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No public option in latest draft of health care reform bill from the Senate Finance Committee. That and the day’s other political news in the TPMDC Morning Roundup.
Sen. Ensign: Sure I helped my mistress’ husband find work after he left my staff, but I do that for all my former staffers.
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We noted yesterday that Sen. Ensign was backing off his staff’s original claims that he came forward with the news of his affair because cuckolded husband Doug Hampton was trying to extort cash from the senator in exchange for keeping the story quiet. Ensign now seems to be conceding that he arranged for employment for Hampton during a period in which Hampton was repeatedly confronting him to demand Ensign stop sleeping with his wife. But now we’re getting another version of just what prompted Ensign to come forward on Tuesday.
Five days earlier Hampton sent a letter to Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly asking her to help him expose Ensign’s “heinous conduct and relentless pursuit” of his wife. “Please help me,” he begged the comely Kelly.
He actually described one of the confrontations …
In fact, one of the confrontations took place in February 2008 at his (Ensign’s) home in Washington D.C. with a group of his peers. One of the attendees was Senator Tom Coburn from Oklahoma, as well as several other men who are close to the senator.
It’s a pretty over-the-top letter, which is odd at some level since the affair had supposedly ended almost a year earlier. Interestingly, Hampton suggested that he only thought it was proper to bring the news to right-wing news organization. Now we’re trying to find out how Ensign found out about the overture to Fox News.
Sen. Inhofe (R-OK) turns down personal meeting/courtesy call with Judge Sotomayor.
While Norm Coleman was battling for his political life in 2008 in a race he ultimately lost to Al Franken by a mere 312 votes, his colleague John Ensign — whose job as chairman of the NRSC was helping GOP senators like Norm get re-elected — was off having an affair and finding jobs for his mistress’ family.
TPM Reader MM:
Isn’t it funny that conservative who used to complain about Obama’s use of rhetorical powers as “just words” now think his relative caution in speaking out about Iran is a deep betrayal of everything American?