Posted on 12/02/2007 6:41:57 PM PST by freespirited
Five men have come forward to say they have had sexual encounters with Idaho’s senior senator Larry Craig. In Sunday’s edition of the Idaho Statesmen four of the men are revealing their names. Senator Craig is denying these allegations.
Two of the accusers' names were released in previous publications when they claimed of having encounters with Craig. The names of two other men are new, and there's an anonymous fifth accusation from a local man who fears if he releases his name, he faces retaliation.
In audiotapes they say this.
David Phillips
David Phillips first told his story to Washington DC gossip website, wonkette. Phillips, an IT man in DC told the website that 20-years ago he had a sexual encounter with Craig.
Mike Jones
Mike Jones, who you may have heard of before for his involvement with the Ted Haggard sex scandal says he took 200 dollars from Craig for sex, more than two years ago. Jones told the paper he didn't know who Craig was until he saw his first news conference back on August 28th. Rumors that Jones had met with Craig surfaced in October, but Jones never admitted to having sex with the Senator until now.
Greg Ruth
Greg Ruth who is from Tacoma, Washington says back in 1981 while at a republican conference in Coeur d’Alene Craig, who was a bachelor at the time, followed him into the bathroom and tried to make conversation. Ruth who was openly gay told the Statesman Craig gave him his number and told him, he could stay with him when he visited Washington DC.
Tom Russell
Tom Russell, a Nampa native who now lives in Utah contacted the Statesman about what he says was unusual behavior from the Senator. Russell, who was openly gay when he met Craig, says the Senator suggested a meeting and allegedly used signals typical of gay men in public places.
The fifth person who is a gay Boise businessman says that he and Senator Craig were on the same plane from Boise to Denver, when Craig made the same motions to him that he was later arrested for in a Minneapolis airport bathroom.
The Statesman says in its investigation they don't have videos, messages, or a letter from Craig to these men but we need to keep in mind these allegations also cannot be disproved.
This is the statement Senator Craig released about the Statesman’s allegations.
“It is unfortunate that the Idaho Statesman has chosen to continue to lower itself to the standards of what can best be described as tabloid journalism. Like its previous coverage, these latest allegations are completely false and have no basis in reality. In fact, the paper itself states that these baseless accusations contain no definitive evidence yet they still decided to print them anyway. However, despite the fact the Idaho Statesman has decided to pursue its own agenda and print these falsehoods without any facts to back them up, I won’t let this paper’s attempt to malign my name stop me from continuing my work to serve the people of Idaho.”
To be added to this ping list just make some stupid bathroom humor innuendo that has nothing to do with Larry Craig.
Craig really blew it. He threw his life down the toilet. The only way he can resurrect his career is to suck it up, swallow his pride, get on his knees and ask for forgiveness.
According to you:
The fact that he knew they were after him but let himself get caught up in this has nothing to do with it.
The fact that he admitted to doing what they accused him of doing had nothing to do with it.
The fact that he lied and said he would leave if he lost his case has nothing to do with it.
The fact that he is caught on tape because he leaves a message on the wrong person’s answering machine has nothing to do with it.
He’s a liar and an idiot, a black mailable idiot. The democrats and the newspapers may very well be out to get him, but he’s played right into their hands and he refuses to get out of his own way. I can’t feel sorry for someone who did this to his own self.
He did not admit to doing what they said he did. He agreed to plead “guilty” to something (not soliciting for sex) in order to get on his way. THAT is the ONLY thing they have on him.
He did absolutely zero in that restroom outside of what any normal person would do....as he told the officer...he went there to use the toilet. Period.
The OFFICER, not Sen.Craig, started doing all kinds of wierdo things that brought some responses from Sen. Craig as it would from any sane individual who sees a note being held under your bathroom stall wall.
What else did he do? He peered into the stall where the cop was? HE WAS TRYING TO FIND AN EMPTY STALL.....just as he said....and he had been waiting outside of that one for some time and the cop just wouldn’t come out and there wasn’t one open until the one beside the cop came open.
And what else. He tapped his foot. Wow.
What else. He moved his hand under the wall of the stall - TRYING TO FIND OUT WHAT THE HECK THE COP WAS SHOVING UNDER THE STALL WALL TOWARDS HIM???
What else. He moved his one foot far enough over that it touched the foot of the cop. Could it be possible the cop was moving his foot over just to produce this result????
These are the most bogus ridiculous idiotic charges that have brought all this hubub and is fitting the purpose of getting rid of Senator Craig.
