings were over. Yeah, Metzenbaum’s, but working with Kennedy – not with Metzenbaum.
And who wrote an expose on Anita Hill back in ’92 – DAVID BROCK!
Hillary’s BEST FRIEND.
Don’t forget, the VIDEOTAPE on Anita’s desk at a university, where she had been teaching her students about a legal case of harrassment that PERFECTLY MATCHED her own testimony before the Senate committee, particularly the soda can, was all PRE-EXISTING on that tape on her desk BEORE the Clarence Thomas hearings.
THAT didn’t come out for a few years, EITHER. About the time of her $10,000 speaking fees on the univeristies talk circuit.
Ed apparently thinks he can square off against Ruth Marcus. But it isn’t exactly a fair fight.
Ed complains about Marcus “cherry-picking” material that supported Anita Hill’s testimony — then tries the exact same thing in reverse, quoting passages by witnesses more favorable to Thomas. But there’s nothing in any of these passages that refutes, or disproves, Hill’s own recollections — or the recollections of Susan Hoerchner, Ellen Wells, and others who corroborated Hill’s claims.
Since he can’t lay a glove on any of Hill’s supporting witnesses, Ed’s own cherry-picking is entirely irrelevant. Actually, it’s worse than that for Ed. In a previous post Ed claimed that Hill made “unsubstantiated representations and outright smears.”
Well, Ed, your own claim is a flat-out falsehood. Hoerchner, Wells, and and John Carr offered supporting evidence, based on their history with Hill. You’ve claimed that no supporting evidence existed. Whether other witnesses said they believed Thomas, or didn’t believe Hill, is beside the point.
Ed then goes on to claim that Hill’s testimony was “created” by staffers for two senators, to try to get Thomas to withdraw. Based on what? Well, Ed digs up a piece showing that Anita Hill didn’t choose to share her recollections with one reporter prior to testifying. And … well, that’s it.
There you go again, Ed. You’ve got exactly zero evidence to back up your assertion. You may believe this, and Justice Thomas may believe it too. But what you’ve done yourself is exactly what you falsely accused Hill of doing — making a claim that’s totally “unsubstantiated.” An “outright smear,” in fact. And, as usual, you then pretend to have proven your case.
Beyond selling copies of Thomas’ book, Ed can’t really say or do anything that actually helps Thomas, at this point. What he can do is beat his own chest, recycle old smears, and pose publicly as one of Thomas’ loyal defenders. Hey, Ed, congrats on making the guest list for the dinner with Thomas the other evening. Too bad you’re still singing for your supper.
Why keep rehashing the Anita Hill situation over and over? Let it go. It was years ago and didn’t end up costing him his seat. Surely there are better issues involving Clarence Thomas that can be focused on. Maybe some of these:
Why does he favor federally imposed equality requirements over states’ rights?
When writing the opinion that there should be no free speech in public schools he emphatically states that it’s important to understand what the framers of the constitution would have thought at the time of the 14th amendment, yet on his opinion about public schools and voluntary integration he does not even mention the 14th amendment or what the framers would have thought. In two incredibly similar cases why is it only important in one?
Why did he again abandon originalist beliefs in FEC v. Wisconsin Right to Life?
But mainly, when does he plan on writing a significant majority opinion?
Susan Hoerchner doesn’t help Hill at all. Here’s the Senate Judiciary’s summary of her dealings with the committee:
“Between September 12 and September 19, full committee did not hear from Professor Hill, but received one phone call from Professor Hill’s friend [Hoerchner] — on September 18 — who explained that she had one conversation with Professor Hill — in the spring of 1981.”
Hill didn’t start working for Thomas until the fall of 1981.
In October 1991 Senate lawyers interviewed Hoerchner. She said the following:
“I remember mainly one telephone call, and I have only been able to guess at the time — sometime before September 1981.”
Hoerchner went on to say that her conversations with Hill ended after she moved to California in September 1981.
September 1981 was at least 3 months before Hill said the harassment started.
During this interview Hill’s lawyer asked for a recess to meet with Hoerchner. When Hoerchner returned she lost all recollection of when the conversation occurred.
John Carr was Hill’s boy friend at the time. According to the deposition of the FBI agents who interviewed her, Hill told them that she didn’t tell her boy friend.
Don’t overlook Linda Lambert Jackson. Hill initially identified Jackson as a corroborating witness in a conversation with James Brudney, a Senate staffer, in September 1991. Hill dropped Jackson from her written statement and testimony. Jackson testified as a pro-Thomas witness. Neither Hill nor Brudney challenged her testimony.
