Poor old Larry Craig. He had the world by the tail. Big job, loving wife, three (adopted) kids, somewhat famous, etc. He seemed to have it all.
Well, apparently Larry's idea of having it all meant a little more than what it means for most of us.
Now Larry has fallen. The victim of a police vice operation in a men's public bathroom at the Minneapolis airport. A victim of a wide stance, restless leg syndrome, and over-zealous police work.
Whammo . . . suddenly Larry is in handcuffs for lewd behavior for . . . well, you know, tapping his foot and putting his hand under the stall wall. Pretty lewd stuff. Though apparently no actual penis was seen during the lewdness.
So Larry pleaded guilty, but only to being disorderly. An ambiguously defined "crime" rooted in biblical admonitions.
Larry, mortified, says, "I'm not gay!" He says it a lot. Maybe that makes it more true. Or maybe it's a fleeting truth in need of regular recharging.
Frankly, I doubt many people care if Larry is, was, or thinks about being gay. I certainly could not care less.
What gives this whole weird tale it's yucky factor is the setting. A public toilet? Eeewww. Who are these people who want to have sex in a public toilet? The germs! The smells! The noises! The random, misplaced drops! Yuck, yuck, yuck.
Plus, there are kids in there! That is what pisses a lot of us off. If my kids were in a public bathroom, and two knuckleheads decided to do the boofoo choochoo, I'd call the cops.
The setting is where Larry went wrong. If Larry had been having a discrete rendezvous back at the Marriott, this would not be such a mess for him. He could declare himself mentally exhausted, check into rehab for a couple of weeks, and voila! He could come back 100% heterosexual.
It worked for Ted Haggard. It could work for Larry.
Larry quit in disgrace after his fellow republicans declared him to be "disgusting." But now he wants to un-quit, with Arlen Specter's support. The only sensible explanation for Senator Specter's position is that he believes Larry's story. Arlen may be all alone on this one.
There are too many holes in Larry's story for it to be credible. Why was he in the public bathroom? He should have been in one of the airline's club lounges. And how do you have a wide stance with you trousers around you ankles? And the hand under the stall wall? I've never heard of that before.
Larry also wants to un-plead guilty to the disorderly conduct conviction. He may actually have a chance at this. If he can establish that he has a legislator's travel immunity from arrest while travelling between Washington and his district, then he can establish that the sheriff had no right to arrest him and the court had no right to try him. Federalism! Separation of Powers! Lack of Jurisdiction! Voila! Larry gets off! Wouldn't that be a hoot?
Politically, it is also questionable whether the Senate should kick Larry out if he refuses to resign. After all, the people of Idaho elected him. So what right do the other Senator's have to tell Idaho it cannot have the Senator it wants? After all, Larry didn't take bribes, or kill the Treasury Secretary in a duel. He wasn't even looking for a prostitute. He was just looking for love in all the wrong places.
As usual, most of our tv pundits have missed a pretty important point about Larry's hypocrisy. Chris Matthews, Matt Lauer, et al rhetorically ask how hypocritical it is for a "family values" pontificator like Larry to look for anonymous, gay sex. Aside from assuming that Larry wanted something "anonymous," as well as unconsciously buying into the bigotry that homosexuality and family values are mutually exclusive, they have the hypocrisy argument exactly backwards.
A person, such as Larry, can believe in an ideal (like marriage and heterosexuality)that he should strive for, knowing that he will occasionally fail or fall short. This is where Christians look for forgiveness. The hypocrisy is to be such a man who falls short, but instead of preaching forgiveness for others, and a path toward redemption, offers only harsh judgment and condemnation. This is the essence of the Republican's hypocrisy on social issues, especially when it comes to bigotry against homosexuals. If Larry would announce that his humiliation has helped him to understand this, a lot of people might be in more of a mood to forgive him.
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Vacation Eyes
Freshly back from a week of vacation. Summer vacation. Recreation. Good for the soul. Good for the mind.
Old friends. Old stomping grounds. Some time with my bride. Make the old feel young.
A cleansed aura. A cleared mind. A freshened perspective.
Good stuff.
Coming back from a vacation should be a new experience in itself. One should see things differently. One should be able to see the forest, at least for a while, before getting back to work on that one troublesome tree.
