The Never-Ending Adventures of Sen. Larry Craig

This will be a short and sweet entry, as we are getting ready to take our son for his first day of school in the next hour - literally.

As a conservative, it may seem relatively un-kosher to bash other purported conservatives, but if there is one thing I can't stand, it is hypocrisy amongst those who claim to have some moral high ground - particularly in public officials like lawmakers/politicians, clergy, teachers, etc. It is not really the scope of this short entry to discuss why I am not endeared to these folks - I have written a much more lengthier blog entry detailing that. I do want to quickly focus my attention to the latest high-profile case which has busted a public official, and a conservative at that.

If you don't know who Sen. Larry Craig is, look him up on Wikipedia for more details. Anyhow, the gist of the case against him is that he, as a grandfather of nine, and a supposed conservative who has backed "family values" and anti-gay legislation, was busted in a Minneapolis washroom by a cop (who was assigned to look for these exact things at that exact location since there have been repeated instances there). He had allegedly signalled to the cop that he was looking to engage in some sexual activity while he was in one stall and the cop was in the other.

I heard the interview that the cop who arrested him had. The cop was so upset with him when he started denying the incident happened like how the cop described (the officer said that he is disappointed that he doesn't just admit how the incident happened like the others). The officer was visibly annoyed and disgusted at how Sen. Craig would not tell the truth. You should check out the interview, available on CNN.com - the officer was very specific in describing the incident in great details and he saw all this first-hand - otherwise, why arrest him? Anyway, subsequently, Craig did enter a guilty plea (which since the time this has been made public, he has backtracked on saying he was confused and he will fight to reverse the plea). He has also resigned from his job as Senator.

What i find laughable in all this is the lame-brain excuses Craig makes. He was accused of making two body language moves while he was in the stall directly to the left of the arresting officer. One was sliding his hand underneath the stall wall, while the other was touching his right foot with the arresting officer's left foot and then tapping it. Apparently, these two signs are common for those who want a sexual favour.

Craig claims that he did not put his hand under the stall, but reached down to grab a piece of toilet paper on the floor. Honestly...who the hell picks up a piece of toilet paper on the dirty ground of a public men's washroom? Craig also admits that his foot touched the officer's foot, but it was an accident...since he sits in a "wide stance". I don't believe this one either since even if he was a...uh...plus-sized individual, he would have to really reach over to touch the other person's foot. Case in point - there is this fella at work, who works for our client, who is, um...quite plump. If anyone has an excuse to sit in a wide stance, he does. However, as I sat beside several times in the past in the stall, his foot was not even once close to coming over to my stall (and this dude is about 6' 3", 400lbs.) He would have had to deliberately reached in with his foot.

The officer also claimed that he used his left hand to slide underneath the stall (which would mean he would have had to reach over), since the cop saw his wedding ring (which Craig says he only wears on his left hand).

Craig has denied that he is a closet homosexual. He has denied that the whole incident happened as the officer indicated. Generally, I give people the benefit of the doubt, but something about his whole story stinks.