In case you missed the back storey involving all of Bill Clinton’s “sexual misconduct”.

 

https://www.vox.com/2016/1/6/10722580/bill-clinton-juanita-broaddrick

In case you missed the back storey involving all of Bill Clinton’s “sexual misconduct”. It would be nice if the left was consistent, and this is one reason they can’t be taken seriously, we only believe “all women” when accusations are made about conservatives. Where is the #MeToo movement.

My whole way of thinking changed during the Duke Lacrosse shenanigans. I believe now each allegation should be taken seriously and left to a jury to decide, not the public.

"Every survivor of sexual assault deserves to be heard, believed, and supported," – Hillary Clinton

Direct Quotes:

Clinton has faced multiple allegations of sexual assault and harassment, most famously his affair with Monica Lewinsky — which, while consensual in some sense, was nonetheless textbook sexual harassment of a subordinate of a kind that would (or perhaps more accurately, should) get many CEOs fired from their companies

Paula Jones, a former Arkansas state employee, sued Clinton during his presidency for allegedly exposing himself to her when he was governor in 1991. Kathleen Willey claims that Clinton fondled her breast and forced her hand on his crotch in the Oval Office in 1993, when she was a White House volunteer.

Most seriously of all, Juanita Broaddrick claims that Clinton raped her during his 1978 campaign for Arkansas governor.

the Juanita Broaddrick case is the hardest one for admirers of Bill Clinton. Her allegation has never been definitively refuted. Only she and Bill Clinton know what the truth of the matter in the case is. But if one generally believes it's important to believe the victim, it's hard to argue that this case should be an exception.

Juanita Broaddrick gave a lengthy account of her alleged rape in a 1999 Dateline NBC interview

The interview was conducted on January 20, 1999, before the Senate ultimately acquitted Clinton on charges related to his affair with Monica Lewinsky on February 12.

In 1978, Broaddrick was volunteering for Clinton's gubernatorial campaign

they spent only a few minutes chatting by the window -- Clinton pointed to an old jail he wanted to renovate if he became governor -- before he began kissing her. She resisted his advances, she said, but soon he pulled her back onto the bed and forcibly had sex with her. She said she did not scream because everything happened so quickly. Her upper lip was bruised and swollen after the encounter because, she said, he had grabbed onto it with his mouth.

"The last thing he said to me was, 'You better get some ice for that.' And he put on his sunglasses and walked out the door," she recalled.

Several friends of Broaddrick's backed up the story.

"[Hillary] came directly to me as soon as she hit the door. I had been there only a few minutes, I only wanted to make an appearance and leave. She caught me and took my hand and said 'I am so happy to meet you. I want you to know that we appreciate everything you do for Bill.' I started to turn away and she held onto my hand and reiterated her phrase -- looking less friendly and repeated her statement — 'Everything you do for Bill'. I said nothing. She wasn't letting me get away until she made her point. She talked low, the smile faded on the second thank you. I just released her hand from mine and left the gathering." Blumenthal also cites reporting from Conason and Lyons suggesting that Broaddrick had asked the Van Buren Press Argus-Courier, her local paper, to photograph her nursing home in 1990 upon the visit of Gov. Bill Clinton. "This was hardly the attitude of a rape victim toward her predator," Blumenthal writes. This assertion, that a "true" rape victim would cut off all contact with their rapist, is rather misleading and pernicious, and maintaining contact with an alleged assailant is hardly proof that a victim is lying. "It is common for victims to maintain contact with their abusers because they may still feel affection for them even though they hate the abuse," according to the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape. "It is also common for some victims to maintain contact in an attempt to regain control over their assault. Others may maintain contact in an attempt to regain a feeling of normalcy."

Given the prevailing view among many progressives — including Hillary Clinton — that one should default to believing rape accusers, the Broaddrick allegation thus poses a problem. Michelle Goldberg, then at Slate, explained the conundrum well in a piece from December 2015:

Today, feminists have repeatedly and convincingly made the case that when women say they’ve been sexually assaulted, we should assume they’re telling the truth. Particularly when it comes to Broaddrick, it’s not easy to square the arguments against believing her with the dominant progressive consensus on trusting victims.

But today, few feminists would find her shifting story disqualifying.

Speaking to Klein, she says she was traumatized and blamed herself for what happened. "I felt responsible. I don’t know if you know the mentality of women and men at that time. But me letting him come to my room? I accepted full blame." In any other context, most feminists today would find this credible. After all, many were outraged when rape skeptics tried to discredit Columbia student Emma Sulkowicz because she’d sent friendly Facebook messages to her alleged rapist after the alleged rape.

There is a crucial tension between "believe

survivors" and the "Juanita Broaddrick is lying" position of some Clinton defenders, lacking further information. When Hillary Clinton tweeted during the campaign that "Every survivor of sexual assault deserves to be heard, believed, and supported," it’s reasonable to ask if that’s true of Juanita Broaddrick, too.

#USA #TheChubbyCaucasianChristianClosetedConservative #Clinton #BillClinton