Today’s Senate Judiciary hearing on allegations of sexual assault by Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh was a milestone in the continuing disintegration of our institutions.

You probably watched the testimony so you have your own view of who is telling the truth. This is a classic “he said, she said.”

Dr. Christine Blasey Ford said she is “100 percent” certain the assault on her was by Kavanaugh. Kavanaagh testified that he’s “100 percent” certain he has never committed such an offense in his life.

She was clearly terrified giving her testimony. He was just as clearly angry and emotional, tearing up or choking up through his testimony.

Which was real?

My guess is both were real. Neither could act that well. The question is, what motivated those emotions. Dr. Ford was stepping onto a stage she did not seek, testifying literally in front of the nation. Judge Kavanaugh has held that stage before, but never as an accused sexual offender whose personal life and career were on the line and had already suffered major hits.

You choose who you believe.  Unfortunately, if you’re a senator you must choose who to believe because the Senate is going to vote on this nomination.

When Dr. Ford's testimony ended, I thought there was no way Sen. LIsa Murkowski or Sen. Susan Collins could vote in Kavanaugh's favor, so convincing was she. But then Kavanaugh came on, his angry up front and personal. And his partisan attacks began.

Personally, I believe her. From the first mention of her name, I could not understand what she had to gain from going public. She isn’t going to get a book deal, her own radio show or whatever out of this. In fact, she and her family have become targets of insults and threats and she was escorted around by a large security guard.

Kavanaugh has a life-time appointment at stake. His emotions clearly were real. He was choked up and tearing up in a manner you can’t fake. His anger and partisan attacks though were just as real. He was on the attack from minute one. Was it true outrage over the process? Was it the anger of an entitled man expecting his entitlement to sit on the Supreme Court?

This was not a criminal trial. It was, as was said, more of a job interview. I think he failed that interview. Even if he is innocent of the charge being leveled against him, the temperament he demonstrated was not the demeanor I expect of a Supreme Court justice. I get the anger. But the partisan nature of his attacks were not appropriate for a Court nominee.

Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t expect him to take it lying down but he brought a “left wing conspiracy” into play, something that no doubt appeals to President Trump who had thought Kavanaugh was being too wimpy in his response to the charge. He was clearly on the attack. Is that his true nature? Was a performance for the President who thought he was too wimpy up to today?

Well, he wasn’t wimpy during the hearing. He also was not Supreme Court material.

Dr. Christine Blasey Ford who is accusing Supreme Court nominee Bret Kavanaugh of a sexual attack is being attacked herself for many things. A short list:

1. How can she remember 35 years later whose drunk body was grinding against hers as he tried to remove her clothes and she was trying to fight him off?
2. If she can sign a letter opposing President Trump’s southern border policies, of course she’d accuse someone of sexually attacking her as a way to get back at him.
3. What took her so long to all of a sudden remember this episode?

Those are just a few. Never having been the victim of such an attack, let me try logically to answer those questions:

1. Who could forget?
2. Because I can oppose a politician’s position without coming up with a sexual abuse lie as a way to get back at him and ruin my life in the process
3. Traumatic events have traumatic effects and she remembered this alleged attack long before the last few months

But this is what it’s come to in our society. Over the last few days at least one Facebook friend has been posting whining about the information coming out on Kavanaugh, even the more ridiculous left-wing media stuff, and snarkily responding about what teenage boys do or probably did as if that makes it okay. (I once was a teenage boy. I never tried to rape someone.)

I believe the left-wing media as much as I believe the right-wing media – they angle stories to appeal to their readerships, be they on the left or right. They want clicks. They want eyeballs. They care less about the truth and fairness. than they care about clicks.

And for those who say in response “oh yeah, what about CNN or The New York Times?” I say…Lord, really? If you really think men and women sit around the Times and CNN all day and make up stories to further a political agenda…then there’s no use trying to get you to open your mind to Dr. Ford possibly telling the truth. You’re too far gone already. And, I don't believe they do that at Fox either. I think Fox's problem is the talking heads they have pretty much support Trump, and that's where the misinformation comes from. The same may be said at the other cable news networks -- but for all of them, that's talking about folks paid to give their opinions. The people paid to get the news try to do it as fairly and accurately as they can. And, yes, they do make mistakes.

