Howard Fineman On The Fallout From The John Ensign Scandal (VIDEO)

Huff Post's Howard Fineman appeared on 'The Last Word' With Laurence O'Donnell, to discuss the fallout from yesterday's Senate Ethics Committee report on the John Ensign affair.

Fineman described the report as "an arrow aimed straight at the heart of the Republicans in the senate. Ensign is gone, but there's still a lot of people to be looked at."

On the allegations against Senator Tom Coubrn, he said: "There are a lot of questions that are going to be asked of Senator Coburn. Because he acted as a sort of go-between between former Senator Ensign and the lobbyist and the lobbyist's wife with whom the senator was having an affair."

He added: "What the legality of that isn't clear. I think there are going to be a lot of questions asked about it. He [Coburn] said that he was just trying to help out a colleague and a friend. I'm sure he head heartfelt good intentions, but when you start talking about possible payments of millions of dollars to people who might cause problems for a fellow senator, then senator coburn is going to have to answer a lot of questions."

Watch the full segment below - where Fineman and O'Donnell also discuss the possible impact of this scandal on the GOP's future electoral prospects.

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Comments

[AGammaRaye]

11:52 PM on 05/13/2011

This whole affair nonsense --- handled so as to allow Ensign to remain in Congress--speaks volumes about the moral spine of the whole lot. Yes, I understand "the process" but 22 months is an outrage. Its obvious Ensign has no character....unless you count duplicity & deceipt.

[sc29403]

01:53 PM on 05/13/2011

"Fineman described the report as "an arrow aimed straight at the heart of the Republican
­s in the senate."

We need a cannon aimed straight at the heart of the supposed christian "C Street Family" cult in Congress which is behind these behaviors and cover ups of several elected officials!

The ideology of the powerful "C Street Family" includes members' beliefs in their elite (i.e., not others) "divine right to adultery", the promotion of fascist policies, hatred of gays and praise of Hitler's personal perseverance­ce to do "Jesus' work".

They, with our money, operate 73+ TAX FUNDED supposedly mainstream schools, "Imagine Charter Schools", in 13 states/DC in which these beliefs are infused into the "academic" curriculum and taught to children. (How about we cut that funding in the Federal Budget?)

Recruited member, Ugandan MP David Bahati, presented his bill to execute gays at a "Family Prayer Breakfast" in 2008. They act as allies in cover ups for morally indefensible­ crimes/sca­ndals (e.g., John Ensign, Gov. Mark Sanford).

Fact check your US representa­tives' associatio­n with this group! A sampling of involved elected officials: Coburn, Pickering, Grassley, DeMint, Graham, Inhofe, Thune, Ashcroft, Meese, Domenici, Nickles, Pitts, Wolf, Wamp, Aderholt, Crenshaw, Tiahrt, Blackburn, Emerson, John Carter, McIntyre, Pryor...