Tag Archives: Roy Moore

national news

Trump endorses an accused pedophile

Roy Moore is in league with Vladimir Putin.

That means they’re in league with Donald John Trump.

Follow this logic for just a moment:

* Several women have accused Moore, the Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate from Alabama of making improper sexual advances on them; the accusations have resonated with many political leaders, who say they believe the women and have abandoned Moore. Meanwhile, Moore denies doing what they allege he did.

* Intelligence experts in this country have concluded that Putin ordered the Russian government to hack into our electoral process during the 2016 presidential election, aiming to swing the election in Trump’s favor. Putin has denied doing it.

So, Moore’s denial and Putin’s denial have cinched it for the president.

Trump has said he believes Putin’s denial that Russia didn’t interfere with our election. Now he implies belief in Moore’s denial that he preyed on women when they were underage girls.

“He denies it. He totally denies it,” Trump said, noting the alleged incidents took place around 40 years ago. “Roy Moore denies it — that’s all I can say.”

‘We don’t need a Democrat’

The president said that Democratic candidate for the Senate seat, Doug Jones, is wrong on national security, on taxes, on immigration and on crime. Moore’s the man, according to Trump.

But … what if the allegations are proven to be true? Senate Republicans don’t need an y more persuading. They are running away from Moore as quickly as they can. Some GOP senators say they are throwing their support behind Jones, who hasn’t been accused of the kind of disgraceful behavior that Moore allegedly has done.

None other than the attorney general of the United States, Jeff Sessions, whose seat Moore and Jones are seeking to fill, has said he also believes the women!

This is sickening in the extreme.

media news, national news

Another media giant takes a header

I’m not going to venture too far out on the proverbial limb by making this declaration: Charlie Rose’s broadcast journalism career likely is over; he’s toast; he’s done, finished, a goner.

Sexual harassment and sexual abuse charges have brought down the former “CBS This Morning” co-host. CBS fired him today after allegations arose from eight women who said Rose pranced naked in front of them and made improper sexual advances. PBS also terminated its relationship with Rose, who had a late-night interview show on the public TV network.

The wave of reform continues to purge the media and the entertainment industry of men who behave badly. Yes, the political world also has been affected by this scourge. Women have accused Alabama U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore of coming on to them when they were underage girls; U.S. Sen. Al Franken is facing pressure from political progressives to quit his office after two women have accused him of groping and unwanted kissing; U.S. Rep. John Conyers has acknowledged “settling” with women who accused him of harassment — but, in a weird statement, denies doing anything wrong.

I’m going to give Fox News credit for the way it handled the Bill O’Reilly matter. Women accused O’Reilly of bad behavior. The network where he worked as a talk-show host paid out big money to settle the complaints. It then suspended O’Reilly … and then it fired him.

The O’Reilly story, in my view, is what made Rose’s departure from CBS a done deal after the allegations came forth.

Where this all goes remains anyone’s guess. It well might end only when the last news media outlet gets rid of its last sexual predator; or when the last entertainment tycoon with similar proclivities is revealed.

As for the political world that is beginning to roil in this climate, it’s fair to wonder how many sudden “retirement” announcements we’re going to hear from pols who are overtaken by guilty consciences.

Something tells me many more men are going to be culled from the public stage.

national news

Conway: Votes matter more than integrity?

Republicans all across Capitol Hill are singing the same verse: They believe the accusations that have been leveled at Republican U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore.

They believe the women who have accused the Alabama candidate of making improper sexual advances on them when they were underage girls.

Is the senior policy adviser to Donald John Trump one of them? Apparently not!

Kellyanne  Conway has told “Fox & Friends” that the Trump administration wants Moore’s vote on tax cuts. It seems to matter little to the president or to Conway that they might be welcoming a pedophile to the Senate.

It’s his vote that counts more than any crime he might have committed back in the old days, when he was a deputy district attorney.

I feel the need to inform Conway — as if she needs informing — that Moore quite possibly will be denied a Senate seat even if he wins the special election in Alabama set for Dec. 12.

The Senate GOP leadership, virtually to a person, wants nothing to do with this guy. He has declared political war against Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Does the president’s policy guru think McConnell is going to surrender to this clown?

Moore faces huge hurdle

A remarkably fascinating aspect of this is how “Fox & Friends” co-host Brian Kilmeade actually challenged Conway’s assertion that the president is depending on Moore’s vote to enact a tax cut. He reminded Conway that McConnell has pulled his support, along with the Young Republicans. Indeed, Kilmeade has said some rather unkind things about Moore himself.