We vacationed on a sailboat. Crazily, it had tv's on it. But we managed to go all week without turning them on once. The best thing about this type of vacation is learning to slow down the mind's emailed, voicemailed, internetted, conference called pace, and instead to take the long, slow time needed to contemplate, and enjoy, a slow, foggy sail through the sound.
But one feels those persistent time-management anxieties creeping up one's back, harping on the brain. You should be reading that good book! You should be talking with your old friends! You should have a drink! You shouldn't be drinking this early! You should be learning about the boat! Do something! And make sure it's the right thing!
Hah. I've been through this before. So, I know. The one important thing to do on vacation is to set worry aside. So aside it went.
Talking with old friends is great. But just being with them is enough. So, sometimes we talked. Other times we just sat, and looked at the water, or read a book. It was nice.
A week is too short a time for a vacation. As our friend and shipmate Lauren related the European view to us, a week is just enough time to get relaxed, then you are ready to start a vacation. My body tells me to agree.
But a week is what we had, so a week is what we spent. And it was a delightful week.
And then our vacation was over. We said good byes. Not really knowing when we might see each other again. No doubt we'll be grayer and fatter then. At least I'm confident I will be. But nobody cares about that stuff. I just hope it's not too far away.
Airports are especially effective at jolting one out of a vacation induced serenity. Homeward bound on a busy Friday afternoon with all of the business travellers trying to get home for the weekend. I like the business travellers. They tend to roll with the punches and be polite, while executing a kind of pedestrian efficiency in the busy corridors and long lines.
Old friends. Old stomping grounds. Some time with my bride. Make the old feel young.
A cleansed aura. A cleared mind. A freshened perspective.
Good stuff.
Coming back from a vacation should be a new experience in itself. One should see things differently. One should be able to see the forest, at least for a while, before getting back to work on that one troublesome tree.
We vacationed on a sailboat. Crazily, it had tv's on it. But we managed to go all week without turning them on once. The best thing about this type of vacation is learning to slow down the mind's emailed, voicemailed, internetted, conference called pace, and instead to take the long, slow time needed to contemplate, and enjoy, a slow, foggy sail through the sound.
But one feels those persistent time-management anxieties creeping up one's back, harping on the brain. You should be reading that good book! You should be talking with your old friends! You should have a drink! You shouldn't be drinking this early! You should be learning about the boat! Do something! And make sure it's the right thing!
Hah. I've been through this before. So, I know. The one important thing to do on vacation is to set worry aside. So aside it went.
Talking with old friends is great. But just being with them is enough. So, sometimes we talked. Other times we just sat, and looked at the water, or read a book. It was nice.
A week is too short a time for a vacation. As our friend and shipmate Lauren related the European view to us, a week is just enough time to get relaxed, then you are ready to start a vacation. My body tells me to agree.
But a week is what we had, so a week is what we spent. And it was a delightful week.
And then our vacation was over. We said good byes. Not really knowing when we might see each other again. No doubt we'll be grayer and fatter then. At least I'm confident I will be. But nobody cares about that stuff. I just hope it's not too far away.
Airports are especially effective at jolting one out of a vacation induced serenity. Homeward bound on a busy Friday afternoon with all of the business travellers trying to get home for the weekend. I like the business travellers. They tend to roll with the punches and be polite, while executing a kind of pedestrian efficiency in the busy corridors and long lines.
A disembodied, robotic sounding, female voice repeatedly told us that the Department of Homeland Security had raised the risk level to Orange. Well, good for them! It reminded me of a movie set in the old DDR. "The Department of Homeland Security" just sounds like too much security for me. I liked the old FBI and our local police department.
I found myself surprised at the Condition Orange Security Alert. Not because I know what Orange means. I was just surprised that all of the silliness was going on, as strong as ever.
Confession time: I'm not terrified. Not in the least. Osama can kiss my big white butt. He just doesn't scare me.
At the airport, I'm much more concerned about the plane being struck by lightning, or ice on the wings, or the pilot being drunk, than I am about terrorists.
