@hightor,
Didn't Allred trot out a
half-truth?
This is what lawyers are paid to do: The ones who defend the innocent and the guilty; the accused and the accusers, the male creeps and the women who decades latter try to cash in on a trauma that never existed.
I believe that it is virtually certain that Moore is guilty of being a man in his 30's who lusted after and pursued nubile High School age girls. Personally, I find such behavior inappropriate, disturbing and probably indicative of some serious psychological flaw, but is it illegal? Probably not unless sexual activity results and then depending upon the age of the nubile teen and the laws of the given state. I don't have any problem with these laws and the arbitrary selection of the age of consent unless they are used in full force against teenaged boys. I don't know the Alabama statute at the time and I don't care to learn about it. If Moore in his 30's violated the statute of the time, he was guilty. That he was an ADA makes it worse.
It's important to point out though that nubile teens, by definition, are sexually mature. I agree with the concept that they may not be intellectually or mature enough to form a truly rationally based consent, and that society, therefore, should make some effort to protect them from the exploitation of adult males, but, again, the ages selected are arbitrary and there is nothing magic about them. A nubile 15-year-old isn't suddenly transformed into a young woman who is not only sexually mature, but emotionally and intellectually as well, on her 16th birthday. For most of human history, nubile teens have been getting married and mating. Juliette Capulet was what? 14 or 15 years old? Today in many places around the world this continues to occur and in some places, sexually
immature girls are married off to lecherous old men (But not to worry, the old goats always wait until after the young bride has her first menstruation).
I don't know if this is true, but I recently heard someone contend that when these incidents took place, that in one or more states, the legal age for a woman to marry was 15. Unless one of those states was Alabama, it's immaterial in terms of whether or not Moore violated any laws, but it does provide context and underscores the arbitrary aspect of the age limits.
I don't know enough about the Nelson case to judge her veracity, but I doubt very much she did not welcome the attention of a 30 something man with power and money that far exceeded anything possessed by the acne afflicted teenage boys in her high school. This is not a criticism of her morality at the time. This sort of thing happens all of the time. When I was in HS, one of the hottest girls in my class had an affair with an English teacher. He was a nasty brute, and I could never understand why she had been seduced (especially since she had no shortage of teenage admirers)
Years after graduation I was at a party which
Hot Cathy also attended and at some point she actually brought up her affair with Mr. Brute. She wondered if everyone in school had known about it, and I told her that everyone in school had heard about it whether or not it was true, and everyone assumed it was. I didn't know if I wanted to hear it confirmed or denied. If she hadn't been having sex with the guy, I would have been one of the students spreading false rumors, but if she had, it would have reawakened the revulsion (and I suppose to some degree jealousy) I had felt back in school. In any case, she confirmed she had and I couldn't help myself; I asked her how and why?!
She told me that she thought it was cool to be having an affair with a) An adult (probably 30 to 35) b) a married man and c) one of the teachers. She said he wrote her poetry (of course!) and spent a lot of money on her. She also recalled with real fondness that he told her things. Secrets that only the teachers knew about other teachers and a lot of the students. The two of them, apparently, had great fun ridiculing his peers and hers. She had been invited into
The Know. I couldn't bring myself to ask her if he was any good in bed and she never volunteered her assessment.
Obviously, this doesn't excuse anything Moore might have done, with Nelson or any of his other accusers, and if the accusations are only partially true and he
only pursued nubile teens, that alone would be enough for him to lose my vote. It may have been decades previously, but, in my experience, a person's character seldom drastically changes for the better; even over decades. Plus he continues, rather clumsily, to deny it ever happened, let alone express regret. That he might have actually had sex with them would be worse, but it wouldn't, in my view, put him in the same category as a rapist or sexual abuser of children, as so many of his critics have.
A very important element of this discussion (and all the others involving men who of have been accused of sexual impropriety, but deny it happened) is that none of the accusations have been proven. We don't have a photo of him grabbing Nelson's boobs or an admission from him that he once or twice grabbed a woman's ass. Personally, I think that what we do know strongly suggests he's guilty of some improprieties and they might actually have involved statute violations, but that's opinion. The only ones who know for certain what actually happened appear to be Moore and his accusers. You can't throw the guy in jail on the basis of an accusation alone, and I would argue, you shouldn't attempt to punish him in some other fashion (Such as forcing him to withdraw from his current race, or, as in other cases, pressuring resignation) In the case of Moore, if you live in Alabama you get to use what you know about all of this in your decision making about whether or not to vote for him. That is perfectly fair game and can't be prevented in any case. He is running to represent the people of Alabama, not the whole country. It's their decision to make, not folks who live in NY, Maine, Georgia or California. The latter can have their opinions about him, but they are just that. Too many people in this country are trying to stick their noses in their neighbors' business.
I think you will have to admit that whatever type of a creep Moore is, it is in the best interests of the Dems to make him seem like the biggest of all creeps...bigger than Weinstein, Rose, Spacey and most of all, Al Franken, and that they and their surrogates in the media are trying to do just that.
It seems to me to be silly arguing over the number and magnitude of creeps in the respective parties when both contain creeps. Better to find a way to get rid of them all (not providing them with party support for election or re-election for example), doing a better job resisting the urge to run creeps who look like they will win,
AND stop protecting them when their creepy actions become known! This congressional slush fund used to pay off victims of abuse is a travesty, no matter which party's members use it, and just another reason why Congress has lost the trust and respect of the American people.
For the longest time, I've been uncomfortable with mandatory term limits because I think voters should have the right to re-elect a corrupt idiot as many times as they want, but the mess is too big and term limits will be a big help in cleaning it up.
As for Nelson's case, she lied in public or at least was not forthcoming with the truth because she didn't want to have to explain why she altered the inscription. That's on her and to the extent it gives people reason to doubt her entire claim, AND Moore's lawyers the ammo they crave to make her look bad, it's her fault and not anyone else's. It didn't have to play out that way. Of course that her lawyer let her do it, or didn't care to work hard enough to find the holes in her claim, is inexcusable and speaks very, very poorly for Allred. Apparently, Allred was once a fine lawyer with principle, but now she seems to spend more time on her make-up before a TV conference than her clients' cases
