[Vision2020] Times-News: Craig's ego

[Mark Solomon]

 From that bastion of Idaho liberals.

m.
**********

Twin Falls Times-News
October 5,2007
Editorial

In the end, Craig's ego trumps what's best for Idaho
"Nothing ever gets settled in this town, a seething debating society 
in which the debate never stops, in which people never give up ..."

- Former Secretary of State George P. Shultz, speaking of Washington, D.C.

After 27 years on Capitol Hill, Larry Craig has decided that serving 
Idaho isn't as important as serving himself. Why else would he 
announce Thursday that he's decided to stay in the Senate for the 
remaining 15 months of his term?

Craig's power is gone. His seniority has evaporated. His credibility 
has disappeared, especially after announcing 35 days ago that he 
would resign in the wake of his guilty plea for soliciting an 
undercover policeman in a rest room at the Minneapolis airport.

The senator changed his mind Thursday after a Minnesota judge 
rejected Craig's request to withdraw that guilty plea. Idaho, he's 
decided, can't do without Larry Craig in the Senate even though 
Senate Republican leaders have made it abundantly clear they would 
rather do without Craig.

But ego is a curious thing. It warps human judgment in ways that 
confound comprehension.

By his decision Thursday, Craig is headed for an investigation by the 
Senate Ethics Committee that will drag out his indiscretion - and 
Idaho's shame - for weeks. David Letterman, Jay Leno and Jon Stewart 
will have comedy material until the day Craig leaves the Senate in 
2009.

And Idaho will effectively have just one senator, Mike Crapo. Craig's 
47 other GOP colleagues - much less the Democrats who run the Senate 
- are unlikely to cut a deal with the lamest of lame ducks in recent 
memory.

Yet the senator has accomplished one thing: He's single-handedly made 
next year's Democratic nominee for his Idaho Senate seat a viable 
candidate.

Larry Craig will be the issue in that election, and Lt. Gov. Jim 
Risch or whomever the Republicans choose will have to defend his 
actions from day one of the campaign.

What a sad and sorry turn of events for a man who used to be Idaho's 
most effective senator since Jim McClure and Frank Church.

Perhaps Craig genuinely feels that he has nothing to lose. That's too 
bad, because Idaho sure does.
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