Finally, Hill testified under oath that no one at the Department of Education ever told her that she had civil service protection. In fact, she signed a standard form advising her that she had “career tenure.” A lawyer from Yale would know her employment status.
It was that bastard Metzenbaum who put some private investigators on the trail of some of Thomas’ character witnesses. Probably had the intent of blackmailing them.
He was forced to apologize. The usual politician’s sorry-I-got-caught crap.
Sexual harassment or no, Thomas sounds like a real scumbag. I’m guessing that’s why people take Hill’s side. A boss that asks to watch pornos with and asks the cup size of his employees loses a lot of credibility right off the bat. It’s easy to believe the worst of people when they’re pretty crappy to begin with.
Posted by nandrews3 | October 3, 2007 7:00 PM
*******************
IF the “GLOVES” hadn’t been laid SQUARELY on “MISS” HILL and her witnesses, at the time, Clarence Thomas would not now be a Supreme Court Justice.
And Democrats might have some credibility.
But he is, and they don’t.
Clarence Thomas has greivously wounded himself with his bitter, pathetic, petty memoir.
This sad clown should be impeached. He has announced for the world to hear and take notice of, that Democrats, women who remind him of Anita Hill, Liberals, and many, many others have an enemy on The SCOTUS who cannot wait to seek revenge on them.
Thomas is a self-proclaimed “victim”. Nobody can expect justice from Clarence Thomas, just revenge. And the fact that he is getting his revenge on Liberals should upset all decent Americans. If there were a broken, tiny, pathetic Liberal who penned such a hate-filled, self pitying, whining revenge novel against Conservatives, white men, and/or Republicans, I would insist that THAT Justice be impeached.
This memoir will stain Thomas for history. He is the Justice Tanney of our times.
Nobody who watches Clarence Thomas speaking believes Anita Hill. Nobody who watches all – EVERY SINGLE ONE – of his other staffers ever believes Anita.
The Democrats don’t believe her – THEY HELPED HER MANUFACTURE THE CR AP SHE SPEWED.
The only way it “~QUALIFIES~” as “TRUTH” to THEM is “RELATIVELY” – they said it and therefore it “MUST” be ~~~TRUE~~~!
It’s all a dung hill, concocted between her and her MARRIED BOYFRIEND – JUST LIKE HER “REPUBLICAN ROOTS”.
Posted by dr.winstonboogie | October 3, 2007 7:53 PM
&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&
You haven’t seen him speak.
Only a Democrat who wants him off the bench as desperately today as they did 15 years ago could say such tripe, while supporting al the DIM politicians, like Hillary Clinton, Algore, and HAnoi John, Toady Chappaquiddick, Nancy Pelosi, Tom Harkin, Harry Reid, William Jefferson, Barney Frank, Jerry Nadler, etc etc etc etc et al
Over at BELDAR’s blog, he cuts Anita Hill “a new one.”
Seems this woman brags that she “passed the DC bar.”
And, Beldar points out that it’s less than a mediocre accomplishment.
I sent this provocative piece to a friend, an attorney. And, he shot back that it’s just another example of Anita Hill, NOT being “best of breed.”
That it happened? Yeah.
Didn’t stop Justice Thomas from being confirmed.
And, the whole charade tells you more about congress, than anything else.
The other side of the coin? So many lawyers are trained by the nitwits on the Left; that we’re not getting a very good legal supply coming out of the system’s pipeline.
And, the other thing that happened? Wouldn’t ya know it! Today’s graduating young lawyers are strapped with $200,000 in school debt; but they’re hired by law firms. To be slaves. At $50,000 per annum. So they’re learning the hard way that they can’t pay their school debts.
And, the legal profession “ain’t what it used to be.” Double-that, if you’re affirmative action mediocrities.
Sure, people anticipate seeing changes, ahead.
But one of the best ones will be to remove threats to women; and “new-new” police actions; where the GOP, itself, can’t become a majority party, if it locks itself in this stupid mantle.
It should be an embarassment to this country, that we’re questioning the legal bonafides, on crapola.
It helped the affirmative action crowd plant itself in so many places …
But we’re gonna be better off when it ends.
And, Clarence Thomas’ makes or breaks his reputation on how he translates the meaning of our US Constitution.
We’ve had brilliant men doing that, before Clarence Thomas arrived to the court.
We haven’t seen any brilliance on the court(s), however, for a pretty long time.
It’s as if the whole process of law was set up to be a taxi-meter;
There’s lots of room to do better!
