The Anthony Weiner scandal gained new momentum over the weekend as the news of his contact with a 17-year-old girl caused House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz to finally call for the congressman’s immediate resignation. While Weiner didn’t budge from his refusal to quit, his office did announce that he would be taking time off from work to “seek professional help.” Pelosi and the White House (for whom the DNC chair was acting as surrogate) have to hope that Weiner’s celebrity rehab stint will somehow put a cork in this story. But as long as there is a danger that Weiner will return from his sessions on the couch hoping to hold onto his seat, the story won’t die.
That’s a problem for the Democrats who seem to have finally understood that the only way to deal with such problems is the method House Speaker John Boehner employed the last time a member of Congress was sending racy pictures of himself to members of the public. After Republican Chris Lee was outed as a philandering fool the Republican leadership didn’t wait for things to get worse before they took action. They cornered Lee and told him to not let the door hit him on the way out of Congress. Boehner understood the ironclad law of Washington scandals was that the only way to deal with them is to end them immediately. Fortunately for the GOP, Lee obeyed and resigned that day.
So when all is said and done about the Weiner scandal perhaps the only substantial conclusion to be drawn from it is about which party has the more effective Congressional leadership.