Ya can’t make this stuff up!

October 8th, 2007

File this under “Why The Pubs Are Going Down.”

Jude

Sen. Craig to Join Idaho Hall of Fame
Embattled Sen. Larry Craig to Join Idaho Hall of Fame Despite Sex Sting Guilty Plea
ABC news
Oct 7, 2007

BOISE, Idaho - Sen. Larry Craig has been chosen for induction into the Idaho Hall of Fame, despite his well-publicized arrest and guilty plea in an airport sex sting, officials said.

The nonprofit Idaho Hall of Fame Association picked Craig in March, months before he pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct after a Minneapolis airport police officer accused him of soliciting sex in the men’s restroom, the organization’s board chairman said.

“Larry Craig has made a great contribution to Idaho over the period of 20-some years. At the time it was considered, this other matter had not come up,” Harry Magnuson told The Spokesman-Review newspaper Saturday.

But some Republicans said the honor is inappropriate now. Kootenai County Republican precinct committeeman Phil Thompson said Idaho Hall of Fame officials should consider at least postponing the induction.

“Maybe in 10 or 15 years we can think of this hall of fame stuff. Now is not the time,” he said. “It’s a sad day to be a Republican.”

Craig vowed Thursday to serve out the last 15 months of his term, despite a court ruling that left intact his guilty plea in the sex sting operation.

Several people are scheduled to be inducted during the Oct. 13 ceremony alongside Craig, including Gov. Butch Otter, Lt. Gov. Jim Risch, Boise State University football coach Chris Petersen and John Grossenbacher, director of the Idaho National Laboratory nuclear and energy research center.

About 100 people have been inducted into the hall since 1995, including the late Nez Perce Tribe leader Chief Joseph, Coeur d’Alene writer and historian Louise Shadduck, World War II fighter ace Gregory “Pappy” Boyington and newspaper and hospitality magnate Duane Hagadone. ++

Craig’s Reversal Dismays Many Back Home in Idaho
WILLIAM YARDLEY, NYT
October 6, 2007

MIDVALE, Idaho, Oct. 5 — Dismissing the wishes of the bigwigs in Washington often scores points for politicians here in the reluctant stretch of the Republic known as the state of Idaho.

Then there is the unresignation of Senator Larry E. Craig.

“A lot of Republicans in Idaho think they need to sit down on a good shrink’s couch right now,” said Tracy Lotz, a former vice chairman of the state Republican Party. “We’re in shock.”

Unaccustomed to political relevance, Idaho has endured more than a month of political parody. And that was before Mr. Craig provided new material on Thursday by saying he would stay in office after all, notwithstanding a court ruling forbidding him to withdraw his guilty plea in a restroom sex sting.

Some Idahoans profess a respect for Mr. Craig for showing an indigenous “moxie” in telling off the national Republicans who tried to force him out, and some insist he did nothing wrong in the first place. Yet it is also clear from interviews with people across the state that he has lost considerable support as he tries to finish out his term, which lasts until January 2009.

Many people say his repeated revision of his plans to serve and not serve has served only himself and ruined his credibility.

“He’s using politics, and that’s not really what his roots are,” said Jim Warren, superintendent here in the Midvale School District, where Mr. Craig was educated in a one-room schoolhouse until seventh grade. “People here really pride themselves on keeping their word.”

The news broke on Aug. 27 that Mr. Craig, 62, had pleaded guilty to a disorderly conduct charge related to the undercover sex sting, conducted at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. On Sept. 1, under intense pressure from Senate Republican leaders worried about damage to the party, he announced that it was his “intent” to resign by Sept. 30.

But a few days later he suggested that he might stay on if he was able to withdraw his guilty plea. A judge ruled Thursday that he could not withdraw it, and a few hours later the senator said he would remain in office anyway. For some, that reversal was more than one too many.

“I think he should do the respectful thing and just step down,” said Maureen Flaherty, a Democrat who manages a restaurant in Boise. “He already pleaded guilty, and to take back your guilty plea for your own personal reasons, I don’t know.”