And, I hope we can do better, too, in refusing to go along with the “squeaky” language … where people DENY any interest at all in the topics at hand.
I can’t wait for the day HONEST BROKERS show up! No games!
Because? Clarence Thomas didn’t need Anita Hill to cancel his confirmation. (I still don’t believe he “never thought about Roe,” … But then he did. And, he’s now against it.) HE WAS ALWAYS AGAINST IT!
That’s what makes the fighting “unfair.”
Better to say I WAS HONEST. And, let the chips fall where they may.
dr winstonwhatever hilariously betrays his paltry historical knowledge by referring to “Justice Tanney” (did he write the Dread Locks decision?)at the conclusion of his standard moonbat string of sophomoric insults. We can only hope that he represents a typical enemy combatant.
As far as I know, there isn’t a single person who observed Thomas’s and Hill’s working relationship who believes Hill. If Hill was upset with Thomas’s behavior, not a single co-worker ever noticed.
Leslein beat me to it. Susan Hoechner’s testimony does not help Anita Hill, and in fact refutes it. Ms. Hoechner inadvertantly was able to date her conversations where Ms. Hill complained of harrassment to a date prior to her work with Clarence Thomas. No one ever seems to pay attention to this crucial testimony undermining Ms. Hoechner, and therefor Ms. Hill, except for Leslein and Me.
The thought of Ted Kennedy coaching her to lie under oath to destroy a man’s name and reputation (a man of color no less) is as repugnant as it is believable.
It’s too bad the readers of the Post couldn’t get “the rest of the story” that Ed eloquently presented here. Good job, Cap’n.
After Bill Clinton’s “performance” in the sexual harassment arena, all of this is very, very small potatoes. Clinton’s “stature” completely changed the playing field for politicians accused of sexual harassment. Remember “I never had sex with that woman”, and the wagging Clintonian finger directed to the American people? Monica Lewinsky was very lucky that Bill Clinton left physical traces to incriminate himself. Without that evidence, she would have been toast.
Kennedy and Metzenbaum wanted to take down a black conservative. Hill was their chosen tool. She failed, and they failed.
The verdict of history is in, and Kennedy, Metzenbaum, and least of all, Hill, lost.
And I’d say Nandrews’s assignment from the Clinton campaign, with a few other trolls, is to take you down, Ed.
When I was growing up (admittedly, an America or two ago), Conservatives would have laughed non-entities like George W. Bush and Clarence Thomas out of the Grown-Up Lounge and sent them to brag and feel sorry for themselves (respectively) with the adolescents.
Now, Conservatives (small and large c) practice excuse-making.
Who is the victimiest victim of them all? That would be Clarence (Whoop de damn doo) Thomas, the hater of liberals, women, poor blacks, Democrats, and Silent Observer when the Oral Arguments are being waged.
The man is a sad, bitter, broken husk, small clown of a person. If a Dog Catcher felt as sorry for himself as Thomas, he would be fired. Only modern, internet conservatives would embrace him. Old conservatives would shudder and say, “Oh, the horror!”
Clarence Thomas never speaks during Oral Argument. Thomas makes Taney look like an important intellectual.
You conservatives will lose this one: Thomas’ smallness speaks for itself. He deserves to be impeached because his vote is cast before he hears the evidence.
Thomas decides who has caused him to be the vitimiest victim of all time (as a Catholic, Thomas should have himself put on the Cross, since Jesus taught him nothing), and then votes against that person or party.
Only Thomas ruled that a prisoner chained to a chair and beaten by prison guards had no Constitutional protection. The prisoner was a poor black, and that is what Thomas thinks poor blacks deserve, unlike his white masters.
Thomas doesn’t speak during oral arguments because he’d rather hear the arguments without interruption. Each side has limited time to make its case.
In the prisoner case Thomas only argued that the Eighth Amendment didn’t apply. He said that the plaintiff had other grounds to pursue damages, which is what happened.
John Carr’s testimony:
SPECTER: Well, aside from what is clear in your mind, my question to you is did she say it was Clarence Thomas?
CARR: I don’t recall.
An important member of Carr’s law firm was also head of the New York City Bar Association. When the bar association surveyed its members for comments on Thomas, Mr. Carr did not inform them that Thomas harassed his girl friend.
The FBI agents who interviewed Hill submitted the following deposition to the Judiciary committee after Hill’s testimony:
“Professor Hill testified she told Ellen Wells and John Carr, her boyfriend at the time, about Thomas’s behavior. However, she told SAs Luton and Jameson she never mentioned Thomas’s behavior to anyone except Susan Hoerchner. Professor Hill specifically advised she did not tell her boyfriend.”
