Yet Another Adulterous "Family Values" Republican

It seems not a week goes by that some Republican elected official who proclaims that "family values" and marriage must be "protected" turns out to be "dipping his pen" in some inappropriate ink well so to speak. This time the offender is Tennessee State Sen. Paul Stanley (pictured at left) who has been having an adulterous affair with a woman who is not his wife. Meanwhile, Mr. Stanley has hypocritically been introducing legislation that would ban unmarried couples - apparently gay or straight - from adopting children and campaigning on a family values platform. As seems to be the increasingly norm for GOP homophobes, Stanley was not practicing what he was preaching. Here are some highlights from the Nashville Post:

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So it looks as though, once again, Mary Mancini’s law of politics has been proved correct. Those who moralize most strenuously about their moral code are the ones most often found violating it. State Sen. Paul Stanley was the sponsor of one of the more ambitious pieces of socially conservative legislation this session. Senate Bill 78’s stated aim was to keep cohabiting, unmarried couples from adopting children. Of course, the true aim was to write into law a ban on homosexual adoption.

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Sen. Paul Stanley was the face of the fight against gay adoption. His reasons for being against gay adoption were cliche. The nuclear two parent family was the ideal. “Our responsibility is to put these children in the best homes in the ideal environment. It’s not always the perfect environment. The ideal environment is a married couple that are able to bring them up in a great home life. And, if they’re not married, a lot of times there’s just not the commitment to one another.

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Now, instead of using cliches in his arguments, now he is one. Today, we learned that Stanley was the victim of an extortion attempt by the boyfriend of a women, a legislative intern, who is alleged to have had a sexual relationship with the Senator. The relationship has not been proven, of course, and the Senator has not confessed — but he hasn’t denied a relationship either.

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Instead of proclaiming his innocence and his martial fidelity on camera to get in front of the story, he hid behind a written statement. While the words in his statement say innocent, his actions say guilty. If Stanley did transgress in any way with this woman, if he put himself in the position to be blackmailed, he should not be sending out statements calling himself a victim. He should not be simply resigning his committee chairmanship. He should be resigning from his seat in the state Senate.

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The GOP has definitely become the party of hypocrites, religious fanatics and Neanderthals.