7/10: Ensign O' The Times

Liberal bloggers are buzzing about the revelation that Sen. John Ensign's (R-NV) parents paid $96K to his mistress. David Waldman quips: "Is $100K the going rate for boning your staffers' wives these days? Indecent Proposal was $1M and that was 15 years ago." Many on the left are arguing that Ensign should resign; John Cole writes: "Why is this guy still in office?...We've gone past 'affair' and have now moved to bribery, hush money, etc." Liberal bloggers are also pointing their fingers at Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK), who is accused of urging Ensign to pay off his mistress (although Coburn denies the allegation). Meanwhile, most conservative bloggers are remaining silent about the matter, although Michelle Malkin is angry that Ensign "continues to drag [the] GOP down."

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Jessup, Morrissey, Richardson) are criticizing the Obama admin. after ABC News reported that $18M in stimulus funds "are being spent to redesign the Recovery.gov Web site."
• Liberal bloggers (digby, Black, McCarter) are criticizing Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) after he urged his colleagues to continue to push for a bipartisan health care reform bill.
• Liberal bloggers (Bowers, Benen) are blasting Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA) after he declared that his primary opponent, Rep. Joe Sestak (D-PA), is a "flagrant hypocrite" who "did not register as a Democrat until 2006, just in time to run for Congress."
• Liberal bloggers (Sudbay, Willis, Lewison) are pleased that Sen. Roland Burris (D-IL) will not run for election in '10.

ENSIGN: Hush Money

Liberal bloggers are mocking Ensign after his lawyer revealed that Ensign's parents paid $96K to his mistress:

• Daily Kos' Waldman: "Is $100K the going rate for boning your staffers' wives these days? Indecent Proposal was $1M and that was 15 years ago."
• TPM's Josh Marshall: "Which is more emasculating? Getting paid a hundred grand by the guy who screwed your wife? Or being a fifty-something United States senator and still needing mom and dad to cut the check to pay off your mistress and her husband?"
• Obsidian Wings' hilzoy: "I'm trying to imagine how the conversation between Sen. Ensign and his parents went. Senator Ensign is 51, old enough, I would have thought, to take care of his own problems. Is he in the habit of asking his parents for nearly a hundred thousand dollars? Why on earth didn't his parents do the sensible thing and tell him to deal with his problems himself?"
• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "Ensign's scandal was embarrassing enough before. After all, Ensign carried on an affair with one of his aides, who was married to another one of his aides, despite championing 'family values,' lecturing others on the 'sanctity of marriage,' and boasting of his membership in the Promise Keepers. Now we learn that Ensign, a grown man and a powerful U.S. senator, turned to his parents to help pay off his mistress."
• The Washington Post's Ezra Klein: "Sen. John Ensign is one of those rugged southwestern types. He represents Nevada. The picture on his web site has mountains. The rotating photo atop his page shows him talking to a soldier in a fighter jet. And now we learn he had his parents give $96,000 to the girl he had an affair with. His parents. It's the least rugged approach to solving a personal problem that a grown human has ever employed."

Most conservative bloggers aren't commenting on the latest Ensign revelation, but Malkin is furious: "Gift. Severance. Whatever you call it, it was hush money. It didn't work. And Ensign's former lover's husband is enjoying the fruits of blabbing publicly about the lurid affair and the attempted cover-up. Ensign's adultery hurt his wife and kids, his mistress and her husband's kids, his state, his party, and the Senate GOP leadership. Now, one of the Senate's best and most upstanding members, Tom Coburn, is getting dragged through the mud. [...] What more will seep out? Who else will be dragged down in the process? How long will he subject the GOP to humiliation? Republicans can't combat their political foes' culture of corruption unless and until they clean up their own."

ENSIGN II: Resign, Senator!

Several liberal bloggers are arguing that Ensign should resign:

