Barney Frank, reprimanded as a congressman after hiring and then living with a male prostitute, now is giving Democrats advice?
A terminally-ill formerly sanctioned Massachusetts congressman and first openly-gay federal lawmaker is now scolding fellow Maine liberals for picking the wrong U.S. Senate candidate.
“I am concerned that some of my party have chosen the flavor of the month so that somebody who is new and doesn’t know much is somehow preferred over the people who know how to do the hard work to get controversial things adopted,” Barney Frank told CNN on Sunday.
Frank, 86, was interviewed live from Ogunquit, Maine, described by Wiki as “a destination for LGBT tourists” where he is in end-of-life care for heart failure.
During the entire softball interview with Jake Tapper the critically-ill Frank rarely opened his eyes.
He sat in a lounger, his gaze cast down, his eyes shut as he tried to make a case as to why people should buy his new book.
“The former Massachusetts lawmaker says progressives in his party have ’embraced an agenda that goes beyond what’s politically acceptable,’” Politico reports.
The longtime ultra-left liberal bragged to Tapper about his having successfully promoted gay rights, such a same-sex marriage, as a congressman.
But he argued he did it partly by downplaying the most controversial – and with Frank illegal – aspects of living the gay lifestyle.
Tapper never inquired of Frank about his 1980s relationship while a congressman with a male prostitute named Stephen Gobie.
Frank hired Gobie in 1985 and subsequently allowed him to live in his Capitol Hill apartment.
While Frank paid Gobie with his own money, Gobie utilized the residence to operate a prostitution ring, leading to a House reprimand in 1990 for ethical lapses.
Frank was also found to have used his congressional authority to fix Gobie’s parking tickets.
So Barney Frank is not exactly the paragon of virtue in whom Democrats should invest their future.
But that doesn’t stop Frank from offering his advice to them about how to live their political lives.
He said he’s disappointed that his fellow Democrats got behind Graham Platner instead of Janet Mills to take on five-term GOP Sen. Susan Collins.
He thinks Platner is too inexperienced to sell liberalism to the Maine general electorate.
“Platner is good at plugging into the anger that people feel,” Frank said. “What I’m afraid of is that he won’t be able to translate that into enough votes.”
