What to make of this Joe Biden problem?
Along with a lot of other Democrats, I’ve been struggling with that question the last couple of weeks.
If there’s not an outright fire, a lot of smoke is swirling around former aide Tara Reade’s assertion that Biden pinned her against a Senate building wall in the spring of 1993, kissed her neck, put a knee between her legs and penetrated her vagina with his fingers.
Reade said that when she resisted the advances, Biden said, “Aw, man, I heard you liked me.” Then, she alleged, he pointed a finger at her and said, “You’re nothing to me.” And, finally, according to her account, Biden shook her by the shoulders and said, “You’re OK, you’re fine” before walking away.
Reade, who had begun working for Biden in December 1992, was fired in August 1993.
Let’s take a look at some of the probable incriminating factors in this case and also at some of the possible exculpating and curious factors…(These are not all of the factors in this case.)
Incriminating
:: Reade’s account just sounds plausible, in the details and especially the terminology: “Come on, man, I heard you liked me.” That’s the way Biden talks; everyone has heard him say, “Come on, man,” or something like that.
:: Speaking to The New York Times a few weeks ago on the condition of anonymity, two friends of Reade corroborated parts of her story. One said Reade had told her about the alleged incident in 1993. The other recalled Reade telling her in 2008 that Biden had touched her inappropriately and that she had experienced a traumatic event while working in his office.
:: Last week, two more people came forward to corroborate parts of Reade’s story in interviews with a publication called Business Insider. Lynda LaCasse, a former neighbor in California, said Reade described the incident to her in 1995 or 1996. “This happened, and I know it did because I remember talking about it,” LaCasse was quoted as saying. Adding to LaCasse’s credibility is her party affiliation. “I personally am a Democrat, a very strong Democrat,” she said. “And I’m for Biden, regardless. But still I have to come out and say this.”
:: The other woman who came out last week, Lorraine Sanchez, worked with Reade in the office of a California state senator in the mid-1990s. Sanchez said Reade told her at the time that Biden had harassed her and that, because of that, she had been fired.
:: Also last week, video emerged of an unnamed woman Reade says was her mother calling into a 1993 broadcast of CNN’s “Larry King Live.” The show was about the culture of Washington, DC. The woman claimed her daughter had run into unspecified “problems” with a U.S. senator. She said: “My daughter has just left there, after working for a prominent senator, and could not get through with her problems at all, and the only thing she could have done was go to the press, and she chose not to do it out of respect for him.” The call came from San Luis Obispo, CA, and CNN has confirmed that Reade’s mother, Jeanette Altimus, now deceased, lived in San Luis Obispo around that time.
:: Biden waited five weeks before addressing the issue publicly and in person. (On MSNBC’s Morning Joe show last Friday, he said, “I’m saying unequivocally it never, never happened.”)
Exculpating and curious
:: Last year, Reade was one of several women who came forward with complaints of Biden hugging or touching them in ways that made them uncomfortable, but Reade did not go public with her assault accusation until March 25. She says she tried to share her story with the media earlier but got “shut down.”
:: Reade is the only woman who has claimed Biden sexually assaulted her.
:: The two friends who spoke to The New York Times would not go on the record.
:: No former Biden staff members have corroborated any details of Reade’s allegation.
:: Reade said she filed a general harassment complaint against Biden with a Senate office in 1993, it has not turned up.
:: Reade’s brother, Collin Moulton, confirmed parts of Reade’s account to a publication called The Intercept in March, but, for whatever reason, he would not speak to the Times, which did the most extensive investigation. Moulton spoke to The Washington Post and said Reade had told her in 1993 that Biden had touched her neck and shoulders, but he said nothing about an alleged assault in the interview. In a text message days after the interview, however, he told the Post he also recalled Reade saying Biden had put his hand “under her clothes.”
:: In the past, Reade wrote and posted tweets praising Russian President Vladimir Putin. Recently, she has backtracked, saying she is not a fan of Putin and that her comments were “misguided.”
**
Back to the issue I posed at the beginning: What to make of all this?
