Mobo2000 wrote:
The mainstream press, now including Rosie Dimanno, are very interested in undercutting the "believe survivors" langugage, and both these cases are great examples for them to use to do so. Kirkland was sought out by the CBC to make this point, and a wider point about double standards in expectations for men's behaviour compared to women's.
I think the lawsuit threats from Moore has quieted them down for a bit, but either way there will be more on this. If she actually serves them they will have a field day with it, and if she doesn't they'll just resume once it becomes apparent she is not going to sue.
I think they are equally invested in creating an equivalency between men and women that doesn't exist. One of the arguments was that the issue was power not gender. It's power, but most of the time it is male power.
There were a multitude of clues in the manner in which Kirkland phrased himself. He did a lot of implying while avoiding answering direct questions. I should think that would be a big red alert to any so-called journalist. The biggest clue is that he said the sex was consensual.
Regardless of what Moore does, they won't go after her again because they know they let themselves be had. That Moore has proof things did not transpire the way Kirkland claimed.
He had several complaints.
His first is that Moore took advantage of him simply by virtue of being an MP even though the sex was entirely consensual.
That isn't the way it works. As long as the sex is entirely consensual, and there is no parliamentary rule against it, MPs both male and female can have sex with whomever wants to have sex with them.
Next he claimed that she had plied him with alcohol knowing he was on powerful medications and that he had accepted because she is a nurse. He even brought his medication list along because he thought it was a consultation.
She then followed him to his hotel where they had consentual sex.
Next she kept texting him and showed up unannounced when he was playing golf with friends and later on his doorstep in his hometown.
So, the accusation was, she took advantage of her position to get him stuplified by a combination of drugs and alcohol, even though she is a nurse. He didn't invite her to his hotel but somehow she ended up following him there where whatever they did was consensual. Then she started stalking him until he got firm when she showed up on his doorstep.
The reporters she has threatened to sue elaborated on Kirkland's story. They liberally embelished it without asking any questions.
Yes we believe survivors, but we also ask them the obvious questions. Like, did you feel intimidated by her? and "Did you respond to her texts? How did she get your personal information? Did she have it because she is a committee member? How did she find out where you were golfing and why was she in that area?
Nope. Suddenly reporters have no questions. They don't bother checking HoC records. They paint Moore as a sexual predator and stalker who took advantage of a drugged out emotionally vunerable vet.
But then we find out the first time they were at the office it was as a group and it was a general offer with everyone pouring their own drinks. Afterwards the party moved to a patio where the drinking continued. Kirkland said he was drinking non-alcoholic beer. Moore then had to go back to vote.The vote was happening at 10:40PM. Let's agree she invited him back to the office with her. This was when he assumed he was going for a medical consult because she is a nurse? Well okay. So they go back to the office and she goes to vote. Either he waited for her until almost midnight, or he returned to his hotel. If she had just showed up at his hotel door he would not have used the term "followed".
He claimed he was with friends on the golf course. I hope the investigator speaks to them.
Turns out he picked her up at the airport in Winnipeg and drove her to his house.
He has no good answers when confronted with the discrepencies. He is suddenly not doing any more interviews, or he isn't being asked. The journalists don't want to expose themselves as fools.
Agreed.
This thread is about Christine Moore, accused of sexual harassment and assault. Try to keep it straight.
dp
Do you disagree Unionist?
NorthReport wrore
Agreed.
Pondering wrote:
NorthReport, you're in the wrong thread. Go post your theory in the proper thread and I'll answer your question. This thread is about Christine Moore's happy times with the boy in uniform.
Because Moore is involved in both situations, as accuser in one, accused in the other, there is going to be some crossover.
You yourself have been indignant that Moore hasn't been expelled for talking to the press because that is what happened to Weir. That leads to comparison between the two cases. With Moore involved in both cases there will be drift back and forth. In the best of cases there is some drift in the majority of threads. I think your expectations of thread purity are unrealistic.
The two cases should be and are seperate in terms of the respective independent investigations, however, Kirkland has repeatedly said his story would not be an issue today if Moore had not behaved as a " self appointed" moral and ethical arbiter. IOW, the forwarding of his years old issues is directly related to, or in retaliation for, Moore's involvment in the Weir case - by Kirkland's own admission. This has made it impossible to tease out the two issues as entirely separate, despite some people's desire to do so.
Further it seems Madame Moore had little to no choice to defend herself against the revisionist history retaliation strategy of Kirkland as suggested here:
NDP MP Christine Moore, who has denied harassing a wounded Afghanistan veteran in 2013 on the Hill, likely had no choice but to publicly defend herself in a nationally televised press conference on Monday in her Quebec riding when she offered intimate, personal details and a chronology of their first sexual encounter, say some political observers.
https://www.hilltimes.com/2018/05/16/ndp-mp-moore-likely-no-choice-defen...