You know what’s amazing? The left never gets embarassed at its antics. By now, it should be obvious the ploy was tried against Clarence Thomas because Blacks are considered to be “oh so sexy” … well endowed. It was the card that got played.
AND, THE PEOPLE SHRUGGED.
That it was an ordeal?
All republican nominees are put through “ordeals.”
While, today, Arlen SPecter still has his CHairman’s seat on the judiciary.
So, the question should be raised? How come congress critters never learn?
I don’t care what side of the aisle! This goes to the whole 100 gas bags.
As to Thomas, as a member of the Supremes, they will stand or fall, on their skills of interpretation.
Taney, by the way, never did do the Supreme Court proud. And, from all the Chiefs, his is the picture kept in the basement.
What will the future do, by the way, once we really get the hang of computers? You don’t think we can mull over s system less harmful to dead trees? ANd, more accessible though data bases?
Just asking.
Because I always think things are in flux.
And, so far, flaws and all, we still have the best system as devised by the US Constitution; because it formed BRANCHES of government. And, powers aren’t put into the hands of one despot.
But those queens in the senate! I’m tellin ya. It’s really strange how DC is never taken out of its swamp. PROM DRESSES FOR All !!!
When I read your quote from Nancy Fitch, I realized that she was testifying about Thomas personally, but her generalized comment obviously fails the truth test when applied to others.
After all, we had Mr. Teddy Kennedy leading the discussion, and attempting subconsciously to equate in America’s mind a fictitious soda can with the certainty of a waterlogged Oldsmobile Delta 88.
And we have a President who treated the Oval Office like it was the White Playboy Mansion. He certainly failed to recognize, as Nancy stated in her generalization, “the gravity and weightiness of his responsibilities and public trust, a role model and mentor who would, by his life and work, show the possibilities in America for all citizens given opportunity”.
Or maybe he did. That’s why he wants his wife to have the Mansion again.
I want to elaborate on Linda Lambert Jackson’s case.
In 1994 the anti-Thomas authors of Strange Justice obtained the notes of a September 1991 conversation between Hill and James Brudney, a Metzenbaum staffer.
According to the notes, Hill identified two corroborating witnesses. We’ve heard about Hoerchner. The other alleged witness was Jackson. According to Hill, in 1983 she told Jackson that Thomas sexually harassed her. Jackson said she couldn’t believe it. According to Hill, this conversation caused Hill to stay quiet about Thomas’s behavior.
It was during this same conversation that Brudney told Hill that the accusation would result in the nomination being withdrawn; Hill would never have to face the public.
Later Hill sent a statement to the Senate and was interviewed by the FBI. She identified Hoerchner as the only corroborating witness. Hill dropped Jackson from the story.
During the hearings Hill testified about her changing number of witnesses and her conversation with Brudney. She never mentioned Jackson. This can’t be a memory lapse since Jackson caused Hill to stay silent for 8 years.
Late at night during the hearings, Jackson testified as a pro-Thomas witness. Neither Hill nor Brudney saw fit to challenge Jackson on the 1983 conversation.
In an interview for Strange Justice, Hill denounced Jackson. In her own autobiography, she said Jackson was a friend and doesn’t even mention this incident.
Why would Hill drop Jackson from her story?
Because she knew in advance that Jackson would contradict her.
How would Hill know in advance that Jackson would contradict her?
Because Hill’s story was made up.
I was never a big “C” or little “c” conservative.
But it’s not lost on me that Clarence Thomas went through hell, and stuck it out. And, of all the things to notice, it’s swell to notice a black man who doesn’t do the “jig” to the tune played by the affirmative action hires.
I’d say the same for Sandra Day O’Connor. She understood that the issues from the conservatives were ones that would destroy the republican party. She did her best. She brought her fork to the table.
If we want to do better? The country has to mature. It has to let politicians know the time of playing games is over.
As to ROE, we’re lucky its the law of the land. Beating up on women is something done by muslims all of the time. And, was once done pretty much across the board to women. All of the time.
Again, it’s among the republicans that you can see see a woman and a black actually standing tall and doing their jobs! Not based on genitalia. Or the color of one’s skin.
Tall. Short. Fat. Thin.
People should be judged on the jobs they can do. Especially when they’re doing it through trying times.
Ya know? In another field. The movie industry. That shot out of a canon in the early 1900’s, the first films were SILENTS. Then came SOUND.
