Tara Reade Biden allegation megathread

[Mr. Illini]

True or false, the Biden campaign needs to address this. It isn't going to go away. I'd personally like to hear from the candidate himself.

[Mr. Illini]

Business Insider indicated that they had verified through public records that the two were neighbors at the complex in 1995...

[Mr. Illini]

The Biden camp needs dig up every dirty detail of Reade's life and leak it to the public.

Drop the nuke on her (politically speaking) and show her that Biden is a force of nature not to be messed with.

Bro... that's some Trumpian thinking right there. We don't stoop to their lows. And how is it going to look to viciously tear into this woman, even though it is likely she isn't telling the truth? That's honestly a really bad idea... and will make Democrats look like hypocrites after Kavanaugh.

Exactly.  Attacking the woman is the worst thing they can do.  She is not coming across as credible and so the major news media outlets are not covering the story (as they shouldn't).  If the Biden camp attacks the woman, it would make people think Biden is afraid of what she has to say and give the media a reason to cover the story.  

I am not saying to do it publicly.

Slowly leak it in a way that can't be traced back to the campaign.

Thank god the campaign isn’t paying you for advice

[Mr. Illini]

The thing I find strangest about this story and the reason I haven't posted much in this thread is what seems to be a huge disconnect between how this is unfolding within Atlas vs. the rest of the political world. If I only had Atlas to go by, I'd think this would be the #2 story in the nation after COVID-19 with major known party gadflies calling for Biden to drop out and Biden holding near-daily press conferences to push back on the allegations. But this doesn't even scratch the surfce of the political discussion elsewhere.

And it's not like I live in some pro-Biden bubble. Dozens of very active Facebook friends are diehard Bernie supporters who post stuff daily hating on Biden, but I rarely see posts about Tara Reade - still the same old "Biden supported the crime bill!" or "Biden voted for Clarence Thomas!" Every now and then someone might post about this, but it really gets lost in the noise. Even on Twitter, (where I spend a decent amount of time for work, even though I'm not an otherwise "active" user") today I saw plenty of tweets about Pelosi endorsing Biden and New York cancelling the primary as evidence of the DNC being corrupt and wanting to destroy Sanders and annoint Biden, but barely anything on Tara Reade except maybe deep in the replies.

If someone has a better lens of what the actual dynamics here are, I'd be curious. I don't watch cable news or listen to the radio, so maybe it's just a question of what medium I'm using? Maybe COVID-19 is just so historically massive that everything else feels completely ignored?

Either way, even if this is true (I still have my doubts, but I'm trying to keep an open mind), I have a hard time seeing it take down Biden or being the difference-maker in November unless there are other women who come forward. Sadly we have short attention spans, and stories like this tend to have their moment in the sun and then fade away. Even if there's a smoking gun in October, the public reaction will probably be something to the effect of "didn't we already talk about this? I thought that was disproven!"

Most of the coverage on the left is on Twitter. On the other hand, right wing media is running with it. I had a Trump-supporting family member mention it to me and they were bewildered that I hadn't heard of the Larry King tape. Bernie and the left lack a media empire like Fox News.

[Mr. Illini]

Personally, as a voter, I am happy that Biden has decided to address the issue. I didn't feel it was appropriate to remain silent and it was clear that this was not going to go away without him speaking on it. I thought he was pretty believable in the interview with Mika. She was very tough and he clearly explained how he views these issues should be approached and emphatically denied the situation and seemed genuinely confused about the allegations.

All of that said, I think it is absolutely disgraceful that the right wing media and some right wing officials are running with this. They are defending a man that has a long history of documented abuse against women, has a dozen or so accusers himself, and bragged about using his position of power to take advantage of women on camera. Democrats won't go nuclear on that (inviting his accusers to debates, etc) because they actually care about this issue. Sometimes it hurts to have more shame and respect.

[Mr. Illini]

"Why won't Biden release his personal senate records" is the new "why won't Hillary just release all her emails" except dumber.

Some have already termed the UD records the “Blue Hen Dossier.” The RW media have become professionals at the theatrics of scandals.

[Mr. Illini]

Something that should be noted is that the Trump campaign and Fox may not believe that there is anything related to Reade in the UD papers, but may be hoping that there is unrelated damaging information in them.

Also, it gives them a way to keep the scandal going into the Fall campaign.

[Mr. Illini]

I actually don’t at all buy the idea that some Republicans are defending Biden as an attempt to save them and theirs from the Me Too movement. Republicans are not at all afraid of double standards - they’d happily trash Biden on this and then vehemently defend their own against any accusations.

Maybe I’m crazy, but I think it’s a lot more sinister. It’s harder to explain with Graham, but with Trump, I think he’s trying to isolate Biden from his own base. The Democratic base sees Trump as an abuser of women. Trump wants Fox to drum up the case against Biden, but he’ll defend Biden because it blurs the distinctions between him and Biden in the minds of the Dem base, therefore hurting enthusiasm/dampening turnout. It makes Biden seem more like Trump.