Senator Craig realized he was wrong to not fight for his right to continue in the Senate just as he should - becuase HE KNOWS HE HAS DONE ABSOLUTELY ZERO WRONG.
I am glad he is fighting - America needs this man in the US Senate.
Totally agree.
The Senator may not have much credibility, but his accusers have even less, so Senator Craig gets the benefit of the doubt.
Do you really think that the guy who brough down Haggard, would sit on the info that he accepted money for sex from a Senator? And the guy didn’t get any proof? One of the allegations is about as bad as the men’s room signals, a guy claims that Craig was nice and friendly to him and that his “gaydar” detector was going off!
Yes and they will be empowered by how quickly the base caves to accusations without hard facts and goes after their own. Dems support their own even if there are hard facts against their members. Don't suggesting we do that but at least give our members the benefit of the doubt. We are in a war with liberal democrats. To the dems the ends justifies the means.
It seems many of you Craig defenders have a hard time separating the media from the court. Yes he did do what the courts said he did. He admitted to it. He was convicted of the crime. The fact that he is now trying to back out of his guilty plea is just one more instance of his propensity to lie.
As far as the media goes. I pay no attention to what they say. If Craig had been smart, he would not have given them all the ammunition to fire at him. If he had only gone in there to use the toilet, he would not be in this situation now. All his explanations for his acts defy reason and in the complaint that he signed, he admitted to the fact that his actions were not normal acts of one just going to use the toilet. By his own words in the court documents he admitted to it.
Either he is a liar, amnesiac, lunatic, or imbecile. I would vote for all except amnesiac. In any case, he does not belong in the senate. His behavior during this entire situation has been one of lie and deception after lie.
If your explanation for his situation were correct and everything he did was completely normal, why did he admit to behavior that others would have found disturbing, disruptive and out of place in a bathroom. You could get by with all your conjecture if he himself had not signed a document disputing what you believe. There is no excuse for his behavior. He can’t even offer any reasonable excuse for his behavior. That is why he has not been able win in court.
Craig’s apologists can say whatever they want, he’s a liar — proved by his own words. He’s guilty which can be proved by him admitting so in the court documents and in his rejected appeal. The democrats and their media will have a field day with this until the day he leaves office. I’m not even sure we can trust his statement that he will be leaving when his term is up. Remember, he has proved time after time to be a liar. So the people of Idaho may have to put up with this garbage until the republican primary. What a great start for the new republican senatorial candidate. If Craig left now, as he had promised to do if he lost the last appeal, we’d have a great conservative Senator without baggage or innuendo who would be preparing for a certain victory.
Making excuses for this lying degenerate’s behavior makes you seem as though you are suffering whatever delusional disease affects him. I hope you recover soon. And I hope the rest of republican party is not severely damaged by this deviant.
At the time of their encounter, he had no idea who his customer was. He learned that the individual was Senator Craig much later.
The article on the Idaho Statesman website provides much more documentation and detail than is given here.
“The account of the undercover cop in the MN bathroom seals it for me. Were it not for that, this would just be a he said/he said.”
Call it entrapment, but the police are trained to infiltrate and interact in the world of vice.
It is how they arrest prostitutes and johns, as well a child sex and pornography operatives.
Apparently it is how they shut down gay sex venues, such as this airport.
They know the signals, language, etc. Craig was caught dead to rights, plead guilty. Done deal.
Yes indeed.
Will have to reply in full later tonight.
Senator Craig admitted to disorderly conduct. That’s it.
He did not admit to nor was he accused of soliciting for sex in that bathroom.
How do you know if Senator Craig stepped down that a conservative Republican would replace him? You have no way of knowing that.
We do know that right NOW we have a conservative Republican VOTE on a host of issues that will be gone if he steps down.
If Senator Craig were a pervert as he is being portrayed to be, of course, I would want him gone from the Senate.
If on the other hand, he is NOT, and there has been zero substantiated evidence that he IS (again, in that bathroom he neither solicited for sex nor was accused of doing so and now all we have are some unsubstantiated accusations by people who are NATURALLY allied with the Democrats)....then wouldn’t you want him to stay and fight and VOTE as America needs his vote and his presence?
Remember again - he has voted consistently pro life and pro marriage and family AND pro tax cuts, etc. He is hated and despised by the leftists, and by the homosexual mafia.....and he is a target, plain and simple.
I do not think a Senator or any man should be forced to give up their career because of foot tapping, and pleading guilty to disorderly conduct.....or because of UNSUBSTANTIATED ACCUSATIONS from people who are members of a group who hates that man’s guts.
Craig needs to repent, resign, and his wife poor needs an AIDS test.
