I was going to point the same thing out, @momof2girls.
@momofthreeboys describes the accusations as “he and his ex’s (sic) fought.” No. Many married couples fight. That’s normal.
The accusation is that he beat up his wives, and also beat up a girlfriend.
To add to what has been said above. Never, ever try to date someone who abused a partner either physically or emotionally. Zebras rarely change their stripes.
A person who assaults their spouse has serious character flaws that I would not trust in any position of power. Assault is still a crime. Porter’s wife had photographic evidence and a restraining order against him. It absolutely affects how he does a job, how does he handle stress, his co workers and treat subordinates?
Spousal abuse is often linked to alcohol abuse. If a guy gets sober, he can turn from a wife beater into a person who doesn’t beat up his wife. So IF a guy is a recovering alcoholic and a former abuser, he may have changed his stripes and be safe to date.
Oh good heavens. Yes you’ve defined marital abuse as it is understood. It’s real. It happened to friends of mine. My H and a previous girlfriend had an abusive relationship that I heard about from girlfriends and from him when I started dating him. Not us, we have no issues, but I think I well understand what domestic abuse is if your comments are directed at me. I think it’s a leap to say that marital abuse is predictive of someone punching a co-worker which happens to be a valid opinion that I am entitled to without scorn.
Someone who hits women is either (a) not respectful of women and thinks it’s OK to hit them, and/or (b) someone with serious difficulty controlling his temper and disagreeing about something in a civilized way. I don’t want an individual with either problem controlling the information the President sees.
The other issue is General Kelly and when he knew. Apparently he knew about this months ago, and it was just fine with him. Once it became public, especially the photo, it became a problem.
Analogy: Suppose General Kelly knew that Stephen Miller had marched in a KKK rally? Apparently that would be OK with him, as long as there was no photographic evidence and as long as it didn’t become public.
I think people in government should have impeccable histories, I want our young people to have role models and aspire for greatness. These dreams shouldn’t include respecting abusive government officials, newscaster or actors.
If we condone some abuse and not all where are the lines drawn?
I’m sure Spacey didn’t need to assault a 17 year old while drunk, or Roger Ailes to Pursue his co workers, or Weinstein to manipulate his actresses. (Sarcasm font)
We can’t begin to excuse criminal behavior in people who many aspire to be. They have to held accountable and to higher standards.
If Porter had acknowledged his abuse and sought help to reform by all means give him a chance, but not until then.
How is this a policy-making position? Besides, even someone who knocked around his ex-wives can believe that it is wrong to knock women around. Bit of a disconnect there, as they say.
And reportedly he was good at his job.
No… really they can’t. This guy didn’t repent, didn’t seek forgiveness and change. He sought to cover up his disgraceful behavior. And he did it to more than one woman. Time’s up for him.
The White House staff secretary decides which documents reach the President and which don’t. If they don’t think an issue is important, they don’t have to give the President any information about it or bring it to the President’s attention. Staff secretary is a position of great power.
Also, Porter is reported to have worked on the State of the Union address, an important policy statement.
So, let’s think of a hypothetical. Suppose the Chiefs of Staff, or other high-ranking military officers, become concerned about violence committed by soldiers against women soldiers. They produce extensive documentation, as well as proposals for new legislation and executive regulations. This documentation, like all documentation, has to pass through the staff secretary’s hands to make it to the President.
But suppose we have a staff secretary who thinks that soldiers losing their temper and assaulting their fellow female soldiers is no big deal; those uppity women deserved it. Then that staff secretary can bury the report and make sure the President knows nothing about it.
He was bad at the “First, get a security clearance” part of his job.
And, this guy beat two women. Even if you want to use the b.s. excuse that the couple ‘fought’ what are the odds that he’d ‘fight’ with two wives?
Not only that, he and his wives are Mormon. Things must have been pretty g.d. bad for two Mormon women to divorce his ass, because divorce is not encouraged in the church.
Also, I’m totally fine with not rewarding crappy human beings with prestigious jobs, no matter how good they may be at the day to day tasks of the job.
^He obviously had a temporary clearance, and it wasn’t his job to give himself a security clearance. Also it is my understanding that he resigned? is that true?
I think unless you have witnessed and known people in volatile relationships or who had volatile relationships you can’t understand the dynamic and how someone can be in an abusive relationship once and never again. It did give me pause that two times he was in abusive relationship as the named abuser. That is troubling to me. I would be curious who filed for divorce in both cases. That might add some insight as I have witnessed relationships that were abusive on one partner and relationships where abusive behavior was evidenced by both partners and you never knew who was going to start what. Really awful.
He “resigned.”
On another topic – my D is in the ‘help’ room for the Physics dept at her university today (TAs take turns providing student support for the class she is a TA for). A student comes in asking for help. She helps him find his computational error. Student insists that is NOT the way to do it, and proceeds to call her “sweetheart” multiple times as he mansplains why his way is “better” and that she doesn’t know what she is talking about. She stands her ground, since her method gets the correct answer to the problem. He leaves in a huff. Grrr… Not assault, but sexist and annoying behavior.
If Mr. KnowItAll comes in again for help, she must insist that he treat her with respect or she cannot help him. No “sweethearts.”
Mr. KnowItAll may also have had a correct way to get the answer-- there are many ways to get to correct answers-- but he needs to act with respect.
Over the last few months I have come to the realization that many – not all – but many men genuinely believe that they are supposed to be in charge of the world. With women’s lib and all that politically correct BS, they have to let a few women into alleged positions of power, but they won’t let them speak and they won’t really let them be in charge. One or two women on a Board of Directors is enough; a few women VPs is enough. Only 19% of Congressional representatives are women. Only 21% of senators are women.
In fact, if the women get too uppity, the men will embarrass them, sexually harass them, hit them or rape them, to put those women back in their place.
Every time I look around lately, I see it. It’s ubiquitous.
ETA:
The corollary to this is that when women complain or come forward with an accusation, they are first assumed to be making it up. Then, if they are believed, they are told they don’t have a sense of humor or, as we were all told in elementary school, “He does it because he likes you!” Then, if they have photographs showing the physical assault, they are blamed for making a big deal out of nothing. “He only hit you once!” Or, they blame the woman – “You must have done something terrible to make him so angry with you.”
Why do men get to be in charge of the world? It’s changing, but not fast enough for me. This issue will not be solved in my lifetime.