History is going to be made a few hours from now at the Senate Judiciary Committee. The controlling Republicans of that committee are men who have for some time shown themselves deft at laying the foundations for tyranny, though they choose innocuous labels for it. A key element of this is sticking rightwing and ultra-rightwing judges into every nook and cranny of the federal court system.
For that reason, they’d very much like to have avoided the testimony of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford about a man they figured just a dozen days ago would already be the 114th justice appointed to the Supreme Court. If her answers to the queries the Republicans’ hired gun asks are as clear and powerful and believable as her prepared statement[1], sending the full Senate a recommendation that Kavanaugh be confirmed will require them to put the depth of their hypocrisy and ideological corruption on national display. While this happens fairly often, this time it’s just six weeks before the midterm elections that polls and analysts already view as potentially disastrous for the GOP.
All or almost all of these committee Republicans made up their minds well before Brett Kavanaugh testified to the committee. They likely will vote to recommend his confirmation regardless of what Ford says. Sen. Lindsey Graham, for instance, says 1,000 accusations of sexual predation by Kavanaugh will not change his vote.
In a just world, Judge Kavanaugh would have withdrawn his name from nomination days ago, or had it withdrawn for him.
But that’s not the dimension we live in. In a just world, after all, the moderate Merrick Garland would have been the ninth justice on the Court for two years by now. In a just world, a woman who reports a sexual attack would not be treated like the perp.
