It's official: US media has permitted Republicans to establish the meaning of "corroborating evidence" to include *only* eyewitness testimony or a confession—a definition "corroborating evidence" has never had in the history of the American criminal justice system. Thanks, media.
2/ Mind you, we have two *direct* (sworn) eyewitnesses to Kavanaugh committing multiple sexual assaults: Swetnick and Accuser #4, whose affidavits corroborate one another. But we also have multiple *contemporaneous disclosures* (as close to an eyewitness as it gets) for Ramirez.
3/ We also have 10 prior disclosures for Dr. Ford, all preceding Kavanaugh being nominated. This too is a form of corroborating evidence. And the testimonial evidence establishing that Kavanaugh lied under oath is now... legion. At least six to ten witnesses. Where was the media?
4/ To attorneys, the "no corroboration" claim is a *farce*. But it's been allowed to stand by the media because apparently there were too few analysts out there given the time or space to discuss what "corroboration" means in the US legal system. So we get a travesty of justice.
5/ Right now I am seeing wall-to-wall cable TV analysis saying that "the Democrats believe" the follow-up investigation was incomplete. I'm sorry, are you reporters? The fact that it was "incomplete" is fact, not opinion—we've all seen the ignored evidence—so why call it opinion?
6/ Republicans like Rick Santorum were allowed to go on TV nightly and lie about the evidence in this case; they'd already lied about it, but they got invited back on to lie again. That happened over and over and over again on cable news. And we wonder why America is misinformed?
7/ Certain things aren't open to debate. That sworn affidavits of multiple eyewitnesses to Kavanaugh committing sexual assault exist ISN'T debatable. That there is a mountain of testimonial evidence that Kavanaugh committed perjury ISN'T debatable. Media should've made it clear.
8/ *Four women* have issued sworn statements that they personally witnessed Kavanaugh committing sexual assault while drunk. That in itself is corroboration. Republicans are saying both that *all the women are lying* and that there's no corroboration. And media letting it happen.
9/ Three of these four women issued *prior disclosures* of what they saw, as early as minutes afterward and as late as *before* Kavanaugh was nominated. At least 13 prior disclosures total. All of *that* is corroborating evidence. The GOP has been allowed to lie about *that* too.
10/ That these four women are in a battle of credibility with a man who, per a mountain of witnesses, recently committed perjury 22 times is *also* key, as it makes it inexplicable why *anyone* would take his word for it over 4 women (minimum) with 13 prior disclosures (minimum).
11/ All this happens in the context of this being merely a job interview, which means the standard of proof for him having committed sexual assault and lied about it is unbelievably low. Make no mistake, this is as big a travesty of justice as American politics has seen in years.
12/ But equally upsetting is that this was reported in such a haphazard way that viewers were given no framework within which to understand the evidence before them. They were left with a morass of confusion, deception, and misstatements at a critical moment in American history.