I'm glad they x-ray all the bags. But making such a big show of it strikes me as a multi-billion dollar, permanent PR stunt, put over on us by the Bushies, to try to smokescreen their ignoring of the Osama iceberg on the horizon six years ago. Enough already. This goofiness has gone on long enough.
Saw the tv's in the airport. Iraq is still being hotly debated. I guess we haven't had enough time to figure out what to do there. The Foxies were discussing it in urgent, loud, and solemn tones. Keeping straight faces the whole time. Hooray for journalism majors. Our Fourth Estate at work.
Keeping my vacation perspective intact for one more day, I spent part of my morning today teaching my 4 year old son to shave. He solemnly told me he had a boo-boo on his face and he needed to shave it off. We shaved together. It was, in fact, the most important thing I could think to do.
Thursday, July 12, 2007
In Retrospect - Molly Ivins Oct 7, 2003 - RIP
Molly Ivins October 7
NEW YORK, N.Y. — Much as I hate to interrupt what is apparently a deeply felt triumphalism on the American right, now that it's over, does anyone see any reason for our having invaded Iraq?
I realize that's what we all kept trying to figure out before the invasion, but don't you think it should at least be visible in hindsight? Good thing we won the war, because the peace sure looks like a quagmire.
These are early days, certainly, to attempt a full historical evaluation. Could be a case of the forest and the trees. Perhaps we're well along the road to having everything work out magnificently, and I'm just missing it. Still, I can't see anything that's going right.
Iraq is in chaos, and apparently the only way we'll be able to stop it will be to kill a lot of Iraqis. Just what Saddam used to do. The other day, we announced we were going to shoot looters, and when that produced nightmare scenarios of children dead for stealing bread, we had to cancel that plan.
Now we're going to try gun control. That should have the enthusiastic support of the NRA. Meanwhile, the chaos in Iraq seems to be costing us whatever goodwill we earned for getting rid of Saddam Hussein, the one unmitigated good to have come from all this.
I hate to be picky, picky, picky, but there are still no weapons of mass destruction. In fact, we've apparently even stopped looking for them. Since Iraq never had anything to do with Al Qaeda or Sept. 11 — despite American public opinion on this issue — it was certainly no surprise to see Al Qaeda back again, with strikes in both Saudi Arabia and Morocco.
Bush's announcement that we had broken up the organization seems to have been a trifle premature. There was much unmuted griping from American intelligence about the total Saudi failure to cooperate before the attack there. (As one antiwar sign reminded us before the recent events, "Sept. 11 equals 15 Saudis, 0 Iraqis.")
Meanwhile, one of the other sales pitches we were given was that, for reasons never explained, getting rid of Saddam Hussein would make it easier to make peace between Israel and the Palestinians.
It's not looking promising. Didn't look promising before the war, doesn't now.
President Bush came out with his Roadmap to Peace, and the Israelis took the first exit. Ariel Sharon, so memorably described by Bush as "a man of peace," wasted no time undercutting that proposal. The always-unhelpful Palestinian terrorists attacked, and Sharon counterattacked and then cancelled his trip here to discuss the peace plan. The usual ugly pictures and refueled resentments ensued, the same-old, same-old of this 50-year-old cycle. So far, getting rid of Saddam seems to have had zero effect on this old deadlock.
Meanwhile, Iraq looks more and more as though it will be costing us the high-end estimate of $20 billion a year, for which the Iraqis have yet to appear noticeably grateful. The Shiites hate us, the Kurds are killing the Arabs, and we're hiring old Ba'athite thugs to run things.
OK, if this is the situation, and it's certainly what's being reported, I don't get why we're still hearing Bushies saying, "Ha, ha, ha; we won the war." Was there anyone who said we wouldn't? Since I am in the happy position of having predicted a short, easy war and the peace from hell, I think I'm looking like a genius prognosticator about now.
I can't figure out why the Republicans are happy about this. Sure, it was a great photo-op for the president on the aircraft carrier, but if you think the American people won't notice $20 billion a year because of some nice pictures, you have sadly underestimated the common sense of this nation. I realize that what we see depends on where we stand, but there is a substantial body of emerging fact here, none of it encouraging for optimists.
