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Thread. @MollyJongFast asks a good question. I expect a big part of the answer is related to Trump’s wealth. He certainly believes men with money (especially himself) are entitled to do anything they want; it’s a belief more widespread in media and politics than most realize.
“Anything they want” absolutely includes forcing themselves on women. You won’t find moral rectitude on that point coexisting with the servile reverence politicians accord big donors & media reserves for men who can drive ratings.
As for the question @MollyJongFast asks about Democrats, I don’t have a good answer. When Trump’s depraved morals came up in 2016 the best the Democrats could do was some TV ads lamenting how Trump’s crude language might make some girls feel bad about their bodies.
The Steve Wynn case, which also involves allegations of rape, met with silence from Democrats. Fox News was looking like Sex Predation Central for a while, what with all the settlements it was paying for. Though Fox News makes its money savaging Democrats, they kept quiet.
Let me suggest a thought that seems to make Democrats in politics extremely uncomfortable. They tend to react to stories of sex predation by men like Trump mostly with sympathy and outrage on behalf of the women involved, not with moral censure. The sympathy and outrage...
...I understand; they reflect a humane impulse. In politics, though, they don’t move voters over time. Moral censure does — not w/every voter, but with enough. Trump’s, er, “personal life” has been, to be truthful, pretty disgusting even without allegations of sexual assault.
Politicians of both parties missed the chance to define his conduct as reflecting depraved morals, and out of bounds for a Presidential candidate in 2015-16 (incidentally, the Republicans in that period missed more chances than the Democrats). But I don’t think it’s too late.
It’s certainly what I would do. Seeing as Democrats in Washington react to obstruction of justice and flagrant corruption with impotent chatter about what is and is not “on the table,” I can’t guess at what they will do.
Addendum: @BriannaWu collected documentation of the nation’s most famous sex predator, the hero of white evangelicals and Republican Senators. He’s old and fat now, therefore (presumably) less active. But Trump retains a sex predator’s values.