And readers such as this Facebook friend pick it up and repeat it. All the while not thinking, apparently, for one minute that maybe Dr. Ford is telling the truth, just knee-jerk being against her. If she is telling the truth, do you want a man who attempted to rape a 15-year-old, whatever his age was, on the Supreme Court? Do you want a man who lied about it to the U.S. Senate while testifying to be approved to the Supreme Court?

I don’t know who is telling the truth here. I tend to lean toward Dr. Ford because it’s hard for me to believe anyone would put herself out in public with this information for a bunch of reasons ranging from what she knew would happen – death threats, threats against her family,  attacks on her integrity. Why ruin your life to try to ruin another’s?

Maybe it was someone else who attacked her but it’s hard to believe she’s making up the attack. Because … well, why? And not liking Donald Trump, I’m sorry, is not a good enough reason. Who would do that and for what purpose? To stop a Supreme Court nominee knowing that even if Kavanaugh withdraws, the next nominee likely will be more to the right of center than he is? It just doesn’t make sense to make up this type of story.

Therefore, it needs to be investigated.  The accusation cannot be ignored. And if that stalls a vote on a lifetime appointment, so be it. I'd rather we not confirm someone who doesn't deserve to be confirmed. And if I were Judge Kavanaugh, that's what I'd want to. No cloud over my lifetime appointment. 

And if it isn't appropriate for the FBI do conduct that investigation (though I don't know why not) then hire outsiders to do it. One named by the Democrats and one by the Republicans, if necessary.

I have to/want to believe there are enough people in this country – from the left, right and center -- who want to get to the bottom of this. 

Watching the Trump saga unfold is a lot like watching a crime family implode.

• His friend, former lawyer, fixer and a guy who once said, “I’d take a bullet for Mr. Trump” yesterday implicated him, under oath, as a felon. Then again all he did was say the same thing Trump’s incompetent lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, said in a court filing some weeks ago – that Trump directed Michael Cohen to pay off a woman accusing Trump of having an affair with her as a way shut her up to influence the election.
• His former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, was found guilty of eight counts of tax evasion and other crimes, and the jury couldn’t come to agreement on 10 other charges, which could be retried. He faces what would amount to the rest of his life in prison. He hasn’t spilled his guts to the special counsel yet but he has that option, which could reduce his sentence.
  
• The first two congressmen to endorse Trump are under indictment for their own, unrelated sins (by the way, the third congressmen to endorse Trump was his attorney general and former senator, Jeff Sessions.)
• At least five have pleaded guilty in the special counsel’s probe -- most prominently, his former national security adviser Michael Flynn and former Trump campaign aide Rick Gates, who are both cooperating with Mueller. Alex van der Zwaan, a Dutch lawyer who pleaded guilty to lying to the special counsel. A bunch of Russians have been indicted and it is clear to all, except Donald Trump, that Russia meddled in our election.
  

You also have to wonder, of course, about the President claiming he's not concerned about people "flipping" on him because he's done nothing wrong. Cohen proved that was another lie yesterday. Plus, Trump's tweets this morning clearly show how upset he is with Cohen, thus there are things for folks to flip about, it would appear.

Did Trump and/or his people collude with the Russians? No real proof yet is public unless you count that Trump Tower meeting with a Russian lawyer and others with Trump’s son and  son-in-law and Manafort, where dirt on Hillary Clinton was promised but not delivered.

Special Counsel Robert Mueller, the Eliot Ness of the story, is methodically doing his job. He just keeps plodding along buoyed by the fact he is fighting to correct injustices (by the way, just because his investigation is focused on Russia messing in our election doesn’t mean he can ignore other crimes he comes across – like Manafort’s and Cohen’s). Trump tweets, Mueller stays silent. You cannot ruffle Mueller that way.

