Profiles in sleaze and courage

Opinion: August 5, 2011 at 12:00a.m.

Los Angeles Times: It is often said, and usually supported by polls, that Americans distrust Congress but like their own representatives.

Sometimes that distinction can seem irrational — how can individually appreciated members be so bad collectively? But there are other times when it is useful to distinguish between the whole and its parts, and one such moment was on display this week during the climactic conclusion of the debate over raising the national debt ceiling, as one member of the House, Arizona Democrat Gabrielle Giffords, staged a triumphant return, while another, Oregon Democrat David Wu, slunk away for home.

Wu’s story is an all-too familiar tale of sexual recklessness and the elevation of self-indulgence over loyalty to family, party or principle. According to the Portland Oregonian, which broke this particular scandal, Wu last year pressed himself on an 18-year-old woman who happened to be the daughter of a supporter.

Giffords, of course, is the congresswoman shot in the head seven months ago while speaking with constituents at a Tucson mall. At first feared dead, she bravely fought back and returned to the floor of the House on Monday just as the debt-limit vote was being tallied. Her colleagues cheered lustily for the congresswoman, whose radiant smile survived her ordeal.

Members of Congress are smaller than the Congress itself, for better and for worse. Some joyously come; some thankfully go.