It’s still quite stunning — after nearly a year into the Trump presidency — to hear a leading presidential spokeswoman place raw politics above principle.

political news

Beware of polls in Alabama

A word of caution may be in order.

Public opinion polling indicates that Republican U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore is falling farther behind his Democratic opponent, former federal prosecutor Doug Jones, in the race to join the World Greatest Deliberative Body.

A special election will occur in ‘Bama on Dec. 12. Moore has been swallowed up by a controversy involving whether he made improper sexual advances on young girls in the 1970s when he was a state prosecutor.

It’s been in all the papers, you know?

Be careful — very careful — about interpreting too much in these polls. You see, they at times can produce what political scientists call “phantom support” that manifests itself in voters being untruthful to pollsters.

Voters might be unwilling to say out loud to a pollster that they’re going to still vote for a guy who’s accused of pedophilia. Then they vote for the guy anyway. Indeed, this is why we call it a “secret ballot.” The fear is profoundly ridiculous, given that reputable polling firms do not reveal the identities of those they question about their voting preferences.

It’s all water over the proverbial dam anyway. Even if Moore manages to win the special election, I find if impossible for him to serve in the Senate. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell — against whom Moore has declared political war — likely will not allow him to take the oath and then tar the Republican Party with his very presence on Capitol Hill.

I’m just saying that as the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States has shown us, the new normal in American politics has proven to be anything but normal.

national news

Yes, Mr. POTUS, pictures — and words — do matter

I now am utterly convinced that Donald J. Trump has no clue, none at all, about self-awareness and how someone with zero moral authority should refrain from speaking out on, um, morality.

The president wasted little time in tweeting a response to the accusation that U.S. Sen. Al Franken groped and kissed a woman without her consent. He referred to Franken as “Frankenstien” and said a picture is “worth a thousand words.”

Trump isn’t commenting via Twitter on that other guy whose alleged sexual misconduct is all the rage these days: Republican U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore of Alabama, who is accused of assaulting underage girls when he was a 30-something prosecutor.

Imagine my (faux) surprise, will ya?

I concur with the president that what Franken did was inexcusable. It was reprehensible and the Minnesota Democratic lawmaker should be chastised in the strongest terms possible.

However …

Trump’s tweet flings the door wide open to conversation about his demonstrated lack of respect for women. He all but admitted on that infamous “Access Hollywood” audio recording that he groped women because his celebrity status made it so easy for him. He said he could grab them by their genital area.

The revelation about Trump’s behavior surfaced about a month before the 2016 presidential election. Lots of Americans were aghast and outraged by what he had said in 2005. In the end, it mattered little as Trump was elected anyway.

But now we’re getting some more buzz about women who say they have been sexually harassed and abused by the man who would become president of the United States.

Why the renewed interest in Trump’s own seedy, sordid past? Because the tweeter in chief just couldn’t resist popping off about something on which he has zero moral authority.

But, hey … he “tells it like it is.”

Disgraceful.

national news

Yep, it’s harder to come down on those you respect

It’s time for an admission.

I am admitting that it is easy for me to criticize politicians I dislike, or even detest and that it’s harder to go negative against those I respect.

Thus, I am having a conflict of sorts as I watch this story about Democratic U.S. Sen. Al Franken play out. Franken has apologized for groping a woman in 2006 while the two of them were on a USO tour; it was before Franken became a member of the Senate. He was a mere comedian at the time of the incident.

The woman, TV news anchor Leann Tweeden, produced a picture of him groping her while she apparently was asleep. She didn’t consent to the groping or to the kiss that Franken reportedly laid on her. Tweeden has accepted Franken’s apology to her.

What gives me grief is that I grew to respect Franken’s performance as a senator. I agree with his politics and thought he had a bright future in politics.

I am now left to use past-tense verbs when talking about Franken. I no longer respect him or admire him. I don’t know how much of a future he now has in politics. Yes, it pains me to say all this.

Unlike the scandal that’s swallowing up Roy Moore, the Republican candidate for the Senate from Alabama, this Franken story is giving me grief. I find myself writing critically of him while my teeth are clenched. I have no such difficulty while criticizing the likes of Donald J. Trump, or Roy Moore, or Newt Gingrich (when he was fooling around on his then-wife in the 1990s).

This time, I suppose that because the latest bomb to detonate involves a politician I formerly admired, that I should really drop the hammer on him … rhetorically, of course.

I am more than merely disappointed in Al Franken. I am outraged that he would betray those of us who once thought so highly of him.

national news

Franken deserves to be censured … at minimum

Al Franken has acquitted himself surprisingly well in the U.S. Senate.