What's that? Kirkland tried to seduce Weir also? This is getting interesting.
Hahaha.
Thanks for another stupid laughable article, like your previous one from Briar Patch. This one quotes "experts" Nancy Peckford (named one of the Women's Executive Network Top 100 Powerful Women in Canada in 2014) and Rachel Curran (former strategic advisor to Stephen Harper) explaining why Christine Moore just had to publicly flaunt her sexual adventures once the Afghan invader boy had gone public.
Great champions Moore has! They deserve each other. Has she been dumped yet? Haven't heard the news this morning...
But thanks for posting in the correct thread.
LOL, I'm not in the least bit "indignant" about Christine Moore. She's not worth such a righteous emotion. I'm watching the NDP and Jagmeet Singh flounder and sink, unable to deal with the kind of issue which we handle fairly and transparently every day in the workplace. I'm sad.
My indignation lies elsewhere - the destruction of Erin Weir's political reputation and career by people not fit to shine his shoes. That's what I'm indignant about.
As for the Moore-Kirkland affair? Netflix should pick it up while it's still available. I'll provide the popcorn. It's not a matter of public interest, not in the slightest.
It's possible Unionist that you might be taken seriously if you were less insulting and dismissive, stuck to the relevant issues and behaved less like a thread cop.
That said, I have not the slightest idea what you are trying to imply here when you state:"What's that? Kirkland tried to seduce Weir also? This is getting interesting."
I imagine its just more of your petty obfuscation and distraction as nothing I wrote would indicate anything of the sort.
Its clear to me the NDP Leadership worked to give Weir material to save face, despite the investigation results confirming three counts of sexual harrassment with signficant impact on the women involved. Weir chose to use that material very aggressively in his defence while also undermining the sanctity of a process he agreed to and accepted the results of. Sadly doing so may result in forcing the hand of the administrators to make public what should have been kept confidential, which well could result in the disclosing of much more damaging details with respect to the extent of Weir's behaviour.
Ah well, in the end, there could be opportunities for Weir and his band of agitators in the new CCF.
The last NDP convention focused almost entirely on establishing these processes to address these issues, Weir almost single handidly has destroyed the entire effort, which had great political potential to not only make gains for women (and Men) in establishing proper work place policy, but also putting the NDP at the forefront of that effort. Now due to these shenanigans, the party is in public disarray and these gains for a better workplace set back.
Not unusual for the NDP to screw up a good thing, but this one could devolve into a civil war that sets the party back for sometime. So good luck with all that.
I'm a part-time unpaid self-appointed moderator. And I'm not interested in being "taken seriously" by anyone who finds it annoying to be reminded that they should not disperse the discussion among various threads, making proper replies difficult or impossible.
It was just petty obfuscation and distraction, to illustrate my sincere opinion that the Moore-Kirkland affair is not a matter of public interest in any way whatsoever. Either call the police (whoever feels they were sexually assaulted - sorry I haven't followed the sordid details), or get on with your life.
Ah, they did a great job! Great processes! But I didn't realize the convention was almost entirely focused on that. That helps explain why they had no time to even allow the Young New Democrats' motion on Palestine to reach the floor. They were too busy setting up a complaint process based on secret accusers. McCarthy's spirit must have been in the guest section.
Weir is indeed a powerful force, to have almost single handidly [sic] destroyed the bulk of the achievements of an entire NDP convention. And now he's taken the controls of history, thrown it into reverse, and is driving the party back to the CCF. Wow, just wow! No wonder the NDP is in total disarray. Unfair fight!
I can see Weir starting a new religion maybe, but civil war? Naw, that requires warring parties that care about something. Where would you find those?
It may be a "process," but apparently due process is not part of it. And Weir hasn't single handidly destroyed anything. The NDP leadership did that. In addition, what are the sexual harassment allegations. And what is the substantiation.
It is interesting how people can draw such different conclusions from the same set of facts. You are entitled to your opinion, Notalib, which I assume you've reached in good faith. My conclusions are very different, but I hope you will at least hear them out in the same spirit.
I think the NDP has been protecting Christine Moore all along, not so much because they like her (although I am sure she has allies in caucus) but because she's obviously dangerous. I think its also possible that Singh and his team weren't fully aware of her back story at the time, since they are relatively new to Ottawa. If that's the case that may have just ended up compounding their error.
