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Filthy-dirty, hard-ball politics are at play in Alabama as former state Supreme Court Chief Judge Roy Moore and current U.S. Senate Republican candidate — faces last-minute bombshell allegations about sexual misconduct involving a 14-year-old girl from 38-years-ago when Moore was 32.

Moore faces Democrat Doug Jones in a special election Dec. 12 to replace Sen. Jeff Sessions who resigned to become President Donald Trump’s attorney general. In Real Clear Politics polling averages Moore has a 6-point lead over Jones. Moore won a Republican primary election six-weeks-ago. The entire establishment in Washington is afraid he just might win and become the U.S. Senate’s most controversial, conservative Christian and far-right member. It’s clear from recent TV news interviews Republican senators don’t want him in the senate while the Democrats say he’s a blatant racist.

Mainstream media fueled by a Washington Post story published last Thursday is hammering away at Moore with these sexual accusations that have yet be proven against Moore while Moore cannot possibly clear his name despite his denials the alleged encounter never occurred. These unproven claims amount to attempted political assassination to take Moore out of the campaign. Why is establishment Washington so opposed to Moore? The people of Alabama apparently like him and it’s up to them to elect him or not. It’s not the decision of Republican senators, Democrats or mainstream media to make. Moore defiantly says he will remain in the race, according to news reports. On Sunday, Moore announced his intention to bring legal action against the Washington Post.

Moore’s spokesman Bill Armistead denies all of the Washington Post’s allegations that are being repeated over and over by mainstream media as if they were true.

“Judge Roy Moore has endured the most outlandish attacks on any candidate in modern political arena, but this story in today’s Washington Post alleging sexual impropriety takes the cake,” said Armistead. “National liberal organizations know their chosen candidate Doug Jones is in a death spiral, and this is their last ditch Hail Mary.”

Moore is an amazing, flamboyant and totally controversial character even more so than President Trump and that’s saying something. Before the September primary election the president did not endorse Moore, but since he has praised Moore for his independence from conventional politics as usual.

Twice Moore was elected to the Alabama Supreme Court and twice he was removed from office. In 2003 he was removed from office for violating federal court orders to remove a large marble statue of the Christian Ten Commandments from inside the Alabama Judicial Building that he had commissioned to be made.  Then in 2013 he was again elected Chief Justice but he was suspended in 2016 for refusing to recognize same-sex marriages in Alabama. Moore appealed the decision and lost. He resigned the court in 2017 and announced his plans to run for the U.S. Senate, according to Wikipedia.

Mainstream media is publishing photos of this 14-year-old girl and the girl’s mother. Both are now coming forward with these allegations against Moore in TV news interviews. Other than denying the girl’s statements backed up by her mother, what can Moore do to save himself from these unproven accusations? To add insult to political injury, the Washington Post story also included interviews with four other women that claim to have dated Moore when he was in his young 30s and they were teenagers between 16 and 18. These women said Moore was never inappropriate with them and they only talked, held hands and kissed. Moore says these claims are “completely false.”

Few if anyone in mainstream media are asking where was this woman, who is now 53, and her mother years ago when Moore joined the Alabama Supreme Court? That’s not a small-potatoes position and surely if these accusations were true this situation would have surfaced long ago and taken its political toll on Moore. But now, it comes across as a classic political hit job by coming up with the strongest, ugliest possible accusations and splatter Moore’s reputation all over the front pages of newspapers, in national TV news interviews and on social media.

First it was sexual accusations against comedian Bill Cosby that was in the headlines. Now it’s Hollywood film producer Harvey Weinstein, ‘House of Cards’ actor Kevin Spacey and comedian Louis C.K. along with some others in Tinsel Town that are being grilled over a hot fire of sexual misconduct. The common thread — amongst these accusations being made against the rich and powerful — is most are old incidents that should have been reported and resolved long ago — not now. Weinstein and Spacey are taking the traditional ‘bob and weave and deny’ approach to these problems while Louis C.K. admits he did — over the years– take advantage of women sexually many times because of his celebrity status.

For some people Moore is not an easy guy to admire unless you value a strong Christian, a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, NY, a U.S. Army officer, a Vietnam War veteran and former military policeman. He’s openly admits to being anti-gay and anti-Muslim. He believes that former President Obama is a secret Muslim. Even in this day and age, Moore is as controversial a public figure to be found anywhere, but it’s up to the voters of Alabama to send Moore to the U.S. Senate or send him home crying.

Political sex scandals are nothing new. Remember President Bill, intern Monica and all those other women? Or when former presidential candidate Gary Hart was caught by the media on Bimini Island in 1987 frolicking with a young, cute blonde named Donna Rice on a yacht named “Monkey Business.” One of the best such scandals was back in 1974 when then U.S. Rep. Wilbur Mills (D-ARK) — chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee — was caught red-handed by U.S. Park Service police driving drunk late one night and fighting with Argentine nightclub stripper Fanne Foxe in his car. As police stopped the car Foxe fled the vehicle and jumped nude into the Tidal Basin near the Jefferson Memorial. Despite the scandal Mills easily won reelection that year. But on Nov. 30, 1974 Mills held a drunken, rambling impromptu press conference discussing the country’s business from Foxe’s dressing room at her Washington, DC nightclub. He soon stepped down from his chairmanship and joined Alcoholics Anonymous, according to Wikipedia. Of course, these public incidents were on the front pages of the Washington Post as well, but those were the days when scandals weren’t so vicious, premeditated and full of lies – they were just plain stupid and foolish. For weeks on end late-night comedian Johnny Carson had a field day telling jokes about Wilbur and Fanne, Gary and Donna — and all that “Monkey Business.”

But what’s going on in Alabama with Judge Roy Moore’s senate campaign is no laughing matter.

 

About the AuthorBritt Nelson relocated to Costa Rica in 2011 from Florida, where he served as news editor for the Palatka Daily News, a newspaper owned by the New York Times Regional Newspaper Group (NYT-RNG) for 20 years.

Nelson served the NYT-RNG for 18 years in Tennessee, Kentucky, Virginia, North Carolina and Florida as a correspondent, reporter, staff writer, senior staff writer training new reporters, copy editor, page designer, editorial writer, editorial page editor and editorial board member.