Clearly, Minnesota Republicans believe they’ve struck gold with Keith Ellison. As Dave Orrick of the Pioneer Press put it in a Labor Day story,
“Keith Ellison, Keith Ellison, Keith Ellison. It’s all about Keith Ellison, at least according a Republican narrative as part of the first wave of what promises to be a tide of political attack ads coming to Minnesota’s 2018 election season. Even in races where Ellison isn’t running, from the U.S. Senate high on the ballot down to state House races, he’s under attack.”
Not that this should come as a big surprise, the game of politics being what it is. To reiterate: in the midst of the #MeToo moment, arguably the largest and most significant cultural revolution going this decade, and minutes before last month’s primary election, Ellison was accused by the son of a woman — his live-in lady friend — of bad behavior, specifically of raging at her and dragging her off a bed during a domestic dispute.
That kind of thing never sounds good, even though no one outside of the two, uh, combatants has any real idea of what else was going on at the time that incident supposedly happened. (The son was not present during the alleged altercation.)
It is of course that “supposed” business where things got funky. Namely, there’s the fact the woman/victim (A:) claims it happened and (B:) she has video of it, but (C:) refuses to let anyone see it on the grounds that, (D:) as a self-proclaimed victim the public should simply believe her, fully accept her accusation and punish Ellison accordingly.
With apologies to Al Franken, #MeToo is morally weakened when we get to a point where women are under no obligation to prove their accusations.
For his part, Ellison has been startlingly emphatic. He says what she says not only never happened, but that no such video exists, two remarkably definitive statements that mean instant career death and permanent reputational ignominy if either are ever proven false. If he’s lying, it’s a gamble of mortal proportions.
(If the video does exist, the woman could quite easily strike a deal with journalists of her choosing to allow them to view it and verify it without posting it for public consumption.)
I’ve only met Ellison a couple of times, once for a fairly long interview prior to him being elected to Congress. My takeaway impression was that of an engaging, bright, cocky guy with plenty sufficient ego to endure a career in politics, where every adversary’s first order of business is to convince the public you’re come kind a cross between a liar, a pervert and a thief.
So, yeah. This latest thing is politics as usual.
But an interesting facet of this episode is the way standard issue Republicans, not Trumpist goobers, have so avidly seized on it as a talking point. While domestic abuse is always a potent political weapon, in this case once you’ve finished smirking at the outrage coming from the lips of folks never exactly in the vanguard of the women’s rights movement, you’re also reminded of their intense desire for anything … anything … that distracts the conversation from their complicity in the presence of Donald Trump in the White House.
I’ve been noting with some amusement how adamant traditional Republicans — and by that I mean familiar, neighborly, civic-minded old-school conservative types — are to urge focus on local matters. To my ears, their passion for city and state issues has never been more committed.
And not that that is ever a bad thing. If there is a “Pink Wave” this November, with hundreds/thousands of female candidates swarming into elected office, that movement is swelling from the neighborhoods up and I’m entirely comfortable saying that the overall system will be stabilized we’ll all be much better off thanks to that kind of street level passion.
My point is really only how embarrassment and discomfort with Trump, and traditional Republicans’ essential role in failing to respond to his flagrant bigotry, misogyny and lack of qualifications in 2016 is manifesting itself two years later. As I say, these are people deservedly proud of the level of responsibility and good judgment they’ve shown throughout their adult lives.
But IMHO, there is a palpable sense of their mortification over how badly their judgment failed them — and all of us — in 2016. And, as I say, you feel this in their desire to ignore the Trump trickle-down effect in their 2018 local issues and candidates and keep polite conversations confined to zones more traditional and comfortable for them.
If you call for Keith Ellison to step aside, don’t you have to call for Donald Trump to step aside?
Even if true, having a loud, nasty domestic fight — without assault-level violence — doesn’t come close to all the crap Trump has pulled for pretty much all of his adult life. But to your point, (and mine), Republicans are flailing about trying to avoid any reference to or discussion of their party’s leader.
I want to believe women when they come forward, however, the former girlfriend states that there is a video of the incident. My question is who was filming that video. We so often forget when we are viewing these videos or even just talking about them that someone had to be actively filming it. One why was someone filming at that time? Two they are also a witness.
From what I’ve read Ms. Monahan was filming it. Her son only saw it on a computer, or at least that’s what he’s saying.
Seem like it’s piled higher and deeper. Just show it or shut up.
Republicans have a good issue here, at a time when they don’t have many good issues at their disposal.
DFL leaders and candidates are in a really difficult spot. To the large number of voters who aren’t willing or able to parse the details of the various accusations, DFLers look like phony hypocrites for condemning Trump, Moore, Meehan, Barton, and others, but not Ellison. The fact that Ellison is a black, Muslim darling of the DNC makes it juicy for turning out the racist parts of the Trump voting block. The seeming hypocrisy also could make it difficult for moderate Republican #MeToo-ers to vote for Ellison-backing DFLers.