And, the art form changed.
For awhile, there, we made the best movies!
Had the best musicals.
And, even had vaudeville.
Like fads, some things just fade away.
While to pass the baton, forward,we need to recognize our strengths. We need to see even when the fight is tough, it’s do-able.
And, in Clarence Thomas’ case HE GOT TO THE BENCH. And, he ain’t dumb. He’s also been able to finally defend himself from scurrilous charges.
Of course, Bubba Clinton did behaviors that should have outraged the ladies. But oddly enough? They fell silent.
Time, itself, lends a helping hand in healing wounds inflicted by prejucial idiots.
Ugh, Ed. We had to get through this to get to the meat of Marcus’ rebuttal?
Yes, it’s all too for easy Marcus, who hasn’t been pointedly smeared in the most public way possible, to act as if a simple dismissal of the smear campaign against him should be accepted because an appropriate amount of time currency has been spent mitigating its damage. Thomas has every right to hold his grudge, if not anger, as damn well long as he likes considering the main thing a judge, a Supreme Court Justice no less, must have to fulfill his duty before competence is even addressed… integrity and credibility. An ideological difference at the time of his hire induced an assault on both. Where’s the justice for Thomas when he will forever carry the artificial tarnish to his name?
See, we expect lack of integrity from reporters, journalists, and yes, columnists from “prestigious” media now. It’s part and parcel of their product if not persona and the unwashed masses are increasingly cynical of them due to their contemporary behavior, a behavior that is probably the same as it has been for years but which is increasingly exposed for its dishonesty and bias. From judges, however, we still expect more, and such assaults and dismissals from ideological partisans, if not outright hacks, seem like an attempt to sabotage yet another institution even if the institution isn’t really the target as much as a singular participant in it is. “An attempt to sabotage” is probably not the best operative phrase – “a consequence of inadvertent sabotaging of” is probably better. Either way, is the end result the elevation of truth or the muddying of it so that a flailing MSM can appear relatively equal? The wheels of the mind churn to decipher what the MSM wants to accomplish. Deciphering Marcus, however, requires but one notch of a gear.
Marcus also notes those questions of destiny: Did Al Gore win? Did Bush mislead? Did a public official (Thomas) take advantage of a subordinate (Hill)? Did a public official (Clinton) take advantage of a subordinate (Lewinski)? Oh, wait. That last one wasn’t addressed. I guess destiny smiled that day and determined that, yes, not all will go undisputed. Or maybe Marcus addressed lewdness, impropriety in office, and the definition of “is” in one of her archived columns to display her sense of balance and quest for truth.
To read Ruth Marcus’ column is to be struck by the dribble glass of her partisanship. She’s so convinced by Hill’s evidence that she cites the “suggest[ions]” made in Merida and Fletcher’s “Supreme Discomfort” that the whole story hasn’t been told. On the contrary. I think stories are being told and that we know of the main story, all book, chapter, and verse, a partisan hit piece scripted years ago that too often serves as the preface of politics. It would seem Marcus would like to script her own, or at least append a post mortem, that would suspend destiny.
Dr. Boogie,
You present yourself as a very racist (against blacks, since things need to be spelled out for you) divider. You say you’re old(er), perhaps it is time to grow up?
I think that Thomas is biased against his “enemies”. He does not deserve to be on the SCOTUS, and I think Liberals and Democrats and Female Plaintiff’s who allege sexual discrimination should, and I suspect will, ask Thomas to recuse himself based on his overwhelming bitterness and hatred towards those groups.
Thomas is no different than someone who writes about how “evil” the Catholic Church is and how the Church harmed him. If that person, or persons, ended up on the Supreme Court Catholics would, and should, scream bloody murder (as the cliche goes).
This terribly divisive man should have raised money through some other fashion and left the hate polemics to people who do not have life-time appointments to a position of unreviewable power.
If Judge Thomas looked like Denzel Washington – no one would have ever heard of Anita Hill.
Three points for those of you who fail to see how Liberals and Democrats start with a vote against them in whatever they bring before the Supreme Court:
1. Thomas was an avid consumer of pornography, established by physical records and testimony of friends. He lied under oath.
2. Thomas lied under oath about ever discussing Roe v. Wade.
3. Now Thomas tells us he had a drinking problem.
You guys get your heroes cheap because they are so worthless.
p.s. Micah, Thomas is the racist who said it is all right to beat a chained black man in custody because the person suffering the beating could bring a Civil Suit. That opinion effectively means that all options are on the table for police, and revokes the prohibition against “cruel and unusual” punishment in the Bill of Rights.
