No Resignation for Condit
  by Margaret Shemo

Sorry, BartCop, but I don't agree with your call to Democrats to force Condit to resign.
As I see it, you're arguing that "former Democratic Congressman Gary Condit" would sound
better than "Democratic Congressman Gary Condit" in the event that he is charged with and
convicted of playing some nefarious role in the disappearance of Chandra Levy.
You're right, but that's not reason enough to join the lynch mob.

Here are more and better reasons for Democrats NOT to force Gary Condit to resign:

(1)  If Condit resigned, the Democrats in the House would be one down.
      (That's enough for me, but if you want more arguments...)

 Right now, we're down by eleven with Gary Condit, who mostly votes GOP.
 Yes, it would be 1/435 better for us if we keep the suspected criminal.

(2)  Democrats belong to the party that defends the right to privacy.
Adults should not be forced to "confess" to having indulged in consensual sexual activity.
Nowadays we don't put people in stocks for passersby to torment, or torture suspects until
they speak on the record.  So Gary Condit has the right to talk to the media or tell them to
go to Hell, as he sees fit.  (It's too bad that Condit didn't think that President Clinton had a
right to privacy, but most Democrats think Condit was mistaken.)  Condit shouldn't have
to resign just because the media are hounding him.

No, he should resign for letting police chase false leads until Chandra's trail got cold.
Sure, his stabbing Clinton in the back is icing on the cake, but the cake is his immoral
and illegal actions of withholding crucial evidence when it mattered most.
Apparently, Condit thinks his relationship with Chandra wasn't important, but that's not his call.
If this was Hardon Kenny chasing him for revenge, he'd have the right to lie under oath.

(3)  Local authorities may be able to charge individuals "suspected" of extramarital affairs with
violations of statutes against fornication, sodomy and/or adultery (although for some reason,
they never seem to press charges in cases involving heterosexuals).  Let DC officials come after
Condit with charges relating to sexual misconduct, if they dare.  No one -- not even a hypocrite
like Condit -- should be subject to such prosecutions.  If people see that these statutes are not
used against politicians, maybe the statutes will be repealed, in DC or elsewhere.

I don't care if he had an affair. Most men do, and almost all powerful men do.
Misleading the police is Condit's crime - not the affair.

(4)  Democrats believe that politicians should not have to resign when unattractive details of their
private lives are exposed by "informed sources" -- unless, of course, they're already on record as
having advised others to do so under such circumstances (the Bob Livingston Exception).
Let the politicians' constituents decide whether they are fit to serve. (Remember "voting"?
It's the Republicans who have disdain for electoral outcomes, not Democrats.)

Reminder: I'm not calling for a mob to pull him out and hang him.
I'm calling on Democrats to SPEAK - to say, "Gary, we don't want you - get out."

(5)  "All" politics may not be local, but in November 2002, people outside of Condit's district will
have issues other than Chandra Levy's disappearance in mind.  It's not likely that the voters in any
other district would throw out their Democratic representative -- who might be a woman -- or vote
for a Republican incumbent, just because a Democratic Congressman from California had an affair,
or several affairs.  And right now, that's all that anyone has any reason to believe he did -- according
to "informed sources" and the first-hand or second-hand testimony of the hussies involved.

Respectfully, there you go again. I don't care if he had affairs.
If I had you on the witness stand, I would ask, "Do you admit that Condit willfully misled police
in a life-and-death situation in the critical hours and days after Chandra's disappearance?"
I suspect you'd be forced to answer, "yes."   That's the only issue I'm concerned with

As far as "people outside of Condit's district having issues other than Chandra in mind,"
I fear we will be the party of  "murdering perverts" until we stand up and say, "No, we're not."

(6)  Democrats recognize that people lie about sex all the time.  Every lie about sex does not constitute
perjury or obstruction of justice.  If a lie about sex does amount to perjury or obstruction of justice,
the liar can be prosecuted.  Unless and until convicted of perjury or obstruction of justice, the liar is
presumed innocent of any crime.  Why should an innocent man resign his office?

I realize it's not fair for me to hammer you with this, because you've had no chance to respond
to replies 2, 3 and 5.   This is not about sex, other than sex is what made Condit mislead police.
 

(7)  Condit's resignation would not in any way assist the police and the FBI in their search for Chandra Levy.
To the extent his resignation would be seen as an admission of guilt in hindering the search for her, it would
afford the authorities an excuse to stop looking at other possibilities and interviewing other suspects.
They would say it's too late, the trail is too cold, and it would be all Condit's fault.
And Condit called himself a Democrat.

