Should Al Franken Resign?

[Cow Poke]

Or unless the former mall manager is a Moore supporter...
Or unless Brietbart is simply regurgitating a local news story...
Or ...

(https://www.snopes.com/2017/11/17/ro...ng-teen-girls/)

There is enough smoke thrown up over this whole thing that I cannot say I have any idea WHAT to believe about whom anymore - and I am VERY careful these days about letting my political bias color my conclusions. Even Snopes won't come down on one side or the other.

We have a lot of he said/she said, and people seem to be picking the he/she that aligns with what they want to be true, IMO.

I gave up trusting Snopes on political issues, but, yeah, there's an awful lot of.... you're not exactly too terribly wrong.

Snopes is notoriously pro-Democrat. If Snopes is hedging, then odds are decent that there is indeed sufficient evidence to exonerate Moore on this charge, and they just can't bring themselves to admit it.

That.

[carpedm9587]

I gave up trusting Snopes on political issues, but, yeah, there's an awful lot of.... you're not exactly too terribly wrong.

That.

When I look across the news outlets (using allsides.com as my meter for left/center/right) those outlets classified as "left" are almost universally reporting "he was banned" and those outlets classified right are almost universally reporting "he wasn't banned" and those classified as center are basically reporting on who has made what accusations and who is reporting what.

When I see a pattern like that - I'm pretty sure nobody really knows anything and the two sides are lining up for their team again...

[Cow Poke]

When I look across the news outlets (using allsides.com as my meter for left/center/right) those outlets classified as "left" are almost universally reporting "he was banned" and those outlets classified right are almost universally reporting "he wasn't banned" and those classified as center are basically reporting on who has made what accusations and who is reporting what.

When I see a pattern like that - I'm pretty sure nobody really knows anything and the two sides are lining up for their team again...

I'm shocked.

[Roy]

While technically true, I think this is really picking of nit. If I claim that the manager of the local Burger King threw you out because you exposed yourself, and the local manager, when confronted with that allegation, says "I don't remember any such incident", it is, for all intents and purposes, 'proven false'.

Unless they might have forgotten because it was forty years ago, or they might be getting senile, or they might have been bribed and are lying, or they might be deliberately forgetting because you're from out of town and it's none of your business, or you might be wrong about it being the manager (and the assistant manager never told the manager), or you might not have actually talked to the manager at all, or...

People make false claims for all sorts of reasons. If two people are making directly opposing claims, one of them is going to be wrong - and proving which requires more than just "the former mall manager said".

My claim could reasonably be rejected. For me to sustain my claim, I'd have to find more evidence, like a police report or eye witnesses, etc.

CCTV would be better.

[Mountain Man]

https://www.snopes.com/2017/11/17/ro...ng-teen-girls/

Snopes?

[Mountain Man]

Unless they might have forgotten because it was forty years ago, or they might be getting senile, or they might have been bribed and are lying, or they might be deliberately forgetting because you're from out of town and it's none of your business, or you might be wrong about it being the manager (and the assistant manager never told the manager), or you might not have actually talked to the manager at all, or...

Or aliens implanted the memories in his head; or he fell through a wormhole and spent time in an alternate dimension where Moore wasn't banned; or he was standing on a toilet trying to hang a picture, slipped off, banged his head, invented the flux capacitor, and all recollection of the Roy Moore incident was knocked clean away, at which point he tried to reconstruct his lost memories based on incomplete information; or...

Seriously, you could dismiss anybody's testimony if you start playing these kinds of "what if" games.

As Simon Greenleaf said, "In trials of fact, by oral testimony, the proper inquiry is not whether it is possible that the testimony may be false, but whether there is sufficient probability that it is true."

And in this case, the man who was in a position to know for certain who had and hadn't been banned is a more credible witness than "a friend of a friend" who believes it happened but doesn't really know for sure.

[Cow Poke]

Unless they might have forgotten because it was forty years ago, or they might be getting senile, or they might have been bribed and are lying, or they might be deliberately forgetting because you're from out of town and it's none of your business, or you might be wrong about it being the manager (and the assistant manager never told the manager), or you might not have actually talked to the manager at all, or...

People make false claims for all sorts of reasons. If two people are making directly opposing claims, one of them is going to be wrong - and proving which requires more than just "the former mall manager said".

CCTV would be better.

So, when two people are making contradictory claims 40 years ago, and there's no proof one way or the other, wisdom would suggest looking elsewhere.

[Roy]

So, when two people are making contradictory claims 40 years ago, and there's no proof one way or the other, wisdom would suggest looking elsewhere.

It's not me you have to convince.

[Roy]

And in this case, the man who was in a position to know for certain who had and hadn't been banned is a more credible witness than "a friend of a friend" who believes it happened but doesn't really know for sure.

1) They may have been in a position to be certain then, but are they now? memory is fallible, and no records have been retained.

2) The opposing witnesses aren't "a friend of a friend"; some of them have been named, were apparently working at the mall at the time so are not providing hearsay, and say they do know for sure.

[guacamole]

Dude's out:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/06/politi...est/index.html

[carpedm9587]

Dude's out:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/06/politi...est/index.html

Just noticed your avatar. Do you live near the St. Joseph's lighthouse? My wife and I stopped there on our way back from Alaska hoping to get a picture, but there wasn't a lot of ice at that time (this past January).

[guacamole]

Just noticed your avatar. Do you live near the St. Joseph's lighthouse? My wife and I stopped there on our way back from Alaska hoping to get a picture, but there wasn't a lot of ice at that time (this past January).

I live across the lake in the Chicago area, but we go to the St. Joseph's region two or three times a year. Harbor country is lovely just about anytime, except January and February.

[Mountain Man]

1) They may have been in a position to be certain then, but are they now? memory is fallible, and no records have been retained.

2) The opposing witnesses aren't "a friend of a friend"; some of them have been named, were apparently working at the mall at the time so are not providing hearsay, and say they do know for sure.

One claimant, as I recall, said something to the effect of, "I told my manager, and I believe she got him banned." That's the kind of testimony that defense attorneys love, because it's so easy to pick apart under cross examination.

Meanwhile, the mall manager, a witness who was in a position to know for certain, says that Moore was never banned. That carries more credibility. Now you can come up with every reason under the sun why he could be wrong, but that's a long, long, long way from proving that he actually is wrong.

"In the absence of circumstances which generate suspicion, every witness is to be presumed credible, until the contrary is shown; the burden of impeaching his credibility lying on the objector."
-Simon Greenleaf

And, sorry, but saying, "He's old!" or "He voted from Trump!" are not sufficient reasons to generate suspicion.

You might argue that this is a case of "he said; she said", but it's not. As an example, police officers are trained to be able to judge the speed of a moving vehicle. If you are in court for speeding, and it's your word against the officer's, the court will side with the police officer every single time. Why? Because as far as the court is concerned, he's the more credible witness.

[Mountain Man]

Dude's out:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/06/politi...est/index.html

I saw that coming. Ever since the infamous groping picture was released, I knew his days were numbered.

[Zymologist]

I saw that coming. Ever since the infamous groping picture was released, I knew his days were numbered.

I actually wasn't so sure. For all Starlight's talk about how righteous the Democrats are, they seem really good at the whole double standards thing.