"White House Finds No Support in FBI Report for Claims Against Kavanaugh/Senators are set to review the FBI’s findings Thursday."

Reports the Wall Street Journal, but I don't have a subscription, so let's move on to the NYT.

The NYT headline plays it so neutral — "White House Sends F.B.I. Interviews on Kavanaugh to Senate" — that I infer the FBI report supports Kavanaugh.

“The White House has received the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s supplemental background investigation into Judge Kavanaugh, and it is being transmitted to the Senate,” Raj Shah, a White House spokesman, said in the statement, which was posted on Twitter. “This is the last addition to the most comprehensive review of a Supreme Court nominee in history, which includes extensive hearings, multiple committee interviews, over 1,200 questions for the record and over a half million pages of documents,” he added. “With this additional information, the White House is fully confident the Senate will vote to confirm Judge Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court.”

The White House statement gave no further details about the material, but an official briefed on the F.B.I. review said the bureau contacted 10 people and interviewed nine of them. It was not clear why the 10th person was not interviewed. The White House concluded that the interviews did not corroborate sexual misconduct accusations against Judge Kavanaugh.

That last sentence meets my idea of journalism better than does the WSJ headline. We only know what the White House says, not what it really found. It could be lying. Maybe it found some support but chose to make an absolute statement.

Let's check WaPo: "In 2:30 a.m. tweets, White House says FBI report supports Kavanaugh confirmation." That's neutral, but with colorful facets — tweeting, early morning hours — that might seem to minimize the seriousness with which the White House assessed the report. A reader of headlines might picture Trump — impetuous Trump — tweeting again, but it was Raj Shah (the spokesman cited in the NYT article).

Also in WaPo  "Senate moves ahead on Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court nomination with a procedural vote expected Friday."

The Senate Judiciary Committee announced Thursday that it has received the FBI’s completed report on Supreme Court nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh, as partisan rancor continued to grow over the scope of the investigation into sexual assault allegations that have endangered his confirmation.

In anticipation of the report’s arrival, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Wednesday night teed up a key vote to advance Kavanaugh’s nomination for Friday. Until that vote, senators will be rushing in and out of a secure facility at the Capitol to review the sensitive FBI report that the bureau has compiled, looking into allegations of sexual misconduct against Kavanaugh.

“There will be plenty of time for members to review and be briefed on this supplemental material before a Friday cloture vote,” McConnell said Wednesday night.

Good! The vote should indeed take place on Friday (unless there's something specific and substantial in the FBI report that justifies cautious delay). If there's no corroboration, I'm glad for Kavanaugh and his supporters. I'm sorry for private citizen Christine Blasey Ford if she believes what she said and that the Senate would keep her accusations private, and I'm extremely critical of the Senators who allowed her accusation to become public. They ought to have made their own attempt at corroboration — or did they try and fail? — and we should never have been subjected to this ordeal. It was a shameful display, painful for just about everyone and the pain isn't over yet.

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Venturing into the territory of mocking Christine Blasey Ford, Trump makes a misstep.

I think it's very dangerous to privilege some people to make ruinous accusations against another person, and we've got to find a way to challenge accusers, even though it is important to protect real victims and to encourage them to come forward.

It's incredibly difficult to figure out how to do this, and it's especially hard when quite a few people want the accused taken down whether the accusations are true or not, and they can and do intimidate those who want to put the accuser to the test. Christine Blasey Ford testified in a supportive environment, and those who hope she's wrong were afraid do anything to test her credibility.

But Trump isn't one to be intimidated, and he is plunging in, attacking the credibility of Christine Blasey Ford. I'm reading "Trump Taunts Christine Blasey Ford at Rally" (NYT):

Playing to the crowd of thousands gathered to cheer him on [at a rally in Mississippi], the president pretended to be Dr. Blasey testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee last Thursday. “Thirty-six years ago this happened. I had one beer, right? I had one beer,” said Mr. Trump, channeling his version of Dr. Blasey. His voice dripping with derision, he then imitated her being questioned at the hearing, followed by her responses about what she could not recall about the alleged attack.

“How did you get home? I don’t remember. How’d you get there? I don’t remember. Where is the place? I don’t remember. How many years ago was it? I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know. What neighborhood was it in? I don’t know. Where’s the house? I don’t know. Upstairs, downstairs, where was it? I don’t know,” Mr. Trump said, as the crowd applauded. “But I had one beer. That’s the only thing I remember.”

