The George W. Bush Years

On June 11, 2007, U.S. Senator Larry Craig entered a men’s bathroom at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. He walked in front of an occupied stall, allegedly looking through the cracks to determine if it was empty. The senator from Idaho, seeing someone in the stall, entered the empty stall next to it. What the senator didn’t know was that the other stall was occupied by a police officer who was conducting a sting operation, waiting for someone who might try to conduct a lewd act.

According to the police report, Craig then started tapping his toe (supposedly a signal) and moved his foot closer to the police officer’s foot and “he moved his right foot so it touched the side of my left foot which was within my stall area.” The officer then took Craig into custody and, under questioning, the embarrassed politician denied being gay or doing anything wrong, but stated he just “had a wide stance when going to the bathroom.”

Craig eventually pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor and promised to resign, but soon backtracked. More charges of misconduct surfaced, and a congressional ethic committee investigation followed. The process lasted long enough for the senator to serve out his term, but he never ran for re-election and left office on January 3, 2009. (The bathroom was eventually torn down by the airport management)

Taking advantage of the all the news coverage the situation was getting in the Twin Cities area, the St. Paul Saints, a professional minor league baseball team, celebrated National Tap Dance Day by giving away 2,500 Larry Craig Bobblefoot (Bobblehead) Stalls. The May 25, 2008 promotion proved very popular, as nearly 8,000 fans showed up for the game. It might not be surprising that the team know for outrageous promotions has Bill Murray as one of it’s co-owners.

I had to search a political collectibles site to secure my copy of this gem.