Scandal and Hypocrisy

31 August 2007 |permalink | email article

The Dog Days of August end, but the sex scandal involving Sen. Larry E. Craig just keeps on giving, nauseatingly alive on cable TV and talk radio.

The career of the ultra-conservative Idaho Republican appears close to collapse as party leaders both abandon him and call for his resignation amid the fallout over his June 11 arrest at Minneapolis-St. Paul Airport for sexual activity in a public men’s room.

Craig, an outspoken champion of family values who repeatedly says “I am not gay” and denied any sexual intent, pleaded guilty Aug. 8 to disorderly conduct, was fined and got a suspended 10-day jail sentence.

It was a kept secret until Monday when the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call disclosed the arrest and guilty plea.

What makes the story interesting, aside from another blow to the presumption that Republicans are the “Morality Party,” is that Craig was co-chair of the U.S. Senate Mitt Romney for President campaign until the men’s room unpleasantness caused him to resign.

So Romney rushed to condemn Craig. He told Larry Kudlow on MSNBC “the most important thing we expect from elected – an elected official is a level of dignity and character that we can point to our kids and grandkids and say, ‘Yey, someday I hope you grow up and say you’re someone like that person.”

It’s understandable that Romney might want to severe a relationship when someone you trusted turns out not to a person with whom you want to be associated. But, I mean, how far do you go to deny reality?

But Romney revealed himself as a self-righteous hypocrite, removing all references to Craig on previously published press releases that appear on his web site as if his former co-chair never existed.

The New York Times columnist Gail Collins nailed it: “People, have you ever in your life pointed to your kids or grandkids and said you hoped they grew up to be like Larry Craig? Or Bill Clinton? Or Mitt Romney?

“No, you might hope they were as politically skillful as Clinton or as financially successful as Romney or as … um, good at barbershop quartet singing as Larry Craig.” 

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