General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Would everyone take a deep breather and Chill the F**K OUT! [View all]BlueWI
(1,736 posts)Al Franken is a sitting senator, and there is a process for investigating ethics violations in that institution, and there are punishments, including censure, and probably even a process of removal from office.
That investigative process had begun. I am of a similar mind to, most likely, around 100% of the people supporting Franken on DU who would be in agreement with investigating the claims. Even Al Franken originally welcomed this in a statement of contrition that, to my knowledge, Moore has not done. Would you agree?
The fiasco comes when a group of 38 Democratic senators decides to invent their own process and pressure Franken to resign, with little public deliberation, despite the fact that he is duly and legally elected from another state - a blue state, in fact, that is trending purple in part because of the general inability of the national Democratic party to extend its base beyond its traditional strongholds. This comes in just over a year when the party got its clocks cleaned by one Donald Trump, with the help of Russian hackers, but also with a failure to run a competitive race in about 2/3 of the land mass of this country.
I really couldn't care less about how fair the media is to Roy Moore, because I'm partisan, because character matters (and I don't see that Roy Moore has the support of women that he actually worked with, quite the opposite for Al Franken), because I'm a black man and I despise the persistence of segregationist mindsets, and because I think the false equivalencies between Moore (a reactionary Republican candidate) and Franken (a liberal Democratic senator) are rife in the way these issues are discussed, even on DU. If Moore were a senator, faced these accusations, and advocated in public for an investigation, as Franken has done, that would seem reasonable to me, at least if I were in favor of Roy Moore. I am absolutely not in favor of Roy Moore, and he has his own core of people to defend him or support him.
I'm sure you're aware of the news accounts of each accuser and possible points about their credibility or the severity of what is claimed. Personally, I do not write (even on the internet) or speak with certainty about accusations against public figures - I actually do try to avoid this, since I do know a number of legislators in my area from both sides of the aisle. I think everyone should try to avoid this.