"Dripping with derision"? "Pretended to be" her — but did he imitate her voice and mannerisms? I don't see video of this at the NYT, and I haven't tracked it down myself, so I don't know if that is accurate. Is Trump showing people the way to challenge an accuser or engaging in antics that no one else should attempt and that Trump alone seems able to get away with?

I suspect the latter. But there's one thing he's plainly done wrong. Christine Blasely Ford did not wonder if it was upstairs or downstairs. She clearly testified that it happened upstairs. You're critiquing someone else's presentation of the facts. You'd better get your own in order!

ADDED: Here's how WaPo presents the "imitation" in video (along with other Trump imitations):



So there you can see that Trump absolutely does not attempt to copy Ford's voice. It's full-on Trump voice. He does not use any mannerisms to depict Ford. It's all in words, the text you see above. WaPo's other examples are all different, not much of a pattern. There's the problematic gesturing while copying the words of a disabled reporter, but really nothing else. The rest is just dramatic speaking and gesturing. He is mocking people, but there should be mockery in politics — not mockery of anyone's disability or possible victimhood — but mockery of the arguments and statements that you're trying to refute.

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The outside prosecutor Rachel Mitchell opines that the evidence would not justify bringing criminal charges and does not even meet a preponderance-of-the-evidence standard.

According to the 5-page memo she sent to the Judiciary Committee Republicans, which WaPo got its hands on. The basis of the opinion is what a lot of Kavanaugh proponents have observed:

In the memo, Mitchell argued that Ford has not offered a consistent account of the alleged assault, including when exactly it occurred. Mitchell also noted that Ford did not identify Kavanaugh by name as her attacker in key pieces of evidence, including notes from sessions with her therapist — records that Ford’s lawyers declined to provide to the Senate Judiciary Committee....

[I]n the memo, Mitchell also argued that Ford “has no memory of key details of the night in question — details that could help corroborate her account,” nor has Ford given a consistent account of the alleged assault. Noting that Ford did not remember in what house the incident allegedly occurred, or how she left the gathering and got back home, Mitchell said “her inability to remember this detail raises significant questions.”

Mitchell also stressed that nobody who Ford has identified as having attended the gathering — including Mark Judge, Patrick Smyth and Leland (Ingham) Keyser — has been able to directly corroborate Ford’s allegations....

Mitchell notes that "There is no clear standard of proof for allegations made during the Senate’s confirmation process," but she is a prosecutor and she can only give an opinion from her point of view, from "the legal world, not the political world."

It is, of course, only her legal opinion, not The Legal Opinion in some grand sense, and she was chosen by the Republican Senators, who have their political goals and needs, even if she has none. And, really, we can't know if what she calls a legal opinion is really just that. She could be lying or unwittingly swayed by political or personal beliefs. We never know whether purported legal minds are really operating in some purely legal way (if such a thing is even possible).

The nominee, in the initial phase of the hearings, performed the usual theater of presenting himself as a judge who does nothing but decide cases according to the law. We in the audience of that theater may not really believe all that but think it's nevertheless close enough to get by, and it's only what every other nominee does, so we must suspend disbelief if we're going to have judges at all.

But when we see ourselves in this predicament, what can we do when we don't like the way the nominee leans? We could just accept the power of the President to make a nomination and demand that the Senate confirm as long as the nominee performs well in the usual theater of acting like a proper judge. The President won the election after all. That's a fact. But why defer there unless it's what you already want to do? Those who don't want a staunch conservative in the swing-vote-Kennedy seat want to resist. Trump didn't legitimately win, they might say — or: Obama didn't get deference when the Scalia seat opened up during his term.

Here's another thing that can be done when we don't like the leaning of a presidential nominee who adequately performs the Neutral Judge act in the initial political theater: Bring in something unrelated to his judicial work, something that makes him unacceptable, and allegations about something that happened in private long ago could do the trick.

But how good do these allegations need to be before they work? Rachel Mitchell can only say she has no idea. And if we are honest, shouldn't we admit that we're all drawn to the standard that gets us to the result we wanted before we ever heard about Christine Blasey Ford? I'd say no. There is one other factor: The short- and long-term interests of the 2 political parties. Republicans may fear that backing Kavanaugh now will hurt them. They might ruthlessly cut loose the damaged goods. Similarly, Democrats may see that voting Kavanaugh down will mollify their voters and energize conservatives in the midterm elections.

