The Weekend Skinny: 3 Men In Hot Water
The Skinny is Keach Hagey's take on the top news of the day and the best of the Internet.
Three men in hot water dominated the news this week - and, for once, none of them was hired by President Bush.
Republican Sen. Larry Craig hit the news cycles on Tuesday with his denial (that somehow sounded more like an admission) that he was not gay, nor had he ever been gay. The story generated seven pages of comments from CBS News.com readers, who noted with amusement that the airport bathroom where Craig got busted just happened to be in Minneapolis, planned site of the Republican National Convention. "Ah yes," wrote commender roger_inkhart, "This is the disgraceful GOP scandal that keeps giving and giving."
Craig remained at the top of the news all week, with Friday's story of his possible resignation generating as much feedback as Tuesday's bombshell.
Michael Vick's Downward Spiral
Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick announced on Monday that he was "ashamed" of his role in dogfighting, but that did little to quell the interest in the scandal. The NFL was worried enough at the damage to its reputation that it hired ad firms to spruce up its image with shots of players calling their moms and reading to their daughters. CBS News' Lindsay Goldwert's story on Friday on the racial implications of Vick's guilty plea generated a lively discussion among Web site readers.
The Strange Tale Of The Fugitive Bundler
The story of Democratic fundraiser Norman Hsu bounced from paper to paper this week. Each reporter added a new revelation or angle until, by the end of the week, Democrats were fleeing Hsu's campaign donations while Hsu was turning himself in to police.
The Wall Street Journal sort-of-broke the story on Tuesday, revealing that there were odd concurrences between Hsu's major donations to Hillary Clinton and those coming from a modest bungalow in a working-class suburb of San Francicso. They were essentially accusing Hsu of bundling - without actually having the final evidence in place.
Hints of possible bundling were quickly superceded on Wednesday, when the Los Angeles Times came out with news that Hsu was a fugitive from the law. It seems the wealthy apparel magnate had an outstanding warrant for his arrest in California that he apparently didn't know - or care - about, since he's been appearing prominently in photographs at Democratic fundraisers all season.
By Thursday, everyone had the story, and Clinton and other Democrats were trying to distance themselves from Hsu. And by Friday, his mug shot was on the wires.
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