testimony

We don't have much in the way of cable-only channels, so I wasn't expecting to watch the Christine Blasey Ford testimony, but I found a feed embedded in the Washington Post home page (we have paid access to that paper), and I picked it up during DiFi's time. They're on lunch break right now. Thoughts.

1. Each senator gets only five minutes, except Chairman Grassley who gets to interject whenever he wants. Whenever a Democrat complains about the lack of an FBI investigation, Grassley takes a time out afterwards to defend himself. When one senator (I think it was Leahy) complained of the rush, Grassley said there would have been plenty of time to hold an investigation before Ford's identity was revealed, if only DiFi had been willing to pass that along to the committee. He assures that Ford's identity would have been protected, but he also twice misspeaks and talks about telling the whole world about it, which reveals how much his assurance of privacy would have been worth.

2. No other Republicans have talked at all, so far. Probably wise on their part: no feet in mouth. They all yield their time to the majority's hired lawyer, who - also wisely - concentrates on establishing details of facts in Ford's account. She sounds less like a prosecutor than a neutral investigator. Again probably wise: prosecutorial attacks would probably not go over well.

3. When asked about her reactions to the assault, Ford speaks in the voice of a traumatized victim, which comes across movingly, except when she suddenly switches gears and gives the technical responses of a psychology professor, which comes across authoritatively.

4. Some of the Democrats, Leahy and Durbin in particular, don't have much in the way of questions. They just want to give speeches about how courageous she is, which is kind of embarrassing when delivered to her face.

testimony 2

I watched parts of Kavanaugh's testimony, and was sorry I did.

Not only did he ramble around into irrelevancies and repeat himself incessantly when avoiding answering questions, he did the same things when he was answering the question, even if the question was a simple one to which we already knew the answer, like "Did you drink alcohol in high school?" (And notice how he danced around acknowledging that it was illegal for 16-year-olds to do.) Never mind the charges, he should be dismissed from consideration for inability to communicate alone.

Also, someone that angry - and that nakedly partisan - should not be a judge of any description. Just no.

And if this were a criminal trial and he the defendant, that amount of anger on display over the charges and the way it was disrupting his life would have any trial judge throwing him in the can.

You want to know what it was like without having to watch or listen to it? Alexandra Petri has caught it.