We can scream all we want that “the circumstances of Trump and Ellison aren’t comparable,” the reality is many voters will think of them as equivalent or near equivalent.
At the same time, if DFLers abandoned Ellison while the video evidence is withheld from even a private review by a credible third party, it would enrage a lot of folks, including Franken-loving progressives with fresh scar tissue from the Franken resignation.
As Texas politician Jim Hightower famously said, “there’s nothing in the middle of the road but yellow stripes and dead armadillos.” On Ellison, DFL leaders are trapped in the middle of the road.
O sage one, you are on to something once again. Democrats are in a pickle largely of their own making, should they dump Ellison based on merely an accusation. L’affaire Franken was built primarily on the “proof” of his goofball photo on the airplane — which played off Ms. Tweeden’s role on the USO trip as the eye candy/foil with big boobs. No other bona fide proof was offered, and that was sufficient in the Roy Moore moment. But it stunk. Now here we are again — with this one going public right before the primary election — and Minnesota Dems are correctly taking the view that Ellison is their guy unless he’s proven to be a liar. Not a pleasant situation, but I think better than railroading a colleague out of office based entirely on accusations … and one sophomoric photograph.
Primary differences being a) eight abuse accusers for Franken; b) a photo of Franken that makes the abuse accusation exponentially more tangible, memorable and politically toxic than a claim with no visual evidence; and c) the subject in the humiliating photo stating that she felt humiliated, which, while many discounted because of her politics, was an emotion a lot of voters could relate to in that kind of woman-used-as-joke-prop scenario.
Franken may have thought that his ass and boob grabbing was merely using the women as part of his comedic schtick, just as other abusers think their ass and boob grabbing are somehow charming, a birthright or a gift to the women. Whatever the motive, it matters that the women Franken groped all felt humiliated and abused. That matters.
Franken could have gone through the Senate ethics investigation and sought reelection. That wasn’t taken away from him. He chose to resign as the number of accusations mounted, so he wasn’t denied due process. Staying in office would have been selfish and harmful to the causes he championed, but it was his choice. He was too politically damaged to remain viable and effective, due to his own behavior, not due to Democratic calls for him to resign.
I’ve had to agree-to-disagree with a lot of friends on this issue, but I just don’t buy this “poor Al Franken was victimized by a Democratic lynch mob” narrative.
http://time.com/5042931/al-franken-accusers/
Well, we’ll have to agree to disagree as well. Given the moment — the Roy Moore moment — and the head of steam built up by Franken’s caucus, primarily, Sen. Gillibrand, there was no imaginable way he could wait out an investigation. The moment was all about demonstrating contrast via total Democratic/progressive commitment to the #MeToo wave … which is not a bad thing, except for the fact that in that case it violated a principal canon of democracy, namely that the burden of proof is on the accuser. Accusations must be proven. As I have said several times since, there was no way a progressive leader like Franken could have said “that didn’t happen”, (in effect calling women liars), and sustained any kind of viability. Conservatives can pull that move and be routinely applauded for it. But it doesn’t work on our side of the chamber. Franken only “went there” when his fate was sealed. Worth noting is that Ellison has gone there rather defiantly.
I don’t know if anyone read the NY Times article “A Broken Relationship and Accusations of Emotional Abuse: The Case of Keith Ellison” published a few days ago. The girlfriend sounds like she has major issues, like maybe borderline personality disorder. He’s shown more patience than I think I could have, given the circumstances. I think the more people find out, the better.
By the way, accusing someone of “narcissistic abuse,” is nebulous — exactly what does it mean? That an egotist was mean to you? Maybe Ellison is an egotist and a jerk, but as a voter, I don’t care about that. And, as a woman, I hope women don’t start doing a lot of this sort of thing. It’s embarrassing.
Ruth: Not only is it embarrassing, it’s extremely counter-effective. #MeToo needs the enthusiastic support of men as well as women. But if accusations are going to be taken as instantly indictable, punishable facts, with no need for full adjudicated, a lot of men — and women — are going to start peeling away. We’re mostly all big boys and girls, we know there are unstable characters among both genders. What we don’t know until all available facts are laid out is which one is the toxic issue in each individual circumstance.
Roger that.
Some women stay in toxic relationships for a variety of reasons. If you lack the financial independence to leave a cohabiting situation, there are options like #GoFundMe to appeal to others for help. Yes, I read the NYTimes article.
I don’t question that at all. My bottom line point is that if Ms. Monahan’s treatment at the hands of Ellison was so abusive and she has unequivocal proof of it she should show it. If she has that evidence justice will be swiftly served.