In any case, though, I think when Moore pressed reply all on her her hit email against Weir, Singh and his team concluded that they had no choice but to make a public statement and launch an expensive investigation because they were afraid that if they didn't she would go public and demand one anyways. I think they were also really hoping that the investigation would find *something*, so that - notwithstanding the totally inappropriate way Moore had acted towards a fellow caucus-mate - they wouldn't have to burn her and lose her seat, but also that the investigation would not find *too much*, such that they had to kick out Weir. I think Flaherty understood her mission and fulfilled it well. Everything was on track until somebody fucked it up.
The timeline is really important here. There was a deal in place on April 19th for Weir to make a (likely carefully negotiated) admission of wrongdoing, undertake some visible steps of rehabilitation and return. But then Singh's office sat on it. Someone must have been holding it up, possibly Moore, possibly someone else.
On May 1, eleven days after the deal was in place but with it still not announced, a complainant goes to CBC and spills the beans, selectively, about the nature of her complaint. Notably, though, this is not one of the sexual harassment complainants. This was a senior staffer for the party who had previously worked for Mulcair when he was leader and who, I also understand, is quite close to Charlie Angus. Her complaint, about which she only revealed selective and inflammatory details, was regarding an actual policy dispute that she and Weir had been involved in, and which took place in a public forum (2016 SK NDP convention). She said Weir spoke to her in an angry and belligerent way and she felt intimidated. Weir felt differently about this interaction, and once the complainant had gone public, he wanted to respond. He contacted Singh's office first, but when Singh did not get back to him and the story ran, he decided he would respond to the story. He did not identify the complainant. He limited his comments to the one complaint and to the context behind it which he felt exonerated him.
It is obvious that this one complaint has very little to do with the other three. Totally different context, totally different allegations, totally different power dynamic involved. The only reason why it got mixed in with the other three complaints is because of the dragnet-style investigation the NDP had launched. In my opinion, this particular complainant should never have been offered confidentiality in the first place - the situation she describes would not appear to warrant it. In any case, I think she waived any expectation of confidentiality by going public, and the fact that people are still giving it to her is allowing her to use it as a weapon instead of a shield like it should be. She was able to say things publicly about Weir - with no apparent repercussions - while he is only able to respond with significant repercussions.
The question I have to ask is why did she go public when she did? The conclusion I draw, which frankly I think is the only reasonable one, is that she was trying to blow up the deal that the Party had entered into with Weir. Why would she do that? Maybe she thought the deal was unfair and her concerns hadn't fully been dealt with. But I find it dubious that this person could rise to such a senior position as working for the Party leader, without having been yelled at by a man before. I think it is more likely that she was acting at the behest of someone else, probably Angus, to try to make Singh look bad. If that's the case, it worked like a charm.
I realize I've drifted now from the topic of this thread - Christine Moore - towards the topic of the other thread - Erin Weir. So I will bring this back around to the other conclusion I've drawn, which is that no matter what you believe about what has happened to anyone else - Christine Moore is bad news. I don't know whether she is telling the truth about what happened between her and Kirkland , or if Kirkland is telling the truth, or if (as is often the case) the truth is somewhere in the middle. What I do know is that she should not have slept with someone who testified before her committee. I also know that she ruined two other MPs careers before her and Erin Weir ever crossed paths - in a similar fashion where she had information that could have been the subject of a proper complaint but she chose to circumvent any such complaint processes for whatever purpose. The effect of her actions was both to betray the confidences of whoever had confided in her, and to place others in a very difficult position when called upon to respond to her actions. I don't think this is a person that any organization can keep on, without seriously crippling itself. She is poison. The NDP needs to find a way to push her out. Once she is gone, I would hope that cooler heads will prevail on both sides and they can find some way to resolve the dispute with Erin before the next election.
98% of this thread is just the usual Liberal gangup of any chance to attack the NDP. And 1% is the usual Unionist any opportunity to attack the NDP.
Guys you really need to reflect on what you are saying here at a supposedly progressive website.
The last NDP convention was opened by the President with a speech that focused on establishing processes that have so far failed women in the party. She sincerely apologised to the affected women past and present, and committed to righting the wrong on behalf of the entire party.
The plenary went on to pass emergency motions in addition to vetted "regular" motions all of which detailed this effort.
Further, people were deployed on the floor of convention in an effort to educate and forward the issues and policy the party was already crafting to update decades old party policy in this respect.
There were also speakers and panels devoted to the issue.
IOW, it was one of the most coordinated efforts I have witnessed to not only prioritize the issue but to have it at the centre of the convention's effort.
