{"id":12786,"date":"2007-09-06T10:10:41","date_gmt":"2007-09-06T14:10:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/12786.html"},"modified":"2007-09-06T10:10:41","modified_gmt":"2007-09-06T14:10:41","slug":"craigs-conundrum-day-10","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/craigs-conundrum-day-10\/","title":{"rendered":"Craig’s conundrum — Day 10"},"content":{"rendered":"

So, what’s the latest from Sen. Larry Craig (R-Idaho)? Keeping up is getting tricky, but the senator is apparently convinced that he can “clear his name<\/a>.” The Senate Ethics Committee, however, isn’t anxious to help<\/a> in that endeavor.<\/p>\n

The Senate Ethics committee late Wednesday rejected Sen. Larry Craig’s request to drop ethics charges against him, saying the committee will review the complaint against him pending any resignation. […]<\/p>\n

Lawyers for Craig had asked the Senate ethics committee Wednesday to reject a complaint based on the Idaho Republican’s guilty plea in June stemming from a police undercover operation in an airport men’s room, saying the events were “wholly unrelated” to official duties.<\/p>\n

“Assertion of jurisdiction over this matter by the committee would be literally unprecedented and would create deleterious consequences for the Senate as a whole,” the lawyers wrote.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I think that’s a fairly persuasive argument, but the Senate Ethics Committee disagreed. It’s moving forward with its plans to conduct a thorough probe, stemming from Craig’s guilty plea to disorderly conduct in June.<\/p>\n

What will be interesting is to see what the Committee does, if anything, should Craig reverse the guilty plea. I’m not an expert in Senate ethics procedures, but can the committee launch an investigation of a private misdemeanor that was thrown out of court? I kind of doubt it.<\/p>\n

Now, there was also some question yesterday about Craig’s post-9\/30 future. If he somehow manages to make legal progress on the Minneapolis charge, is it possible that Craig reached some kind of agreement<\/a> with the Republican leadership about retiring at the end of his term? Apparently so.
\n
\nRoll Call reports<\/a> that Craig is fighting to save face and return to his Senate seat, but he has no illusions about his career beyond this term.<\/p>\n

In the unlikely event that Craig does finish his third term, [Craig spokesman Dan Whiting] said Craig would not run for re-election in 2008, leaving an open Senate seat in a solid Republican state that the GOP should have no trouble retaining.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

With that, Craig seems to have settled on a straightforward message: he just wants to end his career with a little dignity. When you’re caught hitting on an undercover cop in an airport bathroom, that’s kind of tricky, but Craig clearly realizes that the legal case against him is very thin, and without it, he shouldn’t be forced from his Senate seat.<\/p>\n

Other Craig-related news from this morning’s headlines:<\/p>\n

* Republican Senate leaders are “infuriated<\/a>” by Craig’s latest offensive, because they “thought they had contained the political damage from his case.”<\/p>\n

* A spokesperson for Idaho Gov. C. L. Otter (R) said, “We are working toward a replacement. We are working with the senator’s staff toward what we assume is a Sept. 30 date. What Larry has got going on outside of that, you’re going to have to talk to Larry about, but we are proceeding based on what he said at his Saturday event.”<\/p>\n

* The White House still wants<\/a> Craig to go away.<\/p>\n

* Craig’s only outspoken backer is his home-state colleague, Sen. Michael D. Crapo (R), who told reporters: “I’ll support whatever Larry does<\/a>.”<\/p>\n

* WaPo<\/a>: “According to legal analysts, a full public trial is about the best outcome Craig could hope for in his legal case. Minneapolis criminal defense lawyer Jon M. Hopeman said it is ‘almost impossible’ to withdraw a guilty plea after sentencing without showing that ‘the person did not understand the nature of the legal proceeding.'”<\/p>\n

* One GOP aide summed up<\/a> the party’s sentiment: “Craig is the only person who doesn’t know he’s done.”<\/p>\n

Stay tuned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So, what’s the latest from Sen. Larry Craig (R-Idaho)? Keeping up is getting tricky, but the senator is apparently convinced that he can “clear his name.” The Senate Ethics Committee, however, isn’t anxious to help in that endeavor. The Senate Ethics committee late Wednesday rejected Sen. Larry Craig’s request to drop ethics charges against him, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12786","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12786\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}