Captain's Quarters -

Craig sounds like my 9 year old granddaughter with all of his excuses. These and other stupid actions by all other members of the Senate and Congress are what have turned off much of the public and their trust in their government.

Captain-

Craig's evident homosexuality has left him in a compromised position for some time now. Witness his vote for amnesty earlier this summer. Some conservative.

You shouldn't have supported Craig at any level, Captain. Homosexuals always end up betraying their allies. We don't need such friends.

Those homosexual Conservatives who remain are targets for future democrat media eruptions closer to the next election.

The Craig event went off sooner than the mediacrats wanted. There are more coming. Don't support these betrayers either.

Vim Toot

Every time the GOP tries to recover from their scandals they just keep digging deeper. The party wanted Craig gone, but he is not going gentle into that good night. Anderson Cooper rehashed the whole sordid affair for two hours last night.

The Party needs a good housecleaning, and I don't know any other way to do it than a massive defeat at the polls.

Just another reminder that important, national decisions are being made by people who are certainly no smarter than the majority of the people they represent. This has turned into a complete embarrasment and Mr. Craig needs to go away for the rest of his life. This is also Exhibit #1 for both term limits and a part-time legislature. These people have too much time and too little (of substance) to do.

I'm absolutely disgusted at Mr. Craig's arrogance. Michelle Malkin's characterization is appropriate: "Larry Craig was for resignation before he was against it."

I expected much more from readers of this site than a claim that homosexual consevatives can't be trusted. What an absurd statement! I am pro-life, pro-military, a prosecutor who has spent many years putting murderers and rapists behind bars, a church-goer, a student of Milton Friedman type economics as a major in college, and gay. There are no committed conservatives more than gay ones. We have to fight to be accepted by fellow conservatives and then fight to be accepted by fellow gay men and women. The bottom line in this case is that Craig is an embarrassment! He shamed himself, his, wife and his children. Make no mistake, Craig was in that bathroom soliciting sex. Whether or not his conduct rose to the level of criminality is a different question. Any gay man, particularly those in the Big Apple, know the signs - the looks, the stares, the glances. He pled guilty because he thought that it would remain secret, just like his gayness.

I agree, Stephen. I think the Republican Party has to get over its silly obsession with sexual orientation, and I've said so for years. A party truly interested in personal liberty would acknowledge that it has no bearing on public policy.

Posted by Captain Ed | September 5, 2007 8:21 AM

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This wouldn't be better fro Craig if it were hetero sex he was soliciting, or drugs, etc.

This isn't about "ORIENTATION".

It is about CORRUPTION and an attitude that WHO HE IS should have gotten him off, regardless of what his conduct does to contribute to the general welfare, health and safety of the community.

Complaints by the general public are what caused that cop to be assigned to THAT restroom - NOT SOME PRESCIENT IMAGINATION that "HE" would soon be arriving, and at long last, the Idaho media would at last have the "GOTCHA" they had long sought!

Sorry, Captain, MY RIGHT to have PUBLIC FACILITIES it is safe to send my children into, EVEN UNESCORTED BY THEIR MOM, is far above the "civil rights" of a Public Servant to SPECIAL TREATMENT.

This baloney is why I will most likely vote for a write-in for President. People like Rudi, Romney, and Fred don't get it, either.

And I am not interested in their excuses. and when their conduct makes America a less healthy place to live, I don't give a flip about their excuses they took from a Stalinist Agenda.

When Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA) had a sexual flap many years ago (which didn't directly involve him, FYI) his party didn't have a fit, it simply reprimanded him because the Democrats don't make appeals to bigotry a part of their party platform like the GOP does. As long as Republicans value anti-gay votes more than gays, that won't change. I'm sorry, but conservative gays are only deluding themselves if they think their party won't toss them into the gutter when it's necessary to placate their fundamentalist base.

Yes, bigotry is a costly indulgence for Republicans. They were in such a homophobic panic to toss this guy overboard, that after 27 years of service and a consistently solid conservative voting record, he didn't have a single friend to speak up for him.

It's pretty hard to persuade a man to fall on his sword for the good of his party... when the party is treating him like something nasty that's somehow gotten stuck to its shoe.

It's not us. It's Craig's family.

Filistro,

A homophile like you has never had a guy enter his stall and just... reach. Or maybe you have, and liked it. I didn't, and I reserve the right to discriminate. Nothing in the Constitution says I can't, and quite a few things say I can. So there.

And Craig is indeed something nasty that has gotten stuck to our shoes. We desperately want him to fall on his sword exactly once -- but it looks like he's going to do it again and again.

starfleet_dude
So, Democrats value the gay vote... I don't really care! I'm more concerned about the millions of shady campaign donations to the Dems that are just coming to light... and the disingenuousness of the Clintons et al who feign shock over the whole Hsu debacle!

filistro... it seems to me that Craig was the one to decide to leave the party and now changed his mind.

