...Almost done posting about this story?

I know I'm done reading about it.

The press made me do it, the press made me do it. I am as repugnant as a Repugnican can get. The Democrats are blaming me. I am not homosexual. I was not even in that Washroom, oh, and I was reaching for some toilet paper and my hand accidentally got into ne next cubicle, oh please people believe me. I have always supported antihomosexual legislation like the other outed colleagues of mine did. Oh people dont leave me stranded. I promise I wont do it again.

But I'm one the fence, here. This whole story is based on an arrest report written by a cop whom I have not met nor seen on TV nor been given any way to assess his integrity, his absolute and utter inability to fabricate an event in order to get his bored ass up off a toilet seat and get another scalp on his work record. I just don't know. Rogers said he had talked to people who actually had gay sex with Craig. Until at least one of those people comes forward and is shown to be a reliable source of information, I think it's just plumb un-American to convict this guy the way he's been convicted here and everywhere else. Do unto others, folks. All they've got is the word of one anonymous police officer. Would you want to lose everything on those grounds?

"don't want to convict him"

No one has to convict him because he already admitted his guilt. He convicted himself. Didn't you read that part of the story?

"it's just plumb un-American to convict this guy the way he's been convicted here and everywhere else."

Yeah, like, say, in a COURTROOM -- wherein he pled guilty?

"All they've got is the word of one anonymous police officer."

No, the sworn, written attestation of one publicly named police officer.

"Would you want to lose everything on those grounds?"

Well, were I innocent, I'd have certainly not copped a plea, I'd have fought to clear my name.

You cannot be serious.

Jim wrote:

All they've got is the word of one anonymous police officer. Would you want to lose everything on those grounds?

**********

Not quite. There are at least two other witnesses who have alleged that Craig had sex with them in public places. The Idaho Statesman had these sources, and their stories, but refused to run the story as early as last year, before the election (See Greenwald), because the paper felt that these sources were not enough to go with.

Then, the paper found out about the Craig's guilty plea in Minneapolis, and only *then* did they run with the story, using the original sources, as well as the Minneapolis story.

Apparently there have been rumors about Craig for many years, but no confirmation.

So, not only is Craig's claim that he's been the subject of a "witch hunt" completely false (the story showed up in the local paper only AFTER he'd pled guilty), but there is a fairly long trail of smoke here.

Aside from anything else, don't you think that Craig's defense of himself would be completely different if he really WAS the victim of a smear campaign? His peculiar repetition of "I'm not gay" seems to me a singularly tepid response if he really is completely innocent of trying to get casual sex in a public bathroom.

And I do think his private life would be entirely his business, and not ours, except that he has based most of his political success on demonizing the very behavior he appears to have engaged in himself. That makes his private life very much fair game.

Give me a little credit. He pled guilty to disorderly conduct in hopes that would squelch any further foofaraw. Disorderly conduct. I can imagine (IMAGINE) doing something like that in a panic. Unlike many senators, he's not a lawyer. I'm not saying I believe him; I'm not saying I don't believe him. I'm only saying that I don't have enough information to "convict" him of being a bathroom-trolling homosexual. Which in his case, given his job and his voting record, is a very serious matter.

let me get this straight...

are you seriously suggesting that Craig might be the victim of some kind of conspiracy...

that he was framed?

That, somehow that there are innocent victims of over zealous vice cops being railroaded...and one of them just happens to be the notoriously famous closeted gay man in the Senate?

So, tell me....who is behind this conspiracy?

And why you would assume he is innocent, after he pled guilty for cruising one of the most notorious glory holes in Minnesota?

There are at least two other witnesses who have alleged that Craig had sex with them in public places.

Has any of those witnesses come forward and presented their statement and allowed their own credibility to be examined? Jesus, this is such a kangaroo court -- and Salon is the last place I'd expect to find a kangaroo court!

I assume he's innocent because he pled guilty to a crime he's not being convicted of in the press and right here. I do not assume he's innocent, as I've been at pains to say as clearly as I am able. I just think he's been "assumed" guilty on evidence that, under normal circumstances -- i.e. if it was being leveled at YOU -- you would want examined far more closely than it has been.

Okay, that came off a little self-contradictory. I assume he's innocent of gay cruising because he didn't plead to that and it hasn't been proven. It's my job as an American to assume he's innocent until it's PROVEN otherwise. But my original post merely said I'm on the fence. Geez, y'all are putting words in my mouth!

"What was all that business about blaming it all on the 'strain' brought about by the Idaho Statesman?" Steyn asks. "What kind of excuse is that? 'I wouldn't have wound up in that men's room if you guys hadn't been investigating my secret gay sex life?'"

No, no, no. For Christ's sake, Larry, if you're going to launch this ridiculous defense, you need to at least state it coherently so your natural allies over at the National Review can comprehend it. As I understand it, it goes like this: There I was, in he midst of being investigated by the Idaho press (don't laugh -- by modern standards they're actually pretty aggressive at investigative reporting) for my supposedly wild secret gay sex life, a ridiculous notion that I've been unable to shake since my involvement in the House page scandal in 1982. Of course there is nothing to the allegations. Anyway, so I'm taking a dump at the Minneapolis airport with a Bo Diddley song in my head, tapping away to the beat. Didn't even know I was doing it. And then there's my wide stance that I told you about (common here in the West -- lotsa time on horseback, you know). Next thing I know, there's this cop in my face. I'm pretty annoyed -- plane to catch and all -- and I guess I wasn't too polite. Things spin out of control, and suddenly I'm in handcuffs. Fortunately nobody finds out, but a coupla weeks later I'm told I gotta enter a plea. What am I supposed to do? There's that stupid investigaion goig on, and how am I going to look trying to explain about Bo Diddley? Better to get rid of the whole thing quietly. So I plead out.

Entirely plausible.