I don’t give any credence to a male prostitute, unless he has a copy of a receipt for the money he received for services or a video tape. The whole thing gives me the creeps.
No, I don’t. Any man with dignity would have resigned.
Like I said, I don’t pay attention to what the media says. I read what actually gets reported in the court. You need to examine exactly what the media is calling “disorderly conduct.” The court documents have been out there for months.
I can tell that you haven’t read them yet, so now I understand why you have been so misguided. The media keeps portraying the charge as a simple disorderly conduct charge for their own reasons. Once you see the truth, what he was actually charged with and what he actually agrees that he did in his own words with his own signature at the bottom of the court document, you will wonder how you could have been taken in so completely.
Idaho is a conservative state, the governor right now is even more conservative than Craig. Remember, Craig is an open borders, amnesty lover. The governor had someone on tap, lieutenant governor, Jim Risch, who is more conservative than Craig. It is a shame that Jim Risch will have to be burdened with this garbage and Larry Craig knows it, but since Larry has no shame, it does not bother him at all.
I do not think a congenital serial liar should be a senator representing conservatives and the people of Idaho. Given Larry’s history of poor decision making, he should not be considered up to senate representative standards. Whether you think his sworn statement admitting that his behavior was abnormal and disturbing constitutes substantiation or not, this entire situation, from the not telling anyone including his family about what he did until the media found out, to refusing help from a lawyer, to literally pulling out the “do you know who I am” card, to waiting two months after pleading guilty then to only decide he was wronged when the world finds out about it, makes it difficult for any reasoning person to believe Larry Craig is in any way telling the truth. Add to that his serial broken promises to leave office if he lost in court. He does not deserve one extra minute in the senate. This is even before considering the deviant behavior in the bathroom.
There are other conservatives who are honest, more intelligent, much less deceptive, and not prone to blackmail than Senator Craig thank the Lord. The steaming pile that is Larry Craig needs to disappear and stop acting as a plague on conservatives and the people of Idaho.
You are right, I did not read the court documents. But I did listen to the tape of the interview between the arresting police officer and Senator Craig. THAT tape convinced me Senator Craig was indeed NOT LYING, had done NOTHING out of the ordinary, and was pleading guilty to a lesser charge in order to get on his way. The lesser charge from what I read associated with that audio tape was “disorderly conduct”. Are you saying that is not the case?
He went to court to get that guilty plea overturned. It didn’t happen. I do not know who that judge is or anything about him. But if he is a liberal appointee....well I just don’t put a lot of stock in lower court rulings when it is a political “target” who is before that judge. Do you know anything about the judge? I honestly do not.
But I do know what I heard on that tape. It was obvious that officer was not listening to what Senator Craig was saying. I’ll have to go find that transcript again. THAT TAPE convinced me Senator Craig was totally innocent and had nothing illicit or perverted going on except using the bathroom as it was intended to be used.
That does not mean bathrooms or THAT bathrrom is not the location of such solicitations AND actions on those solicitations. Right there in the bathroom. I know of such activities from other public bathroom reports locally here.
It makes me sick. It is horrible and a reason no child should be allowed to go into a public bathroom alone.....but that’s not the point.
The point is that Senator Craig did absolutely NOTHING suspicious or unusual....but that his actions were MADE to seem unusual by that officer.
Yes he promised to step down if the court ruled against him and he has not done that. I AM GLAD HE HAS NOT. Realize I am in the minority but again, if any man I knew or respected had done exactly what Senator Craig has done —— despite his mistake of pleading guilty to the lesser charge in order to get on his way.....yet was innocent, could not possibly have done what he was accused of doing by that officer.....and certainly will NEVER have these latest accusations PROVEN because they are total lies.....I would want that man to NOT SURRENDER their career, I don’t care what career it was.
I just do not like INNOCENT PEOPLE being punished for something they did NOT do nor could they possibly do.
If he surrenders to the people targeting him, HE IS SAYING DO THIS TO ME AND THEN DO THIS TO THE NEXT SENATOR WHO HAS THE AUDACITY TO STAND STAUNCHLY PRO LIFE AND PRO MARRIAGE AND FAMILY (WHICH MEANS ANTI - HOMOSEXUAL AGENDA).
If you are correct that a conservative Republican Senator would be able to replace Senator Craig immediately in the Senate....it would be very soon that this new Senator would become a TARGET just like Senator Craig is.
Who knows if that new “target” could withstand the immense pressures that would come upon him to vote as Senator Craig has voted and will vote - re: prolife, profamily???
