Democrats are now panicked about Bill Clinton.
They didn’t panic about Bill’s alleged proclivity for forcing himself on women in the 1990s. After all, they could just paint his accusers as bimbos out for power and money. But the left decided that in order to push Hillary Clinton to the presidency, all women had to be painted as victims – and therefore, no evidence would be necessary in order to convict men of sexual assault and harassment. As Hillary Clinton tweeted:
Every survivor of sexual assault deserves to be heard, believed, and supported. https://t.co/mkD69RHeBL
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) November 23, 2015
Well, oopsies.
It turns out that Bill has been hit with allegations of sexual misconduct by at least 10 different women.
Which leads to the uncomfortable circumstance that the same people decrying the evils of Bill Cosby – admitted sexual abusers like Lena Dunham – are also backing Bill.
This includes supposed feminist Amanda Marcotte at Salon. Today, Marcotte writes, “Sorry, conservatives, there’s a massive difference between their sex abuse allegations.” She explains:
This entire gotcha is based on a straw man. Contrary to what conservatives might have you believe, it simply isn’t true that feminists think every allegation of sexual harassment or assault, no matter how unlikely, should be treated like God’s honest truth. What feminists want is to end the double standard, where sexual abuse allegations are disbelieved out of hand, subjected to more skepticism and second-guessing than any other crime, or dismissed even in the face of strong evidence. By saying most women aren’t liars, we aren’t denying that some women do lie. This is an important distinction.
This, of course, is the same point Hillary Clinton tried to make when she was asked about allegations against her husband: she said that she would believe women unless evidence showed they weren’t telling the truth. The problem is that there is no evidence Paula Jones or Eileen Wellstone or Kathleen Willey or Juanita Broaddrick or a half-dozen others were lying.
But Marcotte struggles to breathe life into this ridiculous argument. She says that Bill Clinton has been targeted by the right, and therefore we should disbelieve credible accusers:
[It’s] right that multiple accusers, in most cases, sets up a pattern, it’s equally true that there’s another pattern at work here, of multiple right-wingers making lurid and false accusations against the Clintons. Under the circumstances, there’s simply no way to know which pattern these accusations fit into.
LOL. Yes, there is. These accusations against Bill Clinton began before he was even elected president. Most of his conduct happened before he was president. This argument truly amounts to “I like Bill Clinton, so I’ll doubt his accusers.” Which is problematic, coming from the same lady who tweeted this:
https://t.co/LIQ6acGEck The reflexive claim that women are crazy liars is not only bigoted, but super duper harmful.
— Amanda Marcotte (@AmandaMarcotte) December 8, 2014
And this:
@silviobreckman @pzmyers https://t.co/FLIZlLW1M3 False accusations are so rare that they disappear on statistical analysis.
— Amanda Marcotte (@AmandaMarcotte) April 27, 2013
Yes, Bill Clinton is like Bill Cosby. Multiple credible accusers. High profile cases.
Here, for example, is one accuser of one of these men:
Then he tries to kiss me again. And the second time he tries to kiss me he starts biting my lip … He starts to, um, bite on my top lip and I tried to pull away from him. And then he forces me down on the bed. And I just was very frightened, and I tried to get away from him and I told him ‘No,’ that I didn’t want this to happen but he wouldn’t listen to me. … It was a real panicky, panicky situation. I was even to the point where I was getting very noisy, you know, yelling to ‘Please stop.’ And that’s when he pressed down on my right shoulder and he would bite my lip. … When everything was over with, he got up and straightened himself, and I was crying at the moment and he walks to the door, and calmly puts on his sunglasses. And before he goes out the door he says ‘You better get some ice on that.’ And he turned and went out the door.
Here is an accuser against the other:
I was told there was going to be a dinner, and when I got there, no one ever arrived. He asked me if I wanted a glass of wine; I took a few sips. It had a horrible taste. And I started not feeling well. He helped me up by my underarms with both hands. He walked me into the next room, where there was a mirror on the wall, and he told me to look at myself. Something was wrong with me. And then he took my right hand, and he put it behind my back. I remember seeing semen on the floor. And I felt some liquid on my hand. That was when I knew something sexual was going on.
Can you tell the difference? The first is Juanita Broaddrick on Clinton, the second an accuser on Cosby.
Here’s the only difference: the left must somehow rehabilitate Bill Clinton, so they’ll target his victims instead.