Rose... I agree with you that public safety comes before the arrogance of an elected official!

Geez!

uncle, I frequently encounter people who reach under the bathroom stall. But then, I am of the gender where we do that kind of thing. We share paper with each other, nudge each other's handbags back into neutral territory, and return the My Little Pony that somehow got kicked into the neighboring stall by a small foot.

Public bathrooms are cosy, chummy places for us girls. We commiserate with each other over bad hair days, hold the shelf down while somebody's baby is getting changed and discuss remedies for diaper rash, and agree cheerfully about how much we all hate those hand dryers.

We leave with a smile, feeling bonded. Meanwhile, just look what you lot are doing across the hall!

You know, I wouldn't be a guy for anything.

A homophile like you has never had a guy enter his stall and just... reach. Or maybe you have, and liked it. I didn't, and I reserve the right to discriminate. Nothing in the Constitution says I can't, and quite a few things say I can. So there.

OTOH, David Vitter's dalliances with prostitutes is O.K. because a GOP seat in the Senate is at stake. Such double-standards don't reflect well on Republicans, dude.

So, Democrats value the gay vote... I don't really care!

Democrats aren't as supportive of gays as they could be, but at least they don't push for constitutional amendments against gay marriage as a calculated electoral strategy to blatantly appeal to anti-gay sentiment.

I think possibly the Senator has realized that there are worse things in life than embarrassment and ridicule. He chose not to fight the charges initially because he didn't want to risk humiliation. Now he's lost both his reputation and his livelihood. And there's no going back.

The Senator did this to himself. Not the culture, not society, not the Republican Party. Why should any of us be willing to fight for a man who was unwilling to fight for himself?

Why can't he just go to rehab? Seems to work for just every other malady (if, you are rich, famous, powerful or a tinfoil hatted leftist loon).

Another thing: The Vitter comparison is like comparing apples and oranges. Although the escort service proprietor has been charged with running a prostitution ring, she has not been convicted of anything. In fact, she is denying that she was anything more than an escort service, providing companionship. For all we know (although highly unlikely), Vitter used the service for dinner dates and massages, not for sex. He has admitted to nothing more than using the service nearly ten years ago. He did not plead guilty to soliciting a prostitute, nor has he been charged as such. The only reason Democrats and liberals try to use this comparison is because the MSM is willing to accept it. It is intellectually flawed.

Here's what Vitter had to say himself back in July:

Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) acknowledged Monday night that his number appears on telephone records of the alleged D.C. Madam, Deborah Jeane Palfrey, and issued an apology.

“This was a very serious sin in my past for which I am, of course, completely responsible,” Vitter said in a statement released by his office.

Past dalliances with prostitutes by Vitter actually predate his more recent involvement with Palfrey's operation, FYI.

Stephen-

I read your list of Conservative bona fides. I believe your claim of homosexuality.

That you use the descriptor "gay" for what you do is an indicator of dishonesty or confusion at best.

There is nothing at all gay about homosexuality. I won't accept the recent perversion of what used to be an innocuous and pleasant word.

As for your Conservative commitment- I'll believe that when you stop having sex with other men.

What treachery is beyond anyone who has broken the biggest "taboo" of all and betrayed man's nature?

You know that homosexual sex is wrong. You said as much here: "The bottom line in this case is that Craig is an embarrassment! He shamed himself, his, wife and his children."

Yes Larry Craig did. And then he lied. But what's a lie for a man who has had sex with another man?

Like I said, homosexuals betray. They betray friendships, families, nations and nature. Examples are legion. History ancient and recent is filled with examples of homosexual perfidy.

Alliances with homosexuals are disaster. We need no such support.

Vim Toot

Filistra,

Soory -- I assumed your male ending meant a male. Too much Latin earlier in my life.

Male bathroom etiquette, as the training film indicates, is designed for speed and efficiency in getting the job done.

That's why the male restroom line is always shorter; females use the restroom as a social engagement, judging from your comment. I always thought that it was the trading of stalls for swooning couches or something, but you indicate the problem is cultural, and has nothing to do with the advanced features of the facility.

As you put it, you leave with a smile, but I sure bet that you enter with a grimace from having waited forever in line. I know my wife does.

As we have discovered in the Craig incident, there is a subcategory of males who use restroom stalls for other things than dropping the children off at the pool. There are policemen who think nothing of spending 13 minutes in a stall. There are hand signals. And, as I discovered to my personal mortification, there is worse.

As for that kind of bonding, they can take it and put it where the sun don't shine!

Forget about the argument as to whether the Senator is gay, or not.

Forget about whether the Senator's actions rose to the level of a crime being committed, or not.

Forget about whether the Senator voted for or against gay legislation.

More importantly, ask yourself this question.

Does, or can, this Senator tie his own shoelaces?

We PAY these people to run the most powerful nation on this earth, and this one tends to run around in circles, like a three-yead-old, when decisions are to be made.

He needs to be gone. The lot of them needs to be gone.

Toot, the only place being gay is wrong is in your own bigoted little head.

uncle... my screen name is the name of my favorite restaurant.

I've often wondered about yours. I like puzzling out screen names (it's a challenge, similar to figuring out those coded message on personalized license plates) but yours defeats me.

I think it's probably just too clever for me to decipher.

First, I'm not gay and don't know any openly gay people. Second, my conservative bona fides have never been questioned. With that said, I'm flabbergasted that Minneapolis harasses gays in today's world and Republicans have thrown Senator Craig under the bus. Although his every action in the men's room could have been made unwittingly, I assume the Senator is a closet gay and was trying to avoid humiliation by taking the easy way out. Trying to pickup someone for companionship and/or sex takes place in every airport lounge in the country. And, such attempts are a heck of a lot more overt than foot tapping. Why changing the locale to the men's room elevates such an attempt to a crime is beyond my pay grade. If the person in the next stall was straight he wouldn't know he was being propositioned. If he was gay, he could respond or not respond. Had sex taken place in the men's room this would be a totally different situation. But, that didn't happen and there is nothing yet publicized that any such activity was proposed. I for one think that Senator Craig should never have admitted to a crime and shouldn't have said he intended to resign. Whether or not he can retract his guilty plea is a different matter.

There are so many important issues here, it's just sad that the focus for some is on the Senator's sexual orientation (whatever it is). Who gives a flying wallenda if the guy is gay?

If the Senator hadn't been so worried about people finding out (1) that he is gay (if he is) and (2) that he likes to cruise for anonymous sex in public restrooms (if that's what he in fact was doing), then maybe some really important stuff could have been addressed AND he could have found a way to vindicate himself.

Stuff like whether it's the best use of law enforcement resources to station a police officer in a bathroom stall tapping his foot and whether or not certain innocuous behavior can properly be the basis for a reasonable suspicion that a crime has or is about to occur.

This is the important stuff. Not whether or not the man is gay. Larry Craig is a weasel. Not because he's gay or bi or whatever the fashionable term is these days. He's a weasel because he's weak and he didn't act like a man (Don Corleone to Johnny Fontane) and fight for himself.

That is one clever byline, Captain; cute, accurate, and devastating.

Filistro,

Most uncle-ver name. unclesmrgol from Gordon R. Dickson's book, "The Dragon and the George":

"Difficult to slay, I imagine?" queried the knight.

"Its vital organs are hidden deep inside it," said Carolinus, "and being mindless, it will fight on long after being mortally wounded. Cut off those eye-stalks and blind it first, if you can—"

"Wait!" cried Jim, suddenly. He had been listening bewilderedly. Now the word seemed to jump out of his mouth. "What're we going to do?"

"Do?" said Carolinus, looking at him. "Why, fight, of course."

"But," stammered Jim, "wouldn't it be better to go get some help? I mean—"

"Blast it, boy!" boomed Smrgol. "We can't wait for that! Who knows what'll happen if we take time for something like that? Hell's bells, Gorbash, lad, you got to fight your foes when you meet them, not the next day, or the day after that."

"Quite right, Smrgol," said Carolinus, dryly. "Gorbash, you don't understand this situation. Every time you retreat from something like this, it gains and you lose. The next time the odds would be even worse against us."

I won't give away the rest of the book. A very good light read, and would definitely make a good movie.

If the Senator hadn't been so worried about people finding out (1) that he is gay (if he is) and (2) that he likes to cruise for anonymous sex in public restrooms (if that's what he in fact was doing), then maybe some really important stuff could have been addressed AND he could have found a way to vindicate himself.

As if the GOP hasn't been profiting at the polls by villifying gays for decades now. But let's not talk about that, and just focus on Craig instead. There's nothing stopping anyone from addressing such "really important stuff", except the GOP's need to pander to prejudice as usual.

There's nothing stopping anyone from addressing such "really important stuff"...

Lead the way Kemo Sabe.

He's said he's not a homosexual and people are doubting his statement. I don't. He's probably a bisexual which is also part of the LGBT alliance. Now on to the real reason for this response:

Here’s a legal question for you. How do you arrest a Senator or Congressman on their way to or from Congress? There is a little problem with something called the Constitution isn’t there? Since the arrest was unconstitutional then even though he pled guilty it has to be tossed out.

“Section 6. The Senators and Representatives shall receive a compensation for their services, to be ascertained by law, and paid out of the treasury of the United States. They shall in all cases, except treason, felony and breach of the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance at the session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any speech or debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other place”

ahhh... Uncle Smrgol! I haven't read the book, and didn't think of that at all. In true "Jabberwocky" fashion, I was trying to impose some kind of English langauge rules on those letters... thought they might spell "Uncle's Mr. Gol."

I've made a note of book and author. There are several small bloodthirsty people around my house who would LOVE the idea of cutting off the eyestalks to blind a monster that keeps fighting after it's been mortally wounded.

As for the political message in the passage you quoted... well, that brings this little exchange of ours right back on topic, right?

Nicely done, Uncle :-)

Come to think of it...

...cutting off the eyestalks to blind a monster that keeps fighting after it's been mortally wounded...

...might also be a fair description of what the Republican party will ultimately have to do with poor Senator Craig.

I think the best aspect of the brains of Sen. Craig is the fact he left a message about his resignation announcement for his lawyer-on the wrong phone number answering machine!!!! This guy is just bad news. He needs to go. Also, why doesn't someone put a sock in Sen. Arlen Specter's mouth! After all, Sen. Specter is the one that suggested Sen. Craig should NOT resign and fight. UGH! And Captain, it is not that Republicans are obsessed with sex. It is just that many of us have strong beliefs that are based, for myself, as a Christian. There is something called history and I no of no civilization that would, for instance, mandate recognation of same-sex marriage. But, that is another subject. On this, Sen. Craig needs to go now-do not wait until September 30, do not pass go, do not get the $200!

There is something called history and I no of no civilization that would, for instance, mandate recognation of same-sex marriage.

Canada now recognizes same-sex civil marriage, and they're civilized enough.

Larry Craig-The Comeback Kid?

My initial post on the adventures of Larry Craig was written shortly before he announced that he was going to resign his Senate seat. The good news was that the Republicans had leaned on him suffiently to convince him that "it was over". Well, not quite. Now the esteemed Senator from Idaho (and the Minneapolis Airport Men's room) is reconsidering. Apparently, he has received encouragement from Senator "Snarlin" Arlen Spector, that weasely guy from Pennsylvania who still calls himself a Republican. Now with the support of Spector, Craig is proceeding to immortalize himself in political folklore. It's not going to be pretty.

As of this writing, Craig has hired top gun criminal defense attorney, Billy Martin (No-not the former Yankee skipper-he's dead). Martin is fresh off of pleading out Michael Vick to dog-fighting charges, and now is being paid to think of a way to undo Craig's previous plea and fight charges that he solicited sex from an undercover cop in an airport bathroom stall. Good luck.

Now the Senator has made yet another goof. Calling Mr Martin on his cell phone, Craig left a recorded message with strategy instructions for the attorney, informing him that "Snarlin" Arlen was advising him to fight and that Martin should hold a televised press conference to try to turn the events in a different direction. (I am paraphrasing). Nowhere on the message is there any statement of innocence-just spin strategy. So, you say, that is attorney-client privileged communication. How is it that we even know of this conversation? Because boob Craig was leaving his message on a wrong number! The owner of that number has turned the tape over to the news media-and away we go!

Folks, is this the kind of guy we want in Congress leading our nation? Is this the kind of guy the Republican Party wants in its ranks? Hardly. Spector aside, this is the time for the Republican party to stand up en masse and announce that this clown has got to go. If they can't do that, then they deserve whatever punishment they get at the polls in 2008. Let the Dems explain why Barney Frank, Ted Kennedy, and William "Cool Cash" Jefferson still hold office with the full support of the party. Remember the White House tea party they held for perjuror Bill Clinton on the day of his impeachment for lying about how he was playing "hide the baloney" with a young intern? For the Republicans, they need to send a clear message that they will not tolerate the Mark Foleys, the Larry Craigs and, yes, the David Vitters (who is still in office).

As for Craig, he has revealed himself to be a pathetic, self-centered, narcissistic liar, who has no business being a US Senator. If he decides to hang in there and run for re-election, I doubt that the voters of Idaho will mimick those of Massachusetts and reelect a dishonest reprobate as their senator.

gary fouse
fousesquawk

You could be wrong, Gary.

It appears Craig has a couple of good points on which to launch an argument that his guilty plea should be overturned. First, the mail-in form on which he pled guilty contained no instruction about the right to counsel. Also, he had recently voted and thus was either going "to or from Senate business" which is also, apparently, some kind of arcane get-out-of-jail-free card.

Also, those Idahoans are tough as old boots. I hear from friends in the area that the populace is REALLY TICKED at how the Republican party treated their Seanator. Sort of like... "WE may be pissed at him ourseleves, but by God, you Washington sissies can't treat our boy that way!"

He might win a primary just on the indignant vote.

If Republicans aren't able to be a tad more diplomatic with one of their own, how can they possbly be trusted to manage a foreign policy?

This says it all, IMO:

"R MAYBE CRAIG'S LOOKING FOR PAYBACK:

"What if Craig isn't so much desperate or crazy as cold-bloodedly vindictive? I mean, if I were a loyal, long-serving Republican who, at the first whiff of scandal, found myself not just abandoned but loudly denounced by my colleagues, I'd certainly be in the mood for a little vengeance.

"And what better way for Craig to torment his already wounded, panic-striken party than by suggesting that he'd like to hang around the Senate a few more months? Sure, the ethics investigation would be humiliating and painful for him. But, barring some miracle, Craig's political career is pretty much kaput (even as that prostitute-loving Vitter clown gets to keep his job!) The only question remaining is how hard he'll make it for Republicans to pry him out of his seat and let the healing begin.

"I mean, if you were Craig, would you be rushing to do Mitch McConnell any favors?"

--Michelle Cottle

Here's one Idahoovian who gave up on Craig after the immigration debate--I had always voted for him--who is getting great delight at seeing him twist in the wind. Though his poor wife, o my. He wouldn't be re-elected again. Also, we got a lot of Mormons around here. They don't like this stuff.

This just in:

Sen. Larry Craig (R-Idaho) intends to try and overturn his conviction in an airport sex sting and if he is cleared, serve out the rest of his term, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said on Wednesday.

McConnell said he spoke with Craig by phone on Wednesday morning where Craig told him his plan. Craig announced last Saturday that he intends to resign from the Senate on September 30th. Craig would have been up for re-election next year.

McConnell said the case has already been referred to the Senate Ethics Committee and that any further matter on the case would have to come from them.

For those who wonder at some of Arlen Specter's actions, it might help to know he started out as a Democrat. He switched parties when the locals in Philly wouldn't support him for District Attorney. He loves the spotlight (ala Chuck Schumer), I've watched him enough to say Sunday's performance was more about him than support for Larry Craig. He's not worried about Larry Craig as an individual, he worried that the pro-amnesty GOP cabal will lose one of their members.

I live in NE Pa......it pains me to admit he's one of my senators.

Craig needs to go and stay gone; the Hill/Hsu story was just starting to pick up traction when this nonsense hit the air waves last night. Once again Craig has sucked all the air out of the room (forgive bad pun).

Captain, all these comments about Mr. Craig trying to get back into the Senate chambers but nothing from you on your board about the incredible return of Senator Johnson ... doesn't it merit a comment or two?

Monkei... I especially loved this line from Senator Johnson's first speech upon his return to the Senate floor:

"Of course, I believe I have an unfair edge over most of my colleagues right now – my mind works faster than my mouth does. Washington would probably be a better place if more people took a moment to think before they spoke."

This is disgusting. From the start, I've said that Craig should go, NOT because he may or may not be gay, but because he's a f***ing idiot. He pled guilty but now claims "I didn't do it". He said he was going to resign but now he's considering fighting it out. Oh, and he left that message on the WRONG FRIGGIN' ANSWERING MACHINE.

I want him gone for the same reasons I wanted Gonzales gone: he's an idiot. I-D-I-O-T.

Bah.

docjim505,

Unfortunately, being an idiot is not a disqualifying condition for a politician. Rather, it seems to be a job requirement. To steal and slightly modify a line I heard on TV, "If all the idiots left Washington there'd be plenty of parking for the tourists".

Posted by dBryant | September 5, 2007 10:51 AM

Toot, the only place being gay is wrong is in your own bigoted little head.

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That is only your own personal opinion. And it isn't backed up by societal experience. It isn't backed up by Societal OPINION, in your favor, either. (FACT: no political progress "in favor" of homosexual issues has YET been VOTED into the American culture by the American public. If you had the VOTES, you'd settle the conflicts WITH VOTES. But it has not happened.)

There is a reason that back in the 1950's when there was no homosexual population to speak of in America, that when Joseph Stalin was devising an Agenda For The Destruction of America, he included a tenet that one of the cell groups should promote the idea that homosexuality was natural and healthy. That Agenda was published in the Congressional record on January 10, 1963.

But there isn't a single example of homosexuality being healthy on the entire planet, IN ALL OF HISTORY, any continent, any nation, any culture, city or town. There isn't a single instance where the homosexual neighborhood becomes THE prime real estate in any city. (The Real Estate agents NOWHERE are being inundated by new families going "OH, TAKE ME THERE! WE DEMAND THE VERY BEST AVAILABLE!"

And it always runs counter-productive to the legitimate goals of marriage and family, and a healthy environment for posterity.

It has, however, killed off a significant number of various communities. Millions and millions.

As if the GOP hasn't been profiting at the polls by villifying gays for decades now. But let's not talk about that, and just focus on Craig instead. There's nothing stopping anyone from addressing such "really important stuff", except the GOP's need to pander to prejudice as usual.

Nobody has to VILLIFY them, they never bothered to establish any bonafides with the General Public, EVER!

Therefore, their old reputation stands UNCHALLENGED - least of all by their modern generation.

All they've done, as far as "reputation" is concerned, is pursue several Libearl Stalinist judges to make RULES against people's rights to FREE SPEECH and against our FREEDOM of using the Majority Rule established in our Constitution to make critical decisions about our communities.
They used Liberal Socialist judges and politicians to pervert the government policies to give them unprecedented scope to operate WITHOUT HAVING TO ABIDE BY THE RULES OF AMERICAN COMMUNITES by EARNING their positions as members in good standing.

I realize that many of them never thought things through and didn't really bargain for this "failure to be accepted on THEIR terms".

I realize many of them are otherwise wonderful people in many ways.

I know many of them who are wonderful in many other ways.

However, anyone with American citizenship who allows their personal issues to become the CROWBAR USED by OLIGARCHISTS to circumvent our Constitution, and our American DUE PROCESS in matters of mega Social upheaval and engineering - has right there LOST any respect they FEEL their ISSUES are due, when they slapped the democratic process in the face and eschewed that methodology for earning their place in society - and instead, decided to use DICTATORIAL METHODS for getting WHAT THEY WANT, in political shortcuts.

Gee, how did Joseph Stalin know these social rebels could be counted on to destroy the democratic process?

We can love the people - we don't have to love what they are doing to our communites and o ur children.

And they DIDN'T earn the respect they are demanding. And yes, elements of a community do have responsibilities and accountabilities - and DO OWE THE COMMUNITY a fiduciary obligation that demands they EARN their proper place.

When a police station is getting significant complaints about a restroom it is stupid to even IMPLY the police shouldn't be there - "because it is a restroom" - no place should become sancrosanct from police while harboring gross behavior that perverts the natural function of the facilities - that contention is INSANE and anti-social in the extreme.

What should be condemned is that perverts should take over any public facility to the point they FORCE police monitoring of aLL such facilites EVERYWHERE.
I heartily resent that perverts felt comfortable enough conducting themselves in such a degenerate manner that it has resulted in a discussion of whether CAMERAS IN PUBLIC RESTROOMS are called for!

Frankly, I have my own line of punishment I'd like to impose on ANY BEHAVIOR AT ALL that even caused that subject to be RAISED!

Some of you guys act like this is a FIRST, starting with Craig. It ain't. And it ain't even limited to any particular persuasion.
BUT IT ALWAYS RESULTS IN A LACK OF HEALTH AND SAFETY FOR THE GENERAL PUBLIC. And the facility BELONGS to the GENERAL Public, and it does NOT belong in ANY sense of the word to the PERVERTS. I can name 3 small towns and several large cities in our area of South West Texas where the bathroom police have had nasty jobs they didn't want to do to make facilities safe again for ordinary use, after "certain elements" began to "camp out" during the hours those facilities were unlocked!

If they want to petition for their own facilities and have it clearly labeled - GO FOR IT!

But I don't want to hear any more of this talk of the "PERVERTED" POLICE, for answering a VITAL call from the General Public FOR RELIEF of a SERIOUS situation dominating a lot of public facilites across the nation, SEVERAL DECADES OLD!

The health and safety of your community HAS ALWAYS FIRST CALL on the PRIORITY of your obligations to provide the very best at your disposal.

That Joseph Stalin list isn't designed to promote the BEST for America - it is designed for the DESTRUCTION of America - AND THE ITEMS ON IT are thus NOT entitled to dominate the rightful standing of other considerations regarding the social structures of our communities.

Restrooms are NOT for the activities of degenerate behavior that creates a hostile environment that threatens or jeopardizes the health and safety of citizens in good standing going about their legitimate way, and that of their children, et al.

Craig doesn't have a right to contribute to a hostile environment in any public facilities. Neither does anyone else.

Rose, there's nothing I could possibly say to prove my previous point about how homosexuals are villified that your last post doesn't make all too well.

Rose... if the whole idea is simply to make these bathrooms "safe" for law-abiding people... why not just put a uniformed police officer in there, sitting on a chair in plain sight? Surely that would put a stop to all the nasty goings-on. Why do they have a plainclothes officer in a stall playing footsie?

Seems to me like the main goal here is entrapment. I don't like it.

"Why not just put a uniformed police officer in there, sitting on a chair in plain sight?"

I can understand I think why they don't do that. It's expensive and only works as long as the cop is there. The current sit in the stall and tap your toes program has the effect of nabbing enough "violators" that the word gets out --stay away from such and such bathroom-- and then the cops can end the program, at least for awhile.

It's the same principle that works with setting up a speed trap for a couple of weeks, cop car hiding in the bushes, nabs a bunch of speeders and then the word goes out. Better slow down on that road, might be a cop car waiting to pull you over.

I don't know what the solution is to this problem. But that's probably because I don't really see it as that big of a problem. I have no idea what anyone is doing in the stall next to me in a public bathroom. But I spend a lot of time being oblivious to a lot of stuff so I'm probably not the best person to judge all this.

I don't know what the solution is to this problem. But that's probably because I don't really see it as that big of a problem. I have no idea what anyone is doing in the stall next to me in a public bathroom. But I spend a lot of time being oblivious to a lot of stuff so I'm probably not the best person to judge all this.

Obviously, you are NOT the best person to ask.

I know of 3-5 facilities close to parks with playground equipment in the surrounding towns that aren't safe to go to - you pass the equipment, the kids are screaming for a chance to swing, and you know the second you get out, half the people in the car with you have to go tothe bathroom, first, in the middle, and again before you leave - and it isn't safe.

Then, the other day, I heard them on Talk Radio, discussing truck stop facilities, and I remember stories about dangers to adults from 25-30 years ago, all over our area, for several hundred miles, 4 different directions.
Sometimes it is consentual, but often it is not.

The trouble is, the consentual draws the involuntary. And that these are facilities from which anyone once in trouble doesn't have easy access to help - obviously - or that facility wouldn't have been converted to degenerate use, in the first place.

My oldest son is 30, and I don't remember much of a problem before he was born, but there sure has been ever since then!

And these perverts rights just do not have a dominant priority over the families having the natural use of these facilities, in safety and in health.

Some of you guys have had "consentual behavior" drilled into your heads until you lost the ability to think, like someone with the Chinese water torture, dripping water drops on your forehead at a steady beat.

"Consentual behavior" has rammifications that are NOT consentual, and are NOT harmless.

Not least of which is the breeding of a mentality that these degenerates have rights that supercede the very SURVIVAL of the prime directives of a community - the nurturing of FAMILIES.
In other words, you may be fine with activity in the next stall, but what if a single lady sends her little boys in by themselves?
Have YOU no obligation to your community to help promote the SAFETY and HEALTH of those children for 5 minutes in a public bathroom?

Think carefully before you answer - YOU depend on your community for more than you obviously count your blessings for, very often.

Be careful, you know how Rod Serling and Alfred Hitchcock would handle it - those little boys would be the very ones who cross your path again, in 15-20 years, and your treatment that affects them as children would directly dictate the treatment you receive due to them, later, when roles are reversed.

Posted by starfleet_dude | September 5, 2007 7:40 PM

Rose, there's nothing I could possibly say to prove my previous point about how homosexuals are villified that your last post doesn't make all too well.

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I understand what you are saying, and I saw it full well as I wrote.

However, that doesn't change the fact that the original idea of "normalizing" homosexuality in America came from Joseph Stalin, and the political arm of homosexuality elected NOT TO COURT THEIR DESIRED PLACE IN THE COMMUNITY BY THE AGREEMENT OF THE SOCIAL STRUCTURES WITHIN OUR CONSTITUTION - THROUGH RESPONSIBLE AND MATURE ACCOUNTABILITY AND CONTRIBUTIONS, BUT TO WREST THE POSITION BY FORCE THROUGH OLIGARCHY, ABUSE OF POWER, THROUGH LIBERAL JUDGES AND RULINGS THAT STAND IN STARK, HARSH CONTRAST TO THE KNOWN WILL OF THE MAJORITY OF AMERICANS.

And you didn't hear me at all - you looked for Prejudice and THOUGHT YOU FOUND IT in my words of condemnation.

My condemnation is for DICTATORIAL TACTICS which threaten the Constitution, and do not disturb a REBELLIOUS AND DESTRUCTIVE element, that is more PARASITIC than INTEGRAL to the host organ.

The American branch of homosexual political power is TRIUMPHANT in their being a MISTLETOE, and doesn't even know or care that it isn't part of the essential tissue of the Host Tree of Liberty.

It is sad, but in wresting what you consider to be their "rightful place" in American Culture, they have proven themselves to be the very perfect tool that Joseph Stalin was seeking, in them - and have thus, instead, proven the age-old prejudices against them were rooted in a factual assessment of their inability to become a contributing force for beneficence in the community they longed to be accepted by.

It is very sad.

You may remember I've forgotten the book, I read as a teen. A famous classic, or a tawdry cheap romance, I really don't remember - but there was a slave owner, and by chance, a lady became his slave, due to her being an inconvenience to an enemy of her father's, or something like that. She was not of that "class", if there were indeed such a thing. Point being, she was a lady of class and education, who knew freedom, before becoming a slave.

The slave owner fell in love with her, and failed miserably to understand why he was unable to win her love. I remember a very stirring passage where she attempted to explain it to him, he didn't get it - but she was blunt about how love is not a slave's to give, most especially to the slave's owner - it could never be freely given - it would always be by force.
(I think this was one of those old Roman/Christian conflicts, maybe).

Of course, by the end, fortunes had changed and he had become a slave, and then he knew.

