More More Moore (How Do You Like It?)

Ken AshfordCongress, Election 2018, Political Scandals, Sex Scandals, Sex/Morality/Family ValuesLeave a Comment

Roy Moore is now adopting the “best defense is a good offense” strategy. He is setting up to hit the Washington Post with a lawsuit over the allegations that he had sexual contact with a 14-year-old girl while Moore was in his 30’s.

According to AP, Moore told his supporters in Huntsville, Alabama on Sunday that the WaPo story was “fake news” and “a desperate attempt to stop my political campaign.”

Moore added that the newspaper “will be sued,” a declaration that received applause from the crowd.

I put the chances of this at or about zero percent.  Why?

Discovery, that’s why.

This is like when Donald Trump threatened to sue the women who accused him of sexual harassment. The lawsuits never happened.

Meanwhile, at least five companies said over the weekend that they will no longer advertise their products during Fox News’ “Hannity” television show, which sparked an outpouring on Sunday of counter-protests on social media.

Keurig, Realtor.com, 23 and Me, Eloquii and Nature’s Bounty all pulled their ads from the television show, in response to Fox host Sean Hannity’s coverage of the sexual misconduct allegations against Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore.

Although Hannity is “in the tank” for Moore, his actual interview of Moore the day after the allegations broke was pretty aggressive, at least for Hannity.  He came back to several points and Moore readily admitted dating younger women, although he denied the worst allegations (fondling a 14 year old).

But that wasn’t what caused advertisers to balk.

On Thursday, the Fox News host spoke about the allegations against Roy Moore, the Alabama senate candidate who, The Washington Post had reported that day, made sexual advances toward teenage girls when he was in his early 30s, including a 14-year-old.

Mr. Hannity, describing those actions on his radio show while speaking with a co-host, Lynda McLaughlin, seemed to justify Mr. Moore’s reported conduct by calling one of the encounters “consensual. Later, on his television show, Mr. Hannity said that the statement “was absolutely wrong” and that he “misspoke.” He then brought up the possibility of accusers lying for money, or for political purposes.

On Friday, Angelo Carusone, the president of Media Matters for America, the partisan watchdog organization that has campaigned against Mr. Hannity since at least May, began to criticize advertisers for sponsoring his show in light of his comments about Mr. Moore.

Keurig responded to Mr. Carusone, and said that it had stopped an ad from airing during Mr. Hannity’s show.

Conservatives have responded to Keurig’s boycott with their own boycott of Keurig, although it is likely to grow except for a few viral videos like this:

This clearly annoyed Hannity who has tweeted about Keurig repeatedly over the past few days.

And while some on the left dutifully took up arms, tweeting in support of Keurig, others just seemed bemused (or amused).

“Sorry, I was off Twitter for a while,” wrote the author Geraldine DeRuiter. “It appears that people are destroying coffee machines to show their support of child molesters?”

It is unclear what impact any of this has on Alabama voters.  One poll puts Moore’s Democratic competitor, Doug Jones, up by 4.  Another poll, taken over the same span of days, has Moore up by 10.

Here’s a nice editorial from a leading Alabama newspaper. The author is worried that Moore, if elected, will become Alabama’s “brand” and will hurt business (he’s right):

The Republicans in Congress would REALLY like this go away, and even Senator McConnell came out (moments ago) and said he believes the women.

UPDATE — Here’s Moore’s response

Back to usual post….

Moore defenders — mostly Breitbart at this point — are trying lame attacks.  Like the 14 year old woman is lying, or was paid by the Washington Post. Proof of lying is scant, but they only need to convince those with a propensity to believe Moore, and that’s not hard.

Some are saying that, even if true, it’s not a big deal. Alabama state Auditor Jim Zeigler (R) told the Washington Examiner that the allegations are “much ado about nothing.” Zeigler said that even if the allegations are true, Moore never had sexual intercourse with any of the women. He also dismissed the revelations because the accusations are from “40 years” ago and Moore ”

Another tack is to say — so what?  Here is an ugly tweet about that:

Hard to believe. That’s the state of the GOP today: Democrats are worse than child molesters, literally.

The next chapter in the scandal is coming later today…..

More Moore to come….

UPDATE — The next accuser….

Beverly Young Nelson said Moore she was approached by Moore in 1975 in a Gadsen, Alabama restaurant where she worked. One night, Nelson said Moore offered her a ride home in his car. Instead of getting on the highway, Moore parked in the back of the Olde Hickory House restaurant. Nelson said she asked Moore what he was doing.

“Instead of answering my question, Mr. Moore reached over and began groping me, putting his hands on my breasts,” Nelson said. “I tried to open my car door to leave, but he reached over and locked it so I could not get out. I tried fighting him off, while yelling at him to stop, but instead of stopping he began squeezing my neck attempting to force my head onto his crotch. I continued to struggle. I was determined that I was not going to allow him to force me to have sex with him. I was terrified. He was also trying to pull my shirt off. I thought that he was going to rape me. I was twisting and struggling and begging him to stop. I had tears running down my face.

“At some point he gave up. He then looked at me and said, “You are a child. I am the District Attorney of Etowah County,” she continued. “If you tell anyone about this, no one will believe you.” He finally allowed me to open the car door and I either fell out or he pushed me out. I was on the ground as he pulled out of the parking area behind the restaurant. The passenger door was open as he burned rubber pulling away leaving me laying there on the cold concrete in the dark.”

Two years later, Moore signed Nelson’s yearbook: