I watched Fox News last night and saw the excerpts they broadcast of Christine Blasey Ford's testimony.  This morning, I read the transcript of her opening remarks.

The most notable thing about her testimony was her palpable fear.  From the transcript remarks, this is due to her trauma from having been held down and groped, and having her mouth covered so she couldn't scream.  I do not believe that Judge Kavanaugh was the boy who did this, but perhaps it happened with someone else.  Her testimony sounded heartfelt.

I wish she had had a better relationship with her parents.  She concealed from them her attendance at a drunken party.  She did not give them the opportunity to counsel her on how to handle the unexpected behavior and chose instead to try to work it out on her own.  Her parents did not observe the changes in her and try to get her any help.  It is curious that they seemingly didn't tell her anything useful before this happened, such as:

• Don't go to unchaperoned parties.
• If alcoholic beverages are available, don't consume them.
• Teenage boys will sometimes try to take advantage of girls by groping them.
• Serious rapists don't try to interfere with each other and don't give up just because the girl momentarily eludes them.  This is part of why girls shouldn't attend unchaperoned parties.

I could add more bullet points, but these seem obvious and apparently weren't covered.  She kept her parents from knowing anything important about her life and instead allowed the trauma to take root.  She learned to live in fear and avoided even thinking about her experience. How is anyone supposed to deal with something he won't even think about?

ABC News screen grab.

Let me do some full disclosure here.  During the time I attended college, I was attacked at gunpoint and forced to have sex with a complete stranger.  I was attacked after dark and didn't get a good look at the guy.  I feared being beaten or shot, but neither transpired.  I hesitated to report the attack because I had little to no useful identifying information.  I could not have picked the guy out of a lineup.  I immediately told my roommate and a close (male) friend, who insisted I should report it even if I didn't have much information.

I spent a week or so being afraid anytime I was in a similar situation, walking around after dark by myself, so I avoided doing that.  I didn't see a therapist because I couldn't afford it.  After a while, I decided that being afraid was pointless.  The rapist had ruined my evening, but I didn't have to let him ruin my life.  I decided that if I were attacked again, I was going to fight as hard as I could, even if it meant being shot and killed.  Death was preferable to living in fear.

I guess I just don't have what it takes to be a successful victim.  Oh, and I never blamed the gun for anything.

The alleged attack seems to be a case of some teenage boys behaving inappropriately but not atypically.  They probably thought it was all in good fun, as supported by them heading downstairs in high spirits when she went and hid in the bathroom.  They could have pounded on the door or broken it down.  They could have made verbal threats aimed at silencing her.  Nope, they went back to the party.  They probably didn't know she was frightened.  Had she confronted them instead of fleeing, they might have apologized.

I'm not sure why she considers this event so horrific.  Unpleasant, perhaps, but unpleasant things do happen to people, and one should try to learn what one can from them and move on, making better choices in the future.

For choosing weakness instead of strength, she should be ashamed of herself.  For insisting that other people should enable her weakness instead of encouraging her to develop strength, she should be ashamed of herself.  For participating in a figurative gang rape of Judge Kavanaugh's character, she should be ashamed of herself, as should all the Democrat senators on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Judge Kavanaugh, on the other hand, having endured this unpleasant experience, is fighting back.  He has called out the committee on its reprehensible behavior.  He has protested and pointed out that he did nothing to deserve this.  He is putting the responsibility for what has transpired in these hearings back where it belongs: on the senators who have tried to destroy him.  I doubt he will ever forget this experience, but he's not going to be living a life of fear and trembling over it.

He's my kind of person: strong and capable.  I hope the committee recognizes what a treasure such a man is and confirms him.