The Republicans may have abandoned Larry Craig, but the embattled Senator found an unlikely supporter: homo-politico Barney Frank. The Massachusetts representative thinks Craig should defy calls for his resignation:
What he did, it’s hypocritical, but it’s not an abuse of his office in the sense that he was taking money for corrupt votes. I think people should resign when they have clearly done the job in a way that is dishonest. It’s one thing to say that someone can’t be trusted to vote without being corrupt, it’s another to say that he can’t be trusted to go to the bathroom by himself.
Frank’s definitely got a point, but can voters really trust someone who says one thing and does another? There’s something to be said for integrity.
Meanwhile, yet another Republican’s come out against Craig. Indiana’s Rep. Mark Souder said,
While additional concerns are being raised, Senator Craig already demonstrated that he is unfit to serve in the U.S. Congress when he pled guilty. I believe that he needs to step down.
Souder joins John McCain, Rep. Jeff Miller of Florida and Minnesota Senator Norm Coleman in calling for Craig’s resignation. Coleman also donated Larry Craig’s campaign contribution to charity. You know things are serious when politicos start turning over cash.
ben
Would it be wrong to ask if this is all because Craig wasn’t allowed to openly come out of the closet?
Or that societal biphobia prevented him from finding sexual comfort in more legitimate surroundings?
What he did was lewd, but I can’t help to think that a lot of this pressure is fueled by homophobia.
GranDiva
ben, you’d be right, but at the same time, we still live in a country that tried to impeach a president – legal pretexts aside – for getting a blow job in the Oval Office. There is still a strongly held notion here that our elected officials should be held to a higher moral standard than the rest of the citizenry, whether they actually meet that standard or not.
cjc
Barney’s living under ideal Massachusetts logic. Unfortunately, in Idaho, Lar-Lar’s probably going to be strung up from a tree by some neo-Nazis.
Bryan
DIRTY DADDY!!!!!
WWH
Well, if Clinton could continue to hold the highest office in the land for waht many femenists would call sexual harassment (It’s all about poweer, baby), then I suppose Craig should be allowed to sit it out and let the voters decide.
Mr. B
People who accuse Congress of hanging Craig for this fiasco seem to have forgotten that Barney Frank himself went under investigation when he was revealed to be in a relationship with a male prostitute. Now, he’s an extremely liberal Democrat and he was out as gay before the prostitute “scandal,” but the House voted to give him some kind of reprimand and move on. Seventeen years later and he’s still going strong.
The disciplinary action against Craig doesn’t have much to do with gay sex (except that it would be hard for him to solicit a woman in the men’s room). The difference between his case and Frank’s is that Frank was proven not to have done anything illegal (he was dating the prostitute, not paying him or pimping him), whereas Craig has been accused of (and plead guilty to) something that is, like it or not, against the law.
cjc
Unfortunately, Mr. B, the people on the ‘tarded side of the aisle can’t really understand your worthy logic, because, it’s like hard, n’ stuff.
Mr. B
Cjc: Heh heh. You said “hard.”
cjc
tee hee!