Justice Thomas' wife asks Anita Hill for apology

Should Ginni Thomas really be calling Anita Hill's office?

Yup.

It can't be good for a Supreme Court Justice to be married to a stalker. Anyone who says that this is the act of someone other than a stalker is an hopelessly hackish apologist.

One phone call doesn't make you a stalker, unless it's in combination with hundreds of letters and a few dead animals.

I find it fascinating how many of your posts say, essentially "my view is self evident and anyone who disagrees is clearly [insert wildly hyperbolic name calling here]"

It's like you don't even want to be taken seriously, even as a troll or a caricature.

To the OP - I see this as a non-issue and find the idea of turning it over even to the school, let alone to the F-reakin-B-I to be wildly over the top.

Odds are Thomas did it for publicity and the best reaction would be to save the file and mention it to no one and go on about your business.

What doesn't make sense to me is why is she seeking Anita Hill's apology? Either Ginni Thomas believes her husband or she doesn't.

If she believes her husband, she forgets Anita Hill's statement and moves on.

If she thinks Anita Hill's statements may have some truth to it, the logical action for her is to either forgive her husband or not forgive her husband.

But if Ginni Thomas believes Clarence Thomas is innocent and yet is still seeking out Anita Hill's apology....no, that does not compute.

She then also compounds the matter by seeking through the media this same requested apology. Hmm, ok....

There are ways imo to extend olive branches but this is not it. Her statement itself, quite frankly, does not read as an olive branch at all.

It sounds like someone is trying to seek something that is lacking in their own life in all the wrong places. Just seems rather weird.

Eminence, you're setting up a faulty premise. It could be that she does believe her husband AND believes an apology is warranted. Personally, I agree that she should have moved on from this a long time ago, but your premise doesn't work here.

This doesn't have to be about her blaming her husband for anything. She believes her husband is a victim and deserves an apology. That doesn't mean she blames him for anything. That's the equivalent of saying a rape victim somehow asked for their abuse. That's the one that doesn't compute.

Again, I do agree that this should've been left alone but you're reaching here.

Maybe... But this was old news and no one was thinking about it. Why would Ginni Thomas want her husband's name run through the mud once again? Why would she obsessively seek out Anita Hill and give her an opportunity to call into question his good name all over again? If it's a PR stunt, she looses, IMHO.

Maybe she just wants some Hope and Change.

Anita Hill- still a classless act after all these years.

She'll never apologize. She'd lose face if she did and she would basically be admitting she made the whole thing up.

But Thomas got the last laugh.

While I agree this is old news, the only one whose name will be dragged through the mud is that lying sack Anita Hill.

Why dredge up such an ugly subject at this particular moment? Thomas is on the court and I see nothing to gain by rehashing it. This is a Rashoman type scenario if there ever was one. At this point there is nothing anyone involved can say that will change anyone's perception of what happened, short of Anita Hill admitting she made it all up or Thomas admitting it was all true. (in either case, I would still wonder) It just doesn't make any sense. I might have cared at the time, but I certainly don't now.

A single phone call is stalking?

Yup. I don't understand how this even became news unless that attention whore Hill thought she needed to leak a private voice mail to the press and the FBI. She could have just ignored the voice mail and have left it at that.

I would ask Liet to explain himself but I'm no sadist.

Maybe she's in therapy and has unresolved issues and was advised to seek closure.

I doubt Mrs. Thomas was trying to get PR with a single private e-mail. I think Anita is being a bitch and wants to try and make something...attention, grief for Mrs. Thomas..something... out of this woman's desire for closure.

More articles on this:

The Washington Post:

The part about one of Clarence Thomas' ex-girlfriend's corroborating Anita Hill's story was certainly a bit surprising.

Who made it public airing of dirty laundry....Anita did.

A single message isn't harassment, either. A request to consider is not "pushing".

It's going to humped to death and distorted because the woman supports the Tea Party.