Thomas was outvoted 8-1, because none of the other Justices had a Thomas sized resentment of black people and liberals.
Thomas rules against his enemies, and twists the law to find reasons to justify his hatred of them. He is a disgrace.
tomjproudamerican said, quite incorrectly, that
Consider this:
I really don’t want to tread into making claims about an understanding of law that I don’t have, but I wouldn’t want somebody as sadly twisted, angry and whose self-image is so relentlessly victimized with no redress, no sense of–what world it be, I think Christians call it forgiveness. Some sort of reconciliation. I’m not claiming to have sat in Judge Thomas’s chair or walked in his shoes, but psychologically it’s so personally damaging, and others here point to his ability to have his tragedy mean a bias, an angry, self-certain, arrogant bias damaging to others because he himself refuses to acknowledge he should give himself over to accepting his pain (he does), acknowledging his grief, and leaving it behind in some manner that doesn’t hold people responsible for it that didn’t cause it, and that have no connection with those events in his life.
Affirmative Action devalues for him his degree from Yale, but that’s not and never has been how Affirmative Action works. He may or may not have gotten into the school with the help of Affirmative Action, but he had to do the work. He had to earn his passage and should be rightly proud of that accomplishment; but it is forever befouled for him because of some systematic way to have found and recruited people who otherwise would here been disqualified by worse systems of admissions, like legacy, donations, connections. Whether or not he was the best choice for SCOTUS I’m not going to address here. But there’s something fundamentally impaired in his ability to evaluate himself and others.
I confess that I’ve always taken him to be a complete mediocre in over his head. But now I see that he has some intellect, poisonously misspent.
Question: Why keep rehashing the Anita Hill situation over and over?
Answer: Ted Kennedy
I am sick and tired of this bloviating, conniving, two-timing, lying, cheating, stealing, raping, murdering SOB jerking America around because the citizens of Massachusetts are too damned dumb to vote him out of office. I want this person impeached, and if Massachusetts won’t do it, can the other 49 states gang up and INSIST that he be shown the door out of the Senate because he’s a traitor to his country!
I’m sure there’s at least one justice on the Supreme Court who will approve of a new law allowing us to do that.
It appears many commentators above seem to have trouble understanding the concept that something may wrong but not unconstitutional and so they claim that because Thomas didn’t rule something as constitutional, he must approve of it.
It is all too easy to hoist them by their own petard. Consider for example, the 2003 decision (6-3) in which the Court ruled that the Klu Klux Klan’s right of free speech did not include burning crossing on lawns. Voting with the majority, Thomas held that cross burning was not protected speech since it’s intent was not speech but intimidation. Voting for minority, upholding the Klan’s position were: Kennedy, Souter, and Ginsberg.
If I were as, well let’s say it plainly, as STUPID and PARTISAN as tomjproudamerican or dr.winstonboogie, I would now be claiming that Kennedy, Souter, and Ginsberg support cross burning and thus harbor a great hatred for blacks and jews.
I suspect their difficulty lies ultimately in the fact that they view the Court as some kind of super legislature of the benevolent wise who will decide all of those tough issues for the rest of us. Thus for them, there is really no such thing as constitutional or unconstitutional, but only right or wrong. Such a role for the court subjugates our constitional and democratic form of governemnt, and is one of the many horrible bastard children that Roe has spawned.
Carole and drboogie,
Taney was actually one of our better justices with regard to his attempts at strict constructionism. His decision in re Dredd Scott was certainly correct, given the Constitution he was working with, as was his other decisions (e.g, against the Missouri Compromise and the Kansas-Nebraska Act).
The South won its rights to keep slaves, and to “rescue” them from the free states should they flee there. The South also would have eventually won from Taney the right for slaveowners to bear their slaves into free states.
All such decisions, actual and potential, reasonably fell from the Constitution’s commerce clauses, as well as the Constitutional requirement that states deliver up fleeing persons held to indentured labor or servitude in another state (a requirement later repealed by the Republican-sponsored 14th Amendment which was ratified after Taney’s death)
Only the rather idiotic secession of the Southern states negated their legal victory. And only Taney’s rightfully earned reputation as a racist obscures his Constitutional brilliance.
The other notable Constitutional scholar, who held an opposing strict constructionist view on the expansion of slavery, was Abraham Lincoln, whose well-known speech, arguing that the majority of the signers of the Constitution had held the view that slavery should be restricted to just the Southern states, and had actually participated in enacting laws such as the Northwest Ordinance which restricted slavery, propelled him to be the leading Republican candidate for the Presidency.