Yet while people interviewed on the street in downtown Boise were likely to say the senator was an embarrassment who should have resigned, here in rural Midvale, his birthplace, they were more circumspect. Mr. Warren, the school superintendent, said that townspeople were “disappointed” in Mr. Craig but that he would find them forgiving the next time he comes for a visit.

Mr. Craig has made rural issues a top priority in the 27 years he has served in Congress, fighting for the timber industry and farmers. Members of his extended family have ranched in Midvale, some 90 miles northwest of Boise, since the 1890s, and the Craig surname still appears on school rolls. Midvale has fewer than 200 people, according to the census, but the current school draws about 130 students, from preschool through the high school grades, who live in the town and the surrounding area. More than once the senator has spoken at graduation.

Some say Mr. Craig has been persecuted for what they view as a minor offense, given transgressions of other Washington politicians. If he can withstand the pressure, they say, let him stay in office, and just maybe he can be an effective senator again.

“He’s done a lot of good for Idaho,” said Rick Graham, who went to high school with Mr. Craig and whose family owns the Midvale Market, the main retail operation here, with an inventory that includes hunting rifles and Reese’s Cups. “I’m going to trust his judgment on this.”

And while top Republicans in the state may be surprised at Mr. Craig’s reversal, virtually none of them have joined national Republican leaders who called early on for him to resign. Idaho’s other senator, Michael D. Crapo, has said he supports Mr. Craig’s decision to stay in office, and Gov. C. L. Otter, who chose a replacement on the presumption that Mr. Craig was going to resign, has said he has a right to remain.

On Friday, J. Kirk Sullivan, chairman of the state Republican Party, issued a carefully phrased statement saying he was “confident Idaho’s Congressional delegation can continue to effectively represent the best interests of Idahoans.”

Bryan Fischer, executive director of the Idaho Values Alliance and one of the few leading conservatives to call for the senator to quit, said he did not share that confidence. “What Idaho families need is a senator who can be an unapologetic, vocal and visible leader on pro-family issues,” Mr. Fischer said. “And Senator Craig is simply not going to be able to do that for next 15 months.” ++

Patti Murphy contributed reporting from Boise.

Novak: Senate Conservatives Knew About Craig’s ‘Weird Conduct,’ ‘Didn’t Do Anything About It’
ThinkProgress
10/06/07

On Bloomberg Television today, right-wing pundit Robert Novak revealed that “sources in the Senate” have told him that Senate conservatives had prior knowledge about Sen. Larry Craig’s (R-ID) “problem” but intentionally kept it “in the closet”:

I have talked to several of my sources in the Senate, and this came as a surprise to me…They knew about it. They knew that he had this problem, and it was in the closet. And it was not just a homosexual relationship. It was this weird conduct. They didn’t do anything about it.

[Open link to] Watch video.

Novak added, “So Republicans, again, as in the case of Congressman Foley, their cover-up is coming back to haunt them.” Novak did not elaborate on what “weird conduct” Craig has carried out in the past.

Recall, then-Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) “and at least three of his aides were told of allegations that then-Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL) had improper e-mail contacts with a former House page months before the incident became public.”

Ultimately, at least a dozen GOP lawmakers and aides admitted to having knowledge of Foley’s lewd behavior, “some of them for a year or more,” but kept the matter secret.

If Novak’s sources are correct, then the Senate ethics investigation into Craig — which conservatives have been aggressively pushing for — should determine what Craig has done in the past and which Senators were involved in covering it up. ++

Republican Senator Larry Craig: Focus on The Family’s Perfect Presidential Candidate
Richard A. Stitt, BuzzFlash Reader Contribution
BuzzFlash on Mon, 10/08/2007

James Dobson, Focus on The Family founder and a strong proponent of what he calls “traditional Christian values,” has said that he and his evangelical following will not endorse any candidate for president unless he is pro-life. There should be little doubt that Idaho U.S. Senator Larry Craig fits their qualifications perfectly.

American citizens can learn much from the votes of pious, sanctimonious Republican legislators such as Senators Larry Craig and David Vitter and Congressman Mark Foley, all of whom presented themselves to the voters as paragons of virtue and practitioners of Christian moral values while simultaneously voting to strip away rights of American citizens and condemning them for the very lifestyles in which they themselves were engaged.

