Biden for President?

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sir drinks-a-lot said:
Wow, I just saw Joe Biden on MSNBC’s Morning Joe and he was sorta getting grilled about the Reade accusations which sorta surprised me. His answers weren't terrible, at least on the portions I saw, but he didn't seem too quick on his toes.

He seems to have softened his position from the Kavanaugh days though. Back then he instructed us to presume that at least the essence of the accuser's claims are real. Nowadays, he says we should vet their claims.
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In that same interview, he rejected a call to release the records of his work as VP.

https://twitter.com/davereaboi/status/1256242980387803137

Even though those records have a direct bearing on his qualifications for office.
 
wareyin said:
Nonsense. You are the one who is claiming that basically nobody is fired, despite the vast number of people who have been fired. Perhaps in whatever professional capacity you work in (lawyer iirc?), at whatever strata you work at, nobody is fired. I'm pretty sure that Reade, as an aide with less than a year of experience would not get the same treatment you seem to think is simply how things are done.
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I am not claiming the universality of my experience. I'm merely claiming that it is common enough that you can't dismiss it as implausible. Even if it is not common to your experience.


I guess we will just have to disagree on whether touching someone's shoulders naturally leads to shoving a finger in their genitals, then.
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Oh, if Joe had only stopped at touching shoulders people wouldn't be calling him creepy joe.

And for others reading: I'm not claiming the accusation is true, I'm claiming the accusation is difficult to refute because of his prior pattern of behavior. I don't think the truth of it matters politically. What matters politically is how he responds. If he responds similarly to prior requests that he stop acting creepy then we have an uphill battle in November.
 
Dr. Keith said:
I don't think the truth of it matters politically. What matters politically is how he responds. If he responds similarly to prior requests that he stop acting creepy then we have an uphill battle in November.
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I think the only reason the truth of it doesn't matter politically is that the truth of it can't be known at this remove, with the available information.

If the truth of it were to become known, I think it would matter politically a whole hell of a lot.
 
theprestige said:
I think the only reason the truth of it doesn't matter politically is that the truth of it can't be known at this remove, with the available information.

If the truth of it were to become known, I think it would matter politically a whole hell of a lot.
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Agree completely.

It is unknowable unless there is some paper trail of Joe admitting it happened but asking others to cover it up. I doubt Joe is that stupid.

Funnily enough, a record of her denying that it happened wouldn't actually rule it out as happening.
 
Dr. Keith said:
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Oh, if Joe had only stopped at touching shoulders people wouldn't be calling him creepy joe.

And for others reading: I'm not claiming the accusation is true, I'm claiming the accusation is difficult to refute because of his prior pattern of behavior.
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But it's also difficult to prove, for that same reason: His past pattern of behavior includes no other accusations of anything like this. It's conceivable that he sexually assaulted one woman one time, and never before or since. But that's not generally how predators behave.
 
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Dr. Keith said:
I am not claiming the universality of my experience. I'm merely claiming that it is common enough that you can't dismiss it as implausible. Even if it is not common to your experience.
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I can certainly claim it is implausible that she quit to move across country with her boyfriend, quit because Washington is mean to Russia, was forced out because she wouldn't serve drinks at an event, and was fired because she accused Biden of sexual assault all from the same job.

She has even recanted the Russian claim, so is it still plausible to you?

Dr. Keith said:
Oh, if Joe had only stopped at touching shoulders people wouldn't be calling him creepy joe.

And for others reading: I'm not claiming the accusation is true, I'm claiming the accusation is difficult to refute because of his prior pattern of behavior. I don't think the truth of it matters politically. What matters politically is how he responds. If he responds similarly to prior requests that he stop acting creepy then we have an uphill battle in November.
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Biden has a pattern of touching people's shoulders/invading personal space. Reade has a pattern of changing and embellishing her story. For Biden, this pattern is evidence enough for you to believe he made the jump to sexual assault. For Reade, this pattern is no reason to think that the latest version of her story is implausible?
 
As I learn more about this accusation, the more I am inclined to fall back on presumption of innocence. He denies it, in no uncertain terms. She says it's true, and there is evidence that she said it many years ago, at approximately the time that it happened, but other than that, there's nothing. Although the story is plausible, there's insufficient evidence to actually reach a conclusion, so in the absence of further evidence, I'm going to say it isn't important.