Until now.

The Minnesota Democrat has been snagged in a growing scandal involving members of Congress who have misbehaved badly in the presence of women. A television news anchor has come forth with an accusation that in 2006 Franken, before he was a senator, grabbed her and kissed her without her permission.

Franken has apologized for his conduct. He also says he remembers the incident — which occurred when the then-comedian was on a USO tour of the Middle East — differently from what the woman has alleged.

That is not good enough, senator.

The only aspect of this case that differs from the hideous accusations against Republican Senate candidate Roy Moore — who’s been accused of sexual misconduct with underage girls — is that the accuser was an adult when the incident occurred.

That doesn’t make it acceptable in any form or fashion.

You see, Franken is one of those lawmakers who likes to speak glowingly of his wife, their children and grandchildren. He presents himself as a devoted family man.

What should the Senate do? I think a censure is clearly in order. There ought to be a strong statement condemning one of the body’s colleagues — who until this week was actually discussed as a possible presidential candidate in 2020.

For those of us out here in Flyover Country who have admired the work he has done ever since he joined the Senate, Al Franken has just become a huge disappointment.

national news

Oh, brother … now Sen. Franken gets accused

The hits just keep coming.

Now it’s Democratic U.S. Sen. Al Franken of Minnesota who’s been accused of groping and kissing a woman against her will.

She produced a picture of Franken committing the deed in 2006.

See the picture here.

OK, then. It’s reprehensible and disgusting. Franken should be ashamed of himself. The incident occurred when Franken — who was then a comedian — was on a USO tour with news anchor Leann Tweeden.

Franken has apologized for his actions.

Tweeden has leveled some harsh — and well-deserved — criticism at Franken.

Here, though, is a question I think needs to be asked, given the intense fallout from the Roy Moore story and the mounting pressure on the Republican senatorial candidate from Alabama to drop out of the race. Moore blames his accusers of being tools of Democrats and the “fake news” media.

Are there any political considerations to ponder about Leann Tweeden’s accusation?

Suffice to say that a new day has burst all over Washington, D.C., let alone on the entertainment industry, in light of the “Me Too” movement and the hideous accusations that have ricocheted about one-time superstars.

Let’s all stay tuned. My guess is that there will be plenty more of these accusations coming forth.

political news

Why do evangelicals keep supporting Roy Moore?

Roy Moore is losing support among Republican members of Congress by the hour.

The Alabama GOP candidate for the U.S. Senate is falling in public opinion polls. The former Alabama Supreme Court chief justice has been tossed out of that office twice for failing to do the job he swore he would do.

Now he’s in real trouble. Several women have accused him of engaging in improper sexual behavior with them when they were underage girls.

Moore stands accused of pedophilia.

Here is the utterly astonishing aspect of this story: Moore’s base of voters comprising evangelical Christians is standing with him. Politicians on both sides of the aisle are saying the women’s accusations are more credible than Moore’s denials; one of the woman has said she’ll testify “under oath” and has urged Moore to do the same. Yet the candidate’s voting base stands by its man.

These are the same Americans who oppose gay marriage; they oppose a woman’s right to make her own reproductive decisions; they want to allow public educators to promote Christianity in public schools. These also are Americans who bellowed “Lock he up!” as unproven allegations dogged Hillary Rodham Clinton’s presidential campaign in 2016.

Yet they’re standing foursquare in support of someone who might have committed a felony by sexually abusing girls?

Go figure, man.

national news

Moore saga burying the bigger story

A part of me — maybe it’s a tiny part — wishes the Roy Moore story would go away.

I probably shouldn’t give a damn about Alabama’s U.S. Senate race, other than the fact that the Republican nominee for that race is being accused — apparently credibly — by women who accuse him of sexual misbehavior when they were underage girls.

I don’t want Moore to become the next senator from Alabama. Although this matter really is in the hands of Alabama voters, who need to come to grips with the notion that if they elect Moore they are sending an empty suit to represent them. Moore will be unable to do anything for them if the Senate GOP leadership has its way.

But the media are consumed by this story.

It’s masking another more important matter. While the media are focusing on the Moore story, the “Russia thing” is proceeding with all deliberate speed.

But in a way, this all might be a good thing. Special counsel Robert Mueller doesn’t strike me as a media hog. He is working under the cover of a media glare that is shining on someone else, who has nothing to do with his investigation into whether Donald Trump’s presidential campaign colluded with Russian hackers seeking to influence the outcome of the 2016 election.

So, now that I think about it, perhaps the media mania over Moore might be serving a greater good.