Scandals Rattle Republican Ranks

The GOP is undergoing a bit of an ethical crisis following the recent string of scandals involving prominent Republicans—the most recent being, of course, the media hullabaloo surrounding Sen. Larry Craig’s run-in with an undercover policeman in a Minneapolis airport men’s room.  Oh, and then there’s that whole Iraq war issue.

The New York Times:

Forget Mark Foley of Florida, who quit the House last year after exchanging sexually explicit e-mail messages with under-age male pages, or Jack Abramoff, the lobbyist whose dealings with the old Republican Congress landed him in prison. They are old news, replaced by a fresh crop of scandal-plagued Republicans, men like Senator David Vitter of Louisiana, whose phone number turned up on the list of the so-called D.C. Madam, or Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska and Representative Rick Renzi of Arizona, both caught up in F.B.I. corruption investigations.

It is enough to make a self-respecting Republican want to tear his hair out in frustration, especially as the party is trying to defend an unpopular war, contain the power of the new Democratic majority on Capitol Hill and generate some enthusiasm among voters heading toward the presidential election in 2008.

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AP Photo / Douglas C. Pizac

In better times:  The arrest of Sen. Larry Craig of Idaho is but the latest in a string of high-profile scandals to rock the Republican Party.