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Dems: Vitter a hypocrite for bid to prohibit same-sex marriage |
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By Alexander Bolton
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Posted: 07/13/07 07:29 PM [ET] |
Congressional Democrats yesterday accused Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) of hypocrisy because he championed a constitutional amendment prohibiting same-sex marriage.
Last year Vitter told colleagues on the Senate floor, “It is very appropriate and well overdue that we in the Senate focus on nurturing, upholding, preserving and protecting such a fundamental social institution as traditional marriage.”
The words are coming back to haunt Vitter, who is married, following his admission this week that his phone number appeared in the records of the “D.C. Madam,” Deborah Jeane Palfrey, whom prosecutors have accused of running a prostitution ring.
“You need to read his speech about marriage, and if you read that speech and compare it to his behavior you can certainly conclude there is hypocrisy there,” Vitter’s colleague and one of the Senate’s 15 female members, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), said.
“Several years ago, when folks who were focused on the health of marriage and the upbringing of children from around the country gathered to begin the attack on this problem, they came to the Congress with the idea of proposing a constitutional amendment,” Vitter said last year when an amendment banning gay marriage reached the Senate floor. “I was in the House at the time, and I was honored that I was one of the four House Republicans … whom these leaders approached to be the original co-authors of this constitutional amendment.”
Vitter went on to say that “a lot of folks in Washington don’t fully understand” the importance of preserving and protecting marriage.
“Folks in Louisiana want those values upheld,” he said.
“Again, rather than focus on all these new government programs, new little ideas that we run to the floor of the Senate with every day, let’s take time to remember and focus on truly significant, enduring social institutions.”
Vitter has not been seen on Capitol Hill since he issued a statement on Monday pre-empting questions about his relationship with the escort service.
“This was a very serious sin in my past for which I am, of course, completely responsible,” he wrote.
Vitter skipped yesterday’s afternoon vote on an amendment to the Department of Defense authorization bill.
Vitter’s spokesman did not respond to requests for comment.
“It’s hypocritical,” one of the few openly gay lawmakers in the House, Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), said of Vitter’s behavior.
“My own view on this is that privacy and hypocrisy are separate issues. People have a right to privacy but not to hypocrisy. People should be held to the standards they would hold others to.”
Vitter also received criticism from the Democratic leadership.
Rep. John Larson (Conn.), vice chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, said Vitter’s outspoken stance on legislation defining marriage did not match his admission of having committed a “serious sin” in connection with an alleged prostitution ring.
“There’s never a shortage of hypocrisy around the Capitol, but it’s all the more reason people should be careful when casting stones,” Larson said. “Sometimes the people casting the stones find themselves in an ironic situation.
“On the face of it, of course it’s hypocritical,” he added. “That’s something that he has to deal with with his constituents.”
Vitter won election to Congress in 1999 in a special election to replace former Rep. Bob Livingston (R-La.). Livingston, who was poised to become House Speaker, announced his resignation after confessing to an extramarital affair. His revelation was especially damaging because it came in the midst of congressional impeachment proceedings against former President Bill Clinton.
The publisher of Hustler magazine, Larry Flynt, played a role in bringing Livingston’s affair to light then, and this week helped link Vitter to the D.C. Madam.
Vitter e-mailed a confession to the Associated Press Monday night after a Hustler editor contacted Vitter’s office to inform the lawmaker that his phone number had been found in the records of the escort service.
The circumstances of Vitter’s election also could come back to haunt him. Vitter said that Clinton should resign from office because of his relations with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.
“I think Livingston’s stepping down makes a very powerful argument that Clinton should resign as well and move beyond this mess,” Vitter told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution at the time.
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