Posted by
ExGayBloggers on Wednesday, September 05, 2007 5:54:33 PM
This post has a simple premise: Mike Rogers (the liberal blogger, not the Congressman) has the legal right to "out" any gay politician he wants to "out." He does not, however, have the legal right to extort a gay politician, especially when the desired payoff is a vote from that politican.
Extortion is a felony, and when the targets of extortion are politicians, the entire system is corrupted in a vile and unacceptable way. 18 U.S.C. § 875(d) states, "Whoever, with the intent to extort from any person . . . any money or other thing of value, transmits in interstate . . . commerce any communication containing any threat to injure the property or reputation of the addressee or of another . . . shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both."
Arguably, Mike Rogers extorted Larry Craig by threatening to "out" him if he did not vote against the confirmation of Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court. For this, he deserves the condemnation of all morally responsible citizens of this country and, at least, an investigation by the federal government to look for possible criminal wrongdoing.
The facts of Mike Rogers' scheme were covered here at RedState when Mr. Rogers "outed" Senator Craig three weeks before the 2006 elections. At the time, Senator Craig denied Mike Rogers' allegations, and no one had any reason to believe Rogers over Craig. The story blew over. In light of recent events, it appears that Mike Rogers really did have the goods on Craig, to a remarkably specific extent (to wit, that he engaged in gay sexual acts in public restrooms), which makes his actions a very serious matter indeed. While Senator Craig deserves opprobrium for placing himself in a position to be extorted, all believers in clean representative democracy should shudder at the thought of a private citizen influencing the votes of a United States Senator through extortion. Senator Craig has justly resigned. Now we should examine whether Mike Rogers ran afoul of 18 U.S.C. § 875(d). Our system of representative democracy cannot countenance such brazen attempts to corrupt legislators. Make no mistake: Mike Rogers' attempt to coerce Larry Craig into a specific vote by threatening to publicly damage his reputation was no more defensible or tolerable than a quid pro quo involving votes traded for cash.
Mike Rogers' justification for his actions is logically ridiculous: a gay person does not automatically become a hypocrite by opposing gay marriage any more than a black person becomes a hypocrite by opposing affirmative action. But even if one accepts Mike Rogers' argument that Larry Craig was a hypocrite and deserved to be outed, the proper response would have been simply to out him, not to attempt to corruptly change his votes by threatening to reveal the information unless he complied.
Why not contact your local FBI field office and ask them if publicly threatening to out a United States Senator if he fails to vote in a particular way is a crime? The evidence of the threat is here (we have screenshots), and Rogers apparently carried through with his threat on the Ed Schulz show on October 17, 2006.
Our liberal friends are trying to pretend that everything is fair game in the name of EXPOSING HYPOCRISY!!!, but corruption of the functions of government must not be allowed to stand. Through his repeated actions and threats using the private activities of staffers and politicians as ammunition against them, Mike Rogers engages in a campaign of public shaming that perverts everything good and tolerant about the progressive views he claims to espouse. He long ago crossed all lines of basic respect for human beings who have the right to believe and vote as they wish, regardless of their individual persuasion. In this case, we suspect his activity crossed the line to something worse: the perversion of our democracy.
http://www.redstate.com/stories/congress/the_perversion_of_democracy_must_not_be_tolerated#comment