Let’s stipulate that every public figure who has been in Washington for the last decade has by now voiced at least five contradictory opinions on the subject of sexual harassment. And sure, picking out those contradictions in the age of Nexis is, in the idiot folk-saying of THE SCRAPBOOK’s hometown, like shooting fish in a barrel. But, hey, if the bullets don’t make all the water leak out of the barrel, the fish taste mighty fine. Or something.
So here’s this week’s fried fish stick — Sen. Al Gore, on the floor of the Senate in 1991, paying fulsome tribute to Professor Anita Hill:
“Luckily, the American workplace will never be the same. Men and women everywhere — in offices, in factories, in schools, in banks — are talking about sexual harassment; and hopefully this dialog will result in the end of sexual harassment in the workplace and more professional relationships between men and women who work together.
“I have been deeply moved by the stories of women who have written to me from Tennessee and from across the country, telling me about their own experiences with sexual harassment, believing their jobs to be threatened by refusing unwanted personal attention from professional colleagues.” No word on how many of those stories were written from the neighboring state of Arkansas.
Sen. Gore went on to read into the Congressional Record a letter from 157 women attorneys in Los Angeles who noted: “It is not uncommon for cordial professional relationships to be maintained with those engaged in sexual harassment, sometimes because the behavior ceased or because individuals changed jobs, or because it was necessary or prudent to do so for legitimate career advancement reasons.”
Gore has not been as vocal on the subject of Kathleen Willey. But then it is not uncommon for vice presidents to maintain cordial professional relationships with those they serve, for legitimate career- advancement reasons.