Maybe everyone's hoping that the FBI investigation will produce some very clear indications that Christine Blasey Ford is either lying or mistaken and the intensity of the partisan energy will dissipate. I don't think the FBI will save them. All the Senators have is one more week to worry about how to extricate themselves from this horrible trap they're caught in.

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Senator Whitehouse, just now: "I don't believe 'boof' is flatulence. I don't believe 'the devil's triangle' is a drinking game."

"And I don't believe calling yourself a girl's 'alumnius' is being her friend. And I think drinking 'til you 'ralph' or 'fall out of the bus' or 'don't remember the game' or need to piece together your memory the next day is more consistent with Dr. Ford's and other's testimony than his own. If Dr. Ford's testimony is true, I hope we can all agree that Kavanaugh has no business on the Court. And I for one believed her."

On the front page of Urban Dictionary right now:

Devils Triangle
A threesome with 1 woman and 2 men. It is important to remember that straight men do not make eye contact while in the act. Doing so will question their sexuality....

by W_J May 11, 2008

boofed
to have taken it in the butt; had anal sex.

Nick boofed Mal last night.
by Andrea M. October 11, 2004

These definitions go back to the early 00s, so they're not concocted to hurt Kavanaugh, but they don't go back to the early 80s, so they're somewhat weak as definitions used by teenaged Kavanaugh in his yearbook.

Also on the front page at Urban Dictionary because of (I presume) the Kavanaugh hearings (WaPo transcript):

7 f's
Find them
French them
Feel them
Finger them
Fuck them
Forget them
Forever

I did the big 7 f's last night
#find#french#feel#finger#fuck#forget#forever#them#7#f#f's#club#big
by * * February 21, 2007

The 7 f's relates to this part of Whitehouse's questioning of Kavanaugh yesterday:

WHITEHOUSE: And there are, like, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven F’s in front of the Fourth of July [on Kavanaugh's high school yearbook page]. What does that signify, if anything?

KAVANAUGH: One of our friends, Squi, when he said the F word starting at a young age, had kind of a wind-up to the F word. Kind of a “ffff.” (LAUGHTER) And then the word would come out. And when we were 15, we thought that was funny. And it became an inside joke for the — how he would say, “Ffff” — and I won’t repeat it here. For the F word. 

In the same questioning session, Whitehouse had asked Kavanaugh about "Devil’s triangle," and Kavanaugh had said, "Drinking game."

WHITEHOUSE: How’s it played?

KAVANAUGH: Three glasses in a triangle.

WHITEHOUSE: And?

KAVANAUGH: You ever played quarters?

WHITEHOUSE: No (ph).

KAVANAUGH: OK. It’s a quarters game.

Asked about "boofed," Kavanaugh had said "That refers to flatulence. We were 16."

WHITEHOUSE: OK. And so when your friend Mark Judge said the same — put the same thing in his yearbook page back to you, he had the same meaning? It was flatulence?

KAVANAUGH: I don’t know what he did, but that’s my recollection. We want to talk about flatulence at age 16 on a yearbook page, I’m — I’m game.

ADDED: Do I agree with what Whitehouse said "I hope we can all agree" about? I think many people, when they are young, drink and say crude things about sex, including things like that 7 fs business and voicing enthusiasm for anal sex and threesomes, and I don't think any of that junk is even relevant to the question whether a person with a long professional career has the character needed to serve on the Supreme Court.

But Whitehouse only asked us to agree that if Ford's allegations are true, he should not serve on the Court, and I will agree to that. The question remains whether Ford's allegations are true, and Whitehouse is using Kavanaugh's testimony about the meaning of "boofed" and "Devil's triangle" to attack his credibility. If we think he lied under oath about that, then it's more likely that he lied about other things, including his denial of Ford's allegations.

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Let's watch the Kavanaugh hearing.