Trump has tweeted already this morning, among them:

• Regarding Manafort: “A large number of counts, ten, could not even be decided in the Paul Manafort case. 'Witch Hunt!'' and “I feel very badly for Paul Manafort and his wonderful family. ‘Justice’ took a 12 year old tax case, among other things, applied tremendous pressure on him and, unlike Michael Cohen, he refused to “break” - make up stories in order to get a “deal.” Such respect for a brave man!” 
  
• Regarding Cohen: “Michael Cohen plead guilty to two counts of campaign finance violations that are not a crime. President Obama had a big campaign finance violation and it was easily settled!” and “If anyone is looking for a good lawyer, I would strongly suggest that you don’t retain the services of Michael Cohen!”
  
  

Manafort and Cohen’s cases are about financial crimes having nothing to do with Russia meddling directly. A difference is the crime boss in this case also is the President of the United States and he has pardon power.

While eventually Trump could pardon Manafort, I don't think it's a rue thing.  Nor will he pardon Cohen (Cohen's already betrayed him). His morning tweets could be a message that a pardon could come, but likely not until after Manafort's next trial next month. Still, facing the rest of his life in jail, Manafort could decide to cooperate with Mueller. For Cohen, Giuliani, in his statement yesterday said, “It is clear that, as the prosecutor noted, Mr. Cohen’s actions reflect a pattern of lies and dishonesty over a significant period of time.”

Even though Trump is known to contradict his Cabinet members, aides and even himself, you would think Giuliani’s statement and the President's tweets preclude Trump from then saying. “Michael is a good guy and even though he threw me under the bus, and is a chronic liar, I’m pardoning him.” 

Oy.

So, what happens next? Who knows? Department of Justice guidelines don’t allow a sitting President to be indicted, though he could be after his term(s) ends.

Impeachment is still an unknown because while many GOP members are not fans of Trump, they do seriously fear Trump’s base, which could vote them out of their jobs, which they are holding more important than their country right now.

On top of that, the impeachment process begins in the House which charges the President but the trial is held in the Senate. The charging does not toss the president out of office. The conviction, though, can. At the moment, the GOP has a two-vote majority in the Senate. One or two vote switches and...well, we'll wait to see if that's even a factor later.

This is just one reason the mid-terms are important. The Democrats need to control both Houses to even think about removing the president from office.

Trump's base is unlikely to fold after this development.  Most of these folks, however, have logical minds and this is one major blow to Trump’s credibility. He has lied repeatedly to the country about  many things but at minimum, the Stormy Daniels Affair (pardon the double meaning). We’ll see what the polls say but I’m not feeling a folding of his support yet. It should soften some though.

Then again, I double-checked and it’s only Wednesday, and I haven't watched the news yet so anything is possible!

President Trump has gone full Orwell.

As he pointed at the media in the room, he told a convention of veterans yesterday: “What you’re seeing and what you’re reading is not what’s happening.”

Orwell said, “The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”

So, it doesn’t seem Orwellian, it is Orwellian

Our President now tells us not to be believe what we see and hear. He will do that for us. Sound like other strongmen you know?

I still believe my own eyes, as I’m sure you do. And my eyes tell me that Trump has reached a new, even more dangerous stage.

This really is happening.

When he first took office he seemed overwhelmed (understandably). He hired advisors who he could depend on to keep him on the straight and narrow, so to speak. Now, though, he is shedding himself of those men and women and appointing in their places lap dogs. Those waiting in line to take those jobs (as short a line as it may be) have seen what happened to those who preceded them when they asserted their roles and gave honest advice. It was ignored and they were gone.

We all saw the “hostage video” the other day of Trump trying to read a correction for what we all saw with our eyes and heard with our ears: Trump believing Vladimir Putin over his own intelligence agencies. As he struggled, like a 4th grader, to explain he meant “wouldn’t” instead of “would,” or vice versa, it makes no dffierence, we saw what a different person he becomes, like the rest of us, when we are doing something we’re forced do to. We do it without conviction.

