Two cases defy #MeToo mentality

It’s been a good couple of weeks for men who understand their rights, and who aren’t afraid to defend them in the fetid #Metoo atmosphere. Let’s start nationally, and go smaller.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh has yet again become a target of harassment by the same folks who tried to derail his nomination a year ago this month. In connection with the release of a new book about his confirmation process, “The Education of Brett Kavanaugh,” the authors wrote a now-notorious oped in the New York Times discussing a new, unvetted allegation of sexual misconduct. The incident involved Kavanaugh’s penis being shoved into the face of a Yale classmate during a bacchanal.

It is important to note that Kavanaugh is not accused of being the “shover,” but rather the owner of a penis that was “shoved” by someone else into a third person. It is also important to note that the person into whose face the penis was allegedly shoved has no memory of the incident. It is equally important to note that the only person claiming to be an eyewitness to Penis-gate is Marc Stier, a longtime Clinton supporter and legal advocate who had run-ins with Kavanaugh when the justice worked for Ken Starr on the Whitewater investigation.

And if that weren’t enough, it is important to note that none of this was noted in the original New York Times story. The Old Grey Lady made her tepid mea culpas via a “correction” the day after the initial bombshell dropped, but is relatively unapologetic for the sloppy, almost malicious nature of its reporting.

I’m not worried that Kavanaugh is going anywhere anytime soon, and that is some consolation. But the return of the rabid crowds with their prejudices and animosity reminds me that even though you can exterminate a plague of termites in your house, there is always the danger they will come back with an even stronger appetite if you don’t pay attention. I’m paying attention.

That’s why I’m still interested in a local story that parallels in some general ways the tale of Brett Kavanaugh. Daylin Leach is still a Pennsylvania state senator, a famously progressive, vocal, colorful, effective and brash representative of a certain strain of liberalism. I’ve noted in the past that we agree on very little, but in that bizarre way life has of sending you curveballs, he has taken on heroic dimensions.

And that’s because courage and honesty are valuable and increasingly rare in this society, and they should be respected no matter what the outer packaging.

Leach has been the target of a search-and-destroy campaign by “woke folk” in the Legislature, most of who are his fellow Democrats and have benefited mightily from his decades of advocacy for causes they say they support. But now that people like Sen. Katie Muth, Minority Leader Jay Costa, Gov. Tom Wolf and their social media network of supporters have decided Leach is a sexual deviant because he tells off-color jokes, the progressive machine has decided to eat him up and spit him out. They’ve again called for his resignation, despite the findings in the recent report on the matter from the law firm of Eckert Seamans that found no legal grounds for the allegations of sexual abuse lodged against him by some accusers with questionable credibility.

The Democrats are spinning it another way, and saying that his off-color jokes and over-familiarity created a hostile work environment, in much the same way that the GOP essentially caved to the loud ladies in the caucus and failed to defend Nick Miccarelli after allegations were lodged against him.

The reason I am mentioning Miccarelli is that while I align with him on every issue and with Leach on virtually none, I think that the damage being done by the #Metoo movement is bipartisan and that we should not exult in the suffering of those on the other side of the political divide, because one day the axe will fall on our necks as well.

I urged Leach to ignore the calls for his resignation, and he assured me that he will.

Standing up for your rights in this climate is increasingly difficult, especially if you happen to be a man accused of sexual impropriety.

We should all take a moment to recognize that courage when we see it.

I give thanks for the fact that I live in a country where, for at least a little while longer, it is still possible to defy the mobs.