Here’s my read…
Some Democrats, maybe a lot, are doing the equivalent of putting their hands over their eyes, plugging their ears and humming loudly to blank out anything suggesting Reade’s story might be true.
A comparable approach (what a friend of mine prefers) is blaming this on a Republican conspiracy to drag Biden down. One of many problems with that theory is if this is a giant, well-planned conspiracy, it would have to have been launched in 1993, when Reade’s mother made that call to Larry King.
If this was a felony prosecution and I had listened to the evidence that’s come out so far, I would say the prosecution had not proved its case “beyond a reasonable doubt.” On the other hand, based on what I’ve read and heard, I think it’s more likely than not that Biden did what Reade says he did. Regardless of how strongly he has condemned sexual harassment, I can envision how lust, impulse and a sense of entitlement — especially in a much younger Joe Biden — could have co-mingled and prompted an aberration.
That said, am I going to abandon Biden and vote for Trump? Of course, not. Like LaCasse, “I’m for Biden, regardless.”
Nevertheless, this tumult has, at the very least, diminished Biden. He can say it ain’t so, but, like me, a lot of other people are looking at him more circumspectly than they did two months ago.
JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC 
The really sad thing about this is that one woman, feeling her pain 27 years later, threatens a weak alternative to Trump, who, if re-elected, may easily cause the deaths of millions of Americans by his reckless disregard for the coronavirus.
“Guilty until proven innocent” might as well be the motto of the #me too movement, spawned by Ronan Farrow in The New Yorker.
A poster at the Democratic Underground, in a discussion about her accusation du jour being word for word a passage out of her father’s shite book, summed it up for me:
so here are the facts:
Tara Reade has written positively about Biden for decades
Memory changes over time
Her father wrote a book that has a passage that matches her accusation
There are no police records
She could have been upset in 1993 for any number of reasons if she did tell other people SOMETHING. If Biden was touchy feely, that was not a crime in 1993 and why did she write positive letters for decades on Biden.
there is nothing here accept an attempt to swiftboat another Democratic candidate.
now lets talk about proven accusations on trump including his words on a tape about grabbing women by the puss*
She wrote favorable article about Putin after her debt in bankruptcy was magically paid off. The debt was cleared and then the positive Putin vibes started.
She has quite a list of accusing various people of sexual harassment (including her father), getting caught up in various GoFundMe frauds, and other not so honorable financial affairs.
I got a director at my office “allowed to retire” after working with my high level union officials for 2 years on a sexual harassment and discrimination case. The story of the women affected never changed. This is exceedingly important in producing credibility. I spent hundreds of hours working on this in my free time to gather evidence to support our case. In the end management agreed it had happened and even admitted that if the one employee sued, she would win.
Having spent two years of my life involved in that situation, there are too many things here that do not add up. And that she cancelled a face-to-face interview on Fox News on Sunday suggests things are not on the level here with her.
I guarantee that the people affected by the case I handled still remember every detail of what went on. That Tara Reade does not will just cause others not to believe people who are truly affected to get their due. That is the sad legacy here.
Reade says she canceled the Fox news interview because of death threats against her and her daughter…
To the best of my knowledge, none of the broadcast networks or CNN or MSNBC have offered to interview her, which is a bit curious and opens those networks to charges of unwillingness to aggressively pursue an accusation against a major Democratic figure.
After the case I wrote about above (which was almost 15 years ago now), I became the “go to” person to handle these types of issues in our union nationwide. So I did more than a few investigations. All on my own time. Some turned out to be true, some not so true, and some false. All passed through our legal council based on my investigation before determining final judgement.
One of the people involved in my first case has tried to commit suicide twice since then. And I have been one of the people to be there and help her back. So I know all about the impact that these events can cause for these women.
Consistency of facts comes out in an investigation. Jim you know that from working at The Star for all those years. When the story from the main person starts to have multiple variations, that is a big problem and raises a red flag.
