In 2018, here we are again. Another woman, Christine Blasey Ford, testified in front of a panel of mostly men about the sexual assault she says she endured at the hands of the Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh. She too has taken a polygraph test supporting her version of events. She is speaking her truth in front of the nation. Her entire life has exploded because she had the courage to come forward out of a sense of patriotic duty, the greater good. And still there are people who doubt her. Who do not find her credible. And if they do find her credible, they don’t think what she endured merits Judge Kavanaugh’s losing this career opportunity.

Judge Kavanaugh did not need to write down his woes in an essay. He was able to share them in front of an international audience, in real time. When he spoke on his own behalf, he was all rage and righteousness, ego and entitlement. He cried. He glared. It was a grand performance, more implausibly dramatic than any episode of “Law & Order.” Judge Kavanaugh interrupted nearly every Democratic senator who questioned him. A year after the allegations against Harvey Weinstein were first reported, a federal judge behaved as a self-indulgent brat, unwavering in his conviction that he deserves to be on the Supreme Court.