I tell you again, they cannot use DICTATORIAL TACTICS to become a part of the community, especially when their EVERY political shade is to put their own destructive FEELINGS ahead of community SAFETY, or any positive contributing constructiveness.

And the more they try to force it, the more it becomes a thing of violent imposition, and the backlash will mount ever greater.

Those who plotted it knew, and THAT end of violence is of course THEIR imperial goal! Their initial DESIGN of PURPOSE.

And you leave us no right of conscience to CHOOSE. But WE are AMERICANS. And that right is OURS!

Seems to me like the main goal here is entrapment. I don't like it.

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And I don't like it when social predators use our laws FOR freedom to pervert the plain function of ordinary beneficial systems to destructive enclaves for attack against our society.

The entire danger of these people abusing the system for their own ends, AND GETTING BY WITH IT, is that they drive the law-abiding and FRUSTRATED CITIZENS into a "vigilante" state of mind where they lose the ability to CARE about what they are losing, as long as they get the predators and stop THEM.

I have warned folks for DECADES that if they let the predators make the incremental steps BECAUSE WE REFUSE TO STOP AND TAKE THE TIME TO FIND THE EFFECTIVE REBUTTAL AND MAKE THE DISFUNCTIONING STOP, then eventually, those anti-social forces will force the good and law abiding folks to a state of vigilantism that will destroy their own freedom, while the DRIVING FORCES BEHIND the predators WHO USED THOSE PREDATORS UNAWARES, FOR THEIR OWN ENDS, will then attempt to gain control of the reins of the vigilantes, and thus establish their Martial Law, and thus their DICTATORSHIP.

Our Founding Fathers warned of this "natural degeneration of democracies" through abusing liberties to licenciousness.

It is a bad situation, and I think many people here haven't got a clue how bad things are when it becomes a "reasonable premise" that CAMERAS IN PUBLIC RESTROOMS would have SOLVED this Senator's LEGAL PROBLEMS, and either cleared the policeman, or the Senator.

CAMERAS in the RESTROOMS?
AND WE ARE "CIVILIZED"??????????

BECAUSE A DEGENERATING, DESTRUCTIVE SITUATION has been PROMOTED in the Social attitudes of Laissez Faire, and folks don't want to sit down and THINK THE WHOLE RAMMIFICATIONS all the way through.

Let everyone do as they please, nobody is responsible to anyone else for anything.

A society that is not protecting and nurturing their children is DYING!

And a lot of people are worried whether ADULTS have the opportunity to engage in DEVIANT PLEASURE, in dangerous places - without social condemnation.

And I am remembering Ted Bundy's final warnings to society.

Are there enough adults left in America to put our Posterity into the top priorities of this nation? And to make hard choices that "pleasures" that BLOCK THOSE LEGITIMATE PRIORITIES have to be thrown out of the community?

Spring Cleaning time.

We are already segregating in a brand new way, different than anything America has ever seen or dreamed: Liberal, Dim voting Districts are averaging 8,000 fewer children than Conservative voting Districts. According to the National CENSUS.

It won't take long til those with families won't let those inside their security enclaves who appear to them to be of a threatening nature.

Shades of "The Masque of The Red Death".

Rose wrote:

You may remember I've forgotten the book, I read as a teen. A famous classic, or a tawdry cheap romance, I really don't remember - but there was a slave owner, and by chance, a lady became his slave, due to her being an inconvenience to an enemy of her father's, or something like that. She was not of that "class", if there were indeed such a thing. Point being, she was a lady of class and education, who knew freedom, before becoming a slave.

The slave owner fell in love with her, and failed miserably to understand why he was unable to win her love. I remember a very stirring passage where she attempted to explain it to him, he didn't get it - but she was blunt about how love is not a slave's to give, most especially to the slave's owner - it could never be freely given - it would always be by force.
(I think this was one of those old Roman/Christian conflicts, maybe).

Of course, by the end, fortunes had changed and he had become a slave, and then he knew.

Nihil humanum nisi bonum asks:

While not _exactly_ the complete role reversal plot that Rose remembers, perhaps she is of an age to have read as a teenager Robert Penn Warren's Band of Angels (1955) about a young woman of color sold into slavery from her loving father's Kentucky home after his death into slavery in New Orleans. See http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa4074/is_200601/ai_n17180351 for a full-bore critical reappraisal. The 1957 film seriously distorted the novel, with Yvonne de Carlo having to explain the matter of not wanting to reciprocate coerced love to Efram Zimbalist Jr. (a brash northern officer), whereas Clark Gable (a studly but oh so nice southern plantation owner most of whose slaves jes lubs him) wins Yvonne's heart. Also, Sidney Poitier Jr. is a bad slave who leads a rebellion against Gable's social status and property. I don't remember if Gable forgives Poitier or just kills him.