1. It's about to start. I'll update this post as we go.

2. Dr. Christine Blasey Ford has taken her seat. She's nervously looking around, getting patted on the back. She's wearing a dark blue jacket over a dark blue top and has her hair done in a way that allows it to fall over her face and to need to be pushed back. Senator Grassley begins by apologizing to both Blasey and Kavanaugh for the incivility to which both have been subjected. He says he intends to preserve civility in the hearing and to make it "comfortable" for both witnesses.

3. Grassley criticizes Democrats for sitting on the allegations, allowing them to leak out belatedly, and failing to resolve matters in a bipartisan way. Democrats, he says, are to blame for the pain that "Dr. Ford" has suffered in recent days. He praises himself for doing he could to accommodate her. (I put "Dr. Ford" in quotes to indicate that's what she is being called here. I had switched to calling her "Blasey" after reading in the NYT that she preferred that name. From here on, I'll write "Dr. Ford" without quotes.)

4. Dianne Feinstein: "She wanted it confidential, and I held it confidential, up to a point..."

5. Feinstein casts an aspersion on Grassley: He didn't introduce Dr. Ford. Grassley, angered, interrupts to say that he didn't forget to introduce her. He was going to introduce her at the point when he was inviting her to begin speaking.

6. Still waiting for Feinstein to finish reading her intro statement. Dr. Ford seems to be struggling to keep her composure. After Feinstein, I presume we will hear Dr. Ford read this statement, already released to the press.

7. "I am here today not because I want to be. I am terrified...." she begins, in a creaky voice.

8. Sorry, but I got an hour and a half behind. Will resume.

9. Now, I've watched the entire opening statement by Dr. Ford. She seemed very credible to me. Though she was reading, she seemed to be reliving a real, traumatic experience. It's hard to imagine that she could be infusing her speech with that kind of emotion phonily. Even an excellent actress would have difficulty affecting that kind of emotion.

10.  Rachel Mitchell, the prosecutor brought in to ask questions for the Senators, receives 5 minutes of time from Senator Grassley. Mitchell's use of the time is awkward, because she begin with documents that Ford must read and comment on, and Ford takes her time and makes small corrections to the documents. Grassley interrupts to say his time is up, and shifts the proceedings forward to the next Senator, Dianne Feinstein,

11. Feinstein takes her turn and focuses on the difficulties Ford experienced as her name became known. This material bolsters Ford's credibility, especially to the extent that it seems that Ford knew how painful this exposure would be before she decided to go public. Feinstein's time runs out quickly and Mitchell gets another 5 minutes to continue where she left off.

12. Mitchell's approach enables Ford, just by being careful, to slow everything down. The time will run out. The day will end. Maybe Kavanaugh supporters wanted it to play out like that, but Ford is a credible person, and I think the Republicans chosen approach, including the use of Mitchell, will backfire on them, and Kavanaugh will not be confirmed. I'm saying this at 11:06 ET in my recording, that is, an hour before I'm writing this update.

13. At 11:13 ET, Ford speaks of the "indelible" memory of Kavanaugh and Judge laughing — "having fun at my expense." "I was underneath one of them, while the 2 laughed, 2 friends having a really good time with one another."

14. At 11:56 ET, during the questioning by Senator Whitehouse, I exclaim aloud: "The Democrats are winning by a lot here." Whitehouse is talking about the lack of an investigation.

15. Grassley gets angry and yells — about why there is no new investigation — but it feels so wrong that he's yelling in the presence of Dr. Ford. She's the allegedly traumatized victim — don't yell around her! The Republicans are either too bland — operating through Mitchell — or irksomely angry — through Grassley. Do they know how badly they are losing right now? I wonder how Brett Kavanaugh is doing.

16. I'm skipping ahead, looking to see if Kavanaugh's testimony has begun. It has not. I talk with Meade for a while about what Kavanaugh might say if he were asked if he is 100% certain that Ford is wrong when she says she's 100% certain that Brett Kavanaugh did what she remembers. Here's what I imagined Kavanaugh saying: I cannot be 100% certain. I know that I drank far too much on some occasions when I was an immature teenager, and though I've said that I don't remember ever suffering alcohol-induced amnesia, I cannot know for an absolute certainty that it never happened. Watching Dr. Ford testify has been a horrific experience for me. What if there is a blank, dark spot in my memory where drunken young Brett Kavanaugh did what Dr. Ford describes? I pray to God that's not true, but I cannot say 100% that it's not true, and if it is, I am so terribly sorry. I beg Dr. Ford's forgiveness. I hope for God's forgiveness. I hope that my life's work as a sober adult makes up for what I may have done all those years ago. I still believe I have devoted and useful service to give to my country, and I humbly submit myself to your vote, Senators. And I thank all of you for considering my case, and I want Dr. Ford to know that my heart goes out to her, and my heart goes out to every victim of sexual assault. Thank you.

