I’ve gotten piles of email in response to my Vitter post along these lines from a reader in Ohio:
Jonah,
No Way Vitter should resign. No Way. Not until the other side starts resigning for illegal/unethical whatever behavior.
Our side is ready to throw whoever out for the slightest, and not so slight, point granted, wrong-doing. BS! I say. Hey people make mistakes.
This is a stupid mistake, so is taking 100 thou in cash on tape from the FBI, so is earmarking $$$$$ for relatives in PA. in defense appropriations bills. So is leaking state secrets, so is emailing pages so is having sex with pages, so is a congressman’s roommate running prostitution out of his apartment, of course Barney had no idea.
But the outrage only at our side needs to stop.
I’ll tell you what I’ll trade Voinovich for Vitter any damn day of the week.
As a matter of fact I implore Sen. Voinovich to resign!
Me: I have a great, great, deal of sympathy with this complaint. But, ultimately, I find it unpersuasive. Yes, it is a terrific inconvenience that conservatives are often held to a higher standard than liberals. But conservatives champion a higher standard and therefore should adhere to it. If a Republican presidential candidate swears he’ll stop cheating on his wife and then plays baron and the milkmaid in the Oval Office with an intern, I won’t argue that he shouldn’t resign because Bill Clinton refused to.