I disagree on several levels.
Condit has told police he doesn't have time to help them (lie detector) because he's "too busy"
representing his district, so your first sentence is, I believe, inaccurate.  I agree with sentence two.
The idiot DC cops don't need another excuse why they can't do their damn jobs. Your third sentence
uses the word "cold," describing the trail. One man on the planet gets the blame for that - Condit.
He may call himself a democrat, but he votes GOP 62 percent of the time and flirted with joining
Smirk's cabinet, so how much do we owe this "Democrat?"

(8)  As a Congressman, Condit has a vote, and in the past he's often voted with the Republicans,
so both parties have to make a show of respecting him for as long as he remains in office.

 "both parties have to?"
(cough, sputter, choke, gag...)

Once he left office, the Republicans would call Condit "a fugitive" and Democrats "his accomplices."
"The Democrats let him step down before the investigation was over!
They pushed him out, they ran him out of town, so we could never learn the truth!"

Granted, he needs an exit strategery, but exit he must.
 

(9)  If the Democrats cast out Condit, the Republicans will ask:  "Why did Democrats force Condit
to resign, but continue to support Clinton, after both men lied about having extramarital affairs?"

Koresh, I love slow-pitch softball.
Clinton was attacked because he was the most effective Democrat in 35 years.
He was not attacked because he lied to homicide detectives about presumed-murdered Monica.

(10)  The Republicans will never stop screaming,  "Where's Chandra?"  until she's found, dead or alive.
Why would Condit's resignation be a reason for them to stop?  The Republicans wouldn't mind if the
"missing intern" stayed missing forever; it's just the word "intern" that they'd like to keep alive.
Do you think people will be allowed to forget which two politicians were loved by interns?

It's one thing to support a great and popular president who's being attacked because he whopped ass
on two republican war heroes and went after the tobacco companies. (We can't forget that Sentelle,
Faircloth and Helms are all whores for BIG CANCER, and that's why they replaced Fiske with
Hardon Kenny Starr - to get Clinton off the backs of BIG CANCER.) Impeachment was never
about the "rule of law," it was about reversing the voter's will and protecting tobacco profits.

Granted, the whore press eats this up, and the GOP spends all day screaming, "Just like Clinton,"
but we need to get as far away from Gary Condit as we can get.

...and why should anybody stop asking, "Where's Chandra?"

(11)  If Chandra Levy's body is found, Republicans will charge or imply or simply speculate that Condit
killed her or had her killed or knew who killed her or caused her accidental death or drove her to suicide
or -- at the very least -- didn't love her enough to care about her safety.  The conviction of another suspect
in her murder, or a ruling of suicide, wouldn't even slow down the outpouring of accusations.  Do you think
the Republicans would fail to mention that Killer Condit called himself a Democrat, just because he resigned?

I'll give you that one.

(12)  There's a good chance that Republicans will blow this one, too.  They have a tendency to go too far.
Americans have heard these kinds of smears before, and they didn't appear to like them much then, either.
This is from the July 16 Washington Post: "Radio host Laura Ingraham, who was on 'Larry King Live' three
times in six days, says the story is 'Joey Buttafuoco, Clinton and O.J. thrown together, and a little bit of
JonBenet Ramsey.'"  That kind of outrageous ugliness -- portraying Chandra BOTH as a helpless
seven-year-old AND as a murderous teenager, and Condit as a mad hacker -- will ultimately be rejected
as the shameless self-promotion it is.

I'll give you that one, too. It's hard to go too far when condemning a man who let a trail get cold
that might save an innocent woman's life, but leave it to GOP hate to screw up a wet dream.

(13)  If Chandra Levy returns, Gary Condit will weep for joy.

Disagree. He will be happy to have his career back.
He's shown nothing but contempt and indifference while her oxygen was running out.
If he felt anything for her, he'd put her life before his career.

If Chandra Levy is found to have been the victim of a serial killer, Gary Condit will weep for her loss.

Which Gary Condit are you watching?
Do you know him?
Are you privy to some information about him?
You may live in Modesto, I don't know, but you seem to be giving him every benefit of
every doubt, but all I can see is his crooked smile as he continues to mislead the police.

It's been what, 83 days?
Is he going to wait another 83 days before he levels with DC detectives?
They say they'll have a fourth interview with him this week.
Will he tell them the truth this time? Or will he need a fifth interview in September?

If either event occurs, people -- including Republicans -- will ask,
"Why did the Democrats throw that poor man out of his job?"

We asked "that poor man," to resign after he changed his story on the third police interview.
Nobody can change the past, so we'll never know what his honesty might've meant to Chandra
when her life was hanging in the balance.

There are hundreds of maybes in this story, but
"Was Condit honest with police when it counted?" isn't one of them
 
 
 

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