For the record, that's the same stance I took in the last major "He says. She says" case, and every other similar case I can remember unless I said, "Who cares?"
 
Meadmaker said:
As I learn more about this accusation, the more I am inclined to fall back on presumption of innocence. He denies it, in no uncertain terms. She says it's true, and there is evidence that she said it many years ago, at approximately the time that it happened, but other than that, there's nothing. Although the story is plausible, there's insufficient evidence to actually reach a conclusion, so in the absence of further evidence, I'm going to say it isn't important.


For the record, that's the same stance I took in the last major "He says. She says" case, and every other similar case I can remember unless I said, "Who cares?"
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When people make competing counter-claims, presumption of innocence is a zero-sum game.

If you presume Biden innocent, you must presume Reade is guilty of some pretty disgusting acts.
 
theprestige said:
It's getting to the point where I'm starting to wonder how many people have ever actually had a passionate love affair. I'm not claiming I can unhook a bra one-handed, but I do at least know how clothes work.
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TMI


BTW, this whole argument about what was under the skirt is hardly the incriminating evidence here. The changing story, OTOH, is.
 
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theprestige said:
When people make competing counter-claims, presumption of innocence is a zero-sum game.

If you presume Biden innocent, you must presume Reade is guilty of some pretty disgusting acts.
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Not really.

One can in fact say that 'I don't have enough information, nor can I access enough information, to make a call, therefore I'm going to treat both as innocent,' without assuming guilt.

We can know there is a truth while still acknowledging that access to that truth is outside our abilities. It then falls back to the heuristic that generally it is better to treat a person who in reality is guilty as innocent than it is to treat a person who is in reality innocent as guilty. /50000' view

More specifically 'belief' ('trust', 'finding', etc) can have different levels of certainty and is not actually a binary. Information that you could 'believe enough' to not be friends with a person or not date them wouldn't be enough to say, deny them an unrelated job or imprison them. It is perfectly possible to temper a belief with the power of the action that belief will justify.

Now the fact that none of this is in any way a court of law cannot be overstated, but a great example is that the burden of proof in a civil court can be 'the preponderance of the evidence' because it can't jail you while in a criminal court the level of proof is 'beyond a reasonable doubt' because it can.

Level of confidence isn't an unknown concept.

This is where a lot of 'believe survivors' slogan falls as many slogans fall; it isn't as simply as the slogan. Believe enough for what? To not just call them liars, assume they're just sluts, to actually investigate claims seriously, etc. Things that were done before (and in some cases still are done) didn't believe enough.
 
Dr. Keith said:
Agree completely.

It is unknowable unless there is some paper trail of Joe admitting it happened but asking others to cover it up. I doubt Joe is that stupid.

Funnily enough, a record of her denying that it happened wouldn't actually rule it out as happening.
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Have you read the link posted above to an ex-sex crimes prosecutor's article dissecting Ms. Reade's claims? Thoughts?
https://www.usatoday.com/story/opin...ault-allegation-tara-reade-column/3046962001/
 
Dr. Keith said:
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Funnily enough, a record of her denying that it happened wouldn't actually rule it out as happening.
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How about multiple changing stories?

Linked to twice above: Why I'm skeptical about Reade's sexual assault claim against Biden: Ex-prosecutor
Delayed reporting … twice. ...

Implausible explanation for changing story. ...

People who contradict Reade’s claim. ...

Missing formal complaint. ....

Memory lapse. ....

The lie about losing her job. ...
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Motive:
►Suspect timing. For 27 years, Reade did not publicly accuse Biden of sexually assaulting her. But then Biden's string of March primary victories threw Sanders off his seemingly unstoppable path to the Democratic nomination. On March 25, as Sanders was pondering his political future, Reade finally went public with her claim. The confluence of Reade’s support of Sanders, distaste for the traditional American democracy epitomized by Biden, and the timing of her allegation should give pause to even the most strident Biden critics.
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You're a lawyer Dr K, what do you think about this collection of events/incidents with a lot more holes than not?
 
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