Posted on 05/02/2020 6:40:34 PM PDT by edwinland
Three potentially interesting background notes on the Tara Reade story:
1. She is not merely alleging "sexual assault". She is alleging rape. The FBI definition of rape is as follows:
“The penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.”
https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/blog/updated-definition-rape
If Biden were a Republican the press would surely know the correct word. They might even rediscover their dictionary if he were a Democrat who already served two terms and was no longer potentially eligible to appoint pro-abortion Supreme Court justices. But I digress.
2. Title VII of the Civil rights Act prohibits harassment based on sex (among other protected classes) and that's the Act the rest of the country was subject to starting in 1964,
https://www.justia.com/employment/employment-discrimination/title-vii/
The Civil Right Act of 1964 should have been the Civil Rights Act of 1963 but it was bottled up in Congress by Democratic Segregationists (but I repeat myself), notably , Howard W. Smith. After JFK was assassinated, Johnson challenged Congress to pass it as a memorial, but still it was held up by Democratic Segregationists and then filibustered by Democratic Segregationists, including Stom Thurmond, who said the Act was "reminiscent of the Reconstruction proposals and actions of the radical Republican Congress".
(A quick aside. Biden eulogized Strom Thurmond as his "closest friend" and as described by Buzzfeed he "noted, in an admiring context, a 1947 editorial that praised Thurmond’s work with reading programs for black students at the “separate, but equal schools”)
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/biden-praised-segregationist-strom-thurmond-as-closest-friend-who-believed-in-heterogenous-diverse-society
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/henrygomez/joe-biden-strom-thurmond-eulogy
Senate Republicans then crated a new bipartisan bill meant to defeat the filibuster but that too was filibustered, this time by the most senior ("former") Ku Klu Klan member in Congress at the time, Senator Robert Byrd, Democrat.
The Republican bipartisan Act finally passed the Senate with 71 votes.
3. Even then, the Act would not have protected Tara Reade from harassment because the Democratic Congress in 1964 ...
EXEMPTED ITSELF FROM THE CIVIL RIGHTS ACT
yes. It wasn't until Newt Gingrich's "Contract with America" that Congress became subject to ITS OWN LAWS.
https://web.archive.org/web/19990427174200/http://www.house.gov/house/Contract/CONTRACT.html
In fact that was the FIRST PLANK of the Contract with America and the Contract was so popular with ordinary Americans it helped the Republicans win the House for the first time in 53 years. And Republicans made good on their promise by passing the Congressional Accountability Act in 1996 which outlawed sexual harassment by Congressmen (in 1996!) and also outlawed retaliation against accusers for the first time.
(As an aside, not everyone was happy with this situation. Bill Clinton, for example described it as the "Contract on America" and there's no need to wonder why he felt that way.
https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/library/politics/clinton-congress.html)
Moreover, the CAA also established the Office of Compliance as a place for staff to report harassment:
https://www.ocwr.gov/sites/default/files/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/2014-102b-Report.pdf
Many people think the OCC process, while clear, is too slow, overly complicated, and insufficient to hold Comgressmen accountable. But that's a story for another day.
For today, it's sufficient to know that when Tara Reade worked for Joe Biden in 1993 there was no law against sexual harassment by Congressmen, and no clear process for staff who were victimized by Congressmen to follow.
So if the facts of her complaint seem unclear, that could indicate a hazy memory . Or, as Strom Thurmond and Robert Byrd's successors in the Democratic party are already arguing, it could be indicate she is being dishonest.
(Another aside. It was once said that "For a woman to come forward in the glaring lights of focus, nationally, you’ve got to start off with the presumption that at least the essence of what she’s talking about is real, whether or not she forgets facts, whether or not it’s been made worse or better over time." That was said by Joe Biden.)
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2020/05/01/bidens-kavanaugh-comments-resurface-after-sexual-assault-allegations/3067692001/
But it could also very accurately indicate that because of the strenuous efforts of "former" KKK members, segregationist leaders and other type of Democrats in the 1964 Congress (if any), the Civil Rights Act was was almost never passed, watered down when it did pass and then specifically drafted to exempt the Congressmen themselves, so there was no clear process for Tara Reade to follow in 1993.
Chris has come close to Howie Carr’s, “Journalists are Democrats with Press Passes”.
DOUBLE-STANDARDS = NO STANDARDS
RATs have no standards. They have interests.
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