this is playing out nearly the same as thomas/hill. well, on steroid, but still....
thomas had some disqualifying issues before hill came along.
mostly it centered around his mere 19 months of experience as a judge. he was best known as the head of the eeoc, where he mostly went easy on businesses who discriminated and did away with class action suits.
one key problem therefore was that he had *way* less experience as a judge than the norm.
the other key problem was that he was widely suspected of being a stealth right-wing partisan. at the time, presidents tried not to choose obviously partisan justices, even though it was an open secret that they all had a preferred leaning. the theory here was that thomas had an extremely limited "paper trail" documenting his political leanings, so opponents wouldn't really be able to organize a big protest.
then anita hill came along and it all turned into a circus. calm, sober, completely believable accusations of inappropriate behavior, but the dynamic changed, turning the question from "is he qualified" or "is he appropriate for the court" to "shouldn't we give him the benefit of the doubt?"
thomas got angry (nowhere near as angry as kavanaugh, but still) denied everything, and proclaimed himself the victim of false accusations (and a "high-tech lynching", as if technology or his blackness had anything to do with democrats or anita hill objecting to him).
it was stupid, but it worked, and people inexplicably stopped caring that he only had a year and a have of judicial experience and appeared to be way to partisan than was the normal for that era. people only cared about whether or not he was provably guilty of sexual harassment beyond a reasonable doubt -- and if no, then he must get a lifetime appointment to the highest court in the land.
kavanaugh is playing out the exact same way, albeit on steroids, in the trumpian, over-the-top offensive way.
no one cares how horribly inappropriate he is for the court completely aside from the sex crimes allegations. somehow, republicans once again denied everything and proclaimed themselves the victims and once again the only question became "can it be proved beyond a reasonable doubt, and if not, he much be confirmed to the court for life."
the whole process has been kavanauseating. how horrible it is that 27 years later the same episode plays out nearly the same way, but somehow even worse?