It is time for a conservative Republican Senator like Senator Craig to stand up - just as he has done - and say - forget about it you lib nazi’s.....I am not going anywhere because I have never done and I will never do bathroom solicitations for gay sex or any kind of sex. I have never and will never have any kind of encounter with gay men or solicit for gay sex in any way shape or form.....and I am not going to be driven out of my career which not only serves the people of Idaho but also the people of America by trumped up bogus accusations.
There is so much you don’t know about. The judge was not a liberal appointee. He was a good conservative judge.
I think he would have had pity on Larry if he had not been so obviously lying. Larry Craig has no explanation for his behavior. It certainly was not the behavior of an innocent man. It is hard for a judge to overturn a signed admission of guilt without a compelling reason.
I read all the court documents, I read the transcript and I listened to the tape. Based on all that evidence, I can say Larry Craig was certainly guilty of alarming behavior and his actions did not belong in a bathroom. To believe Larry Craig, you have to believe that the entire world is lying about him and is out to get him, not just the democrats, but conservatives, police, judges, and any reasonable and logical person. They must all be trying to make him look bad.
You have decided to declare his innocence based solely on listening to a tape. That’s an emotional decision and I understand it. I don’t agree with it, but to each his own.
I appreciate your comments. However, I am not making an emotional decision here, none whatsoever.
Just the opposite.
The emotional response would be one of anger and disgust at a US Senator, especially a pro family, prolife, Christian conservative one, being “caught in the act” of soliciting for sex in that bathroom.
The emotional response would be one of added anger and disgust and outrage when these latest accusations were published that this same Senator was still in office and had not stepped down.
My support of Senator Craig on this issue has nothing to do with emotion - I actually knew nothing about Senator Craig before all this started except that he was a conservative Republican Senator who had a high conservative voting record and was from the state of Idaho. Period.
The interview with the officer IS THE KEY bit of first hand evidence we have. It is the only evidence we the public have of what occurred in that airport bathroom and THAT is the ONLY event that arrest is critical because that event is what led to all subsequent actions by Senator Craig and the calls for his resignation.
Here is a link to the transcript of that interview: http://www.gameshout.com/news/was_senator_larry_craig_setup/article9368.htm
It is NOT an emotional response to have listened to and to read that interview and to decide Senator Craig is totally innocent of doing anything in that bathroom other than using it for its usual purposes and of picking up a piece of paper off the bathroom floor.
There is much to say about that interview....have done that already...but the key point in the interview is the police officer’s insistence that he saw Sen. Craig’s left hand reach under the stall wall because it had his wedding ring on it. Yet that hand was on the opposite side of the stall from the wall nearest the officer. As Sen. Craig tries to point out - “you saw something that did not occur”.
He would have had to reach his left hand over and under that stall wall. Finally the officer realizes he has a problem here on his accusation - so he says.....did you remove your wedding ring from your left hand and place it on your right hand any time today? Sen. Craig says no of course not - here you try to take it off my left hand (it won’t come off). Senator Craig....you saw something that did not occur.
In other words, the officer made that up. He totally fabricated the claim that he saw the Senator’s wedding ring hand go under that stall wall - it did not happen. That officer knew it. Knew he was caught in his bogus claim so tried to claim the Senator took off his wedding ring and put it on is right hand. But, to his dismay, that ring could have been moved to the right hand because it was stuck - could not possibly be removed. I have a ring like that. You would have to cut through the ring to get it off.
So what does the officer do? He keeps repeating: “embarrassing”. Yes he is an embarrassment to honest law enforcement officers everywhere.
Are you saying that in court, the officer produced additional evidence than what was discussed in this interview?
If so, what was it. I’d like to know. Or a link to the court documents and in formation on that judge would suffice.
I have never accused those who take the opposite view of these events of acting out of emotion and not reason. Freepers as a rule do not do that....though of course there are exceptions.
However, the jump to judgement without looking at actually what happened that day in terms of what started all of this is exactly the emotional result that these bogus charges were intended to produce. Same with the latest unfounded accusations.
You do realize that nonthinking people across this country and the world believe that Senator Craig was “caught” in the act of the sex act with another man in that bathroom, don’t you?
All because the man used the bathroom as it was intended to be used.
And by the way the only person who was even “soliciting” for sex that day was not Senator Craig. It was that officer - just as Senator Craig says in his interview.
“It is unfortunate that the Idaho Statesman has chosen to continue to lower itself to the standards of what can best be described as tabloid journalism.
It’s unfortunate that you have disgraced the Senate. Like I have said many times. Please leave the Senate and take Senator Vitter with you....
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