As long as the list of these self-righteous Congressmen is, Republicans who took over our government for over 12 years gained the rock-solid support of the evangelicals, but now they act appalled that anyone is questioning their probity and exposing their tableau of lies and hypocrisy on which they used to worm their way into every governmental agency and institution, the primary purpose of which has been to dismantle programs put in place to serve the public needs.

Here is a partial list which I excerpted from Project Vote Smart — Senator Craig — Voting Record, revealing some of the most recent issues voted on by Idaho Senator Larry Craig, issues near and dear to the hearts of James Dobson’s religious sect who wish to impose their punitive, theocratic policies on every citizen in the United States:

NARAL Pro-Choice America 0 percent in 2006.

National Right to Life Committee 100 percent in 2005-2006.

Christian Coalition 100 percent in 2004.

Eagle Forum 100 percent in 2004.

Republicans for Environmental Protection 0 percent in 2006.

Family Research Council 100 percent in 2006.

American Family Association 100 percent in 2005-2006.

Gun Owners of America 100 percent in 2006.

American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees 0 percent in 2006.

Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology 0 percent in 2006.

Parkinsons Action Network 0 percent in 2006.

National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association 0 percent in 2005-2006.

Disabled American Veterans 20 percent in 2006.

Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America gave Senator Craig a grade of D- in 2006.

An Internet search reveals Republican scandals breathtaking in scope, yet they are only the tip of the iceberg when you consider the mountain of criminal activity conducted by the entire G. W. Bush Administration whose modus operandi over the last 6 years has been to ignore laws they don’t like and make up their own — just like a dictator or totalitarian government would.

Former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales decided that Bush has the right make up new laws with vague interpretations that he uses as his Constitutional authority to wage war, spy on American citizens, negate habeas corpus, torture with impunity, pass new laws such as the Military Commissions Act, denying detainees and those named by Bush to be “enemy combatants” access to U.S. courts.

These acts are totally repugnant to everything our U.S. Constitution represents. Abominable as they are, they represent the core values that James Dobson supported and still seeks to impose on the rest of America.

Larry Craig should stick around at least until November 2008 so the public gets a clear picture of what this depraved Republican Party truly represents. But, the rest of the (cognizant) country needs to observe this odious, repulsive vermin over the next 14 months as he tries to insulate himself in his little cocoon of self-righteousness. Watch his charade as he tries to foist himself off as a man of superior spiritual and moral values, traits that are nothing but a veneer and a cloak of lies, reflecting the dishonesty of the entire Republican Party and their sordid hypocritical characters such as Idaho Senator Larry Craig.

Lies and deceit were the catalysts that prompted Bush to bomb, invade, and occupy Iraq, a country that had nothing to do with 9/11. Lies prompted former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to usher in a new era of totalitarian government when he said that Bush has unbridled powers to torture with impunity, murder tens of thousands of Iraqi men, women, and children, put 3,810 U.S. military in body bags and send over 27,000 wounded U.S. Marines and soldiers home, many with lifetime disabilities.

Lies were told to the American people that mushroom clouds would appear over U.S. cities unless we forfeited our civil liberties and freedoms and authorize Bush to spy on, arrest without cause, deny access to our courts or legal representation, any person, including American citizens.

So why should Larry Craig, one of Bush’s most loyal anti-U.S. Constitution enablers, be drummed out of the U.S. Senate for acting in a manner any different from his corrosive, corrupt Republican colleagues who never saw a miasma too noxious or a toilet stall too putrid for any of them to drink their swill from?

Focus On The Family founder James Dobson has drunk from that ladle of swill so often in the past that his dream of Armageddon can only be hastened by a presidential candidate such as Republican Senator Larry Craig, who precisely radiates the values of that political party’s dep~ Molly Ivins, 1944 - 2007ravity. Larry Craig is James Dobson’s perfect candidate. ++

“So keep fightin’ for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don’t you forget to have fun doin’ it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce. And when you get through kickin’ ass and celebratin’ the sheer joy of a good fight, be sure to tell those who come after how much fun it was.”

In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.

Entry Filed under: Political Waves