More gay men describe sexual encounters with U.S. Sen. Craig; 1982 Page scandal: Craig was named as sex partner, says lawyer of primary accuser

Things are getting even more fun again in the Larry Craig gay sex scandal. The Idaho Statesman had two stories on Sunday. The first story reported (http://www.idahostatesman.com/102/story/226703.html) that more men have come forward concerning sexual overtures made to them by the U. S. Senator. Obviously, Craig's denials look weaker and weaker. Detailed accounts of each man's statements can be found in the Statesman article. Here are some highlights:

Four gay men, willing to put their names in print and whose allegations can't be disproved, have come forward since news of U.S. Sen. Larry Craig's guilty plea. They say they had sex with Craig or that he made a sexual advance or that he paid them unusual attention. They are telling their stories now because they are offended by Craig's denials, including his famous statement, "I am not gay, I never have been gay." Those words, spoken on live national TV on Aug. 28, are now memorialized on a just-released-for-Christmas Talking Senator Larry Craig Action Figure.

David Phillips is a 42-year-old information technology consultant in Washington, D.C., who says Craig picked him up at a gay club in 1986 and that they subsequently had sex.

Mike Jones is a former prostitute who told the world he had sex with the Rev. Ted Haggard last year. The former Colorado Springs evangelist at first denied it but eventually confessed. Jones says Craig paid him for sex in late 2004 or early 2005.

Greg Ruth was a 24-year-old college Republican in 1981 when he says he was hit on by Craig at a Republican meeting in Coeur d'Alene.

Tom Russell, now 48, is a former Nampa resident who lives in Utah. Russell said his encounter with Craig occurred at Bogus Basin in the early 1980s.

A fifth gay man, who is from Boise but who declined to be named for fear of retaliation, offered a recent and telling account: He was in a men's restroom at Denver International Airport in September 2006 when the man in the next stall moved his hand slowly, palm up, under the divider. Alarmed, the man said he waited outside the restroom and then identified the man in the adjoining stall as Craig, whom he had met in Idaho.

There are no videos, no love letters, no voice messages. Like last August, they are he-said, he-said allegations about a man seeking discreet sex from partners whom he counted on to never tell. But the Statesman's investigation, which included reviews of travel and property records and background checks on all five men, found nothing to disprove the five new accounts. The men offer telling and sometimes similar details about what happened, or the senator's travel records place him in the city where sex is alleged to have occurred, or his accusers told credible witnesses at the time of the incident.

The second story ( http://www.idahostatesman.com/1264/story/226713.html) concerns the old 1982 Congressional Page scandal. Once again, Senator Craig may have been lying in his previous denials of involvement. Here are highlights from that story:

For 25 years, Sen. Larry Craig has not only denied wrongdoing in the 1982 page scandal but has insisted he was not among seven House members accused of homosexual conduct. The lawyer for the page who initiated the scandal says otherwise. On July 1, 1982, the day after the story of a congressional page scandal broke, then-Rep. Craig pre-emptively denied any connection to the scandal before he’d been named publicly. Craig now says speaking out was the mistake of a frightened first-term congressman and that he regrets that his statements have long fueled rumors he is gay.

Bob Scott is the Arkansas lawyer who represented Leroy Williams, the Republican House page who initiated the scandal but later recanted. “I am positive he named Larry Craig in 1982,” said Scott, a former GOP official in Arkansas. Scott said Williams recently reaffirmed to him that he named Craig in 1982. Williams, who is gay, has consistently declined comment. Repeated attempts by the Idaho Statesman to reach him failed. Scott said he believes Craig appears in a December 1982 House Ethics Committee report as “Congressman C,” who Williams said had sex with him two or three times.

Obviously, where there is this much smoke, it is hard to believe that there wasn't some fire too.