17. I picture Trump watching the hearings with Ivanka. Somehow I imagine Ivanka reacting like me. I wonder what they are saying to each other. Remember that Trump said at his press conference yesterday that he would watch and judge Dr. Ford for himself, that he had an open mind about it, and he could "believe anything."

18. I've been listening to Kavanaugh for a long time without stopping to write anything. Let me quickly say that I'm finding his opening statement extremely powerful and persuasive.

19. It was a long day! Let me try to wrap up this post. I thought Kavanaugh did really well in his written statement, expressing strong outrage and real emotion. In the questioning, this demeanor sometimes felt too strong. He interrupted and shouted back and seemed to show some hate and contempt for some of the Senators. He said more than once that his family had been "destroyed," and yet his wife is his "rock." The rock is not destroyed.

20. This was the ultimate he said/she said. Both were tremendously strong and they told diametrically opposed stories. If I had to decide, I would not go by who's more likely to be telling the truth, but how everything we've heard weighs on the question whether or not to confirm. In view of everything we know about Kavanaugh, does he deserve confirmation even with the degree of doubt we have about something terrible he might have done when he was 17 (and a couple of other, much weaker allegations)? I suspect most people will end up in the same position they had on him anyway, because it's a matter of weighing. But when I think about how BK and CBF could be so far apart, I have 3 explanations: 1. BK has some alcohol blackout holes in his memory, and what CBF remembers is in one of them, 2. CBF has a false memory and really believes it (caused by some genuine trauma), 3. BK has no route but forward, and he knows he did it, but feels entitled to what he's worked all his life to attain. Since there's no way back to his old life, he must force his way through this obstacle. And he's barreling ahead to save his life and save his family. Cornered, he had to fight like hell, and that includes lying.

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Julie Swetnick "said she witnessed Judge Kavanaugh... lining up outside a bedroom where 'numerous boys' were 'waiting for their "turn" with a girl inside the room.'"

"Ms. Swetnick said she was raped at one of the parties, and she believed she had been drugged. None of Ms. Swetnick’s claims could be independently corroborated by The New York Times, and her lawyer, Michael Avenatti, declined to make her available for an interview.... Unlike two other women who have accused Judge Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct, one who went to college with him and another who went to a sister high school, Ms. Swetnick offered no explanation in her statement of how she came to attend the same parties, nor did she identify other people who could verify her account.... In her statement, Ms. Swetnick said that she met Judge Kavanaugh and Mr. Judge in 1980 or 1981 when she was introduced to them at a house party in the Washington are... She said she attended at least 10 house parties in the Washington area from 1981 to 1983 where the two were present. She said the parties were common, taking place almost every weekend during the school year. She said she observed Judge Kavanaugh drinking 'excessively' at many of the parties and engaging in 'abusive and physically aggressive behavior toward girls, including pressing girls against him without their consent, "grinding" against girls, and attempting to remove or shift girls’ clothing to expose private body parts. I also witnessed Brett Kavanaugh behave as a "mean drunk" on many occasions at these parties.'"

The NYT reports today.

If the allegations are true, there must be many, many other witnesses. Where have they been all these weeks? And why would she go to "at least 10 house parties" if they were as she described?

The NYT suggests there's a gap in the account because Swetnick doesn't say how she got to go to the same parties as Kavanaugh. We're told Swetnick grew up in Montgomery County, Md., and graduated from Gaithersburg High School — a public school — in 1980 and attended the University of Maryland. That puts her in a less elite crowd. She's also 2 years older than Kavanaugh and graduated from high school 3 years before he did, so it makes it a little hard to picture them at the same parties. Did older, state-college women go to parties with prep school boys years younger than them? If they did and the boys raped them, repeatedly and systematically, how could the boys get away with it, and why are there not many more women coming forward with the same allegations? And why are we getting this through Michael Avenatti?

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"#MeToo depends on the credibility of the journalists who report on it."