We may yet see hopeful developments, but damned if I can see any cause for celebration now, or even for building a presidential re-election campaign around footage of our triumphant pres flying out to the aircraft carrier. There's a very real possibility that by November 2004, Republicans will very much want everybody to forget the war now called Dubya Dubya II. (Sorry, I don't know whom to credit for that one, but it's not original with me.)
I've got an even-money bet out that says more Americans will be killed in the peace than in the war, and more Iraqis will be killed by Americans in the peace than in the war. Not the first time I've had a bet out that I hoped I'd lose.
NEW YORK, N.Y. — Much as I hate to interrupt what is apparently a deeply felt triumphalism on the American right, now that it's over, does anyone see any reason for our having invaded Iraq?
I realize that's what we all kept trying to figure out before the invasion, but don't you think it should at least be visible in hindsight? Good thing we won the war, because the peace sure looks like a quagmire.
These are early days, certainly, to attempt a full historical evaluation. Could be a case of the forest and the trees. Perhaps we're well along the road to having everything work out magnificently, and I'm just missing it. Still, I can't see anything that's going right.
Iraq is in chaos, and apparently the only way we'll be able to stop it will be to kill a lot of Iraqis. Just what Saddam used to do. The other day, we announced we were going to shoot looters, and when that produced nightmare scenarios of children dead for stealing bread, we had to cancel that plan.
Now we're going to try gun control. That should have the enthusiastic support of the NRA. Meanwhile, the chaos in Iraq seems to be costing us whatever goodwill we earned for getting rid of Saddam Hussein, the one unmitigated good to have come from all this.
I hate to be picky, picky, picky, but there are still no weapons of mass destruction. In fact, we've apparently even stopped looking for them. Since Iraq never had anything to do with Al Qaeda or Sept. 11 — despite American public opinion on this issue — it was certainly no surprise to see Al Qaeda back again, with strikes in both Saudi Arabia and Morocco.
Bush's announcement that we had broken up the organization seems to have been a trifle premature. There was much unmuted griping from American intelligence about the total Saudi failure to cooperate before the attack there. (As one antiwar sign reminded us before the recent events, "Sept. 11 equals 15 Saudis, 0 Iraqis.")
Meanwhile, one of the other sales pitches we were given was that, for reasons never explained, getting rid of Saddam Hussein would make it easier to make peace between Israel and the Palestinians.
It's not looking promising. Didn't look promising before the war, doesn't now.
President Bush came out with his Roadmap to Peace, and the Israelis took the first exit. Ariel Sharon, so memorably described by Bush as "a man of peace," wasted no time undercutting that proposal. The always-unhelpful Palestinian terrorists attacked, and Sharon counterattacked and then cancelled his trip here to discuss the peace plan. The usual ugly pictures and refueled resentments ensued, the same-old, same-old of this 50-year-old cycle. So far, getting rid of Saddam seems to have had zero effect on this old deadlock.
Meanwhile, Iraq looks more and more as though it will be costing us the high-end estimate of $20 billion a year, for which the Iraqis have yet to appear noticeably grateful. The Shiites hate us, the Kurds are killing the Arabs, and we're hiring old Ba'athite thugs to run things.
OK, if this is the situation, and it's certainly what's being reported, I don't get why we're still hearing Bushies saying, "Ha, ha, ha; we won the war." Was there anyone who said we wouldn't? Since I am in the happy position of having predicted a short, easy war and the peace from hell, I think I'm looking like a genius prognosticator about now.
I can't figure out why the Republicans are happy about this. Sure, it was a great photo-op for the president on the aircraft carrier, but if you think the American people won't notice $20 billion a year because of some nice pictures, you have sadly underestimated the common sense of this nation. I realize that what we see depends on where we stand, but there is a substantial body of emerging fact here, none of it encouraging for optimists.
We may yet see hopeful developments, but damned if I can see any cause for celebration now, or even for building a presidential re-election campaign around footage of our triumphant pres flying out to the aircraft carrier. There's a very real possibility that by November 2004, Republicans will very much want everybody to forget the war now called Dubya Dubya II. (Sorry, I don't know whom to credit for that one, but it's not original with me.)
I've got an even-money bet out that says more Americans will be killed in the peace than in the war, and more Iraqis will be killed by Americans in the peace than in the war. Not the first time I've had a bet out that I hoped I'd lose.
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