Playing footsie, GOP-style
One of the great mysteries for P+J is why, whenever there is a Wash¬ington controversy in which a major male political figure is discovered to be engaging in superior behavior in a most un-superior way (for example, in a public men’s room), it’s 90 percent likely that the figure is not just a Republican, but a “family values” kind of Republican.
Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised. After all, there is also a boatload of empirical evidence on the non-superior side of how hookers claim to do better business at national GOP conventions than Democratic ones.
So Senator Larry Craig, Republican of Idaho, appears to have been the latest swinger. He allegedly tried to signal to a plainclothes police sergeant in an adjoining toilet stall in the Minneapolis airport that he was looking for a bit of company. Court records indicate that Senator Craig pleaded guilty and paid a fine on a lewdness charge.
The senator, in a statement issued by his office, complained that the police had “misconstrued” his actions. Those actions, according to the sergeant in the adjoining stall, comprised of “tapping his toes several times and [moving] his foot closer to my foot. I moved my foot up and down slowly. The presence of others did not seem to deter Craig as he moved his right foot so that it touched the side of my left foot which was within my stall area.”
While the sergeant said that he recognized this wingtip tango as “a signal used by persons wish¬ing to engage in lewd conduct,” we’re quite certain that Senator Craig will reveal how his footwork was a well-known move used in Pocatello when someone is searching for a fourth for bridge. Either that or he has unusually long legs, and ends up playing footsies with guys in the next stall inadvertently, but on a regular basis.
We breathlessly await more cultural enlightenment from Senator Craig, such as the notion that a “friend of Dorothy” is a reference to Dorothy Hamill (i.e., an attraction to ice skating and bowl haircuts). And you can also bet that the senator’s only “tea-bagging” experiences involved oolong, not “Ewwhh, long.”
Larry, we hardly knew ye.
Related:
How to neuter the Republicans, Smells like mean spirit, Brokeback men's room, More
- How to neuter the Republicans
A heavy burden lay upon the first convention of the “netroots” — that amorphous mass of progressive activists participating in blogs and grassroots organizations outside of the Democratic Party — in Las Vegas earlier this month. Netrooting for Dems: Ten blogs to bookmark for the ’08 race. By David S. Bernstein
- Smells like mean spirit
Lines upon reading that the Minneapolis airport bathroom in which GOP senator Larry Craig was arrested on June 11 has become a tourist attraction
- Brokeback men's room
Once upon a time there was a barbershop quartet known as the Singing Senators.
- Gay deceivers
The California State Supreme Court just upheld Proposition 8, denying gay people the right to marriage. This should disabuse the complacent of the illusion that the religious right has relinquished its death grip on America. So, too, should Kirby Dick's documentary about the homophobic power of closeted right-wing politicians in America.
- Backlash blues
Most big news stories fit the snowball metaphor, with an isolated fact or two slowly gaining significance and momentum over a period of days or weeks.
- Crossword: ''In the language''
New Entries from the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, Sixth Edition.
- Springtime for Militia
I’m scrubbing my armpits in the campground bathroom at Fort Hunt Park in Virginia. It’s taken more than 20 hours for me to get here for today’s firearm-friendly Restore the Constitution rally, which is supposed to commence shortly.
- On the national affront
Where does one begin to recap 12 months of such willful self-parody?
- Vermont man, 60, walks to impeach Bush
Most people are content to mutter and complain as they wait out the final years of the Bush regime.
- Old Port shuffle
The national media would have you believe that a little game of bathroom-stall footsie is a threat to our civilization.
- Capuano cornered?
Republican lobbying-ethics scandals helped convince voters to toss out the GOP and put Democrats back in control of the US House of Representatives.
- Less

Topics:
Phillipe And Jorge
, Politics, U.S. Republican Party, Nancy Pelosi, More
, Politics, U.S. Republican Party, Nancy Pelosi, Boy George, Dorothy Hamill, Harry Reid, Larry Craig, Political Scandals, Mark Rudd, Alexander Cockburn, Less