If you go to a presidential speech, as yesterday’s was (it was NOT a political rally, well, uh, unless you believe your own eyes and ears) you are not watching a show, you are witnessing a strongman tell you he will be your eyes and ears. He will tell you what’s good and bad for you.

His audience yesterday was thousands of American war veterans. Many of those veterans served on missions where reporters accompanied them. Missions where soldiers were lost. Reporters were, too. Martha Raddatz, a veteran war correspondent with ABC News, wrote about it yesterday. She was with them in the field, riding in the fighter jets to get eyewitness accounts for those of us back home, taking the same risks as the military men and women she accompanied. Suffice it to say, I believe her eyes and ears when she risks her life to report to me what’s really going on.

Many vets had reporters trailing them, experiencing the same hail of bullets or bombs they did. Demonstrating bravery to get their job done. The President, on the other hand, avoided military service with foot spurs. And now he talks like a veteran, like someone who served with them. He didn’t. But reporters did.
 
In fact, after the speech, the VFW issued a statement that said, in part: "“We rely on the media to spread the VFW message, and @CNN, @NBCNews, @ABC, @FoxNews, @CBSNews, & others on site today, were our invited guests. We were happy to have them there.”

On the trade front, Trump tells us the USA lost $817 billion in cash last year because we ran trade deficits with many countries, demonstrating that while he avoided military service he also wasn’t paying attention in his economics classes because that isn’t true either. Trade deficits are not a zero sum gain. So, he sinks us into a trade war even his fellow Republicans don’t want and now feels obligated to bail out the farmers who were hurt by his policy – because they are key in the states he won in 2016.

How? We put tariffs on other countries, they put tariffs on us. The most important products are always selected in such trade wars (one of which helped sink us into the depression nearly 70 years ago, thank you Mr. Smoot and Mr. Hawley). In this case, they’ve selected our farmers who, as luck would have it, are largely in states won by Trump in 2016, directly threatening Trump and his popularity.

Farmers don’t want to be in a position to accept a government bailout, they want open markets to sell to. And Trump is not opening markets. And the program he is using to filter that money to farmers was a program his budget cut! And it was a program to protect farmers against a bad crop year, not a bad presidential policy.

On the “witch hunt” front, Trump’s “lawyer” Rudy Giuliani is putting out transcripts of phone calls Trump’s former “lawyer” Michael Cohen had demonstrating Trump did know about payments to a Playboy model he had an affair with, despite all his denials of such a thing.  As does Trump, Giuliani gives his own interpretation of those transcripts reinforcing that we should not believe our own eyes and ears but trust his lying eyes.

Then we hear that Trump’s reaction to this news was shock that Cohen recorded him. “How could he do that to me?” Trump reportedly told his advisors.

As pieces of Trump’s “narrative” are falling apart in front of our eyes, he gets his back up even more. It’s what worked for him in his business career. He threatened, he barked, he called names and, somehow, he created an image as someone who made billions of dollars. Something we can’t prove or disprove because he will not release his tax records, despite saying he would once the IRS “audit” was over. Believe me, there is no audit pending this long. He just is lying.

Lying works for him, though. His approval rate among Republicans is sky high. I’m no polling expert but using anecdotal evidence, those Republican ranks have shrunk because many of us left the party when Trump took over. As we depress ourselves over the numbers, remember that both the Republican and Democratic registrations have been declining over the years. And Independents have grown – they make the difference in campaigns now, if they vote.

Which gets me away from the major point today: Trump is feeling more confident in his role. That’s partly because he basically watches and believes Fox News’ talking heads who are in the tank for Trump.  Who tell him he is the best President since sliced bread. Trump likes to put himself in the same GOP category of successful presidents as Abe Lincoln. Except Lincoln freed the slaves. He built America, he didn’t run it down.

Reporters for outlets like CNN, NBC, CBS, ABC, The Washington Post, The New York Times and others are doing amazing work these days. Trump, via an unintended consequence, has made reporters better than they were before. Those reporters are our eyes and ears.

Thank the Lord.