"Granted, Jones was just a low-level Arkansas state employee and Flowers a singer and model. Neither possessed the gravitas of a porn star. But I can't help thinking the media would've been more supportive of the ladies if they'd been accusing a Republican." AC
"I notice a tiny, almost infinitesimal, difference in the treatment of women who accuse Republican presidents of sexual misconduct compared to women who accuse Democrats.
"Stormy Daniels is the stripper and porn star who tried to extort Donald Trump when he was running for president in 2016, threatening to tell the tabloids they'd had sex, a claim he denies. Whether Trump's description of his extortion payment to Daniels as a "legal expense" constituted a criminal violation of the federal campaign finance laws is a central element of New York's prosecution of Trump.
"The truth of Daniels' supposed sex romp with Trump is utterly irrelevant to the criminal charge, but it's humiliating to Trump, so the prosecutors put her on the stand for hours, and the media covered her testimony like it was the 9/11 attack.
"Most grippingly, Daniels testified that she became unglued upon seeing Trump in his underwear, an unlikely story from a woman who'd had sex on camera with fully naked men in literally hundreds of porn films. She said she blacked out during the sex and, afterward, her hands were "shaking so hard" she could barely put on her shoes.
"Obviously, Trump attorney Susan Necheles questioned Daniels' credibility on this point. She raised Daniels' extensive experience with seeing naked men and then having sex with them, to suggest that maybe it wasn't that much of a bombshell to see a guy in his underwear.
"The media promptly exploded in indignation on behalf of the hothouse flower Daniels, howling about "slut-shaming." (In this case, the "slut-shaming" consisted of asking the witness, "What do you do for a living?" . . .