Dealing with Allen West-like accusations: a Barney Frank history lesson
Allen West's little list reminds me of an episode I love to recount. I hope you'll indulge me. I don't know if anyone else remembers this, but I remember it like it was yesterday; it was one of the ballsiest things I've ever seen a politician do.
In 1989, after Speaker Jim Wright's resigned in the wake of accusations brought by Newt Gingrich (among others), the Dems teed up Tom Foley as their next speaker. But the Gingrichite wing of the GOP was still frenzied with blood-lust (they'd also brought down majority whip Tony Coelho) and decided to launch a pre-emptive strike against Foley. Unfortunately for the junior GOPers, Foley -- unlike Wright and Coelho -- was actually clean. But that was merely an inconvenience. Absent an ethics violation they could point to, the Gingrichites started a whispering campaign: Foley, they claimed, was gay. A Gingrich aide was even quoted in a national newsweekly saying, "we hear it's little boys."
Enter Barney Frank. Frank calls a press conference at which he says (I'm paraphrasing -- hey, it's been over 20 years -- but this is pretty close): "I'm gay. I'm very much aware of which of my colleagues are gay. Tom Foley is not gay. However, there are at least half a dozen members of the opposition who are gay, who I can prove are gay, and whose sexual orientation is not known to the public or even, in some cases, their own spouses and families. I will call another press conference and name them if the rumors about Tom Foley don't stop, immediately."
The rumors about Tom Foley stopped, immediately.
I'm really going to miss Barney.
= new reply since forum marked as read