This is an excellent WaPo column by Megan McArdle.

McArdle says she was ready to write "It's now clear that Brett Kavanaugh's nomination cannot go forward" if another sexual assault allegation came out, but she changed her mind when she saw that New Yorker article about Deborah Ramirez. McArdle had thought that "a second allegation would be stronger, not weaker, than the first." She's "frankly surprised the New Yorker ran the article."

And so I'm writing a different column than I expected, about something I hadn't fully understood until I watched that seismic shift [toward expediting the process lest after nominee would go down to a string of unverifiable allegations]: the extent to which the success of #MeToo depends on the credibility of the journalists who report on it.

We hear the slogan "believe women" a lot, but even its strongest media proponents can't really mean it literally, because journalists know how often people tell them things that aren't true....

As #MeToo has grown, mainstream media outlets have generally been scrupulous about getting that confirmation before they publish. It's hard to overstate the dangers when that filter fails. When Rolling Stone failed to check allegations about gang rape at the University of Virginia, the magazine both smeared innocent young men and caused other victims to be treated more skeptically. And when a weak story breaks into an already raging political conflagration, it not only creates skepticism under which future abusers can shelter but also threatens to turn #MeToo into yet another divide in the culture wars.

In the #MeToo movement, it has seemed that multiple accusations have been crucial in taking down prominent men. And now here is a prominent man who began as the target of a desired takedown.  The first accusation inspired credulity because of the built-up strength of the believe-all-survivors ethic, but the second one felt so weak that it not only failed to strengthen the attack, it roused suspicion about the first accusation.

If only the authorities would do their work, then we could rely on them, McArdle seems to say. They've been "generally... scrupulous" in the past. Oh? Somehow I rankle at that idealized image. And I resist the complacency about professionalized journalism and its alliance with a political movement. It's up to us, the citizenry, to maintain our vigilance. No shortcuts. You can't "believe all women" or trust the "mainstream" press. Pay attention and sharpen up, or we are lost.

NOTE: This is the fifth in a series of posts about Kavanaugh this morning. Comments on this post should only be about this article. Here's my post warning you that a series of posts is forthcoming. If you want to draw attention to other articles, do so in the comments section for that post, not this one.

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"Anita Hill Says Kavanaugh Accuser Hearing 'Cannot Be Fair.'"

That's the headline at NPR (with audio). What's unfair about the Senate hearing? Hill says:

"In a real hearing and a real investigation, other witnesses would be called, including witnesses who could corroborate, witnesses who could explain the context of the experiences of Dr. Blasey Ford and Judge Kavanaugh during that period in their lives, as well as experts on sexual harassment and sexual assault."

I think Hill is using the idea of corroboration very broadly, since there are no other witnesses for the incident Blasey alleges nor are there witnesses to her contemporaneous hearsay about the incident. Hill is, I think, talking about witnesses who heard Blasey tell her story after Kavanaugh became a Supreme Court prospect, decades later, as well as general experts on how to understand and interpret the behavior and testimony of those who tell of sexual victimization.

Hill goes on to reject the Senate as the investigator. The Senate, she says, is not a "neutral body." And, speaking of her own experience before the Senate Judiciary Committee, there is "an inherent power imbalance."

The Senate has the constitutional role to decide whether to confirm the nominee. I resist the idea that it "cannot be fair." It must be fair, and if it is not, it still makes the decision. It makes a lot of decisions, and many of them are unfair or believed to be unfair. Yell and scream about that. I guess that's what people, including Hill, are doing. The Senators are responding to the political pressure, and whatever they do, they'll be criticized. Delay or don't delay. Vote yes or no. And there are lots of elections in 6 weeks, so we the people who think the Senate is unfair/fair will have our say.

NOTE: This is the fourth in a series of posts about Kavanaugh this morning. Comments on this post should only be about this article. Here's my post warning you that a series of posts is forthcoming. If you want to draw attention to other articles, do so in the comments section for that post, not this one.

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"I've got to admit that if I had to say right now, who is more likely to be telling us what is closer to the truth — no stakes, no burden of proof, just who is more likely — I'd have to say her."

I wrote in the comments to a post that linked to a WaPo article and simply quoted Christine Blasely Ford's husband.

