You know, if Craig just wanted a hookup, he could've easily done so

[ButterflyBlood]

I live near the Twin Cities area, I go there a lot, and I know plenty of places to look and I'm not even gay. He could've picked up the free alternative magazine the City Pages and browsed the classifieds. He could've checked out the famous club Gay 90s. Etc.

HE DIDN'T HAVE TO DO IT IN A FUCKING PUBLIC BATHROOM.

The vast majority of people don't want to have to deal with people cruising for anonymous public sex when they're going to the bathroom. And clearly most people the MSP Airport don't either otherwise there wouldn't have been enough complaints for a sting operation to be conducted in the first place.

There's no excuses for Craig's behavior. Let's quit with the knee-jerk defense of anyone who happens to be gay. People like Craig sure as hell aren't doing the gay rights movement a favor. The image of perverts who troll public bathrooms for anonymous sex isn't a good image for the public to have the homosexual community, nor it is one the vast majority of the homosexual community deserves.

And while Craig is clearly an idiot and a pervert, I'm willing to bet he would've most likely have gotten away with it had he not threatened the cop with his Senator card. Abuse of authority or a position isn't exactly an admirable thing. Craig could've simply used the whole misunderstanding excuse, and gotten the case dropped. Instead he threatens on the basis of his position, pleads guilty, then retracts his claim, effectively admitting to committing perjury. What's to defend about this guy?

Let's just call Craig a pervert and idiot and let that be the end of it.

[Ediacara]

1. If I was a closetted US Senator I don't think I would have gone into a gay bar

The internet possibly, but he doesn't seem like much of a 'net guy.

[waiting for hope]

4. I heard earlier tonight

that part of the "bathroom exchange" is the thrill of being in a public space. People have all kinds of little quirks...

[Warren Stupidity]

2. Yeah Another Bathroom Homophobia Thread!

I am so glad. Its been minutes!

[morningglory]

3. Tea Room Trade. My husband used to hate the men who lurked in public

restrooms. In the Anthropology department, during graduate school, they took up the little privately placed men's room in the back of the building. All the boys had fits about it. They wrote things like this on the walls: "We don't s#!t in your bedrooms, please don't f#@K in our bathroom!" One of "them" had written "Pat foot for sex" on the restroom wall. I had a part time student job in the library catalog department, and noticed a title of a book "Tea Room Trade". It was a sociological study of the men (trade) who frequent public restrooms (tea rooms). Not gay. Usually married, often Catholic white men. I don't remember it very well, but it was extremely interesting.

[mitchtv]

5. Knee jerk DEFENSE??????

where have you been? Certainly not here

[foreigncorrespondent]

6. Knee-jerk defense?

Where has that been happening?

[liberalmuse]

7. I really don't think he's gay.

Perhaps he was trolling for man on man, but I know of a lot of hetero males who do that, too. My gay friends have no problemshooking it up with heteros any time they want. I think he just wanted to do something naughty and subversive for the thrill of it. The Republicans can only keep the lid on it so tight for so long before the missionary position with the wife just isn't going scratch all the itches they've ignored over the years.

So whenever you are feeling that life is not kind,
and and the hassles are getting you down,
think of the guy who has no pants,
driving all around
your neighborhood
looking like a typical middle-aged yuppy
asking for directions,
or beckoning you over to check out his "puppy",
because that's the only way
he can get erections
without Viagra, or a $300 an hour diaper changing, whip welding dominatrix clad in nothing but Tucker Carlson's bow tie and nut-grinding stillettos.
If you needed all that just to shoot off your cannon,
or worse, simply a picture of Jeff Gannon,
You'd be a Republican, too.

A poet, I ain't.