• Balloon Juice's Cole: "Why is this guy still in office? [...] We've gone past 'affair' and have now moved to bribery, hush money, etc."
• AMERICAblog's John Aravosis: "This is starting to sound like blackmail territory. The man is a sitting US Senator. Who is increasingly looking compromised. [...] How long until the FBI enters the picture?"
• MyDD's desmoinesdem: "[This story] should eventually lead to Ensign's resignation."
• BooMan: "Look, I don't know what is legal or precisely what is allowed or not allowed under the Senate ethics rules, but getting your rich daddy to pay off your mistress to the tune of $96,000 just doesn't seem worthy of a U.S. Senator. When you add to it that the mistress and her husband were both your employees and that you had them both terminated...I'm just not sure this whole transaction is kosher, let alone survivable politically. Now, I know that the money could be as easily interpreted as fair compensation as hush money, but it was definitely an investment in containing knowledge of Ensign's indiscretion. And, while it's true that he didn't use any campaign funds, the use of his Daddy as a cut-out was clearly intended to hide obvious traces and probably to avoid Senate disclosure rules. [...] In any case, it would probably be best if Ensign followed [ex-NY Gov.] Eliot Spitzer's example and resigned his post. The fact that he's a hypocrite of the highest order only adds urgency to his decision."

hilzoy wonders if Ensign's parents violated the tax code: "$96,000 is a lot of money. Interestingly, it is precisely the amount you can give as a gift without having to report it to the IRS, multiplied by eight: one gift of $12,000 from each parent to Ensign's lover, her husband, and two of their children. I wonder what the IRS will make of that? I certainly hope that neither of the parents has made use of their children's money, or done anything else to suggest that this was all one big gift split up to avoid paying gift tax, or (more likely) having to report the gift. It's bad enough asking your parents to cough up $96,000 to cover up your indiscretions; asking them to violate the tax code and risk prison is a whole lot worse."

COBURN: Knee-Deep?

Liberal bloggers are also discussing the allegation that Coburn urged Ensign to pay off his mistress (which Coburn denies):

• Firedoglake's watertiger: "Coburn knows he's in deep shit, because at this point, he's pulling out the stops to avoid testifying before the Senate Ethics Committee or in a lawsuit."
• BooMan: "I think Tom Coburn is out of his mind pretending to have advised his roommate in his capacity as a physician and ordained deacon, and therefore his urging to to Ensign to pay for the couple's relocation to Colorado is privileged. That is horse-hockey."
• Daily Kos' Jed Lewison: "What we have here is another example of a 'Godlier than thou' Republican whose first reaction was to lie, providing political cover to a political ally. Then his lies changed to protect himself. That's certainly within the realm of normal behavior by politicians, but Tom Coburn has always claimed he was different than normal politicians. Time and time again, Republicans like Tom Coburn prove that they can't walk the talk. Maybe it's time they start talking the walk."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Snowe Jobs

AmSpec Blog's W. James Antle, III:

"The fact is that many of the Senate Republicans' top recruits are, in varying degrees, moderates: [Gov.] Charlie Crist in Florida, [ex-Rep.] Rob Simmons in Connecticut, [Rep.] Mark Kirk in Illinois, [AG] Kelly Ayotte in New Hampshire, and they are still hoping for [Rep.] Michael Castle in Delaware. (Castle is 70 and another member of the cap and trade eight.)

In some cases, like Florida and Connecticut, there are more conservative candidates in the race who poll competitively in general election matchups but not quite as well as the moderate frontrunners. (I discuss this in the July/August issue of the print magazine.) In other cases, like Illinois and Delaware, the moderates are pretty clearly the best -- only? -- chance the Republicans have.

Generally speaking, I don't think electing someone with an 'R' next to their name rather than a 'D' is that important if they are going to vote in ways I dislike most of the time. This is especially true for someone like me, who is off the reservation on the few issues where moderates tend to vote with the party. But for conservatives to have any leverage in Washington, it is important to get the Democrats below 60 seats in the Senate, which may sometimes require supporting less than ideal candidates. It's the Arlen Specter dilemma all over again. Unless all these moderates become Democrats."

LEST WE FORGET: Military Institutes New "Don't Tell, Let Me Guess" Policy

From The Onion:

"WASHINGTON -- Pentagon officials announced Tuesday a new policy toward homosexuals in the armed services, the so-called 'Don't Tell, Let Me Guess' system, which gives Pentagon brass the opportunity to state their opinion on a soldier's sexual orientation, provided it's followed by the phrase 'Am I right?' 'These new guidelines allow homosexuals to serve in the armed forces, as long as they don't show any outward traits that would tip us off and ruin all the fun of guessing,' said Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who purports to have 'excellent' gaydar. 'When you make a game out of it, you're much more invested in the survival of your fellow serviceman -- at least until you guess whether or not he or she enjoys sex with members of the same gender.' Pentagon officials said soldiers who are correctly guessed to be homosexual will face immediate dishonorable discharge, unless they can prove they have killed at least 10 enemy combatants in a particularly brutal fashion."