Posted on 10/27/2017 7:25:53 AM PDT by Kaslin
Let's look at two pictures side by side and see if we can tell how they're different. In one panel, we see a famous TV political analyst who apparently had the charming habit of pressing his erect, if clothed, penis against the bodies of young women who worked with and for him. That was Mark Halperin.
In the second panel, we have former President George H.W. Bush, in a wheelchair, age 89, posing for a photo with a number of others, including his wife Barbara, and an actress called Heather Lind. Lind says she felt moved to share her trauma after seeing the benefit concert for Hurricane Harvey relief in which five former presidents participated. It seems that people are unaware of President Bush's criminal record:
"When I got the chance to meet George H.W. Bush four years ago to promote a historical television show I was working on, he sexually assaulted me while I was posing for a similar photo.
"He didn't shake my hand. He touched me from behind from his wheelchair with his wife Barbara Bush by his side. He told me a dirty joke.
"And then, all the while being photographed, touched me again. Barbara rolled her eyes as if to say 'not again.'"
Fortunately, Lind immediately related the outrage to her "fellow cast-mates and producers": "(They) helped me that day and continue to support me. I am grateful for the bravery of other women who have spoken up and written about their experiences."
Ah, yes, the brave women who stand up to sweet, 90-something guys with a form of Parkinson's. The brave women who put those completely honorable, polite and respectful guys who were war heroes and served their country in their place.
Sorry, Ms. Lind, you're not brave. You're a twit. At the very worst, Bush did something tasteless. As you admit, the cameras were rolling the whole time. How awful can it have been? He's very old. People's judgment declines, especially if they're unwell. But you've made a fool of yourself for equating a pat on the tush from someone who couldn't possibly do you any harm to "sexual assault." You are either hysterical or cynical. I'm guessing the latter. You figured you'd jump on today's bandwagon and grab your moment in the spotlight. Instead, you've embarrassed yourself.
What must the women Halperin targeted think when they compare their situations with Lind's? A woman who had worked with Halperin in 2004, when he was political director of ABC News, described a meeting in his office:
"The first meeting I ever had with him was in his office, and he just came up from behind -- I was sitting in a chair from across his desk -- and he came up behind me and (while he was clothed) he pressed his body on mine, his penis, on my shoulder. I was obviously completely shocked. I can't even remember how I got out of there -- (but) I got out of there and was freaked out by that whole experience. Given I was so young and new I wasn't sure if that was the sort of thing that was expected of you if you wanted something from a male figure in news."
There are several reasons to take the story about Halperin seriously -- as MSNBC clearly does in announcing his temporary departure from the network. One is that five women have offered very similar stories. Another is that Halperin, while quibbling over details, does not really deny the allegations.
"During this period, I did pursue relationships with women that I worked with, including some junior to me. I now understand from these accounts that my behavior was inappropriate and caused others pain. For that, I am deeply sorry and I apologize. Under the circumstances, I'm going to take a step back from my day-to-day work while I properly deal with this situation."
Sorry, Mr. Halperin. You don't "pursue relationships" by grabbing women and pressing yourself on them. As much of a turn-on as it may be for you, it's a violation for them. You "now understand"? No. You always understood. Of course you did. You know that everyone deserves respect and that women, in particular, should never have their dignity compromised in the way you apparently compromised theirs.
What Halperin is accused of, if true, is squalid. The story about Bush, though, demonstrates how common sense flies out the window once the pack is in full cry.
This discussion is symptomatic of how we have lost our national sense of humor. That is a sign of bad times ahead. Good humor is a sign of optimism which contributes to national success.
If you're a politician high enough up (sorry Carlos Danger!) like William Jefferson Blythe Clinton, or George Herbert Walker Bush, you're above the law.
Now it is clear why Bubba and the Bushes have become such good buddies.
Which category does President Trump fall into? Old, unwell with declining judgment or fully aware predator?
À la what Elizabeth Warren reported as "sexual harassment". It weren't.
Mona Charen finally gets something right.
Curious what category you are thinking he belongs in.
Once again, it's just Democrats doing what the Democrat play-book says they must do: whatever your worst crimes are (i.e., Russian collusion, sexual harassment) make certain to raise an unholy squall accusing Republicans of it.
That way, as you are cuffed & perp-walked to jail, your last words as the jail door closes can be: "yeh, but both sides did it!"
I doubt if that's the first of the Rules for Democrats, but certainly in the top ten.
Sad but it appears to be true!
I call people like you "loseservatives", because that's what you're all about - losing.
Laws and definitions of what constitutes a sexual assault crime vary from state to state.
As always is the case, we end up getting the laws we deserve. When people become outraged over actual assaults there are often unintended consequences, e.g. what started out to as an act of penetration is now reduced to “unwanted touching”. Bear in mind that most of these laws are fairly recent. Go back long enough and you’ll find the only sexual assault crime required penetration, and was usually called “forcible rape”.
Now even words can be sufficient, not to convict of sexual assault but to get you fired under EEO law. “Creating a hostile workplace” is the catchall that gets the boss who likes to tell dirty jokes but never lays a hand on anyone in trouble. And then there’s the matter of hanging a pinup in a locker or allowing one’s eyes to linger a bit too long (unless you are Hillary).
There is no one answer.
It’s a NeverTrumper, AKA a “loseservative”.
I know we’re in a period of hysteria right now, over alleged sexual assault. But what’s with this business against George HW Bush? My God, the old man is confined to a wheelchair nowadays. He’s in his dotage. And people are saying he committed sexual assault. I don’t get it.
What did he do? Feel a woman’s body somehow? But for a man confined as he is in a wheelchair, is that really the same as an able bodied man physically accosting a woman?
Yet we’re saying they are both sexual assault? Was this trumped up somehow?
I think a lot of the people condemning GHWB so harshly here are conflating their distaste for this misbehavior with their political hatred for him . If it were some other, more beloved personality who had lost his faculties and was behaving poorly, I don’t think we’d see the same level of harshness.
All of the single guys I know - especially in public places or the work place wil not even look at women, let alone speak to them without witnesses present. Pence sets a good example about this.
Runs in the family...
Total rubbish, there is no "moral equivalence" here, none.
90+ year old HW in his wheel-chair(!) was no more threat to anyone than a young child who might do something similar.
If I recall, the volleyball player invited Bush to slap her back.
I posted this on another thread this morning but felt is was relevant to this article: It actually happened several years ago and my friends family was threatened with his arrest for sexual assault, and removal from the nursing home.
A friend’s 90 something father was in a nursing home for several years before he died. (In his fifties, he had a horrible industrial accident where both of his arms were severed from both shoulders.). So one afternoon a nurse came into his room and found an elderly woman on top of him, performing OS. So this was handled etc. but the next day my friend got a call from the nursing home and said the family of the woman wanted to press charges against her dad for sexual assault................
How about, none of the one’s that you mentioned. Now go away, jerk!
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