Carol Herman said: You know what’s amazing? The left never gets embarassed at its antics.
Well now, they wouldn’t be Leftists otherwise, would they? They owe their continued existence to their mastery of deflection, avoidance and obfuscation.
Ed, it’s obvious that your blogging work is superior to most, but you’ve surpassed yourself with this post–this is the best of what bloggers can accomplish.
Strictly speaking, Unclesmrgol, our Founding Fathers thought slavery would be over and done with, by 1815. Well, projections often go awry.
As to ROE, it IS the law! And abortions are a lot safer! Women were butchered in back alleys. And, demanding women give up children to adoption is about as wrong a concept as there is, out there. This is what got defeated.
To say that when questioned Clarence Thomas said “he hadn’t thought about it.” Okey dokey. But when it became obvious, from his rulings, that he was apposed to ROE, then what kicks in is that “to pass confirmation” HE LIED.
That the attempts to take him out with Anita Hill? Yeah. That was wrong. And, it didn’t work.
But people being concerned about their freedoms? That’s still working.
As to the left, they suffer from their crazy base. This is also true on the republican right. Today, Tony Blankley is saying it would be a smart move for republicans to want to win in 2008. And, to do that they have to give up their petty claims against Roe.
Anyway, it’s not my choice. Everyone gets only one vote. And, yes, I’d like to see affirmative action sidelined. And, I’d like to see the crazy mishigas from the religious nutters also side-lined. This idea that pandering has “improved” our politics; the facts are in. And, no, this crap has not improved a thing. But given you the likes of Larry Craig. What’s there to be proud of in that?
That you can collect votes for promising stuff? Isn’t it about time people learned all the “benefits” from the government costs us money?
And, no, we don’t need more police to begin assailing doctors. And, women. We really don’t need a return to the back alleys.
As to Taney; what he did as Chief just made the whole issue of slavery WORSE. Of course, ultimately Ulysses S. Grant accepted Robert E. Lee’s sword. And, Jefferson Davis ran out of Richmond, Virginia wearing a dress.
And, Lincoln created West Virginia, in 1862, from a rump piece of Virginia. And, this was never “put back” when Virginia returned. Giving Virginians a double-dip.
What can you do? One senator from West Virginia, Robert Byrd, is as Klu Klux Klan as ya can get.
On this score? I buy what Clarence Thomas said. The flowing sanctimony from the liberals is a worse poison than the nuts in white sheets. Not that people don’t invest in hate.
It won’t take a NEW law, they already have one on the books that even after someone is elected, the Congress vets them and decides if they are approved to hold their seat.
There are more than a dozen now who don’t qualify to hold that seat. And that law could be used to refuse them the office. They are what that law was designed for, and Kennedy is certainly one of them.
dr.winstonboogie said “Clarence Thomas has greivously wounded himself with his bitter, pathetic, petty memoir.”
Hmmm… I think the truth of the whole smear FINALLY coming out is what you’re truly aggravated about. Typical Lib.
I’m of the opinion that all these Senators on these committees should likewise be under oath during these proceedings.
Their “evidence” should be subject to subpoena. They should be subject to perjury penalties, not just removal from office, but also prison if found guilty.
If there were a shred of honor or decency in the Senate, Edward Kennedy would not be there. Others have a different opinion. That tells me all I need to know about them.
unclesmrgold twists reason on its head to arrive at the same point that Justice Thomas did which is that BEATING a shackled prisoner is NOT “cruel and unusual” punishment.
Thomas’ view was rejected by all the other Justices. It was an 8-1 decision.
It is NOT an interesting intellectual problem to try and find ways that men beaten while shackled in official custody could THEORETICALLY find some arcane place in the Constitution, or some novel Civil Suit to get redress.
Thomas sided with the torturers. Clarence Thomas, a powerful Supreme Court Justice with a lifelong term of power that is unreviewable by anyone, sees himself as the victim.
All other suffering does not interest him.
I would be ashamed to have this sad, angry, twisted clown on my side.
nandrews, the “corroboration” you say witnesses provided was no such thing. It was dateless, shifting in time frame and detail, and at no time ever pegged Thomas as an offender of Hill. They placed the dates of complaint at times when Thomas and Hill weren’t even known to each other, then when they were–but only after the contradiction was pointed out. They didn’t know names, they never knew names.
