NOMINATION/SEX ABUSE/SUPREME COURT/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT/WOMEN: “President Trump is back to his standard playbook for sexual assault allegations: Deny, dismiss and blame the accuser. The tactic was on full display at a news conference in New York City this evening, in one of those vintage stream-of-consciousness appearances that the president rode into the White House. He rejected all three allegations of sexual assault against Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh as false. Democrats, he said, were ‘dishonest people’ running a ‘con job’ on the American public. And, perhaps most strikingly, the president said his personal experience with accusations of sexual assault ‘absolutely’ influence his thinking about the allegations against Judge Kavanaugh. During the 2016 campaign, Mr. Trump was accused of sexual misconduct by more than a dozen women.”
–Lisa Lerer, “On Politics With Lisa Lerer: Trump, Kavanaugh and the ‘Con Job’,” The New York Times online, September 26, 2018