After ALL THESE YEARS, and she's just NOW asking for an apology? Does anyone smell attention whore besides me? What a crock. Woman, you married someone who got involved with politics via confirmation. This is just part of the game. I can just IMAGINE the outrage if Hillary asked Lewinsky for an apology. LMAO. Now let's talk about double standards.

Actually, there is no reason for Hillary to ask Lewinsky for an apology, because Monica Lewinsky did apologize to Hillary, in 2007 on 20/20.

Hillary I'm sure, for her part, was either politely gracious or whatever, I don't give a shit.

Sounds to me like Ginni Thomas could learn something from Hillary.

It seems to me Anita Hill could learn something from Monica Lewinsky.

Yep. Here it is. If you marry someone who has ANYTHING to do with this government's federal, legislative, or judicial branches, you're marrying a demon. So be prepared for the baggage that comes with it.

Well Anita Hill maintains that she is telling the truth. So I would assume she thinks she has no reason to apologize.

I think it's interesting to note how much nation has changed since that time. Back when the harassment was said to have occurred, in the early 1980's, protections against sexual harassment were not anywhere near as strong as they are now. Yes, the 1960's Civil Rights Legislation did grant women some protection, but even the very first sexual harassment cases didn't occur till the 1970's. Even then, the concept of "Sexual Harassment" didn't really enter into the national debate (that is, outside of legal circles) till in fact, the Clarence Thomas/Anita Hill matter itself. The Anita Hill/Clarence Thomas matter was really the first instance that nationalized the idea that sexual harassment was even a problem in this country.

The other part of this is also that it wasn't till 1988 that the EEOC issued guidelines saying that a woman could prove that she had been sexually harassed "based solely on the credibility of the victim's allegation." Mind you, that doesn't mean that you could simply accuse someone and condemn them, you still had to prove that your allegations are credible, but it was a marked change from how these things were dealt with before when you couldn't prove harassment had occurred simply by your word alone. You had to have corroborating witnesses, and let's face it, how many sexual harassers harass their victims when someone else is around to witness it? The extra burden of producing a witness before you could get relief, as opposed to now being able to prove harassment by proving the credibility of your allegation, in fact kept many women from taking action to assert their rights to be free from harassment. Whatever one may think about the Anita Hill matter, at least it had the one benefit of informing everyone on a national level how the rules had changed and what exactly were a person's rights in this situation. In the year following the Anita Hill/Clarence Thomas matter, sexual harassment lawsuits increased 50% as more and more women realized that they did have recourse in difficult situations.

This makes me wonder then what Anita Hill's actions may have been if such protections were around at the time when the alleged harassment occurred with her. Would she have filed formal charges against Clarence Thomas?

My sense is yeah, probably, and I would venture that she likely could have shown enough cause for a hearing. Now, that's not to say that she would have been able to prove that Clarence Thomas is guilty, but she would have at least been able to have him indicted, if you will, by bringing out about a hearing to figure out if he was indeed actually guilty.

Of course, we'll never know now, since obviously you can't go back in time and apply the laws of today to the actions of yesterday, but it's something interesting to consider.

Off topic, while I would ordinarily never wish ill on another WF'er, I sorta wish Hillary Clinton would murder Eminence's entire family with a rusty machete and he'd walk in on the middle of it. I wonder what would happen.

That's just rude, Volpone. Do not bring my family into this.

You could have just said "I sorta wish Hillary Clinton would murder Eminence with a rusty machete. I wonder if he'd still be as 'enamored' with her then", or something to that effect.

Troll me = that's fine. When you bring my family into it = I'd probably kill you.

From one of the opinion writers at the Washington Post.

Ruth Marcus weighs in. Somewhat fair treatment, imo, as she takes both Ginna Thomas and Anita Hill to task.

Exactly. The time to ask for an apology - if she felt one was warranted - would have been soon after the hearings, though the smart thing to do would have been to wait until after his confirmation.

Nineteen years later? The lady doth protest too much, methinks.