Ethics warm-up - discipline of congressmen David Durenberger and Barney Frank

National Review, August 20, 1990

THE SENATE and the House have passed judgment on David Durenberger and Barney Frank. Durenberger was denounced for evading limits on honoraria, and for squeezing lobbyists and the Senate to pay for limousine service and a condo in Minneapolis, respectively. Frank got slapped for fixing parking tickets for a male whore, whom he hired first as an escort, then as an aide, and for writing inaccurate testimonials to the prostitute's probation officers on House stationery.

The House debate on Frank was heated; Charles Wilson (D.,Tex.) attributed the raised temperature to "the homosexual issue." True enough-though it is also true that Frank's homosexuality probably cushioned his fall: he was reprimanded, not censured, and thus retained his seniority and his chairmanships. Homosexuals, occupying what Kenneth Minogue calls a "suffering situation," are given certain immunities by enlightened opinion. Thus, when two congressmen, one straight and one gay, were condemned for having sex with pages a few years back, only the hetero (Dan Crane) felt obliged to make a show of contrition.

In the larger view, the Durenberger and Frank cases represent what the shrinks call denial. The biggie, as everyone on the Hill knows, is the S&L mess. Congress knows, however much it bellows about Neil Bush or the regulators, that this is its baby. And Democrats further know that, even as they are the majority party, the majority of the rogues were in their ranks. No wonder they'd rather rail at Frank's fixed tickets and Durenberger's condo, both of which were reprehensible, but neither of which cost half a trillion dollars.