A GOP leader Sunday denied a double standard in pushing Sen. Larry Craig to resign after a sex sting guilty plea, while remaining silent over GOP Sen. David Vitter's involvement with an escort service.Not only that, Larry Craig was hitting on a guy; David Vitter was paying for sex with women. If David Vitter's name had been linked with Jeff Gannon, the right-winger who ran a gay porn and escort service while at the same time holding a White House press pass, you can bet he'd have been drummed out of the Senate regardless of who was the governor of Louisiana.
A senior Democrat said a double standard by Republican leaders is exactly what occurred.
Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., the Senate Republican campaign chairman, said Craig "admitted guilt. That is a big difference between being accused of something and actually admitting guilt."
"David Vitter never did that. Larry Craig did," continued Ensign on ABC's "This Week" program.
Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt. and chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, expressed a contrary view on "Fox News Sunday."
"One, I say there's a double standard," said Leahy. "Secondly, I don't think they'll ask him (Vitter) to resign because, of course, he'd be replaced by a Democrat. It's easier to ask Larry Craig to resign because he'd be replaced by a Republican."
As for the difference between Sen. Craig "admitting guilt," and Sen. Vitter only being accused, Sen. Vitter was the one who held the press conference (with his wife at his side, looking like she wished she had a large polo mallet) and admitted that he had "sinned." Not exactly a guilty plea, but in the fundie culture, it's as close as you can get without showing the evidence. Also, Mr. Vitter knew that the statute of limitations had run out on his crime, so he was in the clear even if he had confessed. Had not Roll Call found the arrest record, Larry Craig would still be free to make his booty calls in the biffy.
There's also another issue here. A lot of people on both sides of the aisle are asking what exactly Larry Craig pled guilty to, and whether or not the secret tea-room code he used is a violation of the law. (I have this great image of the Minnesota Legislature debating the finer points of what actions constitute a sexual come-on and codifying the entire canon of the Radical Homosexual Agenda into the Minnesota Civil Code. A wink and a nod equals "Hi guy, what's up?" Wiggling eyebrows equals "Wow, nice basket," and humming the first three bars of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" means "I've got a room at the Radisson and an open mini-bar.") And as it has been noted elsewhere, in order to get Mr. Craig to follow through on his intent to hook up with the undercover cop, the police officer had to respond to the toe-tapping. Otherwise Mr. Craig's actions were meaningless. Whether or not Mr. Craig was looking for a hook-up is beside the point; at the time of his arrest he had done nothing lewd or sexual. But that's all moot now, and while the GOP may be congratulating themselves on how quickly they responded to this situation as compared to the dithering they did a year ago with the Mark Foley case, they shouldn't insult our intelligence by telling us that they didn't heave Mr. Craig overboard for any other reason than he was trolling for gay sex.
Of course there's a double standard here, and while the GOP claims to be the Party of Morality and Purity and holds itself up as those who, according to President Bush, ask themselves not just "what is legal, but what is right," they only apply that to the other guys. And the queers.