It’s clear from the comments of the other leftnuts writing here that none of them have read Thomas’ book, but have read other leftnuts’ reviews. They’re heavy on the accusation that Thomas says in the book that he was a “victim.” It’s not what he says. That’s what his witless critics say he says.
And tomjproudamerican (which it is obvious you actually aren’t), no, Thomas was not to anyone’s knowledge an avid consumer of pornography; and no, friends did not attest to that. One person said that he had a Playboy centerfold on a wall in his apartment (that’s what she said on TV when asked about Jane Mayer’s accusation). Jane Mayer (who does this kind of dishonest crap all the time in her books) amplified that. There is no other corroboration of his being “an avid consumer of pornography”—a characterization that is, quite appropriately, of the same nature as Jane Mayer’s transformations. Buying an issue of or having a subscription to Playboy doesn’t make one an avid consumer of pornography. I had, at various times in my younger years, a subscription to Playboy. At no time did that make me “an avid consumer of pornography.” And please… don’t even try to tell me that having looked at Playboy or having had a subscription to Playboy disqualifies one for any level of public office. (It would be quite an irony, considering the left’s avid support of pornography in media and in law.)
And no, Thomas did not lie by saying he had never discussed Roe v. Wade. There are two problems with your lie here, tom. First is that no one has ever even said that Thomas had *discussed* Roe v. Wade. Second, he didn’t say he had never discussed it; he said he had never debated it. And again, no one has ever said they debated it with Thomas. Your baseless belief that he must have DISCUSSED it with someone, sometime, though there’s no evidence of it, does not really trump his statement that he had never debated it. So saying that he lied in saying something he didn’t say, with no evidence that what he did say is false, is beyond petty dishonesty. It’s pathological.
The third (bonus) problem is that you do the same exact thing with his vote in a Supreme Court case as you did in the other two instances: You completely distort and mischaracterize what in fact he did say, because without doing so there is no support whatever for your accusation. This is not a surprise; it’s SOP for leftnuts. But it’s still disgusting.
Posted by Rose | October 3, 2007 6:20 PM
“I remember from the hearings that when Anita Hill complained to friends about a NAMELESS superior at work giving her a rough time, although they tried to portray that was Clarence Thomas, it turned out that it was in fact a couple of years BEFORE she ever went to work for him.”
You are right on Rose. In particular, Susan Hoerchner testified at the hearings about the UNNAMED superior, and Hoerchner gave particular dates as to when the Hill alleged behavior by the UNNAMED superior occurred and when Hill allegedly told Hoerchner about said alleged behavior by Hill’s UNNAMED superior. Then, the Republicans on the committee put one and one together demonstrating that when Hill allegedly told Hoerchner about the alleged behavior of an UNNAMED superior, Hill was not and never had worked for Thomas. Once said facts were pointed out to the Hoerchner, the poor fool immediately changed (i.e., lied under oath) her testimony to cover her transparent lies. There has never been a witness more thoroughly discredited than that poor sap Hoerchner. The most hysterical thing about it, though, is that you have these like-minded pea-brained, dingbat feminists like Ruth Marcus, Jill Abramson, Jane Mayer and the entire Washington press corps who actually “believe” Hoerchner. God please help us, if any of those dupes ever sit on an actual jury.
I think Thomas assassinated his own character in his latest book by showing that he really is just a partisan… Unfortunately for us, he’s a partisan sitting on the supreme court
To those that complain that Thomas might be basing his rulings on how victimized he feels, maybe the solution is to stop victimizing nominees to the Supreme Court in their confirmation hearings.
You reap what you sow.
To CK and others,
While you’re accussing Thomas of being partisan while sitting on the Supreme Court could you please provide evidence? The fact is that Thomas (and Scalia) have ruled against what conservatives and/or libertarians would want on numerous occasions b/c the Constitution or the law forced them to do so. Furthermore, they have never invented something like a “Constitutional right-to-life” just as Blackmun invented a Constitutional right to unfettered access to abortion out of whole cloth.
The partisanship here is not coming from Thomas, the parisanship is coming from liberals who want judges to come to the (policy) judgement they want no matter what the Constitution or the law says. Just b/c you approve/disapprove of a policy doesn’t make your view of that policy part of the Constitution.
I never saw Anita Hill as credible during the hearings. But the most damning thing to her credibility has always been that the Senate apparently didn’t find her credible either, since they went on to confirm Clarence Thomas. They speak more by their final vote than anything else. Looked pretty foolish too!
Clarence Thomas is an angry incompetent and we are stuck with him for years to come.