Such undertakings are typically evidence of a coordinated effort that has put the highest political priority on ensuring the party successfully addresses the issue in order to appeal to a large politically important demographic for the party.
Weirs lack of respect for the unanimous will of convention, and his subsequent actions to undermine the very processes the party is grappling with installing as a result of the members and leaders unequivocal desire to properly address these issues, suggests a suboridance that can only result in his explusion. He must have knew this was the case when he decided to roll the dice and attack his accusers , as he clearly understands the discipline required among caucus to forward party policy given his experience with carbon pricing at the Saskatchewan convention.
Weir could have simply accepted the publicly offered material for him to save face, underwent the training he agreed to and it would have been done with. The party could have delivered on its convention's mandate while ensuring the caucus reamined whole. Weir made that impossible, tainted the directive of convention by usurping the process they mandated and decided to crusade on the issue while simultaneously looking to boost his own profile by appealing to yesteryear when misogyny was normal and women were largely marginalized in the work force.
This was a fatal mistake.
Wow. Did he kick small puppies and steal candy from children too? So is it all about misogyny and marginalizing women in the workplace because he spoke to the press after someone took it upon themselves to make a public accusation (the actual reason given for canning him), or because he wanted to speak his mind at a convention?
I'll take off my thread cop badge temporarily and forgive your drift, robbie_dee, because finally we have, in detailed form, a plausible explanation of what happened. I don't know about the Charlie Angus speculation, nor do I know or care (as I have repeatedly said) what happened in bed between Moore and Kirkland. But this makes sense, however sadly it reflects on the integrity and competence of the party leadership. It certainly beats some of the asinine opinion pieces we've seen in the media. Thanks for doing this.
Thanks for giving me a pass this time, officer unionist, and for your nice words about my post. I wanted to respond to Notalib's last response as well, but will do so here to keep the threads clean.
Then why are you in this thread?
As to Weir, what has he done to impress you so much? Your defence of Weir seems hyper-partisan to me possibly also fueled by your anger at the non-democratic way the NDP is run in general.
Because Moore is yapping publicly about how she is good and Kirkland is bad, while the investigation ordered by the party hasn't even begun - whereas Weir was expelled from caucus for that very sin. It's a sobering example of how the party can't get anything straight.
That idle speculation on your part is on a par with your having imagined that Weir had harassed Moore. You have a bad habit of making things up - maybe it's all innocent, you can't control it - as you are doing throughout this thread by imagining what happened in that steamy bedroom. As for Weir, my defence of him is based on two things: 1) his work as a progressive economist on behalf of the trade union movement; and more importantly 2) that he is an innocent victim of people that are more clever, conniving, calculating, and amoral than he is - and that injustices like those committed against him are a distressing indication of a party that has totally lost its sense of principle and humanity. It's not a small thing. As for "hyper-partisan" - that's your idle speculation, and unworthy of being taken seriously long enough to formulate a reply.
You are full of shit. I pointed out where you were malicious so you ignored it. You have accused me of hyperpartisanship several times. Goose Gander.
Being a progressive economist, if he is, does not mean that he cannot also harass people. He initially accepted the findings of the report so perhaps not so innocent as you proclaim. Weir did and still does have recourse. It is his own actions that have resulted in his current situation. That he hasn't sued yet doesn't mean he won't. It can take time to get it together. I don't believe he will.
Moore and Weir are in very different situations so there is no reason why they would be treated identically. It was to Weir's benefit to stay silent while the investigation looked into the rumors. It was to Moore's benefit to respond quickly because her accuser went public with his name and she had physical proof that he was lying. Her statement was so well-crafted I suspect she did go through the party and they were aware of every word before she said it. I could certainly be wrong. I am expressing my opinion not claiming fact.
It is certainly debatable whether it is to Moore's benefit to speak out and attack the accuser publicly. The fact that she lied or mislead on an matters that can be checked, such as his testimony, where she first said he said under oath he was only taking insulin, then a day or two later claimed he said he was only taking two medications, when he said no such thing. There was no statement that these were the only medications he was taking. Given this unreliability of something that is in public records, it seems foolish to trust Moore's words on things that cannot be checked. She has a strong motivation to make herself appear innocent and to have behaved appropriately for an MP.
ETA: I believe the reason the accused is expected to not say much while the process is going on is, in part, to create an environment where people feel confortable reporting. When people know that an MP will speak out, likely with the aid of communications experts, not to mention an MP's experience in public speaking, one can certainly expect fewer complaints to be made.
Moore claimed that under oath Kirkland stated he was only taking insulin and arthritis medication. I haven't read anything stating that is untrue. Have you?
Was anyone instructed not to speak during the investigation?