Just because I have a different viewpoint from having done these type of investigations does not mean I am shaming anyone. Going into an EEO investigation, I always approached the claim as being true. I let the facts confirm that initial thought or disprove it. My experience shows there a lot of issues with consistency and facts in this instance that people are just overlooking in a rush to judgement.
What is going on with these comments? Abusing and assaulting women have been going on for years, and our society was finally starting to understand the horrors caused by these entitled individuals to their victims thanks to the amazing efforts like #me too. This almost looks like a modern day “slut shaming.” Of course I will still vote for Biden because he is the lesser of two evils, but it doesn’t mean I don’t believe Reade. Her story and all survivor stories should be heard.
As Maureen Dowd said in her Sunday NYT column, “Each case has to stand or fall on its own facts, patterns, corroborations, investigations — not on viewing it only through partisan goggles.”
I don’t think I am looking at this through partisan goggles. If anything I wish she was being untruthful because I don’t want Trump in the White House. However, the days when the default was to assume the women were liars must end.
I wasn’t suggesting you were viewing it through partisan lenses, Allison. A lot of people are, however, and I just wanted to emphasize Maureen’s insistence that each case be investigated and reported on its own merits. It is concerning that none of the major networks has sought an interview with Reade. She deserves to tell her story on nationwide TV so viewers coast to coast can gauge her credibility.
I see. Sorry if I misunderstood your comment. I agree about the major networks not wanting to interview her. I’m the one at the Thanksgiving table insisting that the media work hard not to be biased. This gives me pause, at least for the networks.
After the over coverage of Hillary’s emails, I suspect networks are being more cautious this time around. The stakes in November are high.
There was nothing wrong with the media’s coverage of Hillary’s emails, Tom, it was that idiot Comey who fucked things up!
I see this through the lens of someone who experienced workplace sexual harassment. My own. And it did not go well for me because I stood up for myself and the good old boys club won. I resent Allison’s implication that, because I do not agree with her, I am being partisan. Pure and simple, this lady does not meet the sniff test of how a victim remembers. TRUST ME.
I am also so tired of all the victims out there who project their own experiences onto Joe Biden. My own sad experience was over 20 years ago. My story had never changed and I remember everything in technicolor detail. I have plenty of feelings about what happened, but none of them have a thing to do with Joe Biden.
https://web.archive.org/web/20190404043945/https:/medium.com/@shewrites94/why-a-liberal-democrat-supports-vladimir-putin-f54ca2a3a405
This is illuminating
Oh, my, she wrote that 18 months ago…That, in my opinion, signficantly damages her credibility. Thanks, Tom.
Biden was created by a Democrat Establishment desperate to find a “moderate” candidate to run against Trump lest they have a repeat of 1972. By the same token, I predict that same establishment will find a replacement for Biden by the convention. His endless gaffes and clear dementia would be more of an issue as the campaign went forward than any hypocritical crocodile tears over Tara Reade.
The media promoted Cuomo early on in the pandemic and Gavin Newsome has toned down some of the California goofiness in his agenda and could also be a potential replacement at the convention. That said, the party’s long term solution to the current bevy of leftists soundly rejected by the country is to start marching back towards the center with candidates who truly are moderates.
A counter point by someone who writes much more elegantly than I ever could, Peter Wehner, former aide to President’s Reagan and both Bushes.
The President Is Unraveling
The country is witnessing the steady, uninterrupted intellectual and psychological decomposition of Donald Trump.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/05/president-unraveling/611146/
If we pass 500,000 deaths from the pandemic by election time, one of my friend’s cats could run against Trump and win. I’d pick her tuxedo cat as he would always be prepared for the formal dinners.
I’m all in for Tuxedo Tom at this point. No, I think the Democratic Party is in pretty sad shape if the best it can come up with in the way of a candidate to oppose Trump is Joe “what was her name again?” Biden. Hey, I’m waiting for Barack Obama to pull a Grover Cleveland and return to the highest office in the land after being away from it for four years. There’s no law preventing him from doing so at this time.
Obama cannot run again. Amendment XXI: “No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice …”
Correction: Amendment XXII.