Political expediency 

The first thing that happens when someone gets accused of sexual assault, sexual harassment, or rape is denial. Denial that it ever happened. Denial that the accused is that kind of person.

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Um, obviously, rapists wear T-shirts that shout #Imarapist to everyone they meet. And obviously they like to tell their friends, family, and colleagues about what a piece of shit they are. That's how you know someone's a serial sexual assaulter. Duh!

Next up: Questioning the validity of the victim's statement.

Thank you President Donald "old privileged pussy-grabber who still got elected" Trump for informing us via Twitter that if the assault that your conservative darling Supreme Court pick allegedly committed was so bad, police would totally have found out about it. Yes, police officers, definitely don't doubt women who come to them with sexual assault allegations, right San Luis Obispo Police Sgt. Chad "I still somehow have a job" Pfarr?

Sliding right on into third: What about his reputation?

To which I respond: Um. Who cares?

And right on into home base: She gets to re-live the awful thing that a man did to her over and over again as people point fingers at her, level death threats, and accuse her of terrible things. It follows her around for the rest of her life.

But before you, my avid choir of progressive lib-tard readers, clap your hands about me railing against Trumplethinskin and his favorite fellow rich, Ivy League-educated white man Brett "why would you believe her over my drunk ass" Kavanaugh, I've got something to say to you.

STOP being such goddamn hypocrites.

I'll go ahead and start with U.S. Rep. Salud "silent on my buddy Tony Cárdenas" Carbajal (D-Santa Barbara) who likes to tweet out things about Kavanaugh. "Given credible & disturbing allegations against Judge Kavanaugh, the Senate must delay the confirmation vote until claims are fully investigated," he stated via political PR machine Twitter.

But for some odd reason, I haven't gotten a Twitter memo from Carbajal about the sexual assault accusations against fellow Congressional Hispanic Caucus BOLD PAC member Cárdenas. A lawsuit filed earlier this year accuses the San Fernando Valley representative of drugging and molesting a 16-year-old girl, which he, of course, denies—alleging in good ol' second step fashion that his accuser is the manipulated daughter of a "disgruntled former employee," according to an LA Times article.

Carbajal didn't return the Times' request for comment on that article—so weird ... not. Most California Dems have been unapologetically loud about Kavanaugh and unsurprisingly mum about the Cárdenas lawsuit. And in August, Cárdenas set up a House of Representatives Ethics Committee-approved legal defense fund to cover his lawyer's bills, according to Politico. He can now receive contributions of up to $5,000 annually from donors for defending himself.

Huh. I wonder if good buddy Carbajal will donate? His campaigns have benefitted to the tune of $20,000 from his affiliation with Cárdenas and the BOLD PAC. Money talks at least as loud as Twitter. If you're going to call out Republicans due to the Kavanaugh situation, then you should practice what you preach against a fellow Democrat, otherwise you look like someone who cares about political expediency over violence against women.

So, to Carbajal's challenger, Justin "third time's (probably not) a charm" Fareed, whose campaign is hammering Carbajal about Cárdenas yet staying supremely quiet about Kavanaugh at the same time: You look like someone who cares about political expediency over violence against women.

Yes, we know that Fareed's also taken to crying foul at Carbajal for being soft on crime over the Marilyn Pharis case—a Santa Maria woman who died after undocumented immigrant Victor Martinez broke into her home, beat, sexually assaulted, and strangled her in 2015. Martinez had a criminal record and had not been deported.

Fareed's steadfast hold to the Pharis case is more about immigration issues and less about sexual violence against women issues. It's a politically expedient easy sell to his base. Because while Fareed waxes on, and on, and on about his opponent being on the wrong side of undocumented immigrants and crime, he says nothing about the prevalence of sexual violence against women and what we need to do to prevent it!

Women aren't going to stop being raped because we deport more people! And women will continue to be re-victimized as political pawns as long as we keep playing the game of double standards when it comes to sexual assault allegations.

But at least Bill "I'm going to be eating a lot more Jell-O behind bars" Cosby is finally in jail. It only took more than 60 women to come forward and accuse him of drugging and assaulting them ... and for one of those to fall within the statute of limitations ... and for the case to get retried because the original ended with a hung jury. He was sentenced to a minimum of three years in prison and a maximum of 10.

Trump's Attorney General Jeff "the pot czar" Sessions recently moved us a giant step back in the direction of mandatory minimums for drug convictions. Did you know that the mandatory minimum sentence for someone convicted of distributing a five-day supply of meth was five years? You know what the maximum sentence could be? Forty years.

Drug and rape more than 60 women. You get three. Δ

The shredder is wearing a pink pussy hat at [email protected].