He'd said, "Her mind-set was, 'I’ve got this terrible secret.... What am I going to do with this secret?' She was like, 'I can’t deal with this. If he becomes the nominee, then I’m moving to another country. I cannot live in this country if he’s in the Supreme Court'... She wanted out."

I've reflected on why that quote tipped me to have the thought quoted in the post title and to want to reveal that. I've challenged myself: Am I a tool of the patriarchy? The husband says something, and now I believe?!

But I don't believe. I don't take anything at face value. I blog from a position I call "cruel neutrality," and I begin, always, with the prosaic awareness that people don't say everything they think, that they may sometimes outright lie but also almost always shape their telling of the truth, and that memory isn't a video recording that can be played but a mysterious process of the human brain, and that we are all blessedly human.

So I'll forgive all the commenters who misread what I wrote and fought me over the idea they got in their head when they read what I wrote. And let me quote a few commenters who were closer to getting what I was saying.

Henry said:

I've got to admit that if I had to say right now, who is more likely to be telling us what is closer to the truth — no stakes, no burden of proof, just who is more likely — I'd have to say her.

Your key phrase is "closer to".

Kavanaugh's problem is that he can't admit to anything. The most innocuous story will be seen as proof of her most serious allegations. "Closer to" could be "I was at a party and tripped and knocked her over and it was pretty embarrassing." That's closer to her story than "I have never done anything like what the accuser describes -- to her or to anyone" but it's still a long long long long way from "I'm an unsuccessful rapist."

Francisco D said:

I am going to give Althouse the benefit of the doubt.

She feels that Christine Blasey Ford is more likely telling the truth.

Althouse is describing an emotional reaction, nothing more. She is not indicating how she has processed the available evidence and what her thoughts on the matter are.

Walk don't run begins with something that isn't close to describing me at all, because it's about performing the role of juror after all the evidence has been presented, when I specifically hypothesized a requirement to suddenly answer a question when there has been no comprehensive presentation of evidence. At a trial, a burden of proof would apply and a defendant would be facing the consequence of a deprivation of liberty. That's not my hypothetical situation.

Anyway, here's how walk don't run begins:

I was a juror in a rape case some years ago. The case should never have never have been brought to court it had so many holes in it. During the deliberations that took a couple of days I outlined 7 aspects of the case that provided reasonable doubt. All of us agreed except one female juror who insisted that she had to convict the accused. Her explanation was that she had been raped and could not find her way not to convict the accused. The facts did not matter to her. It was all an understandable emotion. I think something similar is going on with Althouse.

But I see that walk don't run only says he/she thinks "something similar" is going on with me. It may be similar, but it's also different. I would never abuse the role of juror in a real legal proceeding. The question with Kavanaugh is whether he should be confirmed to a lifetime position as Supreme Court Justice, but even that is outside my hypothetical because that is what is at stake, and I said I'm telling you what I feel without regard to the stakes, and I'm only saying what I think is more likely.

Notice that I could have gone on to examine what I would do if there were never any more evidence than there is right now and it were my job to vote whether or not to confirm Kavanaugh. Nothing in my statement would prevent me from adding that I thought — given all the other evidence of his excellence and good character and the absence of other negative reports — what we've heard about what he may have done when he was 17 and his possibly false denials are not enough to justify a no vote.

Anyway, walk don't run goes on to say:

On the other hand, to give Althouse some slack, Kavanaugh seems just too good to be true - perfect scholar, perfect athlete, perfect coach, perfect husband, perfect father and perfect jurist. I wish he seemed more human with some failings and frailties like the rest of us. I don’t think Althouse likes or trusts that and that perfection strangely makes him less trustworthy in her eyes.

Yes, that's what I wanted to quote. Kavanaugh is vulnerable precisely because he's presented himself as good all the way through. Any hint of a stain wrecks his purity. He's the opposite of the man who nominated him, who's a crazy tie-dye pattern of stains. Nothing shows on that man. It's so annoying to his antagonists, who keep adding to the stain pattern and making it even harder to see any new problem. What has Trump really done that's so bad?, I ask myself from time to time. There are so many stupid things, like saying a hurricane is tremendously wet. I have trouble remembering what (if anything!) is supposed to be so awful. But with the wonderful paragon Kavanaugh, the accusation stands out like a red wine spill on the cream-colored carpet.

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