I recommend Randall Balmer's "Thy Kingdom Come" which demonstrates how the evangelicals, who had largely supported Jimmy Carter, abandoned him in favor of Ronald Reagan, becoming the "religious right," not because of abortion or homosexuality or any of the slogans they use now, but because Carter hadn't changed the government policy of going after their segregationism (the IRS had gone after Bob Jones University's tax exempt status).

In order to move to Reagan and the Republicans, these people had to abandon divorce and adultery as issues, since they didn't reflect well on Reagan. They basically came up with the ideas of using homosexuality and abortion (years after Roe v. Wade) as issues in order to hide the fact that racism was their true issue.

Who's "we"?

The closeted, bathroom stall cruising "conservatives"?

Tim Johnson is well on the road to recovery.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0d8g5SGGEI

I think its time you got yourself a frontal lobotomy, or a least electro shock therapy you pitiful creep.

I agree completely with what you're saying. But I believe another factor weighing heavily here is that Vitter is from Louisiana and could potentially be replaced by a Dem = not good. Craig is from Idaho and would probably be replaced by a Rep = good. This makes it doubly easy to call for one's replacement while the other is left in place.

This Machine Kills Fascists,

IIRC, the time Jesus really got angry was when he faced the moneychangers and others who were profaning the Temple with their business and other non-religious interests.

Now, let me see, which party conflates religion with business and politics....

1. Men aren't the only dumpers of spousal units. Women dump men as well.

Obviously. I didn't say otherwise ("Hence we have scads of people sitting around opposing same-sex marriage because of their professed belief in "Traditional Marriage" while their "third husbands" and multiple step-children and live-in girlfriends sit next to them on the couch").

Nonetheless, the model among the Family Values political movement is overwhelmingly that their leaders dump their first wives and then get much younger models to replace them.

2. Divorce is not ipso facto bad or the wrong answer (although it can be). Adultery, weather the paid (and illegal) variety or the unpaid (and perfectly legal) variety, is not a necessary adjunct to divorce.

Again, I didn't say otherwise. But how can someone oppose same-sex marriage on the ground that they believe the law should only recognize Traditional Marriage or Christian Marriage while supporting laws that allow divorce and which recognize "re-marriages" (also known, in the Gospels, as "adultery").

3. This is a perfect example of why the government has no business attempting to create and enforce "social norms" outside of the obvious ones like the prohibition on murder, theft, etc. The constitution enjoins the government to promote the common good but the common good is not a social norm. The concept of having the government create and enforce social norms is a very liberal idea - i.e. the big government should be telling us what to do. Having the government behave thusly will only fracture society since not all of society agrees with the norms of the mostly hypocritical "Family Values" movement.

Agree entirely, except for the bit about "having the government create and enforce social norms is a very liberal idea". It is and has for a long time also been a very "conservative" idea, at least as the term "conservative" exists in reality rather than in theory.

perhaps this has already been mentioned, but David Vitter has a rhyming nickname, discussed at

http://www.10zenmonkeys.com/2007/08/27/the-dc-madam-speaks/

although clearly satirical, much truth is spoken in jest in this "planned statement" "from" Sen. Vitter

http://www.10zenmonkeys.com/2007/07/18/senator-vitters-suppressed-statement/

You are exactly right ... not only that .. but remember what he told the guy that bitched about paying taxes? ... "Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's .. " .. it seems that the Right has forgotten 99.9% of what is in the bible ... sorry to get on a rant .. but it is so much BS that those on the left are anti-religious ... we aren't ... we just don't make a public spectacle about our beliefs like the Right does .... Hell ... Jesus even talked about that too ,,, basically saying that the true believers don't go around making a show of it in public .. that it is obscene for one to go spouting off about religion in public like a lot of Republicans do

Last October, Megyn Kendall of Fox News cherry picked information from a poll stating that the Foley scandal would not significantly influence the election, and that "the good news" of the scandal was that voters saw "a distinction between Mark Foley and who he is versus what the Republican party is.”

This was the same Fox News that repeatedly misidentified Foley as a Democrat.

http://www.newshounds.us/2006/10/10/megyn_kendall_cherrypicks_good_news_for_republicans_in_foley_scandal_polling.php

I don't want to stray O/T, but might it be fair to say that this otherwise black-and-white example of hypocrisy and two-faced political exploitation is yet another sign of our lost times? Was it not once the case that any sexual scandal and/or any such obvious "flip-flopping" on an issue would never fail to carry with it a political cost?

But nowadays illogic and disingenuousness (a word?) is on full and bold display, proudly taunting and challenging anyone to take a shot at it. But no one does.

The over-arching, but unspoken, political challenge of the Bush-era is simply put:

"Whaddya gonna do about it?"

...between the two hypocrites. I've heard the argument that Craig's sins are made worse because of the "ick" factor: many heterosexual men find gay male sex revolting, plus it took place in (typically nasty) public restrooms. But no one mentions the fact that when David Vitter was outed, it was revealed that he had a penchant for wearing diapers. From Wikipedia:

Many diaper lovers gain arousal from "wetting" or urinating in their diapers. A smaller number gain the same arousal from using the diaper to "mess" or defecate. Some fetishists do not use their diapers at all. They may find such practices unappealing or they might not want to deal with the cleanup. Others may become aroused by wearing in public; still others prefer the security of wearing only in private.

Maybe we need to remind the lazy media of just how deviant Vitter's behavior was, too. An enterprizing reporter would track down and interview the prostitutes he was illegally visiting, and find out just what "Family Values" really meant to him.