Larry Craig Standing His Ground in the “Toughest Fight” of His Career.

POSTED BY kevin brannon, 17 October 2007

Well, Matt Lauer’s sit down with Idaho Senator Larry Craig and his wife Suzanne proved to be the squirm-in-your-seat groaner everyone had anticipated. With nothing remotely persuasive to say in his defense, Craig ticked off the laundry list of self-defeating justifications he used in early press conferences, adding the outright allegation of entrapment. Although Lauer, as the seen-it-all high school principal, dutifully asked all the icky questions, he did manage to convey the embarrassment that everyone involved should be feeling.

Makes you long for that Today Show demographic doesn’t it, Matt?

A few of my picks for the highlights reel:

• A nice cut-away of Lauer performing the old foot tap and shuffle that got Craig hauled out of that men’s room at the Minnesota airport.

• Suzanne Craig chirping, “On whose part?” when Lauer asked if the distinction between solicitation and homosexual acts is one of semantics.

• The Craigs’ bright-eyed certainty that they remember the exact circumstances of the senator’s alleged cruising of a man at a store in Boise—they were shopping for shoes as man and wife, thanks.

• Lauer’s recitation of an editorial published in the Idaho Statesman: "we cannot afford … to have a senator who merely provides fodder for bloggers and late-night talk show hosts."

Yep, that's pretty much what he’s doing. And chuckling over it all like a man remembering a boyish prank from long ago.

So, the Republican leadership and plenty of folks back home in Idaho are ready for this guy to resign; but can they really be surprised by Craig’s quixotic determination to hold on?

In his quest for vindication, the senator has totally alienated those who elected him to office and needlessly prolonged the ridicule to which he’s exposed his party. But he says he knows in his heart that he’s right, despite it all. More than anything else, Craig sounds like a man who’s taken a few pages from the White House play book: Shut down, shut out and stand firm.

And you know, maybe someday we’ll look back on all of this and laugh.



interview, Larry Craig, Men's room, Matt Lauer, Minnesota airport, sex scandal