Franken: Accusers 3 and 4.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

102. Depends on what you mean by "tolerate."

Do we demand the resignation of a very effective progressive senator (Jeff Sessions probably wouldn't be on the hot seat now if it hadn't been for Franken's questions) because he patted some strangers' butts in public and acted like a dumb frat boy during a typically bawdy USO show, when he could do a lot more good remaining in the senate and doing penance by promoting legislation that strengthens the currently toothless legal procedures dealing with sexual harassment?

Or are we going to go for some zero-tolerance approach, which almost always leads to ridiculous overreactions - like a kid getting expelled from his zero-weapons-tolerance school because he forgot he had a little pocket knife in his backpack, or the first-grader who gets kicked out because during recess he pretended a stick was a gun? Zero tolerance policies of any kind lead to mindlessly treating things the same that are actually very different. Some things should be tolerated if they can be corrected, mitigated, and used to improve a situation, and where the consequences of not tolerating them are worse.

And, by the way, we can "advocate for women" until we're blue in the face - and all that advocating will go nowhere if the GOP controls everything.