Dear Rebecca:

Ever gone back and read the contemporaneous coverage of the Clarence Thomas hearings? A lot of what was being said back then sounds really familiar now.

“There is a radical change in culture,” Amitai Etzioni, a sociologist at George Washington University, told The New York Times. “Things which used to be tolerated by both genders are now increasingly defined as inconceivable. And I find it interesting that this case focuses on the margins: You said, but you didn’t touch. It’s a good place for the debate to be. It’s an interesting indication how the culture has changed.”

Sound familiar?

What’s fascinating about all the voices that have emerged in 2017 is how little the culture has changed since 1991. The lessons learned from the Clarence Thomas hearings were given lip service by responsible corporate and political leaders across the land — and then, apparently, utterly disregarded.

Which leads me to ask a question at The Week: Are we really learning our lesson this time?

Please read me!
Joel