GOP members of Congress turning against each other quickly, after-the-jump ...
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The time after George Santos was saved from expulsion by his GOP colleagues … to being expelled by them was only thirty days. We’ll look at this later: just to note that the GOP can turn on one-of-its-own suddenly in two other major cases.
After his election to the US Senate in 1968, Bob Packwood seemed a less likely sort to be the focus of sexual harassment charges. Like other GOP legislators from the Pacific Northwest of that era, he was moderate on issues such as gun control and among the first GOP senators to call for Richard Nixon’s resignation. Moreover, he was an early supporter of abortion rights, and opposed the nomination of both Robert Bork and Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court because of their intentions to overturn Roe vs. Wade.
In particular, he had a history of hiring women, promoting them and supporting their careers even after they left his office — and often held powerful posts on his staff — at a time when that was rare. A magazine story (that I cannot locate again) said that (in the early 70’s) he said that female staffers were often overlooked and outworked their male colleagues, hence most of his staffers were female.
Yet in 1992, the downside of his hiring practices of women came out … as many of his staffers related unwanted sexual advances. The Senate did hold investigations, and GOP members were disturbed over his altering his diary entries before turning them over (which he did only after a Supreme Court ruling).
Nonetheless, they publicly tolerated his claims of merely poor judgement and that he was the victim of lies. Further, they voted (largely along party lines) in mid-1995 against holding public hearings by a 52-48 margin, by his own request. While I did not follow his case closely at the time, my recollection was that this would be yet another investigation that would be settled quietly.
Then two things happened: first, the investigative committee was made aware of two more claims, one (possibly) involving a minor. Upset, Packwood changed his tactics, insisting upon public hearings … so that he could confront his accusers.
I do recall the reaction being quite swift, resulting in the release of 10,000 pages of testimony and a 6-0 committee vote for expulsion. In little more than 24-hours, his GOP colleagues turned on him: as they felt they had risked much in supporting him publicly (and voted against hearings) that he now demanded . He resigned in September, 1995 and is age ninety-one today.
Much more recently: someone who was not forced to resign but, rather, was ostracized enough to lose a re-election was … your-friend-and-mine, Madison Cawthorn. Elected in 2020 to succeed Mark Meadows, his one term was marked by various controversies, including allegations of insider trading, improper payments, visiting Hitler’s resort Eagle’s Nest, claiming president Zelensky was “a thug”, claiming his disabling injury had “derailed” his application to the Naval Academy (when he had been rejected beforehand), being accused of sexual misconduct and bringing a handgun to an airport, for starters. None of which was an issue for his colleagues (at least not publicly) as he expressed his youthful, hyper-masculine Christian credentials prominently.
But in March, 2022 that changed … with an appearance on a podcast, where he claimed the Netflix drama House of Cards was an accurate description of the powers-that-be in Washington:
"I look at all these people, a lot of them that I've looked up to through my life, I've always paid attention to politics. Then all of the sudden you get invited to, 'Well hey, we're going to have kind of a sexual get-together at one of our homes, you should come.' I'm like, 'What did you just ask me to come to?' And then you realize they are asking you to come to an orgy."
"Or the fact that, you know, there are some of the people that are leading on the movement to try and remove, you know, addiction in our country and then you watch them do a key bump of cocaine right in front of you," he added.
In a recurring theme: GOP lawmakers were now being asked if these charges were true … and confronted him about it (privately and publicly) as many feared he was talking about them.
Many backed his main GOP re-election primary opponent Chuck Edwards … and just a month later, a photo of him wearing lingerie (in what appears to be a party setting) was leaked to Politico. Not long after, a right-wing opposition group leaked a nude video of him that he referred to as “blackmail” just two weeks before his May, 2022 re-election primary … that he lost to Edwards by 1-½ %. Cawthorn subsequently moved to Florida … but failed to pass on important information about constituents seeking help to his successor (standard practice for any legislative transition) as if he lost a Loser-Leave-Town wrestling match.
You need little reminder from myself about George Santos — suffice it to say, his previous expulsion vote on November 1st failed not only to get a 2/3 margin, it lost 179-213. Exactly one month later, the vote total flipped to 311-114 (thus a 73% margin).
While the November 16th release of a House ethics report helped turn-the-tide against keeping him … there were also personal threats and grievances:
It was from Ohio Republican Max Miller to his fellow Republicans, (saying) he was a victim of Santos' alleged credit card fraud, and so was his mom. He says they're out tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees trying to fix it. And so that - yeah, he was going to vote to oust Santos.
Rep. George Santos also got into a heated floor discussion with Miller as the chamber debated whether to expel the New York Republican on Thursday.
After Miller called Santos a “crook,” the New Yorker referenced past allegations of alleged abuse in a relationship by Miller, calling the Ohio lawmaker a “woman beater.” Miller has forcefully denied those allegations, suing the woman for defamation but voluntarily dropping the lawsuit earlier this year.
His fellow New York state GOP representatives were afraid him staying in office would rub-off on them, especially the seven hailing from districts that Joe Biden won in 2020. In turn, Santos threatened to file ethics complaints about several of them, most notably Reps. Nicole Malliotakis of Staten Island:
Santos said the complaint against Malliotakis will focus on “her questionable stock trading since joining the Ways and Means committee this Congress.”
“Let’s talk about hypocrisy. Can someone ask Nicole MalioStockTips when did she become a savant in stock trading? The signature bank trades she did REEKS of insider trading much like Paul Pelosi’s every trade!” he added, referring to the husband of former Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
I’ll miss Bowen Yang’s portrayal of Santos on SNL.
Note to wayward GOP members of Congress: Paul Gosar and other crazees can be ignored by your colleagues … believing the public will see them as lone wolves. It’s when you threaten your colleagues … that they’ll turn on you.
Now, on to Top Comments:
From twingrace:
In the diary by ENG2018 about parting with friendship, family, and also freedom from betrayal, Private Ice speaks the powerful truth of real love. It brings tears to my eyes.
And from Ed Tracey, your faithful correspondent this evening ........
In the fabulous diary by tonyahky about a scammer trying to defraud a patient who uses her medical clinic — with only a sketchy Linkedin page — amongst numerous heartfelt suggestions on who to report this to, telltale signs of scammers and ways to prevent fraud — leave it to lineatus to break-the-tension by indicating a possible link to a different scammer.
Next - enjoy jotter's wonderful (and now eternal) *PictureQuilt™* below. Just click on the picture and it will magically take you to the comment featuring that photo.
TOP PHOTOSDecember 13th, 2023
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