MOORE ACCUSED – AT 9:20 A.M. ET:  Alabama Republican Roy Moore, running to fill, permanently, the US Senate seat vacated by Attorney General Jeff Sessions, has now been charged in a Washington Post piece with multiple incidents of sexual harassment.  From WND:

Former Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore charged Thursday the Washington Post launched a “completely false” and “desperate” political attack on him with its report featuring a woman’s allegation he engaged in sex acts with her when she was a 14-year-old, nearly four decades ago.

Moore is the Republican nominee in a special election Dec. 12 for the Alabama U.S. Senate seat vacated by Jeff Sessions, who left to become U.S. attorney general.

The Post, which endorsed Moore’s Democratic opponent, cited statements from four women, including one who claimed she went on several dates with Moore when she was 18, another who dated him when she was 17, and a third who said he asked her to go on dates when she was 16, but her mother wouldn’t allow it.

The timeframe would have been when Moore was in his early 30s.

Breitbart News, which previously reported the Post was preparing the story published Thursday, said the only serious claim is from a woman who said he kissed her on a first date and on a second removed her clothes when she was 14.

COMMENT:  I hate stories like this.  I really do.  The Washington Post piece is well researched and reaches appropriate journalistic standards.  But the fact is that these charges, made a month before a special election, relate to events that may or may not have happened almost 40 years ago.

They could certainly be true.  Moore might be guilty.  However, he is intensely disliked by the Republican establishment, has faced ethics issues during his time on the Alabama bench, and is regarded by many as a religious fanatic with little regard for church/state precedents in this country.  No doubt many Republicans would like to see him out of the race, and they've got an excuse.

Moore defeated the establishment candidate for the Senate post, Senator Luther Strange, in a hotly contested primary.  Strange, who was temporarily appointed to the seat after Sessions resigned, was endorsed by President Trump and virtually the entire Republican establishment. 

What should be done?  The charges, coming this late in a transparent attempt to destroy Moore, lower the level of American politics.  And yet, it is hard to see how Moore can continue.  From the president on down, high-level Republicans are demanding that he get off the ticket if he is guilty.  That means, in plain terms, "Get off the ticket."  There is no time to prove guilt or innocence.  In politics, Moore is presumed guilty.

I am not a Moore fan.  But I despise things happening this way.  You may be sure that many of Moore's detractors are the same people who denounce "McCarthyism."  But this is McCarthyism. 

November 10,  2017